Archive of Our Own ^beta

The deluge hadn’t stopped. It should have stopped the minute everything had gone south, but apparently whoever had been in charge of that spell was either dead or on the run. Not that it mattered. The humans would think it was just a freak storm, anyway. The less they knew the better. Let it be a freak rainstorm. More than that, one could hope that any and everyone could forget what had happened that night. They wouldn’t forget, because the Gods had long memories, but he could still hope.

He wasn’t sure how he’d gotten there. Rain poured through the dark, soaked him to the bone, but though the sheets of water that fell from the sky he could see yet another motel sign. It wasn’t The Elysian Fields, obviously, but just another fleabag stopover along the highway that no one would ever remember. How the fuck had he gotten there? How long had he been there? For the moment the last recollection he had was just staring up at the neon sign as something in his chest pulled him through the rain. Something warm. Something that could help him. 

Gabriel watched himself die. This wasn’t a new turn of events, though. He’d seen himself die from every angle probably a thousand times over the millennia. There was always someone with a stake or a sword that thought they could best him, and usually by the time it came to that he was more than happy to let them think they were right. It made it easier to move on. Let them think they’d killed The Trickster. Loki. Whoever they thought he was. Sometimes he was even just Some Guy who was in the wrong place at the wrong time, but it was easier to slip away when someone was standing over a dead body. He’d seen himself die enough times to know that this had been his best performance yet. 

Lucifer had believed it. Whether it was because he was blinded by guilt or sadness or whatever, Lucifer had believed it. Gabriel had gotten really good at dying. The only difference this time was that it had been at the hands of his own brother. It hurt more. It hurt to know that at the end of the day they were all fated to kill each other for reasons that, in the end, didn’t even matter. He loved his brothers. Gabriel had practically worshiped them when he was young and their existence was new. Lucifer had held him on his shoulders and showed him Creation. He taught him all the things that Archangels should know and how to be the best version of himself in the eyes of their Father. And now, an eternity later, he’d killed him. 

Not without remorse. Gabriel had seen in Lucifer’s eyes that he wasn’t happy to do it. But, as it had always been, Lucifer’s purpose had come first. Gabriel had been an obstacle. Obstacles were always removed. It never mattered who or what or where, they were always taken out. Remorse or not, love or hate, when it came down to it there were only those who were loyal to The Plan or not. Gabriel hadn’t been. Not for a long time.

This death was different. Gabriel had assumed, like he always had, that he could fake his way out of anything. Sure, Lucifer had taught him everything he knew in the Beginning, but Gabriel had picked up plenty of things on his own since then. He was confident. Cocky, even. Lucifer had been gone for a long time, and Gabriel had changed so much since the last time they’d seen each other. He was sure that he could just conjure up a duplicate, one made from Trickster magic instead of Archangel grace, and it would have been enough. He’d been wrong. So fucking wrong. Stupid and wrong. 

He hadn’t actually counted on the Archangel blade. It had been a copy, yes, and in the hands of Kali or one of the Winchesters it probably wouldn’t have done anything. It wasn’t real. In his own hands, though, or in Lucifer’s…it made it real. It made it real because Lucifer had expected it to be real. Maybe not as powerful as the actual real thing, but real enough. Real enough that as Gabriel watched from relative safety he’d felt the blade pierce his vessel and cut all the way through to his true form that was inside. It wouldn’t kill him immediately. He almost wished it had, though. The slow drain of his grace as it left him was sickening, and he swayed as he stared up at the neon sign again. Gabriel was dying. Slowly.

The Winchesters had split up once they’d gotten far enough away. Gabriel had two choices: follow after Dean and Kali as they got further out of dodge, or go to Sam who had presumably holed up in the nightmare before him. He hadn’t even really made the choice. He’d felt a pull, a decision made for him, and suddenly he was there. In his dying moments he’d been called to Sam Winchester.

Gabriel closed his eyes. He could feel the rain running down his face, through his hair, and he tried to suck in a breath. One hand rested over the wound just under his sternum, and he winced as another wave of pain hit him. Standing there wouldn’t fix this. Nothing would fix it, but just standing there and staring was only ticking down what little time he had left. He needed to move. He needed to finish what he’d started when Lucifer crashed their little party.

