[detroit!AU: Summoning]

[stilljustandrew]

There's a triple circle on the floor of the room: standard Summoning, and two extra tracks. The one of holy oil is a matter of last resort.

Oddly enough, it's the true name part that's easiest this time.




Andrew speaks the last words of the Summoning, and rises to his feet.

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[stilljustandrew]

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."

[changeinasnap]

"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."

[stilljustandrew]

"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."

[changeinasnap]

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."

[stilljustandrew]

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



A long, long beat.


"What about Dean."

[changeinasnap]

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."

[stilljustandrew]

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?"

[changeinasnap]

"Lucifer never wanted anything to do with Dean."

Oh, you sorry bastard, says that tone.

"Michael did."

[stilljustandrew]

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."

[changeinasnap]

"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."

[stilljustandrew]

He's staring at Gabriel, through Gabriel, comprehension slowly lighting his mind like the first red streaks of some disastrous dawn.

"It's not a resolution," he hears himself say. "It's a reenactment."

[changeinasnap]

Gabriel shrugs, in a loose and tired flop of a movement.

"Sure. Call it that. Call it whatever you want."

[stilljustandrew]

"Oh god."

His voice is thready with shock, and ragged at the edges with disbelieving horror.

"They were trying to set Dean up to --"

[changeinasnap]

"Kill him?" Gabriel supplies, and shakes his head. "Nah. There's room for improvisation in this scene. A new ending every night. Maybe this time the bad guy wins."

[stilljustandrew]

No answer.

Andrew's still staring past him into nothingness, shaking his head infinitesimally.

[changeinasnap]

Gabriel watches and waits in silence, still wearing that level, steady look.

[stilljustandrew]

Finally he focuses back on the angel, blinking hard.

"And Dean said no," he says, very low.

[changeinasnap]

"Yep."

A thin smile.

"Which means this party ain't getting started for real just yet. Not that Luce is all that inclined to care."

Gabriel hooks a thumb over his shoulder, indicating the room they've since departed.

[stilljustandrew]

"Yeah."

A long beat.

"...can I ask you something?"

[changeinasnap]

The thin smile stays put.

"Shoot."

Just because he's asking doesn't mean Gabriel has to answer, after all.

[stilljustandrew]

"Why'd you save me?" Low. "Just now?"

[changeinasnap]

Gabriel lets out another snort.

"If I've gotta follow the rules here, so does he," he says. "No recruitment drives. Especially not from a place not even involved in our business, because, you might have noticed, I'm kind of a big fan of keeping this neutral ground."

He waves an arm, indicating Milliways at large.

[stilljustandrew]

A slow exhalation, more sigh than word. "Yeah."

His gaze drops to the grass underfoot.

"Thank you."

[changeinasnap]

"It's not going to happen again." Clipped. "You've played your get out of immolation free card. And I gave you a five-second head start on top of it, so you'd better start running before he figures out you're not really dead and comes looking for you."

And for Gabriel himself.

But of the two of them, Andrew's much more likely to end up dead.

[stilljustandrew]

"Can he find me in my world?"

Andrew doesn't look up.