Small continuation of the drabbly AU from chapter eight! This wouldn't leave me alone. It's a little disjointed, but mostly I wanted to address how the events of s5 and s6 might play out with Gabriel!Harry.

I feel like Harry's got a lot to deal with - those two identities don't mesh together very well. At this point, Ron and Hermione (and the Weasleys) know about Gabriel, if not his other various identities, and what Gabriel is, but he still doesn't tell them much about what's going on over in America even if he knows about what's happening.

Just so you know, this takes place at an unspecified point after the series ends (assuming this takes place in the original HP timeline, it would've been a while later that the whole Apocalypse thing started).

Also, please excuse me if I switch tenses for no reason, I'm doing my best :(

Harry doesn't go downstairs expecting to see the angel in his kitchen, but he'd noticed Castiel the moment his brother arrived.

"Mind telling me what you're doing here?" He asks mildly, mug still mostly full of tea that he's keeping warm out of pure willpower at this point.

Castiel looks at him, tilts his head, squints.

Yeah, yeah. This is what an archangel looks like - messy hair, glasses that are no longer prescription lenses (not that he thinks they were in the first place, his vision had gotten a lot better as soon as he'd remembered), pajamas that are half handmedown from Mrs. Weasley via a furiously embarrassed Ron and half bought at a secondhand store (they always had better, comfier stuff). A mug of tea and an expression that says Well? and a presence that Gabriel makes sure Castiel doesn't feel until Gabriel's in the room.

"I need your help," Castiel says.

Well, shit. Gabriel had been hoping it was only a scholarly kind of need that had brought Castiel looking for a ''long-dead'' archangel, and not the world-is-ending-please-smite-our-enemies kind of need.

"Yeah, everyone says that," Gabriel says. "Sit down. You want tea?"

Castiel's confusion is palpable, even though Gabriel hasn't reconnected to angel radio and has no desire to. He sits. He shakes his head.

"Suit yourself," Gabriel says. He takes the seat opposite Castiel, props his feet up on one of the empty chairs, and takes a long sip from his own mug. He reflects that he may have possibly left the teabag in too long, but hey, you can't blame a guy for getting distracted.

Castiel's still looking at him like he can't figure out what Gabriel's angle is.

"So," Gabriel says. "Lemme guess. You want to recruit me because you think it'll give you a better chance with my dear older brothers."

"Yes," Castiel says, head still tilted like a different angle of sight will reveal all of Gabriel's secrets.

"At least you're honest," Gabriel mutters into his tea. "So who else knows where I am?"

"No one."

"Excuse me?"

"I didn't tell anyone," Castiel says. "There are only so many I can trust, and I...didn't want to get their hopes up." He looks at Gabriel warily now. "And you have been in...very deep hiding. I believed you were dead. So did many others. I thought it might be...inappropriate to broadcast my findings."

"You thought right," Gabriel says, and puts his mug down. Castiel is...something else. He looks closer, past the general dishevelment, past the barest sputterings of power. "Who can you trust, Castiel?"

"Hopefully," Castiel, the stupid hopeful seraph says, "you."

For a moment, they just stare at each other.

"Michael and Lucifer cannot be allowed to continue," Castiel bursts out. "They'll ruin this planet in pursuit of their own agenda. Humanity - everything here is worth more than that, but they can't see past their own pride to understand!"

"You're not telling me anything I don't already know," Gabriel says tightly. He gets up to get more tea, just so he won't have to look at Castiel.

"So you'll help?" Someone help him, he can feel how eager Castiel is to hear a 'yes'.

"That's not what I said," Gabriel replies, facing the window.

There's a very pregnant pause.

"I don't understand," Castiel said.

"Why do you think I left?" Gabriel snaps, turning to Castiel. "You come here and ask me to jump back into that argument and expect a yes? You think I enjoyed dealing with Michael and Lucifer up close, back then?"

"If they're not stopped, it will only get worse!"

"What are you asking me to do?" Gabriel retorted. "Be very clear, Castiel. You're not asking me to join. You're not asking for help. You're asking me to kill one or both of them." Gabriel leans closer, unfolding his essence from inside his vessel, and he can't help but be angrily vindicated by the way Castiel leans away. "No."

"What will you do, then?" Castiel asks, through gritted teeth.

"I am not obligated to do anything for you," Gabriel snaps. "If I show up helping you, guess whose probably homicidally-inclined brothers start gunning for me?" He jerks a thumb at himself. "I've done perfectly well for myself by staying out of it."

"For yourself," Castiel emphasizes. "What about everyone else?"

