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I'm sorry, I'm sorry, but I just can't pass up Gabriel/Loki. I can't. *ducks head* And the chance to add in Cas, and Loki's kids ...
Title: Running Games
Rating: PG-13
Fandoms: Supernatural, Norse Myth
Continuity: Sequel to Weregild
Characters/Pairings: Castiel, Raphael, Jormungandr, Loki, Gabriel. Mention of Uriel, Hel, Yahweh, Dean'n'Sam, most of Heaven ... Gabriel/Loki pairing
Summary: Castiel and a grief-maddened Raphael finally have their showdown. Unfortunately, having it over the ocean was maybe not the best plan ...
Wordcount: 3620
Warnings/Spoilers: up past 5x22, same as Weregild. Probably only makes sense if you've read that story.
Disclaimer: I can dream? But no, I don't own.
He should have. Even more than a year ago, he should have seen that. Uriel. He should have remembered Uriel. The pain of his old friend, the exhaustion, the grief and hope and cold anger. The pity in the other angel's eyes as he raised his hand to kill Castiel. Not for his death, that pity. For his innocence. Uriel had regretted that Castiel would die without understanding, without realising that God was dead or had abandoned them, without realising the Apocalypse was their only hope, without realising that it was to Lucifer or Michael he should look, not God. Not humanity. That's what Uriel had thought, when he raised his hand with pity in his eyes.
That's what Heaven thought now. But there was no pity in the eyes of the angels who looked at him on this White Plain. No understanding, no pained grief. Only wild, anguished rage. Only endless grief, and the loss of their last hope. Only the knowledge that, God or no God, right or wrong, Castiel had helped cage all that they had believed in, in the long years without their Father. Only the knowledge that he had helped steal their last hope for reprieve.
Heaven did not forgive something like that. Heaven did not remember how.
He had told Dean he wanted to help them. Clean up the town. Be the sheriff. He'd told Dean that, and he'd meant it. But Heaven didn't want his help. Heaven didn't want his justice. Heaven wanted his blood. His blood, his Grace, his screaming cries. His death. Arm in arm, angels came to kill him. Pushed past thought of consequence. Pushed past caring. And anyway. Even if God really did raise him, if God really had brought him back not once, but twice, well ... third time's the charm, right? Even in Heaven.
They wanted him dead. And though that was nothing new, though he had faced that and more over the past year, though he had known, in some little secret place, that maybe this would be the way it ended ... Castiel found he did not want to let them. He didn't want to fight them, he didn't want to die, he had no time to explain.
So he ran. Ran from Heaven, ran to the only place he had ever been even briefly safe. He ran to Earth, to home, to the world he had died twice to protect.
And those angels that could, those angels that had vessels, came after him.
It was Raphael who caught him, in the end. Raphael, wild and crazed, lightning burning behind his eyes as the once-healer surrendered the last shreds of sanity, of compassion. Raphael, who had loved Michael, served beside Zachariah, who had believed with every fiber of his being that their Father had left, that their Father had to have died, rather than let them be hurt so. Rather than let the world go to ruin. Raphael, who thought he had acted in good faith as long as he could, and been ignored for it, while Castiel ... Castiel had known their Father's mercy. Raphael, who had promised him a death, months ago. Raphael, who found time now to fulfill that promise.
As he fell, as he flew, as he tumbled away from that burning, anguished Grace towards Earth, Castiel understood then the pity that had lived in Uriel's eyes. He understood what it was to look at an enemy who had once been a comrade, and feel nothing but pity for their blindness.
He understood what it was like to have to raise your hand anyway.
He led Raphael through the skies, through the fall. Lead him far from humanity, far from anyone that might be hurt by the archangel's maddened grief. To the icy wastes of the north, the howling vastness that still existed in the gaps of humanity's grasping spread, their endless, desperate needs. To the quiet places that yet remained, where an angel could die alone, in peace, and leave no scar upon his charges. Castiel led Raphael north, for one of them to die. There was no other way, now. He understood that.
In a way, he always had. Castiel was, and ever would be, a soldier. The enemy may have changed, the General, the cause ... but the fight had not. The instinct had not.
The pity had not.
Ice boiled as they landed, cracked with a deep and terrible sound as they impacted, and Castiel staggered, blinded by steam and lightning, his blade in his hand. He dove away on pure instinct, feeling Grace sear the air behind him, fighting blind. But he had learned how to do that, in his time on Earth. He had learned how to fight far more than blind. Without Grace, without strength, without sense, without hope. He had learned that, over and over at Dean's side, at Sam's side. He had learned that. He would not fall now. Not now. He ran, he dodged, he called Grace to shield and deflect and anything, anything that would keep him alive. Castiel did not want to die. Not again.
He'd had just about enough of that, after all. Twice was enough for anyone.