There was only one room in the long line of them that had a light on. In the pouring rain and fog it looked sickly yellow, though only a sliver of it was visible where the curtains didn’t close all the way. That had to be the one. Gabriel dragged himself across the parking lot and leaned heavily against the door. He was starting to feel heavy. He hadn’t felt heavy in the entirety of his existence, but the weight of his vessel seemed to pull him down and pin him to the concrete under his soaking wet boots. He raised a hand, not the one that was still nursing the wound in his chest, and let it rest against the cold wood. It was shaking. His hand was shaking. He could see it tremble. 

With a soft sigh, Gabriel rapped on the door. It wasn’t the commanding type of knock he’d been hoping to muster up, but it wasn’t so quiet that it wouldn’t be heard. Pressed against the door as he was, he could hear the soft sound of a TV playing, and it immediately cut off the last time his knuckle tapped against the wood. There was a pause. A long pause. He could imagine Sam, big and strong Sam Winchester, still and silent on some crappy motel room bed. They’d just come off of a fight with two Archangels and a handful of Pagan Gods, after all. His adrenaline would still be pumping, and there would (rightfully so) be some residual worry that someone was going to come after them. So, Gabriel took another breath and knocked again.

A wave of pain hit him and he grunted, damn near doubling over on himself, eyes squeezed shut. Any other time he might have just started knocking incessantly to annoy Sam, but he just didn’t have the strength right now. Or ever again. Something cold and sickly was spreading through him, robbing him of any strength and higher brain function, and Gabriel let out a soft sound.

“Sam,” he whimpered, “please.”

Gabriel looked down at himself. He was soaked to the bone from the rain, and looked nothing like his mighty Archangel self. It was pathetic, really. What was more concerning, though, was the fact that what was running down his front wasn’t just water. A dark stain had bloomed out across his shirt, and when he pulled his hand away from his chest it was stained a rich, human red. Blood. His vessel was dying right alongside him.

“Sam!” he repeated, and toppled forward as the door opened.

Two arms caught him, though all Gabriel saw was the concrete and dirty carpet of the entryway. His eyes were rolling in his head, and he hung limply as Sam held him. He thought he heard a soft “what the fuck?” erupt from Sam’s mouth, but his ears were ringing. Everything seemed fuzzy and far away.

“Gabriel?” Sam asked, and stuck his head out of the doorway to look around the parking lot, “I thought… fuck , I thought Lucifer had-”

“He did,” Gabriel slurred.

The world around him spun, and after a moment he was set down on something soft. The bed, Gabriel assumed, and he closed his eyes as another stab of cold agony ripped through him. One hand fisted in the comforter that was steadily soaking up the water that clung to Gabriel’s skin and clothes, and he buried his face in against the musty smelling fabric as he fought to get himself under enough control to talk. He still had things he needed to say. Things Sam needed to know. He just had to get them out of his mouth before the last of his grace left him.

Warm hands pushed and pulled at him. They put him on his back, and Gabriel could feel Sam pull off his jacket and rip his shirt open to get to the wound on his chest. He let out a strangled cry as thick fingers touched his skin right where the blade had pierced him, and one of his own hands grabbed for Sam’s wrist to get him to stop.

“What can I do?” Sam asked. He was fighting against Gabriel’s hold, and pressed his hand over where blood was dripping out of him. “Tell me what to do!”

Gabriel shook his head, “There’s nothing,” he whispered, “nothing you can do.”

“The fuck there’s not!” Sam snapped and pressed down hard against Gabriel’s ribs, “don’t you fucking dare say there’s nothing we can do.”

“Sam,” Gabriel prompted, “it’s okay. Don’t…this isn’t important right now.” He opened his eyes and focused his gaze on Sam’s face as best he could. The lights felt entirely too bright, and color swam across his vision as he searched Sam’s eyes. He could see that they were red, puffy like he’d been crying before, and now they were wet again. 

“You’re dying ,” Sam hissed, “of course it’s important!”

Gabriel shook his head again, “No. You need to, fuck ,” and spasmed as the icy cold pain sent a shock through him. “The DVD I gave Dean,” he whimpered, “you still have it?”

“You’re worried about your porn stash right now?” Sam asked, eyes wide, “Jesus fucking Christ, Gabriel-”

“You have to watch it,” he said, “I…it sounds stupid. I know that. But you have to watch it.”

Sam was shaking his head, mouth half open in confusion, and his eyes searched Gabriel’s face. He could feel it, like the warmth of the sun on a cold day, and Gabriel sucked in a wet breath. Sam’s hand was still pressed hard over the wound in his chest, and Gabriel could feel his fingers sliding through the blood that seeped between them. Were he not about to die, this might have been romantic. He’d imagined something like this before: stretched out a bed, clothes ripped off, with Sam looming over him and looking into his eyes. Those fantasies usually ended much better.

