Some stuff that took place during the eleven-year gap between Modern Legend and The Accidental Vessel. Part one: directly after the final scene.
Michael doesn't leave immediately, after Gabriel comes back.
They end up retreating to Hermione's flat, because the funeral is over and none of them feel like lingering by a graveyard. Fleur is absent, called back to France for family matters or some kind of urgent situation, so it's just the three of them.
Gabriel brings up the subject, after Hermione has gone to sleep with a stern word or two about how they had better not wake her up before her alarm does. "Are you going back?"
Michael doesn't ask him to clarify. "Eventually," ne says.
"I'm nervous," Michael says, when Gabriel doesn't reply.
"Nervous?"
"I don't want to lose what I've gotten here," Michael says. "They're not going to be expecting me to be different."
"You're Michael."
"I know."
"Verchiel could help," Gabriel offers, probably because he's not sure what to say in this situation.
"I was counting on that, actually," Michael replies, smiling faintly. "Appearing in Heaven last summer and then vanishing again most likely didn't help."
Gabriel shrugs, and doesn't continue the conversation.
"Gabriel," Michael begins cautiously. The silence between them is comfortable, not awkward, but ne still sounds wary. "Have you...spoken to Them, recently?"
The emphasis on Them is enough that Gabriel understands. "Wha - why? Did - did you?"
"Yes," Michael says, because ne has already guessed that Gabriel's answer will be yes.
Gabriel stares. "When?"
"While you were injured."
Gabriel frowns. "Was He talking to us simultaneously, or something?"
Michael shakes nir head, but does not explain that answer. "Did They give you a message?" Ne tries to sound casual.
"...No." Gabriel shifts, hand curling around his side where Michael knows the deepest part of the wound is. "We just...talked." He glances at Michael. "You?"
"The same," Michael says. "They didn't stay for very long." Just long enough to rattle Michael so that ne feels the need to see if Gabriel is as shaken as ne is. "Free will was mentioned."
"Free will, huh?" Gabriel doesn't scoff. His eyes are on the floor. "He seems big on that."
"For someone who had me cast down Lucifer," Michael says, "yes, They do."
Gabriel's eyes shoot up to nem, startled - probably because this is the first time Michael has voluntarily brought up Lucifer since the Fall. Michael meets his gaze evenly.
"Huh," Gabriel says. "You really have changed a lot."
Michael doesn't reply immediately. Then ne asks, "Do you miss him?"
"Lucifer? He tried to kill me!"
Michael waits.
Gabriel slumps into the sofa. "I miss Samael," he admits quietly, and Michael feels like someone's jerked nir insides in the wrong direction at that name.
"Yeah," ne says. "I do too." Gabriel and Lucifer had always been closer. Gabriel had been closer to practically everyone than he'd been to Michael.
It's one of Michael's bigger regrets.
Gabriel snorts, but his heart isn't in it. "Who would expect this out of a coupla archangels, huh?" He muttered. "'Specially Michael."
"My reputation has gotten a little out of control," Michael tells him. "I should probably fix that."
"Are you kidding?" Gabriel scoffs. "You get yourself down the level of a regular angel, no one's going to listen to you."
"Good," Michael says. "I don't want them to listen if they don't want to."
Gabriel stares. "You're not going to have an easy time of things."
"I'm supposed to be the embodiment of Their will," Michael says. "I might as well start trying to do my actual job instead of what I think my job is."
"Huh," Gabriel says again. "I guess actually talking to Him helps."
"I still have no idea what They want."
"Oh, fantastic." Michael doesn't hear any ill will in Gabriel's grumbling. "He didn't bother to say?"
"No." They hadn't spoken about that, really.
"Why do you think He showed up now?" Gabriel bursts out. "Radio silence for so long, and then a two-minute conversation?"
"You looked," Michael said, "didn't you?" Like ne'd heard Castiel had.
"So?" Gabriel says, but he looks uncomfortable.