Gabriel shrugs, but the effect his probably somewhat ruined by the stare he's leveling at Castiel. "That's the question, isn't it?"

Castiel looks somewhat taken aback.

"I don't understand," he says, again.

Gabriel sighs. Takes a piece of paper out of thin air.

"If you tell anyone I gave this to you," he says, "...well, just don't." Castiel's imagination will be worse than anything he comes up with.

Castiel's puzzled expression gets more puzzled when he unfolds it. "This is an address," he says.

"Wow, really? I didn't know," Gabriel says sarcastically. "I happen to know a guy there who knows a spell or two that would be handy."

"A spell won't-" Castiel began in frustration.

"The Cage is still there," Gabriel says, and Castiel shuts his mouth. They both know what Gabriel means - or Castiel can guess, at least.

Castiel folds up the piece of paper and puts it into his pocket. "I assume," he beings, "that whoever is at this address - I should not tell them you told me where to find them?"

"You got that right," Harry says.

"But, Gabriel-"

"Gabriel who?" Harry leans up against the counter and picks up his mug of tea again. "Didn't you listen to all those 'many others' you said you talked to? Gabriel's dead. He can't help you, and you definitely can't be imposing on him right now. And if you told anyone you'd found him, well, he might be tempted to do something about that. If he weren't, you know, impossible to find."

Castiel understands. Of course he does. "I see," he says, delicately, and then, "thank you."

"Yeah, yeah." Harry waves the mug around dismissively. "Get outta my kitchen."

Skippy skip skip to some vague scene later on, I didn't plan this all out I just thought of separate scenes

The last thing I need is for this situation to get any worse, Gabriel thinks. Given that he's currently facing off with Lucifer while Castiel struggles with the holy fire barrier, he doesn't see how it can.

So of course Ron and Hermione choose that moment to burst in.

Harry's glad to see them, for one wild second, and then Gabriel thinks, shit, Lucifer's going to kill them.

Lucifer only has time to look at them but Gabriel can see his immediate disdain for Gabriel's two human friends, so Gabriel does the stupidest thing he can think of.

"Don't you dare!" He physically crashes into his brother and manages to take Lucifer by surprise for a second. Lucifer roughly shoves him away, face curling in a sneer.

"Harry!"

"Gabriel, don't-"

"Pathetic," Lucifer snarls, grabbing Gabriel before he can get away. "You'd turn on me? For what? Humans?"

"Well, I happen to like those two," Gabriel says. Only Castiel sees the way the two of them are struggling, two forces locked in a stalemate, Lucifer's powers pushing towards the two humans with dark intent. Neither of them pay any attention to the wands trained on them. "And, y'know, the rest of the species in general. They've invented some cool things, I don't know if you've taken the time to look. Chocolate, for one-"

Lucifer stood abruptly, yanking Gabriel up with him. "Enough of this," he said, suddenly soft and persuasive. "Earth may have its pleasures, but what is it worth, really?" He doesn't flinch when a spell hits the floor next to his feet, just looks at Hermione with deadly intent.

Gabriel wrenches Lucifer's hand the wrong way, but he can hear a shout (he didn't redirect all of it, just the worst parts) while the recoil shivers its way through him. Lucifer's Grace is freezing cold. It's not a pleasant feeling.

"They're broken," Lucifer murmurs, twisting his hand out of Gabriel's grip and looking at him in curiosity. "If they aren't now, they will be. I'm only sparing you-"

"Fucking hell, shut up, you sound like a megalomaniac," Gabriel says. He's got his sword out and no intention of using it, and his only allies are either more of a liability or trapped.

"You know I'm right," Lucifer says, reproachfully.

"I know you think you're right," Gabriel says. Lucifer huffs indignantly. Castiel's drawing something on the floor, and Gabriel thinks fast to try and distract Lucifer from noticing. "You and Michael were so caught up in fighting your never bothered with anything down here. Who's got more experience with humans, huh?"

"Just because you've been...slumming it," Lucifer says, ignoring Gabriel's scoff, "doesn't mean you're right. They're flawed."

"And yet," Gabriel says, half his attention on Ron and Hermione, still hovering in the doorway (here's hoping they stay there), "they're still better than us."

He feels (rightfully) vindicated when pure shock flashes across Lucifer's face.

"No," Lucifer seethes. "Them? You cannot be-"

"Serious?" Gabriel finishes, restraining himself from looking at whatever Castiel might be doing. "Oh, I am. They might be flawed, but at least they try to do better. To forgive each other."

He doesn't miss the tiniest pause, before Lucifer speaks.

"Brother," Lucifer says softly, "it doesn't have to be like this."

