Title: Molting Season

Prompt: Written for wolfling's christmas stocking on livejournal.

The motel room was six inches deep in soot-black feathers. Castiel glanced up quickly at the Winchesters' return and then resumed his x-ray study of the carpet stains under the mass of fluffy down.

"Something you want to tell us, Cas?" Dean demanded, dumping his mini-armory on the closest flat surface (the kitchenette table). The sharp implements bounced dangerously on the bed of feathers.

Sam just watched quietly from just off Dean's left.

"Nothing at this time, Dean," the angel reported solemnly. "Was your pursuit of-"

"Yeah, Castiel is molting," a new voice reported from just behind Sam, making the youngest Winchester jump a foot. "Breathe, kiddo," Gabriel grimaced, "and stop with the projecting, will ya?"

The archangel stepped around the Winchesters, snapped a recliner into existence and tossed himself into it. As soon as Gabriel was situated, three feathers floated down out of nowhere to land on his head. Gabriel sighed, and shook them off.

"Yeah, baby bro is FINALLY molting after a very long very colorful adolescence." Gabriel wiped away a mock-tear. "I thought this day would never come."

"Gabriel, I should like to kill you now," Castiel informed his older brother conversationally.

"What happened to him already being dead?" Dean demanded.

Gabriel leaned forward, smirking as he shook his head with exaggerated tsk-ing noises. "Dean, Dean, Dean . . . you know why you're not supposed to kick the fluffy heads off of dandelions? 'Cause a hundred new ones will sprout up in the original's place." Gabriel leaned back again, visibly smug. "I'm the Dandelion 2000, kids."

Forcibly rejecting the concept of 200,000 archangel Gabriels spread across the world, Dean refocused. "So you're risking your latest life by baiting Cas?"

"Cas couldn't do anything bigger than squash a human right now," Gabriel chuckled. "Molting really takes it out of ya, huh, bro?"

"Molting will only last for so long, Gabriel," Castiel reminded him levelly.

"Sad, but true. It only takes a thousand years to get to this step, and it's over in a matter of two or three hours."

"I can giftwrap you for the pagans in honor of the season," Castiel suggested. "It is traditional to exchange gifts at this time of year."

"You think he's pissy now, you should have seen him as a toddler," Gabriel confided to the Winchesters. "I thought that the Terrible Two Hundreds would never end."

"In fact," the archangel mused. "I think some of your toys are still standing over in England, Castiel, Michael's lecture notwithstanding."

A scowl (that would never ever be labeled as a pout by anyone who wished to continue existing) briefly crossed Castiel's face. "The invaders knocked part of it down."

Gabriel patted the empty air comfortingly. "It took them a decade, thirty men, and the world's first pulley system to manage it. After that, the invaders decided it wasn't really worth the effort."

"Are you," Sam's voice stuttered out, before he began again, newly emboldened by new historical information, "Are you talking about St-Stonehenge?"

"Have you ever tried to convince an interdimensional light form the size of a house to pick up his toys?" Gabriel demanded.

Castiel was carefully not making any eye-contact with a single being in the room.

"I always said the teenage rebellion started early and lasted longer with each new generation of fledglings," Gabriel continued. "Putting a stop to the end of the world on Zachariah's watch? I'm surprised you weren't more permanently grounded. And taking Michael's dare to go into hell after the Righteous Man . . ."

"You were not there to stop me," Castiel pointed out.

"You bet your wings I wasn't, because if I'd known about that, I would have kicked Michael from one side of heaven to the other, before tethering you to me with your own halo," Gabriel snorted. "Of all the stupid, immature pranks . . ."

Castiel's face suddenly lit up with that very small, very sneaky smirk. The Winchesters took a large step back, but Gabriel was too busy reminiscing to notice.

"And Anael, was she really-ack!"

As Gabriel spat out feathers, Castiel flexed his newly refeathered wings, and advanced slowly on the archangel. Molting season was over, folks.

The archangel took wing, and Castiel followed after him. Dean slowly turned to Sam, and knocked a few feathers off of his little brother.

"We book it now, grab a new motel room, a couple beers, and this never happened, okay?"

Sam could only nod faintly.