Two chapters today! Make sure you read the previous one before reading this one!

THE END OF THE BEGINNING

"Welcome back, Gabriel." Cariel was waiting in Gabriel's office as soon as the Archangel landed. Gabriel couldn't help but notice the Seraph's shoulders relaxing, years of tension slipping away. Had Cariel been worrying the entire time Gabriel was gone? "I've been-"

Cariel was interrupted by the flap of angel wings, and Michael was suddenly in the office with them, filling the space with his grace. "Gabriel. My office. Now."

Michael vanished as soon as he had appeared. Gabriel glanced to Cariel. "Did you know he'd do that?"

Cariel shook his head. "No, everything's been running smoothly in your absence. Smoother, actually, than before, without the constant warring between you and Raphael…"

Gabriel groaned. "He's probably trying to head off a rekindling. I'll return shortly, and you can update me on what I missed."

Cariel gave a sharp nod, and Gabriel opened his wings again.

Raphael was already waiting in Michael's office, along with Metatron, who was cowering in a corner. Michael was leaning against his desk, his wings held high and sharp. They were quivering, fine little tremors rustling his feathers together in a steady chime of metal on metal. That was the first thing Gabriel realized upon arriving. Michael was visibly moving.

"What's this all about?" Raphael asked as soon as Gabriel had landed. "Is it us?"

"No." Michael clenched his hands into fists on his desk, his wings giving a larger shiver of agitation. He flicked out one arm, sealing off the room. The windows went dark. The door slammed and locked. The sound of the Host inside Gabriel's head was muted—not removed like Lucifer had done in the Underworld, but drastically reduced. The four of them were alone, with no way in and no way out. "Metatron. Tell them what you told me."

"It's…" Metatron shrunk back from Raphael's glare, now turned on him. Gabriel was watching Michael, amazed that whatever had happened was serious enough to snap Michael out of his millennia-long funk. "God," Metatron squeaked out. "It's God. He's… He's left!"

"He does that." Raphael shook his head, but his eyes never left the Cherub. "What does this have to do with us?"

"No, He left," Metatron stressed. "He's gone! Forever! He said so!"

"Dad wouldn't…" Now Metatron had Gabriel's attention, a frown pulling at the angel's face as he remembered his own interactions with his Father. God made a son. He wrote down instructions. He weaned us off His presence. "When did He say this?"

"Just today! He said our work was done, He thanked me for my service, and He said He was leaving Heaven to us. Then He said good-bye, and He was gone! He never says good-bye!" Metatron wrung his hands together, glancing between the Archangels. "I came straight to Michael!"

"This happened just as you returned, Gabriel." Michael tapped his hand against his desk. "Father returned earlier this week to the Garden, and He left just as your grace reentered Heaven."

"Did you chase Him away?" Raphael asked Gabriel, though the fold of his arms and twist of his wings did say that he didn't genuinely believe it was Gabriel's fault.

Gabriel pulled a face at his twin but didn't dignify the question with a response. "I was delivering the Word of God to humanity."

"Which they already had," Raphael interrupted.

Gabriel narrowed his eyes at his brother. "A different form of the Word. Muhammad was not calling himself the Son of God the way Jesus had. Has Jesus been found?"

Michael shook his head. "I questioned Azrael," he named the Seraph who oversaw the dead in Heaven, writing their names down in his book, "just last year again. Jesus' soul still has not come to us."

"Are you sure he's not in the underworld?" Raphael asked.

"The demons would have crowed about it if he were." Gabriel massaged his temples. "I thought… when Dad set me to watch over Jesus, I thought maybe He was planning to leave then. But He wouldn't have left without leaving Jesus in charge."

"He left it to us," Metatron reminded them. "The angels."

"And that was a damn stupid thing to do," Gabriel said. "Look at us. We're useless."

"You're useless," Raphael snapped back. "We should find Him."

"Find Him?" Michael asked.

Raphael nodded. "He didn't die. We would have felt that."

"True…" Michael watched Raphael, encouraging him to continue.

"If Father isn't dead, then He must exist somewhere." The Archangel shrugged. "We find Him."

"And ask Him to come home?" Gabriel shook his head again. "Dad's not going to come if we call."

"Maybe He wants us to show some initiative for once," Raphael answered. "We find Him."

"He's not in the universe." Michael looked away from his brothers. "I already checked. When Metatron first told me, I doubted, so I cast out my grace."

Michael had the largest grace of any angel. Gabriel knew he could stretch it to the farthest reaches of the universe if he really tried. Lucifer had been able to do that as well. Neither Gabriel nor Raphael could quite reach from end to end at once, but they could cover most of the universe without moving. If Michael couldn't feel God, then there was nowhere in the universe for God to be hiding.

"What does that mean?" Gabriel asked quietly. "If He's not dead, and He's not here…?"

"Then He's Outside." Raphael closed his eyes. "He left."

"We can't just follow Him out."

"No," Raphael agreed. "We can't. We would need to secure this universe first, to ensure it won't fall apart while we are gone."

"You're going to take over the universe?" Metatron squeaked.

"It's already ours," Raphael answered, turning his dark eyes toward the Cherub. "We just need control."

"Do you know how to control the universe?" Michael asked. "Because Father never told me."

"Nor me," Raphael admitted. "But I wasn't the one writing the universe's instruction manual for Him."

Three Archangel turned in unison toward the Cherub in the corner. Metatron backed up as far as he could go, wrapping his wings around him. "I… guys, I just…"

"Tell us?" Michael pushed away from his desk, taking a step toward Metatron. "Tell us how to do this, Metatron."

"I don't think I should…" Metatron cowered away from the Archangel.

"That wasn't a request." Raphael joined Michael, stalking toward the younger angel. "Tell us, Cherub, or we'll have Naomi figure it out for us."

"I just…"

"This is ridiculous!" Gabriel snapped, refusing to advance on Metatron. "Honestly, this is our plan? Seize complete control of the universe so we can go Outside to find God?"

"Do you have a better one?" Raphael demanded, looking back at his twin. "You said yourself that it was stupid for us to be in charge."

"And it's even stupider to put it on lockdown!" Gabriel threw up his hands. "So God's gone. He hasn't truly been ruling anything here anyway! We've been in charge all along! We've done a piss poor job of it, but we've still been doing it."

"How is not finding Him a better plan?" Michael asked, cocking his head to the side.

"If we grow up," Gabriel said. He pointed at Raphael. "We stop fighting." He pointed at Michael. "You get over yourself. Sammael's gone, and that's horrible, but our brothers aren't. They need us to be strong for them, not falling to pieces. We need to-"

There was a crack of thunder and a flash of light from the corner Metatron had been huddling in. A shockwave threw the three Archangels back, and the defenses on the corner of the office hung limply, shredded apart where key sigils had been erased. Awareness of the Host came flooding back in, and Metatron was gone.

"That little-!" Raphael ran to the hole, swearing at the Cherub who had escaped.

Michael clenched his hands back into fists, his knife-sharp wings slicing the air. "Find him," he growled. "Do not let him escape!"