"Really?" Gabriel says. "I'm not the one picking a side, here. You don't want it to end like this, walk off the game board."

"Michael would never let me!" Lucifer takes a step closer. "You'd choose them over me?" He asks, sounding wounded. "Truly, Gabriel? When we could be in this together, like old times?"

Old times when you weren't an asshole? Gabriel keeps a cool facade over his face. "Yeah, that sounds like my brother," he murmurs, looking Lucifer in the eye. "Maybe if you didn't just try to kill my friends twice in a row, I'd've considered it. Oh wait, no I wouldn't have." Not when the rest of the world is at stake.

"It doesn't have to be like this," Lucifer says, and Gabriel wonders at the note of honest pleading. Now that his brother's up in his face, it's hard to gauge the lies. "Don't make me do this."

"Nobody makes us do anything," Gabriel replies, shrugging and spreading his hands. You've got a choice, Lucifer, please. For me. Make the right one.

Lucifer's expression is something approximating sadness.

He grabs Gabriel's wrist, twists it, and stabs Gabriel with his own blade.

Gabriel nearly bends double around the sudden pain in his stomach, too shocked to do anything else. There's shouting, Castiel's presence flaring up at the edge of his senses, Lucifer holding him up, standing calm and steady.

Gabriel looks up at his brother, how could you do this to me, Lucifer-!

"I admit," Lucifer says, cupping his face, and Gabriel grabs at his arm because it's Lucifer, please, help me, why would you- "After Michael, you were always my favorite."

Something rips him away with the force of a banishing spell (Castiel) and Gabriel collapses, bending around the sword still embedded in his abdomen. There are two souls headed toward him (Ron...Hermione...) but Castiel gets there first (the holy fire...?) and whisks him away.

Listen, I blame inukagome15, she's the one who started talking about listening to 'Control' while writing.

"You can't just refuse to tell us where he is!" Hermione shouts.

Castiel looks completely unbothered by the wand poking his throat. He looks the opposite, really, if the opposite of 'bothered' is 'scowly'. "If he is disturbed, the spells I erected could break," he growls. "Given how you burst in earlier, I don't trust either of you not to think yourselves capable of saving him and ignoring that warning."

"You said yourself you didn't have much power left," Ron protests, "we could-"

"Your human magic would be entirely ineffective."

"Cas," Sam breaks in, "c'mon. He's their friend."

"Who is currently threatening me because I did the only thing I could and they don't like the conditions," Castiel says waspishly. He pushes Hermione's hand down. "If you'd rather break those spells and have Gabriel get worse, that's hardly going to change my mind. I can't fix him, so keeping him in stasis is the best option."

"You don't know that we couldn't help," Ron objects.

"You don't know what Gabriel is well enough to help," Castiel snaps, and turns to stomp into the living room, where Dean is.

Sam casually inserts himself into the doorway, blocking Ron and Hermione from following.

"I'm sorry," he says sincerely. "But regardless of intent, I think Cas's right about regular magic not working on angels. It's never worked before."

"You don't have magic," Ron retorts, stung by the constant refusal.

"We have some kinds," Sam says, shrugging. "But if Cas says messing with whatever he's put up to protect Gabriel is a bad idea, then I believe him. He hasn't steered us wrong before." He pauses, and then adds, "For what it's worth, I'm sorry about this. He seemed like a good guy."

Ron and Hermione probably helped out, but this whole situation is a little beyond what they're used to..

Castiel has been remade, killed by Lucifer and then - impossibly - resurrected.

The first place he goes, after ensuring that Dean makes it back to Sioux Falls in one piece, is to Heaven.

Gabriel can wait - he's in stasis, he's certainly not getting any worse, even if he's also not getting any better - and then it's a constant repetition of that in Castiel's mind, it can wait, Heaven is more important, more immediate, and then he finds himself in another fight and it's getting steadily worse and he can't tell Dean but he needs a break.

He did not watch his trail as carefully as he could have.

"This is what you've been hiding?" Castiel freezes when Raphael speaks, how did he not notice-? "Your trump card?"

"Not a hidden weapon," Castiel replies, turning slowly. Raphael is already stalking slowly around to the other side of the bed. Castiel had hidden Gabriel in a hospital. There is no way into the room, none of the staff notice that it's there, and only Castiel (or another angel who knew how to navigate around the spells without disturbing them) could enter. "He's injured."

Raphael's eyes flick down to the wound that still gapes unpleasantly. Castiel had been attempting to figure out how best to heal it, but he hasn't gotten very far.

If this were a normal meeting of foes, they would have come to blows by now. With Gabriel present and essentially helpless, they are locked in an odd kind of stalemate.