Raphael swung again, furiously, clumsily, maddened past care for skill. The archangel was nothing but raw power and rage, a silent scream of grief and passion against Castiel's senses, a deadly force of hate. He struck out, over and over, while ice screamed and the sea fountained, and angels left in Heaven watched with pitiless eyes.
And then, as ice collapsed, as Castiel staggered and went down on a floe, as Raphael screamed in triumph and agony over him, then, then ...
A great head broke the surface of the waves. No. Not great. Massive. Gargantuan, terrible, monstrous. A vast head reared up out of the sea behind the archangel, behind the gleaming arc of Raphael's sword, and turned dark, depthless eyes on their battle. On the archangel.
Castiel cried a warning. Not out of caring but out of sheer, stunned instinct. Castiel called out to what in a past life would have been his brother, his comrade, and screamed to him that an enemy had come. Screamed to him to watch his back, Raphael, please. He called out a warning, crumpled at the archangel's feet, helpless beneath the blade. Raphael didn't listen. Raphael didn't even hear.
The monster reached down his mighty head, tore the sword from Raphael's hands between vast jaws, pulled the archangel screaming into the air, and plunged down once more beneath the surface, carrying Raphael with him out of sight.
For a second, Castiel did nothing. Shock, sheer disbelief, amazement and pain. Too many things to be believed. For a second, he did nothing.
Then he found his blade, scrabbled to his feet, and raced to dive after the creature and its hapless prey.
Hands caught him. Appearing out of nowhere, wrapping around his waist, pulling him off his feet and back from the edge. Small hands, maybe, but pulsing with power. With such power. Castiel lashed out in shock, wrenched himself free on the edge of the iceberg and spun, sliding on the ice, his blade raised in front of him. He spun.
And almost fell backwards into the ocean in sheer shock.
"Gabriel??"
The last face his brother had worn in life crinkled, folding itself into an exasperated smile. A far harder smile than any Gabriel had ever worn, holding more potential cruelty than the Messenger had ever owned, ever felt. The creature behind that face smiled, and Castiel knew instantly it was not him. It wasn't Gabriel.
"Right form, wrong occupant," the creature smirked, and sketched a little bow for Castiel, waving a graceful hand and smiling through gleaming eyes as Castiel backed to the crumbling edge of the ice, between the ocean with its monster and the creature wearing his brother's face. "I'm afraid Gabriel doesn't live here anymore. Had to make alternate arrangements ..."
"Loki," Castiel whispered quietly. "You're Loki."
The creature -god- grinned, bouncing back on his heels, completely at ease on the ice. For a second, he looked exactly like the archangel that had worn his face, exactly like the man who had possessed him for so many years. For a second, he looked exactly like Gabriel.
Something clenched, hot and hard, in Castiel's stomach.
"You're quick, you are," the god grinned, that lurking cruelty fading behind the bright glitter of real humour, studying Castiel up and down. "I thought so, watching you that time. Easy to manipulate, but hard to fool. Pretty rare, the likes of you, you know that? A Trickster's dream, too. Challenging in all the right ways."
Castiel shook his head, feeling ice cracking warningly beneath his feet, spreading his wings to catch himself. He didn't look back at the ocean. Didn't look down for the monster in its depths. The Leviathan. He knew what it was, now. Who it was. It was the creature before him he had to fear first. But ...
"Raphael," he said, cautiously. "Is he ...?"
Loki tilted his head, eyes crinkling in that wry sarcastic assessment that was so familiar, and Castiel took a moment to curse the god for wearing his brother's face, wearing Gabriel's face. Though technically it had been Loki's face first, and Castiel supposed it was only fair for him to regain it after the archangel had ... had left ... it still made it hard. So very hard. To raise his blade against the one angel in Heaven or Earth who had actually helped him.
"Worried about your enemy," Loki mused. "About the angel who had you on your back with a sword at your throat not five minutes ago." A pause, and then a bright, fierce smile. "Oh yes. You are his brother, aren't you? Bloody archangel wouldn't even try to kill his brother. To fight back. Not in earnest, anyway. And here you are, diving into the ocean after the one who almost killed you. Yup. Definitely Gabriel's. Definitely."
Castiel flinched, shrugged, looking away uneasily. "Gabriel was ... I do not know what I was to him, or he to me. I simply want to know ... what will happen to Raphael."
The god watched him for another second, weighing him with eyes full of a laughing darkness, and then he moved. Meandered gently around Castiel, forcing him to circle back around, away from the edge, smirking as he kept his sword instinctively between them, and crouched down on the lip of the ice. Staring down into the iron seas, smile gone soft and pensive.
"He'll be fine," Loki said at last, with a small twist of his lips. "Or he'll live, at least. Jor's just going to soften him up a little, toss him back up once he's too beaten to be a danger for a while. Shouldn't take long. Angels don't do at all well underwater, you know. But he'll be fine." He turned his head, eyed Castiel with a smile. "Don't worry. I'd never hear the end of it, if I let him die. But you ... if I'd let you die, Castiel ... oh, that would have been trouble. That would have been a whole heap of trouble. So Raphy here had to take his little bath. Hope you don't mind?"