“Okay,” Sam said finally and nodded, “yeah, fine. I’ll watch it. I’ll watch your…porn.”

Gabriel let out a breath, “Good,” and nodded twice, “good.”

He closed his eyes. His body was trembling, and he could feel his grace twisting and churning just under the surface of his skin. It wanted to escape, to explode in a firestorm of celestial energy, but instead it was slowly leaking out of him like a dying helium balloon. How anticlimactic, really. He’d always thought he would go out in a flash of glory and light, but instead he was going to bleed out in some fleabag deathtrap in middle America. This wasn’t how it was supposed to happen.

“Gabriel,” Sam whispered, and he opened his eyes again. Sam wasn’t looking at him like he had been, instead his focus was lower, on his hand, and Gabriel tipped his chin down to see that through the blood there was the distinct glow of his grace leaking through. It wouldn’t be long now.

“Archangel blade,” he said by way of explanation, “even a fake one can do some damage in the wrong hands.”

Sam shook his head again, “You can’t heal yourself?” he asked, and looked back up to meet Gabriel’s eyes.

“Not from this,” Gabriel answered, “kinda the point. You get stabbed by the one thing that can kill you- can’t heal up from that.”

“No,” Sam said. Gabriel could hear the hard resolution in his voice. “ No. ”

The hand not on Gabriel’s chest flailed out across the bed toward the opposite nightstand. There was a phone sitting on the edge, plugged in and charging, and Sam reached out to grab it. He flipped it open and started pressing buttons, but Gabriel reached up a hand to stop him. Sam frowned, shook his head again, and tried to pull his hand away.

“Dean’s not that far,” he said, “he took Kali, but he can bring her back. Maybe she can do something-”

“She can’t,” he breathed, “I told you: no one can.”

“Yes we can!” Sam yelled, and leaned his weight on the hand that was covering the wound, “there’s always some way to fix it! You just have to fucking stay alive long enough for me to figure it out!”

“Don’t be like that,” Gabriel said, “don’t, okay? Not now.”

“Why?” Sam asked.

Gabriel let out another soft sound. His grace was thrumming, writhing, and dying inside of him. The cold of the blade spread through him, and it was so sharp that it was almost hot. Searing. It was cutting off every last connection to life he had. 

“It’s not your fault,” Gabriel murmured, “this…none of this was your fault.”

In the space of a second Sam’s face went through about ten different expressions. They ranged from shock to rage to fear, but settled on something softer. Sadder. His eyes were red again, and Sam sniffed as he shook his head again. And again. Over and over.

“Sam, it’s not your fault,” Gabriel repeated, “it’s not, okay?” Something hard and heavy was in his chest that had nothing to do with the wound Lucifer had left him with. It felt like a rock was wedged between his ribs, and it made it even harder to breathe than it already was. The look on Sam’s face, the guilt he knew Sam felt for so many things, all of it…he had to tell him. Sam had to know that this wasn’t his fault.

“I don’t care,” Sam said softly, “you’re not, you can’t die on us!” He dropped the phone in his other hand and leaned more over Gabriel. He pulled at Gabriel’s shoulder, pulled him so he was propped up with Sam’s arm wrapped around him, and used the leverage to try and press harder against the wound. Blue-white light was leaking through his fingers along with the blood, and Sam growled as he tried to squeeze them together. “You can’t,” he whispered.

“I don’t think either of us get a choice,” Gabriel said, and tried to smile, “but, I can think of worse ways to go. In the arms of some strapping, young hunter might be in my top five.”

“Shut up!” Sam snapped, “this isn’t fucking funny!”

“It’s kinda funny.”

“You are not allowed to die, do you hear me?” Sam said, “not, not now .”

One of Gabriel’s hands lifted to tangle in Sam’s shirt. It left bloody smears in the fabric, but they were both covered in it already. A little more wouldn’t hurt. He gripped hard, pulled slightly, and squeezed his eyes shut again. He could feel Sam’s heart racing. He could feel the heat coming off his skin. He could feel the ragged way Sam breathed as he held him.

“Why not now?” Gabriel asked, voice shaking, “hm? Sam? Why not now?”

