This really was the tricky one. I never really seemed to get a grasp on Raphael and the show certainly does not make it easy to like him. So I decided to take a completely new approach based on some research about the mythological Raphael, trying to connect this friendly healer to the Raphael we see in the show. Please bear with me and enjoy.
Raphael
He had always been a dreamer and in some ways he needed to be. "God heals" is the meaning of his name and you had to be a dreamer to believe in that, as he later found out the hard way.
In retrospective he had dreamed his way through all the beginning of creation. It had been the happiest time of his existence. He had had his father and Michael and Lucifer and Gabriel and everything was well. No, it was better than just well.
Sometimes he tries to recall that warm feeling of being loved and needed that he had constantly and naturally felt in those years and those he spent as chief healer of heaven. But it is too far away, too far gone and the echo he can still conjure is stale and feels like salt in his wounds. So he stops and reminds himself that he isn´t that dreamer anymore.
Hasn´t been for ages.
Will never be again.
The healer in him, that isn´t only a healer of the body, but also and especially of the mind, nudges at him all the time, trying to tell him what is wrong with him, where it all went wrong and what he should do about it.
He ignores it, pushes it all away. He knows that he is broken, but he also knows that he can´t ever be healed, so in order to survive he can´t allow himself to look back.
Not ever.
He had always been a dreamer and how couldn´t he be? He was the angel of happiness, light, love and prayer after all and he believed in all of these things. Healer, protector, the social center of heaven, always there for everyone.
While Gabriels laughter was always laced with mischief (benevolent at that time, but mischief nonetheless), Raphaels was always warm and welcoming. He was the one all the other angels went to with their hurts and problems and he listened to everyone and was happy to help.
Happiness and light and love and prayer. He hasn´t felt the first three things for a very long time and the last one is useless. A broken angel, who can´t believe anymore. Broken, but not fallen. That is maybe the only positive thing he can say about himself.
There was a dreamer once, who always thought positively and really believed the world was good. Raphael wants to get that dreamer back at any cost, but if he could succeed somehow, he isn´t sure if he would protect or smite him.
Lucifer's rebellion for him came out of nowhere. Of course he had heard everything about Lucifer's discontentment (he was the social center of heaven after all), but he had never even thought it could come to this.
The angel of happiness, love and light saw his brothers fighting each other, Lucifer being thrown into the pit, Michael growing cold, Gabriel trying to interfere, then disappearing. And he prayed and prayed, but God didn´t answer him anymore. So he felt alone for the first time in his existence. Grief and loneliness, pain and hate, darkness and despair… they all hit at once, tossing him around helpless, tearing him apart bit by bit. And still he clung to his believes, tried to smile, to be there for everyone, because that was what heaven now needed most.
He was a broken angel, with an empty smile.
But a dreamer still.
And then one day the last brother he had left turned on him. Raphael had once again been positive about everything and everyone, because he just couldn´t help himself and Michael hadn´t been in the mood. Not at all.
He shoved his brother against a wall, shouted at him and hit him, till Raphael was sure he would end in the pit with Lucifer. And every single one of Michaels words was like a blade into his grace, twisting and wreaking damage that could never be healed.
"Stop! Stop it! Just stop your pitiful show! Everything is breaking apart and you are still smiling and telling everyone it will be better tomorrow. And the worst thing is, you really believe in it. You are the most useless, naive, little idiot in creation! You think the world is all sunshine and rainbows and that you can make it all better! You! Well, here is some news, little sunshine: We are soldiers. Lucifer has betrayed us. I cast him into eternal suffering and never blinked an eye. Gabriel, your other little sunshine, is dead and many along with him and our father doesn´t care. They are dead and our father doesn´t care! Grow up, Raphael! Do for once something useful and finally grow up!"
And he grew up that day, taking Michaels beating. Oh, how he grew up. That naive, little dreamer died under Michaels fist that day and forth came a soldier without illusions, without mercy. A broken angel, an empty shell, that had no problems with killing humans or even his own brothers. Hard, cold and determined, a healer turned destroyer. Who needed an angels of happiness, love, light and prayer after all? Useless naivety, all of it! He was a soldier and all he needed were his orders.
So when God disappeared, Raphael was the first one to declare him dead and support the apocalypse. Because somewhere inside him there was a broken dreamer, that just couldn´t take it anymore.
