Merry Christmas, darling readers! Happy Kwanzaa, Hanukah, Ramadan and all the other celebrations that I'm pretty sure I missed! It has been a while due to essays, three major tests and my English teacher being a bitch. So, here it is. The Twelve days of Christmas thing-y. Here. Take it. It's yours. Just don't kill me for not updating sooner.
Disclaimer: Deck the halls with boughs of holly, fa-la-la-la-la, la-la-la-la. I don't own this awesome show, so, fu-u-u-u-u, u-u-u-dge. Ha! Didn't swear.
Chapter 24: How Michael Ruined Christmas (For Gabriel)
Christmas.
The time of giving, seeing the smiles on children's faces as they get exactly what they wanted. Couples kissing under the mistletoe and making goo-goo eyes at each other, so in love, with him waiting for the perfect time to pull out the ring. Or her. Feminism and all that. There were people giving gifts to the homeless. A hot meal and a cozy blanket with some clothes without holes in them. Money being stuffed into donation bins in the hopes of making some poor sick kid's life a little less bleak, with hope for a cure. Gabriel tilted his head back and stared straight into the oncoming snow, eyes slightly glowing as he took in the beautiful lights and the happy families running around and beaming at each other.
No wonder Christmas time had one of the highest suicide rates.
Sure, all this stuff was beautiful, but what about the orphans and college students far from home? The ones with no family to go home to and nothing but a beer to keep them company? Gabriel had been around on the very first Christmas and it had been nothing at all like this. It had been small and treasured, not internationalized. Not used to sell consumer crap. Just sweet and pure. Until the shepherds brought their gifts. Sheesh, talk about a mood killer…
Humming to himself, he absently looked at the crime scene pending from one of said suicides and rolled his eyes. The shopping centre. Way to make a statement, dude. A recent divorcee spending her first Christmas alone without her alcoholic husband handing her wine and cheese and she jumps off of a Toys 'r' Us? It was slightly pathetic, but alright. The man a few blocks down hoping to drink himself into a coma on the day his wife died in a car accident?…alright, he had nothing for that one. He had never been in love before so he wouldn't know, now, would he? Point is, high suicide rates on Christmas. Ah, if only Jesus could see it now. Happy birthday, little brother!
Seriously, though. Maybe it wasn't that bad. After all, he was finally able to spend this holiday with his brothers. Too bad dad wasn't there, though. He never was. So maybe it wouldn't make a difference but of course, it did. Michael was blaming Lucifer for keeping him away, Lucifer was blaming Michael for blaming him, Raphael had his hands full with angels sick off of a fruitcake that weighed about as much as a building and Gabriel was tired of listening to the moaning and whining. Hence why he was here. The screams of laughter were much better than those of frustration and the terrible sound of Grace-constipated angels. Eeeew. Bad picture, bad picture! Thank Krishna he didn't eat that fruitcake. He was starting to wonder where Balthazar got it.
Snow started to fall around him, banishing the thoughts of suspicious fruitcake and bringing ideas for potential fun. Not with the whole suicide thing but for his favorite knuckleheads. Gabriel had been watching them for a really long time. Before they were born, actually, so he knew exactly how suckish a Winchester Christmas was. Dollar store presents for Sam, nothing for Dean and a John that was either drunk out of his mind or injured beyond consciousness. Or a smattering of both. So really, this year he was going to actually let them have a Christmas. With a tree and everything, including ornaments that he had, for some strange reason, kept for a few dozen decades. No idea. Alright, he wanted to decorate a tree in Heaven.
Michael said no.
Michael hated this time of the year, more than even John had. Might have been something to do with how he had left but then again, his brother was perpetually sulking over something. That stick up his ass must be poking out of his mouth, by now! He had even helped that guy come up with the idea of Scrooge using his brother as a template. Just a simple message planted in the back of his mind and Voila! a timeless masterpiece. It didn't work like that with Michael. To get results, you have to butt heads for a few dozen centuries, pull out the puppy eyes and threaten to Fall with Lucifer to even get him to consider changing his mind. Even then, he'd probably just lock Gabriel in the Pantheon and ignore the angered screams that followed.
Come to think of it, maybe this Christmas thing was a bad idea.
No. No, Sam had never had a real Christmas in his life and Dean couldn't remember if he ever had. Gabriel wanted to do something special that would undoubtedly piss them off while simultaneously showing his brothers a thing or two. Balthazar would help, that much he knew. Possibly Castiel, if he got over the millions of questions that were required from the kid to get him to understand what it was they were actually doing. Jesus, he understood. The worship? Not so much. It would be a long night trying to get it into his thick skull that they were not, in fact, pulling another bronze bull debacle for the son of God, but it could be worth it.
Smiling to himself, Gabriel took one last glimpse of the Big Apple and silently disappeared. He had work to do.