Castiel frowned, confused. "Why?" he asked, warily. "Why would you want to protect me? I am not ... there is no-one ... there would be no consequence for letting me fall. Not for you ..." He stopped, but Loki was already smiling, that slow, cruel smirk, eager anticipation, and he was looking behind Castiel, looking beyond him ...
"Oh, but there would be," a slow, familiar voice purred behind him, smiling as Castiel turned to stare into familiar, sardonic eyes, smiling as he looked into a mirror of the god behind him, the very same face, but this one ... This one was softer, lighter. More full of humour, more full of caring. This one was so, so familiar ...
"Gabriel?" Castiel whispered, not daring to believe. Not again. "Gabriel?"
"Hey, little bro," Gabriel said gently, before flashing Loki a smile. "Don't you worry about this old Trickster. He'll help you, or I'll have his head. Part of the deal, that, and he knows it. And if I don't ... well, there's Dad, too. Hel may be able to stare our Father down with no ill effects, but Loki might find himself having a little more trouble ..."
"It's His own fault," the god grinned, resting his hands on his hips as he matched Gabriel smirk for smirk, challenging and bright as Castiel stared between them, completely confused. "If the little bastard wouldn't keep challenging people who want to kill him, we wouldn't have this problem! You don't see me knocking on Odin's door, do you? No. If Castiel had died, it would have been his own stupid fault, and First-father can blame no-one but Himself!"
Gabriel tilted his head, pouting thoughtfully. "Huh. Could work. Maybe. It has merit, and after Hel dressed him down ... it could work, I guess." A slow grin. "Still leaves me to answer to, though. What were you planning to say to me, darling?"
Loki smirked. "Maybe I wasn't planning to tell you anything," he murmured dangerously, prowling towards the archangel, towards his twin in face and power and mischief. "Maybe I was planning to simply spend the next century or so ravishing you so senseless you couldn't remember your own name, let alone your suicidal little brother ..."
Gabriel grinned fiercely, fanning wings in challenge, bouncing on his toes as he circled the god. "You think you're that good, Loki darling? You think you could?"
And Loki grinned, and looked all set to answer, when suddenly the ice beneath them heaved, almost knocking the three of them off into the sea. Gabriel instantly darted forward to grab the god around the waist, tug him close and pull him rapidly into the air, clutching Loki protectively to his chest. The archangel cast around for a moment until he saw that Castiel had followed them up, flashing Castiel a small smile of relief.
Castiel simply frowned, confused by too many things, still barely able to believe that Gabriel was alive, was here, and that the archangel also appeared to be here in the arms of a pagan god was simply too much to handle right now. Besides. He had other concerns.
He watched the huge head rise once more from the waves beneath them, massive, weighty and serene. Watched Jormungandr, the Midgard Serpent, the Leviathan, rise from the deeps once again. Watched the creature reach down and lay a crumpled body on the ice.
Watched him return Raphael to them.
He barely waited until the World Serpent had pulled back his jaws before he was darting down, skidding on the landing as he reached for the archangel's body, as he reached to check. He heard Gabriel hit the ice behind him, far more gracefully, but paid little attention, searching for the vessel's pulse, the angel's Grace. Searching for proof that Raphael was yet alive. And as Gabriel knelt silently beside him, as one archangel reached down to cradle another's head ... he found it. Found Raphael. Battered but alive.
Castiel had brought him here to die. He had brought Raphael to Earth, to this quiet place, so that one of them could fall, and the other finally be free. So that they could end this war between them and know at last the pity that Uriel had known, so very briefly. So that they could know a soldier's mercy. He had brought Raphael here to die.
And now, he didn't have to. Not yet. Not if Castiel could have the chance to talk to him, to help him, to explain ... everything he had wanted as he flew through Heaven's gates once more. Not if Castiel could show him ... so much. The proof of their Father's caring. The worthiness of humanity. The true cost of the war, and it's true solution ...
He looked up, up at the towering mass of the Leviathan, of Loki's monstrous son. Looked up to meet the depthless, intelligent eyes of Jormungandr, the World Serpent. Looked up, reached out, one pale hand outstretched towards jaws that could swallow him whole, tear him apart, and Castiel whispered thank you. To a monster and the son of a monster. For sparing his enemy's life, for saving more than the Serpent could know.
Jormungandr almost flinched, his great form quivering in shock, and he lowered his massive head to nudge Castiel's hand. Slowly, waiting for Castiel to flinch back, to retreat in shock and revulsion, or in fear and anger. Jormungandr reached down and touched his nose to Castiel's hand, murmuring silently his welcome, and Castiel did not flinch. He had learned better. Instead he smiled, desperate with relief and sudden hope, and leaned in to rest his forehead against the great jaws.
