Chapter Text
Gabriel woke up somewhere unknown and wasn't that just a kicker because he had been fully expecting to not wake up at all. Really, that was the best-case scenario when your once beloved brother stabs you with your own blade.
It took a few blinks but he was able to see he was in some room that was covered in sigils, things designed to keep him in and prying eyes out and he faltered a bit. There was a distant pain, something achy and deep in his grace and he knew it was scarring over. A lasting reminder of just one more betrayal in the web of hate that tangled them all together.
He was even in his same clothes that he had thought he was to die in, green jacket, jeans, boots and his shirt that now came with a complementary hole, the edges hard with dried blood. His vessel’s blood and if he looked closely he could still see slight burns – no, no he wasn't going to look that closely. Just like right now was not the time to question the whole, well, being whole problem.
It was the realization that he couldn't feel his wings, to even attempt to escape that took his breath away and he staggered to his feet, panicked.
All of him was still there, he could feel his grace but not use it and finally, the heaviness on his neck and wrists broke through the terror and he held his hands out, sleeves pulling back on his arms a little. There were circlets engraved with ancient markings, things whispered of but so rarely used that many of his brothers thought they were only a myth. His fingers felt his neck, finding the same there. No beginning or end, no way to get them off and he knew what they had been made out of.
The only other thing in this tiny room barring the walls and a bare bulb was a door. Try as he might it wouldn't budge, his body lacking angelic strength and the markings over it baring exit even if he had it.
Sliding down a wall he waited. It was all he could do.
Lucifer appeared the next day. At least he was pretty sure it was the next day because his sense of time was jacked up from not having access to his grace. Which was all sorts of wrong for an angel.
“Hello, little brother.”
“What do you want?” How am I alive? His mind silently added.
“Oh Gabriel, I control Death. Do you think I would let you die in a hotel full of that heathen scum?”
“Well, kind of a hard call there since you were all too eager to ventilate me.”
“As I recall, you were trying to stab me first,” Lucifer clucked his tongue and squatted next to him. Gabriel resolutely stared ahead. “Come on, little brother, didn't you think there would be a price?”
“And you're judge, jury, and executioner?”
“No.” That mouth was so close to his ear that it took a lot to not squirm. “I want you to know what it's like to be a cockroach. Like them.”
“Looking for something new to step on?”
“I want you to teach you so you understand. I want you to join me.”
“Kind of already got my fill on insanity the first run around,” he panted, feeling a sharp tug on his head, Lucifer's cold fingers wrapping around his scalp. He really shouldn't say that, he knew better. He knew but he couldn't help it.
“You have such a mouth, Gabriel. It is something that we will correct. And we have time,” Lucifer said quietly, Gabriel wondering how much time his brother really had as he burned through that vessel. All those lesions and he wondered if it was because Sam Winchester was close to breaking.
Oh, Father.
He closed his eyes, not wanting to look at the crazy in the pale blue ones staring at him. He should have helped them more; he should have done something to stop this thing that claimed to be his brother.
“Let's begin, shall we?”
“Couldn't we discuss this over breakfast? Preferably something with extra syrup and -”
The scream exploded out of him as he felt Lucifer's blade slash across his chest. He couldn't keep it in and he prayed that maybe Death would be kind enough to take him this time.
He was a mess of blood and grace on the floor and wasn't it just ironic that his grace could be leaking out but he still couldn't do anything with it? There was a hysterical laugh trying to bubble past his lips but he swallowed it back, the pain grounding him a little even though everything right now felt distant.
In this room with no sun, he had lost track of time but it still flowed onward, marching towards that inevitable conclusion that he would die here. He had cried out to his Father, to Raphael, Castiel, even to Michael though he feared the last as much as Lucifer. A terrified part of him thought Michael might join in with this, that he was this lost, and given the state of Dean Winchester at times it wouldn't come as a surprise.
No one came, and he panted against the cold floor, Lucifer standing there watching.
