AN: I know, it's been an age, but I am still here and intend to finish this story, I've just had a lot of life get in the way. I apologise. As you may have seen in my other recent updates, I find myself unable to write Dean/Cas any more. Maybe it's the direction the show's taken, maybe I'm just tired of wishing and believing in something that will never be resolved, maybe the Dean and Cas in season 9 aren't the Dean and Cas that I enjoy writing, but whatever the reason, I just cannot bring myself to focus on their story any more. They'll still be appearing, doing the side character slots, but I will not be doing any more dean/Cas stories, for the foreseeable future. Anyway. Now that's done, please enjoy the latest chapter of Sam Winchester Makes Bad Choices For Good Reasons And Gabriel Is A Dork.

Castiel sat opposite Sam and Dean, the two benches that flanked the walls of the changing room just wide enough apart that their knees wouldn't touch each other's. He ran a hand over his face, cleared his throat, and began.

"Lucifer had just finished defending the prize belt. He was on a high, and not just an emotional one. Sure he had debts, sure he had enemies, but he was, as far as he knew, invincible. Once upon a time, mind you, he had been a good, Christian man who loved his wife. But, when he lost his job, he found a bar. When he found a bar, he found a taste for expensive drinks and high-stakes card games. From there, it was a long, painful descent into addiction and owing. All this is conjecture, of course; the only way to get the truth of the matter would be asking Lucifer about it, and you don't want to talk to him if you can help it."

"Anyway. One of the people he owed money to was Zachariah. And Zach is not the sort of person one owes. Zach is the sort of person one pays. So he sent a guy to collect, and the guy never came back. He showed up three days later in a hospital. Turns out Lucifer had also developed a mean and violent temper. So Zachariah approached him personally, and offered to wipe all debts if Lucifer came and fought. He ran through seventeen trainers in five years, and the last one of them was Gabriel, who he stole away from some other guy before dropping him and deciding he didn't need a trainer. So Lucifer fought alone and won the belt. That was fifteen years ago. Gabriel took on a bunch of fighters, but none of them lasted long. Then he found Thor, and for a while it looked like he was the only one who would manage to end Lucifer."

Sam started guiltily. He knew how that part of the story ended.

"And he didn't manage it." Dean concluded. So he knew the story too.

Castiel nodded, and continued.

"Anyway. Two years ago, Lucifer won the belt, again, and he was high on adrenaline, steroids, you name it. He went home, and his wife… his dear wife… She had been his high-school sweetheart. Her name was Lillith. And before Lucifer's descent into violence and anger, she had been a strong, intelligent, beautiful woman. Since then, however, he had found her a perfect outlet for his anger. Both the children they had, were only born because of his forcing himself on her. The violence, the abuse of every kind… it turned her cold, and manic. And that night… that night was just one fight too many for her. She died, that night. Lucifer had a good attorney… Zachariah, actually… they claimed it was accidental death, that she had been trying to leave him, that they had fought at the top of the stairs while Lucifer was trying to convince her to stay and care for his children… they claimed his various wounds and scars were inflicted by her… and that she had pulled away from him, over balanced, and fallen down the stairs. The judge, for some ungodly reason, believed them. Apparently that was more likely than him pushing her down the stairs when she tried to get away from him."

Sam was silent. He had known, or, suspected, that any guy who chose to be known as Lucifer wasn't a good guy. But that…

"I didn't know…" Dean started, his voice sounding strangely heavy. He cleared his throat and tried again. "What happened to the kids?"

"They were placed in the custody of their Godfather. Lucifer's brother..."

The bottom suddenly fell out of Sam's stomach. The entire world fell away from him like a badly maintained fairground ride. The pause between Castiel's words seemed to go on for days, years, and Sam would have happily kept time frozen for as long as it took if it meant the conclusion he had jumped to the moment before Castiel spoke was proved wrong. Say a name, he thought, any name, just not that one.

Dean stared at Castiel, drawing in breath and slightly shaking his head. He must have known who Lucifer's brother was. Sam slowly felt the word swimming out of focus. Maybe it was the multiple traumas to the head and neck, or severe internal haemorrhaging, but he doubted it. He managed to swallow back the acid rising in his throat and tried to make a sound.

"Who..?"

Castiel's eyes were rounded, softened with unspoken apology, with grief. When he spoke, Sam was sure he'd never heard so much gravity laden on a single word.

"Gabriel."

(-*-)

The phone clicked over to voicemail again, and there was a hesitation before Gabriel broke the silence. In the dark, in the quiet, he could almost pretend there weren't two glorious, brilliant sources of all that shone and was good in the world, just sleeping innocently upstairs. Maybe if it stayed dark, if it stayed silent, he could pretend they'd never even been there to start with.