"Thank you," he rasped again. "You don't know what you've saved ... Thank you."
"Alright," said another voice, very quietly, in surprise and soft ferocity. Castiel lifted his head, looked round to see Loki standing beside Gabriel, to see the god's hand digging into the archangel's shoulder so hard it had to hurt, his expression dark and haggard, laid open. Gabriel, kneeling beside him over his fallen brother, only smiled, soft and broken and proud. "Alright," Loki repeated. "We'll take care of him, Gabriel. Just this one. Just for that."
"I told you," the archangel said softly, cradling Raphael's head. "I told you he was the best of them. My little brother." He bit his lip, smiling rich and proud at Castiel. "Family worth fighting for. I told you."
"Yes," Loki whispered, and his dark gaze wrapped around more than Castiel, reaching out to embrace his son and something more beyond him, something Castiel could not see. "Yes."
Castiel blinked, looking between them. "Gabriel?" he asked quietly. Demanded, maybe. "Gabriel ... what is this? What ... What are you?"
The archangel smiled faintly, and shook his head. "Nothing, kid," he answered wryly. "Nothing at all. Just a big brother who maybe missed his chance once, and wants to make up for it. Just someone who wants ... to look out for you, that's all. Me and my ... my lover here. If ... If you'll have us?" His voice cracked around the end, his eyes dropping down to stare blindly at Raphael, and beside him Loki all but radiated power and danger and fierce, protective challenge, his hand still resting possessively on Gabriel's shoulder.
Behind Castiel, Jormungandr moved, pushing forward gently to nudge Castiel towards them. Castiel looked back at him, and saw in ancient, serpentine eyes a love, a hope, a warm pity and a soft understanding. Leviathan, great and terrible beast of legend, and when he looked towards his father and his father's angel, what whispered in vast, dark eyes was a simple echo. Family worth fighting for.
And Castiel ... had to agree.
"Always, brother," he said, turning on his knees to look at Gabriel once more. To smile his own tired, hopeful smile. "I missed you, Gabriel," he admitted softly. "When Sam told me ... I missed you. I wished ... many things. I did not think I would ever get a chance to ask them again. To ask you ..."
Gabriel bit his lip, the corner of his mouth curling up, eyes bright and shining for a second before he mastered himself, before he pushed back that terrible vulnerability and managed a challenging grin. "Hey now," he managed. "Never said I was going to answer questions or anything, bro! An archangel's gotta keep up his air of mystery ..."
"You mean his air of cheap theatrics," Loki murmured darkly beside him, but the god was smiling. Gabriel elbowed him viciously.
"And where did I learn the cheap theatrics?" he purred pointedly, grinning up.
Loki smirked. "Oh no. You don't get to blame that on me. We may have been stuck together for a few centuries, but I promise you, the cheesy flourish is all you, Gabriel. Ask Jor, here. I was never that cheap."
Castiel felt the rich, rumbling thread of the Serpent's amusement curling through him, the vibrations of laughter through the snout beneath his hand. "Brother Sleipnir might disagree," the Leviathan noted disingenuously, tilting his vast head to the side in faux innocence and almost knocking the lot of them into the sea. Loki scowled impressively.
"Oh, I don't know," Castiel decided to weigh in, before the weight of Gabriel's smug smile could threaten to capsize them itself and beat the Serpent to the punch. "I remember rumours in the garrison, about Gabriel having to talk his way out of having lost a certain Trumpet ..."
The god and the archangel looked at each other, their faces so strangely twinned, their expression eeriely similar, and nodded in unison, twin smirks creeping over their faces.
"Dump the homicidal brother somewhere safe, Gabriel," Loki purred. "You can take Jor. I'll pin Cas."
"No need," the archangel grinned, rising slow and ready and eager. "Raph'll be unconscious for ages yet. I'm sure he'll be fine. These two, on the other hand ..."
Castiel watched them warily, feeling his own mouth curl into a smile, the vast bulk of the World Serpent shaking in amusement and challenge behind him. He looked up, met Jormungandr's cunning eyes, and grinned. Well, he had come to Earth to run, this time. And a little race couldn't hurt. Blow off steam. Get rid of all the adrenalin pumping through Jimmy's body after the stress of Heaven and Raphael ...
"You will have to catch us first," he challenged quietly, and laughed at the flash of delight in both their eyes as he leapt into the air and his new comrade dove beneath the waves. He'd never played a game with one of his brothers before. Never played at all, really.
He looked forward to learning how.
Contd: Win, Lose, or Draw
A/N: For a really, really, REALLY awesome Gabriel & Jormungandr comic, look here. Zanzekiel delivers in a big way. *grins* Seriously. It's awesome.