696969696 Silent Night, Holy Night 969696969 Shepherds Pray, At The Sight 696969696
The tree was relatively easy to get, in theory. Just go to a tree farm, pick a nice evergreen, chop it down before mounting it to the family car like a deer in hunting season and drive off. Hell, Gabriel could probably grow a pine tree himself right in the middle of Singer's living room, complete with chirpily singing chipmunks and warbling birds. Reality is, he couldn't do it. When a human goes to a tree farm, they see stumps and have happy, fuzzy thoughts of someone else having picked the perfect one. Then they find their own and, following the above instructions, got one of their own.
Yeah. Not so much for an angel.
These trees screamed out in pain and anguish, sometimes even grief. Gabriel just wanted to cover his ears and walk away, preferably extremely quickly, just to get the sound out of his mind. It hurt his heart knowing that nobody could hear them scream. There was an Elf standing next to him, not really like those from Middle Earth, but an Elf nonetheless, just standing there completely motionless humming to a baby tree. Five minutes later, it had been ripped out of the ground by a family whose little girl wanted a tree of her own. Left in a hazy state, Gabriel made a motion with his fingers and replaced that tree with a fake one, giving the Elf back his weeping bundle of needles. The look he got in return was completely dead and he knew that this particular Fae was not going to be seen next Christmas.
In the end, though, he did find the tree that he wanted. It whispered to him pleadingly and, foregoing the ax, simply reached into the ground and uprooted it. Seems as though the Salvage yard was going to have new life, other than the 'coons and other critters that ran wild through that scrap heap. Thank heavens for that! The sheer amount of those things is terrifying and, though he hates to admit it, raccoons scare the shit out of him. So, he was happy, the tree was ecstatic and he was on to phase two of Operation; Winchester Christmas. On second thought…maybe he should come up with a new codename. He'd seen a Winchester Christmas and was 99.9 percent sure that the demons doing Hell's rumba were having a better time.
Maybe he should call it Operation; Christmas Chimes. Now, Gabriel saw why his brothers never allowed him to name anything. Aw, well. Too late now.
The tree he had now affectionately named Fred made itself perfectly at home right in the middle of the old man's house, roots digging straight through the floorboards with a little help from Gabriel. He also have it's consent to be decorated with corny decorations as long as there was popcorn strands, which didn't make any sense. How was Fred going to eat the popcorn? Was he a weretree? Thoughts aside, he only had an hour left before the chuckleheads got back. Not to mention he had no wish to catch a glimpse of Balthazar in his new 'kiss the cook' apron. Chances are, that was all that he was wearing. In which case, Gabriel was going to thoroughly use antibacterial measures, of which he knew nothing about, to prevent the sure case of Chlamydia he would receive. The boys? Yeah, their's too. Nobody wants a redo of the Herpexia commercial.
A quick flight to Heaven and ignoring the amused stares later and Gabriel was set to go. Sitting cross-legged under Fred, he waited impatiently for the brothers Winchester to come home. Balthazar swore loudly as the knife slipped again but he paid it no mind, instead wriggling around to get comfortable. And so, he waited. And waited. An-hey, wait! Was that a partridge? A few minutes later, he was waiting again with a mutinous partridge in a flowering pear tree. The squawking made a discordant harmony with Balthazar's kitchen mishaps, which happened at least once every ten minutes or so. Gabriel, being Gabriel, waited for a grand total of half an hour, in which time Michael stared down and worried about his motionless brother.
Then he saw the tree.
Michael had always thought of Christmas as a blasphemous holiday. Not everybody went to church on Sunday, the day of God, but most religions celebrated some form of Christmas for varying reasons. He had never really like Jesus, either. Much too sarcastic and not performing nearly as many miracles as Michael thought he should have. The blind man? Who was that profiting, other than the visually impaired elderly man? Yeah, a lot of citizens were awed by it but not many took the time to actually go to church. That didn't stop them from celebrating the birth of their Lord long after he believed it was past time to let go.
Many might say that Michael was much too hard with his judgment, a job he and Gabriel shared. God had decreed to never let one angel decide the fate of another and so gave the job to two, who never agreed. Michael wanted a harsh punishment for whatever the charges were so that the convicted could never commit such a crime again. But Gabriel always wanted a lighter punishment, believing that a small amount of kindness and an admonishment could set them straight. Admittedly, it worked better than Michael's idea but that wasn't the point. His baby brother celebrating a lazy Lord? That was the point.
Eyes narrowing in a visage of what Lucifer like to call the 'oh, shit! Run! I think he's pissed' look, Michael took a breath and plummeted to earth. Somewhere in Australia, some might say it was the brightest shooting star they had ever seen but one little girl looked at it and whispered under her breath, "What have you done now, dear one?"