He pulled at Sam’s shirt until they were forehead to forehead. Sam’s hand was still pressed hard at his chest, and the arm holding him up was trembling just as much as Gabriel was. Sam’s breath was warm on his face. In all of those fantasies that Gabriel had, they’d ended up just like this. Somehow. Without the blood and the dying, obviously, but in the deepest and darkest parts of him there had always been that candle burning for Sam Winchester. Since they’d met and well before that, since Gabriel had become aware that his brother’s vessel walked the earth, Gabriel had felt something pull him to Sam. He couldn’t explain it. He’d never tried. Now he didn’t have enough time to.

“I…” Sam started, but cut himself off with something that sounded like a sob, “I just figured out you’re not the world’s biggest dick, you know?” he asked, and sniffled again, “and…”

“It’s okay,” Gabriel soothed, “it’s going to be okay.”

“No, it’s not,” Sam breathed, and looked up into Gabriel’s face. Tears gathered in his eyes and threatened to spill down from long lashes. “You can’t.”

Gabriel wanted, needed, to say something. He needed to tell Sam that it really was alright. He was, mostly, at peace, with this. Not really, but none of this was his decision. He’d passed along what Sam and Dean needed to know, he’d done his job, and he could die now. Sam could let him go. He hadn’t realized that Sam had been holding on, to what Gabriel wasn’t sure of, but he needed Sam to know that it was okay. It was okay that he was dying. Sam would be okay.

But he couldn’t. He couldn’t say the words. 

Instead, he tipped his chin up and kissed him. If he was going to die, then he was at least going to kiss Sam Winchester once before he did. He had to. That pull that had been leading him there since the Beginning had looped around them both, and Gabriel couldn’t leave this life without the one thing he wanted more than anything. It was selfish, he knew that, but he could only hope that Sam wouldn’t hate him for it. He’d hated Gabriel for so many things already, what was one more to add to the list?

Sam kissed him back. He pressed his lips hard against Gabriel’s, and let out a quiet gasp as he did so. Gabriel could feel his lips trembling. Like he was trying so hard not to break that kiss and cry. It hurt. It hurt so badly that the searing ice that cut him to ribbons on the inside was suddenly the furthest thing from Gabriel’s mind. It hurt because in that moment Gabriel could feel just how much Sam wanted to kiss him. That he needed it like Gabriel needed it. There was no way of knowing if Sam had felt that pull throughout his life like Gabriel had, but it had led them to the same place. A kiss. A real, world shatteringly sweet kiss.

Something changed. Deep inside of him. Gabriel had been on Earth long enough to train himself to look past the celestial way of seeing things. His kind, the angels, rarely saw past the souls of those they came into contact with. It made it easy to determine who was human, who was a demon, and who was an angel. Gabriel had thrust that part of himself down, locked it away, and instead focused on the reality before. He would get a glimpse of a soul here and there, especially when he wasn’t thinking or someone’s was particularly bright, but he hadn’t focused on it in millennia. He hadn’t seen a soul in longer than he could remember.

Now? Now he could see Sam’s. Even with his eyes closed the burning gold of it filled his vision. It was bright. So, so bright. Brighter than anything Gabriel had ever seen. And strong. It twined and reached like vines climbing a brick house, and as they kissed he could see that golden light reaching for him . 

His grace was leaving him quicker now. Not that he cared. Sam’s mouth was on his, his hands touched him, and he could feel the warmth of Sam’s soul crying out and searching for him. He was going to die soon. Very soon. But this? This was heaven in a way that not even Heaven had been. Gabriel could die like this. He could die in a mix of human and angel, and everything else that had happened up until this point didn’t matter.

Something tugged him back. It wasn’t that pull, that string that kept leading him back to Sam, but something else. Gabriel’s eyes opened, and were met with Sam’s hazel ones. But they were different. The gold of his soul shined through, bright and warm, but there was the telltale blue of something angelic there too. A mix of human and angel. Gabriel’s grace and Sam’s own soul flowed through him, presumably from the kiss, and Gabriel could feel them both wrapping around each other. Like they were meant to. 

“Sam,” he whispered, and let go of the shirt he was still clutching to run his fingers over Sam’s cheek.

“Don’t go,” Sam whispered back, and kissed him again.

This time the kiss was deep and heated, begging without words, and Gabriel could feel the warmth of Sam’s soul wrapping around his grace. It reached for him, tangled him up in the same way Sam’s arms held his body, and held on tight. The churning and twisting inside of him stopped, held in place, and the creeping cold ebbed until it was solely focused at the wound in his chest. It hurt. It hurt so fucking much, but all Gabriel could do was hang on and kiss Sam like his life depended on it. Because it did. At this moment it did.