Title: Running Games
Rating: PG-13
Fandoms: Supernatural, Norse Myth
Continuity: Sequel to Weregild
Characters/Pairings: Castiel, Raphael, Jormungandr, Loki, Gabriel. Mention of Uriel, Hel, Yahweh, Dean'n'Sam, most of Heaven ... Gabriel/Loki pairing
Summary: Castiel and a grief-maddened Raphael finally have their showdown. Unfortunately, having it over the ocean was maybe not the best plan ...
Wordcount: 3620
Warnings/Spoilers: up past 5x22, same as Weregild. Probably only makes sense if you've read that story.
Disclaimer: I can dream? But no, I don't own.
Running Games
Castiel had expected many things, returning to Heaven. Expected chaos, confusion, fear. Anger. Even violence. What he had not expected, not really ... was the grief. The hollow, white rage, the mindless desolation. The grief. For Michael, for Zachariah. Even for Lucifer. He had not expected that.He should have. Even more than a year ago, he should have seen that. Uriel. He should have remembered Uriel. The pain of his old friend, the exhaustion, the grief and hope and cold anger. The pity in the other angel's eyes as he raised his hand to kill Castiel. Not for his death, that pity. For his innocence. Uriel had regretted that Castiel would die without understanding, without realising that God was dead or had abandoned them, without realising the Apocalypse was their only hope, without realising that it was to Lucifer or Michael he should look, not God. Not humanity. That's what Uriel had thought, when he raised his hand with pity in his eyes.
That's what Heaven thought now. But there was no pity in the eyes of the angels who looked at him on this White Plain. No understanding, no pained grief. Only wild, anguished rage. Only endless grief, and the loss of their last hope. Only the knowledge that, God or no God, right or wrong, Castiel had helped cage all that they had believed in, in the long years without their Father. Only the knowledge that he had helped steal their last hope for reprieve.
Heaven did not forgive something like that. Heaven did not remember how.
He had told Dean he wanted to help them. Clean up the town. Be the sheriff. He'd told Dean that, and he'd meant it. But Heaven didn't want his help. Heaven didn't want his justice. Heaven wanted his blood. His blood, his Grace, his screaming cries. His death. Arm in arm, angels came to kill him. Pushed past thought of consequence. Pushed past caring. And anyway. Even if God really did raise him, if God really had brought him back not once, but twice, well ... third time's the charm, right? Even in Heaven.
They wanted him dead. And though that was nothing new, though he had faced that and more over the past year, though he had known, in some little secret place, that maybe this would be the way it ended ... Castiel found he did not want to let them. He didn't want to fight them, he didn't want to die, he had no time to explain.
So he ran. Ran from Heaven, ran to the only place he had ever been even briefly safe. He ran to Earth, to home, to the world he had died twice to protect.
And those angels that could, those angels that had vessels, came after him.
It was Raphael who caught him, in the end. Raphael, wild and crazed, lightning burning behind his eyes as the once-healer surrendered the last shreds of sanity, of compassion. Raphael, who had loved Michael, served beside Zachariah, who had believed with every fiber of his being that their Father had left, that their Father had to have died, rather than let them be hurt so. Rather than let the world go to ruin. Raphael, who thought he had acted in good faith as long as he could, and been ignored for it, while Castiel ... Castiel had known their Father's mercy. Raphael, who had promised him a death, months ago. Raphael, who found time now to fulfill that promise.
As he fell, as he flew, as he tumbled away from that burning, anguished Grace towards Earth, Castiel understood then the pity that had lived in Uriel's eyes. He understood what it was to look at an enemy who had once been a comrade, and feel nothing but pity for their blindness.
He understood what it was like to have to raise your hand anyway.
He led Raphael through the skies, through the fall. Lead him far from humanity, far from anyone that might be hurt by the archangel's maddened grief. To the icy wastes of the north, the howling vastness that still existed in the gaps of humanity's grasping spread, their endless, desperate needs. To the quiet places that yet remained, where an angel could die alone, in peace, and leave no scar upon his charges. Castiel led Raphael north, for one of them to die. There was no other way, now. He understood that.
In a way, he always had. Castiel was, and ever would be, a soldier. The enemy may have changed, the General, the cause ... but the fight had not. The instinct had not.
The pity had not.
Ice boiled as they landed, cracked with a deep and terrible sound as they impacted, and Castiel staggered, blinded by steam and lightning, his blade in his hand. He dove away on pure instinct, feeling Grace sear the air behind him, fighting blind. But he had learned how to do that, in his time on Earth. He had learned how to fight far more than blind. Without Grace, without strength, without sense, without hope. He had learned that, over and over at Dean's side, at Sam's side. He had learned that. He would not fall now. Not now. He ran, he dodged, he called Grace to shield and deflect and anything, anything that would keep him alive. Castiel did not want to die. Not again.
He'd had just about enough of that, after all. Twice was enough for anyone.