“Am I pretty enough, Luci, or do you have work to do yet?”
It would do no good to egg on his brother but if he was going to die here he was going to die like a damn angel, not some broken wreck. Or worse, turn into that thing in front of him. That monstrosity of twisted black grace that still wanted to believe it was an angel. That they were family and this was love.
“You still talk too much, Gabriel. We'll have to do more to rectify that.”
There was an involuntary shudder in him, knowing the extent his brother would go to try and get him to beg. This body, well, this body had never been about to take home the virgin of the year award but what it was now -
He cut off that train of thought before it reached the station and tried for a smirk at his brother.
“Good to know you get off to something, Luci,” he said right before he felt a hard kick to his ribs. He sucked in air, the pain exploding and coming roaring back and he forced himself not to curl up, to not look submissive.
“Really, Gabriel. This is for your own good. Get up.”
His body sent the message that it was refusing that command at this time and he tried to force back the feeling of helplessness. There was another hard kick though he doubted telling Lucifer that that wouldn't speed things up would help at all in this situation. Somehow he managed to push himself up to his knees and felt a cold hand on his shoulder, deep ice of hate against him, and he did shudder.
“Actually, I think I like you like this,” Lucifer said, his voice merry as he gave a gentle shove, putting him on all fours. “Submissive, just for me.”
Something was breaking in his mind; he could feel his grace crying out in desperation for Michael even as he tried to quiet it. Those cold hands on him, that mouth by his ear and he willed himself not to crack, not now. He wouldn't be this.
“Michael isn't coming, little brother. He abandoned you, just like he did to me.”
A sob unbidden escaped his throat as those hands lazily stroked down his exposed body then suddenly they stopped as a flash went past him. There was the sound of something being slammed into the wall and he turned in time to see an overgrown teenager there pinning Lucifer, his sword through the latter's chest.
Michael. He couldn't see him in that vessel in his state but it was him, he would know that power leaking through those pores anywhere.
Lucifer's mouth formed a small 'o' in surprise as Michael withdrew his blade, Morning Star sliding down the wall leaving a trail of blood. As the grace begin unraveling Michael turned, flaming sword still in hand to take him in. Gabriel felt so exposed, his brother's dying cry ringing and deafening in this small room as his light finally flashed out. As the eldest of all of them made his way to him, Gabriel scrabbled back, wanting to get away.
Not like this, he couldn't die here like this. Not by those hands.
A small frown creased Michael's face and he looked down at his sword as if realizing it was still out. He was wearing a tall, lanky kid with sandy hair who had a look of being far too young to be mixed up in all of this. Gabriel was fairly certain that it was their half-brother that had met an untimely death by ghouls before he had known about him. It meant Sam and Dean were angel free and at least the world wasn't going to burn.
That thought calmed him a bit. Maybe he could be ready for this.
“Go ahead,” he said and Michael's face became more vexed.
“Little One, what has he done to you?”
“What hasn't he done? So you know, if you plan on ganking me let's get this party started. I know you have paradise to raise and things to rule.”
Michael looked back down at his sword and to Gabriel's surprise, it disappeared as his brother came towards him. He couldn't help but flinch as Michael crouched down and reached out to him. Something flickered in those features before they became carefully blank again.
“I cannot take these off of you until you are stable.”
“So you don't want to kill me?”
“I would never hurt you.”
And, wow, Gabriel was inclined to almost believe him. Almost.
“Sure, Mikey. Whatever you say. Not like stabbing someone is the only way to hurt them or anything.”
There was that look again and he wondered how much control his brother was exerting to not look like he felt anything. Last time he had seen him he had felt that same coldness which Lucifer had grown into a full-blown blizzard. He doubted little had changed.
“You should rest.”
He tried to push back, to get away from that hand, but the wall stubbornly refused to stop existing and the last thing he saw was Michael's blank eyes staring at him as his villainous vessel betrayed him and obeyed.