He let out a cry as something wrapped around his heart. Gabriel’s body jerked, and his hand dropped from Sam’s face to cover the one that was still resting on his chest. Sam’s fingers dug into his sternum, gripped harder than he should have been able to, and Gabriel threw his head back as a streak of white hot pain erupted through him. It was like nothing he’d ever felt before. Even the blade stabbing him before hadn’t hurt this much, and it stole what little breath he had left.

“Gabriel,” he heard Sam say, and he fought through the painful shocks that ran through him so he could look at Sam.

What he saw was…

Light. Light like Gabriel hadn’t seen since Heaven. It flowed out from Sam like an aura, like Gabriel’s wings when he was in his truest form, and wrapped around them both. This was the power of an Archangel’s vessel. This was the power of his Father’s prophecy. Sam Winchester had always been fated to hold the power of Heaven in him. 

Sam Winchester was Holy. 

The grip on Gabriel’s chest loosened, and Sam leaned in to kiss him again. Their lips met, and Gabriel sighed into it. Soul and grace wrapped around each other, tangled to the point where there was no way to discern one from the other, and that white hot pain burned the hole in him closed. It softened, eased, and as Sam kept kissing him Gabriel could feel it seek out the other parts of him that were still ripped open and bloody from where he’d cut himself off from Heaven. All those aches and pains, all the guilt and fear, were soothed in that moment. He was whole. Finally, after eons and millennia, Gabriel was whole again.

This was what had pulled him along for the entirety of his existence. Gabriel had run, tried to hide away every last aspect of his true self, but he could never fully escape it. It had always been there. All those years of painful emptiness, the unending longing, and now it was as though he’d been made anew all over again. 

The kiss slowed. Sam’s lips were still against his own, but it was more about sharing breath and space than anything else. The hand on Gabriel’s chest clenched, but he could feel that the hole that had been there moments ago was gone now. It felt cold, tingly, and almost like there was a barrier keeping him from fully being able to feel Sam’s hand against him. He could feel the warmth of Sam’s palm through it, though. It was soothing and gentle, and any lingering ache was gone. He was healed. Sam had healed him. 

“I couldn’t take it all,” Sam said against his lips, and let out a shaky breath, “I tried.”

“You couldn’t,” Gabriel murmured, “you’re human.”

Sam moved away just enough that they could both look down. Gabriel was shocked to see that the blood was gone. There had been so much of it, and now it looked like he’d snapped it away but he hadn’t. He saw his own chest, rising and falling with his breath, clean and bare. Sam’s gaze moved over him, and Gabriel could feel it like it was another set of hands on his skin, but stopped where the wound had been. Gabriel’s eyes followed, and where before there had been nothing but the pristine flesh of his vessel now there was a black and curling scar. A lasting reminder of Lucifer, yes, but also a testament to Sam.

“It’s on you too. The real you. The you under…this. I can see it.”

Gabriel reached out to run his fingers through Sam’s hair, then down to lift his chin. He studied Sam’s eyes. They were still the same beautiful hazel, but Gabriel could still see the lingering gold and blue that burned inside of him. Their shared soul and grace. If Sam could see the mark on his true self without his eyes burning out of his skull then it meant they were tangled together, almost like one being without the possession. Together. Always.

“It’s okay,” Gabriel told him, “I’m alright.”

Sam nodded and turned his head to press a kiss against Gabriel’s palm. His eyes closed, and he took a few deep breaths before he moved to stretch out along Gabriel’s side. The hand that had been on his chest before rested there again, over the scar, and Sam buried his face in Gabriel’s neck. Both of Gabriel’s arms wound around his shoulders and he kissed the top of Sam’s head. Warmth flowed through him. Comfort. Contentment. This was right. This was how it was supposed to happen. 

“Thank you,” Gabriel whispered against Sam’s hair, “for not letting me go.”

Sam made a noise against his throat, and Gabriel closed eyes at the feeling of lips on his pulse. He could feel the warmth of Sam’s body beside him and the way he breathed. He could feel his hands, his breath, and the way his hair tickled Gabriel’s cheek whenever he moved. He could also feel Sam’s soul curled up and nestled against his grace. He could feel it warm him from the inside like nothing ever had. His Sam, now. And now he was Sam’s Gabriel.

There was still a looming Apocalypse to stop. He’d done his job: given them what they needed to hopefully end it without the rest of the world going with them. Gabriel knew he would have to square off against his brothers because he’d chosen a side now. Sam’s side. He chose to be by Sam’s side.