Raphael swung again, furiously, clumsily, maddened past care for skill. The archangel was nothing but raw power and rage, a silent scream of grief and passion against Castiel's senses, a deadly force of hate. He struck out, over and over, while ice screamed and the sea fountained, and angels left in Heaven watched with pitiless eyes.
And then, as ice collapsed, as Castiel staggered and went down on a floe, as Raphael screamed in triumph and agony over him, then, then ...
A great head broke the surface of the waves. No. Not great. Massive. Gargantuan, terrible, monstrous. A vast head reared up out of the sea behind the archangel, behind the gleaming arc of Raphael's sword, and turned dark, depthless eyes on their battle. On the archangel.
Castiel cried a warning. Not out of caring but out of sheer, stunned instinct. Castiel called out to what in a past life would have been his brother, his comrade, and screamed to him that an enemy had come. Screamed to him to watch his back, Raphael, please. He called out a warning, crumpled at the archangel's feet, helpless beneath the blade. Raphael didn't listen. Raphael didn't even hear.
The monster reached down his mighty head, tore the sword from Raphael's hands between vast jaws, pulled the archangel screaming into the air, and plunged down once more beneath the surface, carrying Raphael with him out of sight.
For a second, Castiel did nothing. Shock, sheer disbelief, amazement and pain. Too many things to be believed. For a second, he did nothing.
Then he found his blade, scrabbled to his feet, and raced to dive after the creature and its hapless prey.
Hands caught him. Appearing out of nowhere, wrapping around his waist, pulling him off his feet and back from the edge. Small hands, maybe, but pulsing with power. With such power. Castiel lashed out in shock, wrenched himself free on the edge of the iceberg and spun, sliding on the ice, his blade raised in front of him. He spun.
And almost fell backwards into the ocean in sheer shock.
"Gabriel??"
The last face his brother had worn in life crinkled, folding itself into an exasperated smile. A far harder smile than any Gabriel had ever worn, holding more potential cruelty than the Messenger had ever owned, ever felt. The creature behind that face smiled, and Castiel knew instantly it was not him. It wasn't Gabriel.
"Right form, wrong occupant," the creature smirked, and sketched a little bow for Castiel, waving a graceful hand and smiling through gleaming eyes as Castiel backed to the crumbling edge of the ice, between the ocean with its monster and the creature wearing his brother's face. "I'm afraid Gabriel doesn't live here anymore. Had to make alternate arrangements ..."
"Loki," Castiel whispered quietly. "You're Loki."
The creature -god- grinned, bouncing back on his heels, completely at ease on the ice. For a second, he looked exactly like the archangel that had worn his face, exactly like the man who had possessed him for so many years. For a second, he looked exactly like Gabriel.
Something clenched, hot and hard, in Castiel's stomach.
"You're quick, you are," the god grinned, that lurking cruelty fading behind the bright glitter of real humour, studying Castiel up and down. "I thought so, watching you that time. Easy to manipulate, but hard to fool. Pretty rare, the likes of you, you know that? A Trickster's dream, too. Challenging in all the right ways."
Castiel shook his head, feeling ice cracking warningly beneath his feet, spreading his wings to catch himself. He didn't look back at the ocean. Didn't look down for the monster in its depths. The Leviathan. He knew what it was, now. Who it was. It was the creature before him he had to fear first. But ...
"Raphael," he said, cautiously. "Is he ...?"
Loki tilted his head, eyes crinkling in that wry sarcastic assessment that was so familiar, and Castiel took a moment to curse the god for wearing his brother's face, wearing Gabriel's face. Though technically it had been Loki's face first, and Castiel supposed it was only fair for him to regain it after the archangel had ... had left ... it still made it hard. So very hard. To raise his blade against the one angel in Heaven or Earth who had actually helped him.
"Worried about your enemy," Loki mused. "About the angel who had you on your back with a sword at your throat not five minutes ago." A pause, and then a bright, fierce smile. "Oh yes. You are his brother, aren't you? Bloody archangel wouldn't even try to kill his brother. To fight back. Not in earnest, anyway. And here you are, diving into the ocean after the one who almost killed you. Yup. Definitely Gabriel's. Definitely."
Castiel flinched, shrugged, looking away uneasily. "Gabriel was ... I do not know what I was to him, or he to me. I simply want to know ... what will happen to Raphael."
The god watched him for another second, weighing him with eyes full of a laughing darkness, and then he moved. Meandered gently around Castiel, forcing him to circle back around, away from the edge, smirking as he kept his sword instinctively between them, and crouched down on the lip of the ice. Staring down into the iron seas, smile gone soft and pensive.
