stilljustandrew | [detroit!AU: Summoning]

"Not to make a really bad pun or anything, but what the hell were you thinking?!"

The unfathomable presence that surrounded Gabriel has shrunk, leaving him as little more than the spirit Andrew thought he knew -- and right now, even without it, he's got a voice furious enough to take down mountains.

One hand steals up to rub the back of his head. Other than that he doesn't move, not even to climb to his feet.

His own voice is barely enough to stir a blade of grass. "I thought you heard it all."

"I did, I just didn't think someone who's got occult life experience on par with a hunter would act like such an unquestionable moron," he snaps. Tossing a hand in the air, "Let's not even touch the part where you wanted to talk to Lucifer's vessel -- you summoned Lucifer himself to do it?"

He jerks both hands down from his temples in a gesture of abject disbelief.

"What's the matter with you?!"

Andrew's gaze drops.

No louder, and deeply bitter: "I think you covered it with 'unquestionable moron.'"

Gabriel gusts out an explosive breath.

"And now both our asses are hanging out to dry," he points out darkly, and hooks an arm under Andrew's to haul him to his feet. "Should've just let you cozy up in that three thousand degree sauna -- come on, get up."

His movements are slow, leaden, but he does get to his feet at Gabriel's none-too-gentle prompting.

"Thank you," he says, just as leadenly, without looking up. "For getting me out of there."

Gabriel snorts as he lets go of his arm, and looks away.

"He --" Andrew blinks, hard. "He was going to --"

The shivering starts without warning, and he folds his arms around his midsection and stares into nothing.

"Yeah," says Gabriel shortly, and slants a glance back at him. "And now you've gone and painted a giant flaming bullseye on your chest. Congratulations."

He's not in the mood to be overly sympathetic to this kid right now. Whatever Gabriel's intentions, Lucifer's already construed this as him taking sides; which means his other idiot brothers are probably going to go and do the same once they hear about it.

"I just wanted to talk." Small and hopeless. "Just talk."

"To who?"

Incredulous.

"You seriously thought Sam Winchester was still in there?"

Silence.

And tears, making their way slowly down Andrew's averted face.

"He's dead, isn't he."

Gabriel sighs.

Good. The kid finally gets it -- and maybe that's what gets his expression to finally soften, his voice to gentle a little as he says, "Might as well be."

(Maybe it's just because when it's in your base nature to show mercy, you can't help but do it sometimes.)

"He --"

Andrew's face is crumpling again.

"-- he went to him, why did he go to him?"

"Because that was how it had to be."

Gabriel looks up at the canopy of branches overhead, and the sunlight dappling the leaves.

"He was destined for this long before you two ever met."

Andrew's shoulders tense painfully, muscles knotting at the base of his neck.

"Don't start," he grinds out. "Don't dare say the word destiny."

"What else am I supposed to call it?"

And while the heat may be coming back...he sounds nothing so much as wearied. Like this is an argument he's had too many times before, and he no longer has the energy to make this iteration count.

"This is how it was always going to be. Right from the start, from the time they were born."

"Look, I know about destiny, okay?" He turns and glares up at Gabriel, and his voice is still profoundly unsteady but his jaw is set. "I work with Vampire Slayers and Champions, I've studied prophecies from twenty different religions, I'm a frelling expert on destiny. And that's not what this is. This is a cheat. This is powergaming. Destiny doesn't trump free will."

His hands are clenched, and his voice is rising.

"You cut free will out of the equation and it's all meaningless. All of it. If there's no free will, then nothing on earth or heaven or hell means one God. Damned. Thing."

Gabriel stares at him.

And then he laughs, a sharp and bitterly sarcastic sound that blots out all traces of sympathy.

"An expert?" he says. "Okay, so...with all of your years of expertise, you didn't clue in once how much of this hinges on a choice? All of it does, Andrew. Sure they were chosen, and anything and anybody can make offers, make promises, threaten forever to get them to accept. But when it comes down to it?"

He jabs a finger at Andrew.

"No angel can take a vessel without their permission. I'm sorry if you don't want to hear it, but this was Sam's choice. His act of free will. And if he'd wanted, he could have walked the other way and there's not a thing Lucifer could've done about it. Look at Dean."

"That's what I said, that's exactly what I'm --"

A long, long beat.

"What about Dean."

Gabriel's brow creases. "What do you mean, what about -- "

He stops. Studies Andrew's face.

And, after a beat of own, lets out a long whistle of disbelief.

"You really don't know the first thing about any of this, do you."

Unsteady: "I know Lucifer wanted Sam. As part of his plan for the end of the world. That's all either of them told me."

He folds his arms again.

"Did -- did Lucifer want Dean first? And he said no?"

"Lucifer never wanted anything to do with Dean."

Oh, you sorry bastard, says that tone.

"Michael did."

For a fleeting moment, Andrew's mind goes terrifyingly blank.

Michael who? he almost says. As though it isn't obvious. As though there isn't an archangel standing in front of him right now.

"Michael threw Lucifer out of Heaven," he whispers, barely hearing himself. "That, that's why the Orion project was code-named Michael. In Footfall. Lit ... literary reference."

"Yeah, that's not one I ever got around to reading," says Gabriel, dryly. His steady gaze -- and there's something about it that's too even, that hints at the depth of power he keeps hidden -- doesn't leave Andrew.

"It's like I told them once, way back." Quiet. "All this war is about in the end? Is two brothers."

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