Michael's landing was a sight to see. Wings still outstretched and feathers shining in the moonlight, he was made beautiful by the reflection of the Christmas snow. Which promptly burned away in the heat of his furious Grace. The winter wonderland that his brother had created was systematically ripped apart by the dangerously beautiful commander, meaning that when the door carelessly opened and Gabriel opened his mouth to complain he was struck speechless by the plainness of his creation. The teenaged vessel stared wordlessly at him, amber eyes wide. Michael grabbed him roughly by the arm and dragged him outside, ready to vent his frustration. Balthazar silently shrank back into the kitchen, hoping to remain unseen.
The commander of Heaven's armies opened his mouth and let his true voice blast the message straight into Gabriel's mind. It was basically feelings that oppressed the archangel's own and forced him to his knees, giving sudden hiccups at the command he was being forced to answer to. In his mind's eye, Gabriel watched his brother promptly set fire to Fred the tree and snap all of the prepared food away to some place he deemed needed it. Facing his brother sternly, Michael stated, "No more of this nonsense, Gabriel. You have ridiculed Heaven's name with your deeds in the past but I will not allow you to follow through with this idiotic holiday. It was bad enough that you were there for his birth but to prevent him from joining us in death? That is not an honor!" He was roaring by the time he got to the second last sentence.
Gabriel knelt silently at his feet. For the first time in his existence, he had no will to contest Michael.
Taking the silence as consent, the eldest gave a small smile before patting his brother's head and flying back to Heaven. When he reached the gates, though, he was not allowed through. Shaking his wings in irritation, Michael growled low under his breath. It was cut off by a hard smack on the back of his head. Whirling around, he was confronted by a sight he had never wanted to see. Something no angel, Arch or otherwise, had the slightest inclination of even looking the being in the eyes, powerful and protective as God himself. Seraphiel, the guardian of Father's throne. Protector of all angels and every living being ever created by Him. One glance would be all it would take for her to smite him. God knows it looked like she wanted to.
Another hard smack was delivered by Lucifer, who, when faced with the wide-eyed angry stare of his brother, promptly slapped him again for good measure. It would be worth mentioning that Michael never believed that he would ever see Seraphiel again, nor the day when Lucifer deigned to bring himself to care. Another would be that the two of them had practically adopted Gabriel and would kill whoever made him cry. The tower of Babylon is a good example. A very good example. It lasted for all of three days and had absolutely nothing to do with shoddy construction, though it very well might ha-
A sharp punch brought him back. Seraphiel had all ten wings out and dangerously ruffled, features changing between those of a woman and that of a hawk. Her arms were crossed tightly against her chest and the fury had only grown from the last time he had looked at her. Risking a glimpse, he was promptly bashed over the head again by Lucifer. Grabbing the hand before it could have another go, he shouted, "Alright, alright! What did I do?"
The deep voice still startled him. "You, little brother, have ruined the little Trickster's spirit with your words. You have destroyed something he saved from death, popped the perfect little world that even I was beginning to enjoy and effectively scared a millennia or more off of Balthazar. Not only that, but you ruined Gabriel's Christmas!" Seraphiel's voice was a high pitched shriek now. "Michael, you melted the snow for miles around! Do you know how much people hate green Christmases? And the kids! I just saw a three year old girl make her first snowman only for it to melt three seconds after she put the carrot on. Do you have any idea how heartbreaking that is? Do you?!"
Michael opened his mouth to speak and was again, cut off. "Of course he doesn't. He doesn't like humans any more than I did, but he bowed to them anyways. Always the good son. It doesn't make a difference to him if they're suffering."
"Do not speak to me abo-"
"NO! Do not speak to me, Michael. Did you see what Gabriel went through after you started ignoring him? He practically went through withdrawal without the love and attention. Still, you focused on the day when you could kill your own brother. When Gabriel left, you blamed it on Lucifer. When one of your angels died, you blamed it on Lucifer. But Lucifer's Fall? You blamed Gabriel. The only one who didn't want to follow your orders, see it to the very end that his brother was dead and gone. Who prevented it for millennia until a sword was shoved through his stomach- which I still haven't forgiven you for, Lucifer- and he died alone and unwanted. He had adopted humans as a substitute for you. You, who weren't there anymore and didn't care to be. Gabriel took the traditions as his own, celebrated different religions while everything here was bloodshed. It was all he had left. Now. Fix this, Michael."
"Ho-"
"NOW! Don't balk-talk me, mister!"
And so Michael went. He flew in a slow circle around the globe, looking at families asleep in their beds, children sneaking downstairs to open their gifts and a few carolers out after dark. There wasn't anything special happening. It was just a day when humans were crazier than usual and maybe slightly less cruel than any other time of the year. The suicides weren't exactly attractive, either. He could understand it but that didn't mean he condoned it.