"I'm not judging you for that." Michael really isn't. Ne'd have looked, if ne could have.
"You passed on the Judgment shtick to me often enough, you're probably just out of practice."
Michael smiles. "Judgment goes better with Mercy than on its own."
Gabriel shrugs, like he's not sure how to handle the compliment. "Never got around to being merciful very often."
Michael doubts that, but doesn't contest it. "What did you do?"
"What?"
"What did you do, if you weren't off being merciful and spreading Their word?" Michael's sure ne sees Gabriel's mouth twitch with a suppressed smile. "I have missed a few thousand years."
Gabriel is silent for a while. "Maybe later," he offers eventually.
"Alright."
"You're going to be too busy with Heaven to listen to me ramble on about a thousand years' worth of stories," Gabriel adds, cracking a slightly false smile. It gets more genuine when Michael laughs quietly.
"I suppose I'll just have to visit when I need a break."
"And a pack of lies."
"Is that what your stories are?"
"The best parts of my stories are when whoever's listening has to try to figure out whether I'm telling the truth," Gabriel tells him, smirking.
"For you, or for them?"
Michael has missed this. Not that ne ever had it, with Gabriel or anyone else, but it's the closest to the relationship ne had with the other archangels before.
Michael has very much missed that.
"Mostly me," Gabriel admits.
"The puzzle aspect sounds interesting, actually."
"You're not supposed to enjoy it." Gabriel's petulance is all play, and he's still grinning.
"I'll pretend to be irritated, then."
"Well, it's no use doing that now that you told me."
"So the only solution is to pretend I never said anything?"
"I do that anyway."
Michael takes a beat too long to realize Gabriel's still joking. Gabriel's smile fades somewhat.
Michael can't find an answer that will restore the mood and they end up sitting in an only slightly less companionable silence for a few moments. Ne settles on changing the subject instead. "I was going to ask, before," ne said. "Your vessel-"
"What about it?"
"I can tell that's not a human, Gabriel."
Gabriel made a face, extending his hands and looking at them like he was inspecting them. "So?"
Michael isn't sure if ne's reading the situation right. "Were they the real Loki?"
"I'm not a fake," Gabriel says, nastily enough that Michael backtracks.
"Sorry. The original, then?"
Gabriel's hands clench - not fists, but not a kind motion. "Yeah," Gabriel says grudgingly. "He wasn't shit back then. I needed a disguise good enough to fool anyone no matter how close they looked."
Michael waits. When Gabriel doesn't continue, ne asks, "And?"
"And I made a fuckin' name for myself that he never would've gotten and no one bothered to check who I was, so what? There hasn't been anyone else in here since then. I'm Loki."
It is almost an unnoticeable change, but Gabriel seems to abruptly be softer around the edges, shadowier and a little rougher than pure Grace. Michael doesn't look closer.
"Alright," ne says. "I was just wondering."
Neither of them voice the fact that the disguise - the pagan vessel - was to help Gabriel hide from nem.
"There are still pagans today, y'know," Gabriel says, as if he still thinks there's a point to prove. The rough edges of his Grace haven't vanished.
"I'm aware." Michael had thought it unfortunate before, but ne's aware now that people couldn't be forced into Christianity just because it was 'right' (which it really wasn't - or at least, Heaven wasn't in the right at the moment).
Ne wonders for a moment if Gabriel is trying to brag about those who follow Loki.
"I should go," Gabriel says after a moment. "The boys are probably going to be panicking about me not being back yet."
Michael stands when Gabriel does. "I'll make an effort to drop by."
Gabriel affects a smile he must know won't fool Michael, but the strangeness of him smooths out somewhat. "Call ahead first."
Gabriel leaves, and all that remains is the profound sense he's given Michael that ne missed something important.
Thought I'd establish the Loki thing...and sort of hint at how well Michael would handle that. Though to be fair, this isn't Michael's best area. Angels are biased.