"I can heal him," Raphael says, quietly. "I will take him to Heaven-"

"No," Castiel says.

"You cannot stop me."

"Gabriel would hate you for it," Castiel says, and Raphael actually pauses.

"It would be for his own good," Raphae argues. "Even he could see the logic in that."

"Gabriel has spent thousands of years hiding from you and Michael," Castiel replies. "I don't know why, but I'm sure he had his reasons."

Raphael scoffs. "He's a-"

"What are you planning on doing that you cannot do here?" Castiel cuts in. He's not in the mood to hear Gabriel be called names.

For a moment, they simply glare at each other.

Raphael lowers his hand to let it hover over Gabriel's wound, as if he's gauging the situation. His face reveals nothing. Castiel knows it's bad, but Raphael is - was? - the Healer; he would know better than a seraph exactly how bad it is.

At least he hasn't brought any of the Rit Zien.

The foundation of Castiel's spell splinters. Gabriel heaves in a breath, back arching, eyes flying open. Raphael plants his hand firmly and doesn't let Gabriel wriggle away. Castiel isn't sure healing is supposed to be as painful as it looks.

Raphael moves to pull his hand away, when he's done, and Gabriel grabs his wrist.

"Shit," he gasps, "it's actually you."

Raphael seems unsure how to respond. Castiel's not sure if this is going to turn into a private archangel thing or not.

"...Yes." Raphael extricates himself from Gabriel's grip. "You would do well to return home. You'd heal much faster there." Raphael doesn't get past 'well' before something shutters over Gabriel's face and hides the moment of...something that had surfaced when he'd seen Raphael.

"So you can do, what, exactly?" Gabriel gingerly touched the now mostly-closed stab wound. There's something sour in his voice, an implication Castiel's missing.

Raphael presses his lips into a tight line and does not reply. Both of them glance at Castiel.

"Maybe turn off your ears, bro," Gabriel suggests. "I think Raph and I need to have a conversation."

Castiel obligingly turns around, dulling his vessel's auditory senses. He doesn't trust Raphael, but if the elder archangel attacks him Gabriel will probably at least try to stop him.

Hermione shrieks when she sees Harry in the kitchen. "Merlin!"

"Yeah, I - ow," Harry says loudly, when Ron hugs him tightly. Ron hurriedly lets go, looking abashed.

"Sorry, mate-"

"It's fine, you mostly avoided the stab wound," Harry says dryly, taking a sip of the tea he'd miraculously managed not to spill.

"You're alright, though?" Ron asks anxiously.

"Mostly," Harry says, shrugging. "Nothing anyone can do but let me lie around and heal, though."

"Good," Hermione says fervently. "Your brother wouldn't tell us anything."

"Which one?"

"Castiel," Ron supplies.

Gabriel shrugs again. "He's a good kid. 'Bout the only nice family member I've got left."

"Hey, you've got us," Ron says. "We wrote Mum, by the way, she'll be thrilled to have a chance to actually do something. She's been pacing around worrying about you and I think she might insist that you get a hand on the clock."

"The clock? That one that's labelled Mortal Peril and stuff?"

"We were worried," Hermione said. "We didn't know where you were, or when you'd be back, or anything!"

He squints at the two of them. "...Why are you in my house if you didn't know I was going to be here?"

"Oh, mum said we should come by and keep things orderly, and stuff," Ron said. "She's been over once or twice, too, I'm not that great at cleaning spells. D'you know you've got a cabinet none of us could open?"

"There's a reason it can't be opened by anyone but me," Harry says, but he looks surprised. "That's, uh - tell your mum thanks, for me."

"She'd love it if you came over yourself," Ron says, and then hastily adds, "if you're up to it, I mean-"

"Maybe another day," Harry says, carefully avoiding saying anything about how he feels.

Ms. Weasley does insist on coming over, and then insists on Harry coming over, where Ginny pulls him away to her room and gently bullies him into showing her.

"If your mum comes up and sees us alone with me topless, she's going to assume a lot of things," Harry jokes.

Ginny doesn't budge. "You're not allowed to almost die without letting me find out whether or not we're dating again," she says, and reaches for the hem of his shirt.

Harry lets her pull it up. The scar is a neat, slightly raised, pale mark just under his ribs. Ginny does not touch it, just looks and then yanks his shirt back down.

"It looks too small," she says. "You're too big to die from something like that."

"I'm glad you have such faith in me," Harry says, and when Ron comes up a few minutes later they definitely get caught in the middle of making out.

There's more, but I'm gonna end it there.