Finally, his eye was caught by a big city. For a strange reason, too. There was a voice that refused to be ignored and suddenly, it opened up a floodgate of prayers and thoughts. Please let my daughter live- I don't want to be alone…-Dear Father, who art in Heaven, hallowed be thy name- Merry Christmas, children. God willing, maybe next year you'll find a home.- Silent night, - Oh, my God, please let me be around for this next year!- Poor Steve. Alone at this time of year? Maybe the angels will be kinder next season. Michael hadn't even realized he landed until there was a small hand on his shoulder. Whipping around with a ready snarl, he paused when the only thing facing him was a sweet little face. An eight year old girl with rosy cheeks and dark eyes watched him curiously. "Are you alright, mister?"
Michael took a second to catch his breath before the girl led him to sit against the building. She cuddled up to his side and asked another question. "Why are you here?"
"Because I messed things up."
It was only after he said it did he realize how true the statement really was. Seraphiel probably wasn't going to let him back into Heaven if he didn't fix things and if he went to Gabriel, he'd be hit with a wall of pure angst. It was either make up or sleep in a motel room for the rest of eternity. Neither were exactly desirable but according to his watch, he had five minutes to set up the Winchester's surprise Christmas party before the gates of Heaven locked him out forever. It was plenty of time for him but just in case, he slowed it to a crawl. The girl didn't seem to notice and Michael took that as an invitation to ask her questions about this hated holiday. "Why do you celebrate this day?" It was abrupt and tasteless. She was a child, though, and took no notice.
The girl pondered it. "Well, sometimes, I don't even know. There isn't that much to be happy about and even though it's baby Jesus' birthday we forget a lot of the important things he taught us. We're not compassionate, caring or loving to anyone who isn't family or a friend. We walk by the suffering and don't blink an eye. Not to mention the greed tearing families apart at the seams with little kids demanding more and more every year. Nobody is thankful for what they have. So maybe, we celebrate this day to remember the humanity we've lost. I don't know. You just have to find your own reason to believe."
She didn't sound like an eight year old, spouting off that much intellectual knowledge. Too old. Suspicious now, he asked, "What's your name?"
The girl smiled a little flatly and stated, "I don't remember anymore", before vanishing.
Time sped up again without Michael allowing it to and he cursed before taking flight again. His first stop was the tree farm, where there was a grand total of one full-sized pine whimpering quietly in the snow. Wincing slightly, he ended up doing the exact same thing as his brother and gently removing the tree from the surrounding soil. It calmed soon after his Grace had touched it, which was quite flattering, really. Most living things cowered away from him. Holy fire and all that. It was a little on the bare side, a thing that was easily taken care of.
Michael also had to fly to Heaven to get the rest of Gabriel's strange ornaments, some of which were no more than a piece of tin foil attached to a string. Aziraphael practically shoved them into his arms with a disapproving stare while some of the Hounds snarled and nipped at his heels. Tree and ornaments weighing him down, he came upon a sad sight. Gabriel was sitting where he had left him on his butt in the grass, sniffling slightly. Michael managed two steps before turning around and slinging him into a wing. He didn't even fight it, just shifted around a little before going still. Two minutes left.
Humming deeply to his upset brother while juggling all of the needed 'Christmas' items, he was promptly reminded of the other tree when the sight of three half-burnt twigs put together made itself known. Michael sighed before bringing back the entire thing. He just planted the other tree beside it and was astounded to realize that he had named it Thea. With a simple snap, there were garlands and lights in every nook and cranny the old house had to offer. He shifted his wing to show Gabriel, who's sniffling stopped instantly when he saw a perfectly decorated Fred, a perfectly decorated house, an unscathed Balthazar popping food out of nowhere with Aziraphael and the hideous sweater a sweet old lady had given to Michael for helping her across the street. Somewhere in Heaven was the archangel Ariel laughing her ass off with Seraphiel. But they'd never tell.
Three hours after the popcorn strand were put in the trees, a weary Winchester opened the door and was promptly blinded by lights. Dean swore and groped around for a light switch before being intercepted with something that felt quite deceptively like a male chest. Blinking with his tiny pupils, he grunted, "Sam, that had better be you."
The response from behind him was less than promising.
Somewhere in the middle of all this blind groping, Michael realized that the meaning of Christmas was not, in fact, the birth of Jesus(although it's a goodly part of it)but a celebration of humanity and family. That little girl he had met was right after all. It would be months before Gabriel forced him to read a story called 'The Little "Matchbook Girl', whose starring character bore a startling resemblance to that intelligent lass. She had frozen to death but it was just a story. The wash of Godly love running through him stated the same. In awe, Michael blinked up at the heavens as it started to snow.
But that's getting ahead of the story. In reality time, the hunters were actually quite pleased up until the moment Fred turned in a rather leafy tree-child. "I knew he was a were tree!"
Merry late Christmas, readers! Watch me get the chapter from like, two months ago up in two days. That would be amazing, wouldn't it? Please Review!