"He'll be fine," Loki said at last, with a small twist of his lips. "Or he'll live, at least. Jor's just going to soften him up a little, toss him back up once he's too beaten to be a danger for a while. Shouldn't take long. Angels don't do at all well underwater, you know. But he'll be fine." He turned his head, eyed Castiel with a smile. "Don't worry. I'd never hear the end of it, if I let him die. But you ... if I'd let you die, Castiel ... oh, that would have been trouble. That would have been a whole heap of trouble. So Raphy here had to take his little bath. Hope you don't mind?"
Castiel frowned, confused. "Why?" he asked, warily. "Why would you want to protect me? I am not ... there is no-one ... there would be no consequence for letting me fall. Not for you ..." He stopped, but Loki was already smiling, that slow, cruel smirk, eager anticipation, and he was looking behind Castiel, looking beyond him ...
"Oh, but there would be," a slow, familiar voice purred behind him, smiling as Castiel turned to stare into familiar, sardonic eyes, smiling as he looked into a mirror of the god behind him, the very same face, but this one ... This one was softer, lighter. More full of humour, more full of caring. This one was so, so familiar ...
"Gabriel?" Castiel whispered, not daring to believe. Not again. "Gabriel?"
"Hey, little bro," Gabriel said gently, before flashing Loki a smile. "Don't you worry about this old Trickster. He'll help you, or I'll have his head. Part of the deal, that, and he knows it. And if I don't ... well, there's Dad, too. Hel may be able to stare our Father down with no ill effects, but Loki might find himself having a little more trouble ..."
"It's His own fault," the god grinned, resting his hands on his hips as he matched Gabriel smirk for smirk, challenging and bright as Castiel stared between them, completely confused. "If the little bastard wouldn't keep challenging people who want to kill him, we wouldn't have this problem! You don't see me knocking on Odin's door, do you? No. If Castiel had died, it would have been his own stupid fault, and First-father can blame no-one but Himself!"
Gabriel tilted his head, pouting thoughtfully. "Huh. Could work. Maybe. It has merit, and after Hel dressed him down ... it could work, I guess." A slow grin. "Still leaves me to answer to, though. What were you planning to say to me, darling?"
Loki smirked. "Maybe I wasn't planning to tell you anything," he murmured dangerously, prowling towards the archangel, towards his twin in face and power and mischief. "Maybe I was planning to simply spend the next century or so ravishing you so senseless you couldn't remember your own name, let alone your suicidal little brother ..."
Gabriel grinned fiercely, fanning wings in challenge, bouncing on his toes as he circled the god. "You think you're that good, Loki darling? You think you could?"
And Loki grinned, and looked all set to answer, when suddenly the ice beneath them heaved, almost knocking the three of them off into the sea. Gabriel instantly darted forward to grab the god around the waist, tug him close and pull him rapidly into the air, clutching Loki protectively to his chest. The archangel cast around for a moment until he saw that Castiel had followed them up, flashing Castiel a small smile of relief.
Castiel simply frowned, confused by too many things, still barely able to believe that Gabriel was alive, was here, and that the archangel also appeared to be here in the arms of a pagan god was simply too much to handle right now. Besides. He had other concerns.
He watched the huge head rise once more from the waves beneath them, massive, weighty and serene. Watched Jormungandr, the Midgard Serpent, the Leviathan, rise from the deeps once again. Watched the creature reach down and lay a crumpled body on the ice.
Watched him return Raphael to them.
He barely waited until the World Serpent had pulled back his jaws before he was darting down, skidding on the landing as he reached for the archangel's body, as he reached to check. He heard Gabriel hit the ice behind him, far more gracefully, but paid little attention, searching for the vessel's pulse, the angel's Grace. Searching for proof that Raphael was yet alive. And as Gabriel knelt silently beside him, as one archangel reached down to cradle another's head ... he found it. Found Raphael. Battered but alive.
Castiel had brought him here to die. He had brought Raphael to Earth, to this quiet place, so that one of them could fall, and the other finally be free. So that they could end this war between them and know at last the pity that Uriel had known, so very briefly. So that they could know a soldier's mercy. He had brought Raphael here to die.
And now, he didn't have to. Not yet. Not if Castiel could have the chance to talk to him, to help him, to explain ... everything he had wanted as he flew through Heaven's gates once more. Not if Castiel could show him ... so much. The proof of their Father's caring. The worthiness of humanity. The true cost of the war, and it's true solution ...
He looked up, up at the towering mass of the Leviathan, of Loki's monstrous son. Looked up to meet the depthless, intelligent eyes of Jormungandr, the World Serpent. Looked up, reached out, one pale hand outstretched towards jaws that could swallow him whole, tear him apart, and Castiel whispered thank you. To a monster and the son of a monster. For sparing his enemy's life, for saving more than the Serpent could know.
Jormungandr almost flinched, his great form quivering in shock, and he lowered his massive head to nudge Castiel's hand. Slowly, waiting for Castiel to flinch back, to retreat in shock and revulsion, or in fear and anger. Jormungandr reached down and touched his nose to Castiel's hand, murmuring silently his welcome, and Castiel did not flinch. He had learned better. Instead he smiled, desperate with relief and sudden hope, and leaned in to rest his forehead against the great jaws.