"Kali," he said, at length. His voice was hoarse, his tone resigned. His eyes were red, but his cheeks weren't wet. He had held it back, held it in, and that was probably why he was so hoarse. "Kali, it's me. I don't know what you're planning, but Luci-" He stopped himself. "…he gave me a pretty good idea. Just… just don't, OK? You know as well as I do, those kids… He couldn't… wouldn't… Have a heart. If you want to spite me, fine, spite me. Hurt me. But just leave them out of it. They've… Jesus, Kali, haven't they hurt enough? I…" A long, high-pitched beep told him the message had cut off. He resisted the urge to throw his phone across the room, but only barely. He sat on the edge of the couch, elbows on his knees, the heels of his palms pushing into his eyes. His phone buzzed, and he snapped it up. The call ID said Sam. He put it down again, leaving it on the couch as he stood and made his way upstairs. He stood at the door to is room, hesitated, and turned away. Too much had happened in there. And it was too empty, now. He turned and walked back along the landing, coming to a door with black and green stickers all over it, declaring it a "Toxic Waste Zone" and a "Grown Ups Keep Out" area. Gabriel smiled slightly, before gently pushing open the door and peeking inside. Jesse was sprawled over the bed, his black and red pyjamas making his skin look even paler as the dim light from the window caught him. His breathing was quiet, his chest slowly rising and falling… Jesse slept the sleep of a kid who'd run himself down to empty, and had eight hours to recharge and do it all again.

Gabriel ducked back out of the room, easing the door closed as silently as possible. He turned to the door covered in macaroni collages, glitter and craft paper, and pushed it open with similar stealth. He saw he needn't have bothered though, as a white sheet sat up in the dark with a ray of yellow light inside it seemed to be visiting already.

"Audrey…"

The sheet squeaked and the light disappeared. Gabriel smiled, but it didn't last long.

"Audrey, it's gone midnight. You should be asleep."

The sheet didn't move.

"I'm right here, I can see you."

Audrey pulled the sheet off her head, leaving her hair a mess of sticky-up brown curls. Her face was puffy from lack of sleep.

"I had a nightmare and you weren't in your room so I read a story instead and I was under the sheet so nothing would get me."
"Ah," Gabriel nodded. "Well, as long as it's a defensive up-after-bed-time-reading, that's fine." He walked into the room, took away her torch and her book, and put them back up on the bookcase by the door. "Go to sleep."

"I can't…" Audrey's voice quaked. He turned around, and looked at her. She really did look scared. "It was… that nightmare." She didn't look at Gabriel, but he knew which one she meant. The one where Mommy comes back and takes her out for a picnic, and Daddy turns up like the big bad wolf. The one were Uncle Gabe can't help her because he's not there. Gabriel hated that one.

"Let me get changed for bed and I'll be right back," He said, trying for a reassuring smile. In the next ten minutes, he was wearing a pair of Christmas pyjamas (dark blue with little reindeer all over them. They had been a present from Audrey and they were now his 'human-comfort-blankie' pyjamas) and squeezed in next to Audrey on her bed. She was curled into his arm and, even though he was in a less-than-comfortable position with his knees tucked up and his head on one side so he'd fit, he was perfectly happy to get what little sleep he could while holding her close. They couldn't take her if he was clinging on to her.

(-*-)

Sam woke, gasping for air. He lay still, waiting for the difference between dream and reality resolve itself. Dean's ceiling swum into view overhead, the painful mattress springs solidified beneath him. The smells of coffee and stale air lay in between.

Cas had been smoking again.

Sam wondered if smoking would relax him a little. Sure, it was bad for you, but so was voluntarily locking yourself in a cage with a violent criminal. In fact, if anything, smoking was relatively healthy. Sam longed for the option where he lived long enough to die from smoking.

They'd stayed at the fight, after Cas's revelation. Thankfully, Lucifer wasn't the kind to put someone out of their misery and there'd been plenty of fight left to watch.

Sam didn't even have the spirit to be sarcastic.

Thankfully.

Watching Lucifer fight was… terrifying. Legitimately, absolutely terrifying. For all the time Crowley had spent baiting the crowd, working them up into a frenzy of bloodlust… The moment he said Lucifer's name was like lightning striking a pack of chimps or baboons, screaming, stomping, bearing their teeth, the crowd had roared at him, not for him, and when his opponent had launched at him, they screamed louder. Then, in some kind of superhuman feat of reflex, Lucifer had tripped the guy, thrown him to the floor and had his arm in a position where, if he so chose, he could have easily dislocated… hell, he could have torn the thing clean off.

The crowd had fallen silent, then. They had watched, completely mute, as every time the guy went to stand up, Lucifer knocked him down again. The light played on the scars that covered his face, casting weird, unnerving shadows over his eyes, making them glint like onyx on a black sheet.

Is it a 'pack' of chimps? There's probably a special word.

Sam pushed himself up, and was dimly surprised to see Dean already making coffee. Dean saw him over the back of the couch, and forced a smile. Sam forced one back.

"Busy day," Dean said, gesturing with the coffee pot to the toast that sat on a plate next to him, apparently for Sam. Sam swung his legs off the bed and rested with his elbows on his knees.

"Is it?"

"Yeah. You've gotta train. You're going up against that guy, you need all the help you can get."

Sam nodded, dumbly agreeing. He pushed himself up to his feet.

Training meant he'd have to track down Gabriel. After running out last night, Gabe hadn't answered any of his calls. Sam wondered what had happened, whether it was just the shock of seeing his brother again, or whether it was something more. As Sam leant against the counter, he thought about himself, and Gabriel, and Dean, Bobby and Cas. Their weird little support group. Chuck, too, and Ash. People who would help him. Would keep him alive. He swallowed his mouthful of toast, when a thought struck him.

"Troop."

Dean looked at him. "What?"

"I was trying to think… it's a troop of baboons. Not a pack."

Dean stared at him.

"Get in the shower and wake up properly, otherwise you'll sleep-walk into traffic before Lucifer's even had a chance."