"Thank you," he rasped again. "You don't know what you've saved ... Thank you."
"Alright," said another voice, very quietly, in surprise and soft ferocity. Castiel lifted his head, looked round to see Loki standing beside Gabriel, to see the god's hand digging into the archangel's shoulder so hard it had to hurt, his expression dark and haggard, laid open. Gabriel, kneeling beside him over his fallen brother, only smiled, soft and broken and proud. "Alright," Loki repeated. "We'll take care of him, Gabriel. Just this one. Just for that."
"I told you," the archangel said softly, cradling Raphael's head. "I told you he was the best of them. My little brother." He bit his lip, smiling rich and proud at Castiel. "Family worth fighting for. I told you."
"Yes," Loki whispered, and his dark gaze wrapped around more than Castiel, reaching out to embrace his son and something more beyond him, something Castiel could not see. "Yes."
Castiel blinked, looking between them. "Gabriel?" he asked quietly. Demanded, maybe. "Gabriel ... what is this? What ... What are you?"
The archangel smiled faintly, and shook his head. "Nothing, kid," he answered wryly. "Nothing at all. Just a big brother who maybe missed his chance once, and wants to make up for it. Just someone who wants ... to look out for you, that's all. Me and my ... my lover here. If ... If you'll have us?" His voice cracked around the end, his eyes dropping down to stare blindly at Raphael, and beside him Loki all but radiated power and danger and fierce, protective challenge, his hand still resting possessively on Gabriel's shoulder.
Behind Castiel, Jormungandr moved, pushing forward gently to nudge Castiel towards them. Castiel looked back at him, and saw in ancient, serpentine eyes a love, a hope, a warm pity and a soft understanding. Leviathan, great and terrible beast of legend, and when he looked towards his father and his father's angel, what whispered in vast, dark eyes was a simple echo. Family worth fighting for.
And Castiel ... had to agree.
"Always, brother," he said, turning on his knees to look at Gabriel once more. To smile his own tired, hopeful smile. "I missed you, Gabriel," he admitted softly. "When Sam told me ... I missed you. I wished ... many things. I did not think I would ever get a chance to ask them again. To ask you ..."
Gabriel bit his lip, the corner of his mouth curling up, eyes bright and shining for a second before he mastered himself, before he pushed back that terrible vulnerability and managed a challenging grin. "Hey now," he managed. "Never said I was going to answer questions or anything, bro! An archangel's gotta keep up his air of mystery ..."
"You mean his air of cheap theatrics," Loki murmured darkly beside him, but the god was smiling. Gabriel elbowed him viciously.
"And where did I learn the cheap theatrics?" he purred pointedly, grinning up.
Loki smirked. "Oh no. You don't get to blame that on me. We may have been stuck together for a few centuries, but I promise you, the cheesy flourish is all you, Gabriel. Ask Jor, here. I was never that cheap."
Castiel felt the rich, rumbling thread of the Serpent's amusement curling through him, the vibrations of laughter through the snout beneath his hand. "Brother Sleipnir might disagree," the Leviathan noted disingenuously, tilting his vast head to the side in faux innocence and almost knocking the lot of them into the sea. Loki scowled impressively.
"Oh, I don't know," Castiel decided to weigh in, before the weight of Gabriel's smug smile could threaten to capsize them itself and beat the Serpent to the punch. "I remember rumours in the garrison, about Gabriel having to talk his way out of having lost a certain Trumpet ..."
The god and the archangel looked at each other, their faces so strangely twinned, their expression eeriely similar, and nodded in unison, twin smirks creeping over their faces.
"Dump the homicidal brother somewhere safe, Gabriel," Loki purred. "You can take Jor. I'll pin Cas."
"No need," the archangel grinned, rising slow and ready and eager. "Raph'll be unconscious for ages yet. I'm sure he'll be fine. These two, on the other hand ..."
Castiel watched them warily, feeling his own mouth curl into a smile, the vast bulk of the World Serpent shaking in amusement and challenge behind him. He looked up, met Jormungandr's cunning eyes, and grinned. Well, he had come to Earth to run, this time. And a little race couldn't hurt. Blow off steam. Get rid of all the adrenalin pumping through Jimmy's body after the stress of Heaven and Raphael ...
"You will have to catch us first," he challenged quietly, and laughed at the flash of delight in both their eyes as he leapt into the air and his new comrade dove beneath the waves. He'd never played a game with one of his brothers before. Never played at all, really.
He looked forward to learning how.
Contd: Win, Lose, or Draw
A/N: For a really, really, REALLY awesome Gabriel & Jormungandr comic, look here. Zanzekiel delivers in a big way. *grins* Seriously. It's awesome.
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