Compression

Note: This is an AU post-Swan Song because the events of "Hammer of the Gods" went differently. Gabriel did not die, but when Lucifer stabbed him, Sam returned. Lucifer therefore didn't twist the blade and actually kill Gabriel, but disappeared, leaving Sam and Dean to patch Gabriel up to the best of their ability and he healed up enough to aid them in stopping the Apocalypse. Sam still jumped into the Cage, but Gabriel and Castiel pulled him out (with his soul, don't worry), and now the Winchesters are living a safe post-Apocalyptic life. Until this story happened at least. With that said, enjoy the show!

Gabriel coughed, and that was really the point where he should have realized something was horribly wrong. A plume of dust shifted as he sat up, bumping his head on a broken metal pipe, and pain blossomed in the top of his head.

Seriously? He was an archangel of the Lord - well, technically, he was also a Trickster, too, but details - and therefore shouldn't feel any pain whatsoever. He snapped his fingers in the hopes of at least getting some light, but there was nothing. No surge of power, no reaction, nada. Then he felt it: a crackling sort of energy in the air that could only be binding magic.

He was completely powerless. Awesome. He scrambled through his last memories to figure out how he'd gotten into this mess and then it all came flooding back.

It was supposed to be a routine hunt, just an errant ghost the Winchesters could easily salt and burn. Instead, it had turned out to be a group of demons, luring them into a trap in order to tear Sam a new one for sticking Lucifer back into his time-out corner. In a fit of desperation, Dean had prayed to both Castiel and Gabriel when the demons had split him and Sam up.

Now Gabriel had no idea where the prodigal little angel was, but at least he had shown up when Dean had called. And that was when the roof had caved in, the binding sigils acting as a detonator for a massive supernatural bomb.

A wet cough that was definitely not his echoed through the tiny space.

"Sam?" Gabriel guessed and a groan answered him, confirming that it was indeed Sam Winchester. "Where are you, Sasquatch?"

"Here." That didn't really clear things up. "Gabriel?" Sam slurred, which was an obvious indication that he had a concussion.

"Yeah, it's me. The hell happened?" Gabriel felt blindly in the dark, but only came across bits and pieces of plaster and no plaid-wearing humans.

"Demons. Must've known you were coming, triggered a bomb. Sorry." Because even while trapped under piles of rubble, the kid felt guilty for things out of his control. "Don't suppose you could zap us out of here or-?"

"No, sorry. Place was full of binding magic, I can't do much of anything." Sam's voice seemed to be coming from Gabriel's right, so the archangel - or whatever he was at the moment, because he sure didn't feel divine - pushed at the wall of plaster beside him. A piece gave way and dim light shone through the hole.

"That you?" Sam's voice sounded clearer now; he was apparently on the other side of the wall.

"Yeah, hang on. I'm gonna try and get through to you." Sam obediently fell silent as Gabriel began to work on shoving little pieces of rubble aside to make a larger hole in the wall. It was much tougher without supernatural strength backing him up and he could hear himself struggling for breath soon enough.

Sam huffed a weak laugh that turned quickly into a cough. "Shouldn't've eaten all that candy, huh?"

"Oh, shut up," Gabriel retorted eloquently. Sam chuckled again, but then hissed sharply, setting Gabriel's senses on hyper-alert. "Sam?"

"I'm fine, I'm okay, just...ah, shit." Sam sucked in a breath again. "My leg's broken, I think."

"Hang on, I'm almost there." Gabriel continued to shuffle plaster around until there was a large enough hole for him to wriggle through. He landed on the other side in a disheveled heap and pushed himself up, only to wince when he got a good look at Sam in the dim light shining through a cracked window half-buried in cement and plaster.

Sam's hair was matted with blood, his leg at an odd angle. There was more blood trickling from the corner of his mouth while he held himself stiffly, a hand splayed against his chest, where a dark red stain was spreading ominously.

"Hey," he rasped wearily.

"Hey, yourself. You look like crap." Understatement of the millenium. It wasn't that Gabriel wasn't used to seeing people beaten up - to be fair, he used to murder and beat up people for a living back in the Trickster days - but seeing Sam, the boy with the demon blood who had taken on Lucifer and won, in this sorry state was too much for him to handle.

"Feels worse than it looks, trust me." Sam's expression was twisted in a pained grimace, his jaw clenched.

Gabriel couldn't think of a response - what could he possibly say to offer comfort to Sam? - but was saved the trouble when a prayer came through. Normally, he would tune them out, but this was Dean reaching through.

Hey, Gabriel, Cas and I are outside. Sam's not picking up his phone and neither are you, so I'm guessing you're both still in there. Hang tight, we're working on getting you out.

The transmission cut itself off and silence settled in the small space. Gabriel was suddenly far too aware of Sam's shallow, wheezy breathing. Even with his meager knowledge of human physiology, he knew that wasn't good.

"Dean and Castiel are coming," he offered helplessly and Sam managed a terse nod of acknowledgment before letting his head flop back against the wall. Gabriel leaned back against his own section of wall, taking in the unfamiliar aches and itches all over his body. "So this is being human, huh?"

"Welcome to the rat race," Sam deadpanned.

"I don't like it," Gabriel decided.

"No one likes it." Sam grinned wryly, as if remembering an old joke that Gabriel didn't, but then hunched over, pressing his hands to his mouth as a coughing fit took over. His hands came away bloody.

"Shit, Sam." Gabriel was already halfway to Sam's side before the hunter shook his head, wiping his mouth on his sleeve.

"I'm okay."

"Okay people don't cough up blood," Gabriel pointed out, raising an eyebrow.

"Where'd you get your medical degree?" Sam snarked back, a teasing quality to his tone, and Gabriel supposed he should be relieved that Sam still had the energy to joke with him.

"Hey, I'll have you know that my skills as Dr. Sexy were incomparable."

Sam looked momentarily confused before the memories of T.V. Land came flooding back. "You hit me in the nuts," he said sourly.

"You know what, Sammy? Sometimes you gotta take one for the team."

"Don't call me Sammy."

"Right-o, Sammich." Sam cracked an eye open to glare at him mildly, hazel iris bright and glazed in the darkness, before shutting it again with a weak groan. "Sam?" Gabriel closed the distance between them, grasping Sam's shoulders. "Come on, Winchester, you've gotta tell me what's wrong with you."

"You're apparently a doctor now, you figure it out," Sam snapped back, but there was no heat in his tone as he leaned back heavily against the wall. Figuring he had no other choice, Gabriel settled for doing just that, skimming his fingers over Sam's sides and checking for broken ribs. Sam sucked in a sharp breath. "The hell're you doin'?" he mumbled.

"You said to figure it out." There was a large gash just below Sam's ribcage - the source of all the blood - and a few fractured ribs, not to mention the broken leg and the head wound. No wonder Sam was in such a bad shape. "Damn it, of all times for me to be useless," Gabriel muttered, glaring up at the ceiling as if it had personally insulted him, and Sam shook his head weakly.

"'S okay. Not your fault."

"You seem to do that a lot," Gabriel noted and Sam opened his eyes slightly.

"Do what?"

"Forgive me for crap that you shouldn't."

Sam rolled his eyes. "Seriously? You're bringing that up now? Look, I dropped any grudge I had after Elysian Fields. You should, too. Now shut up 'cause my head is killing me." He shut his eyes again.

"Oh, no, you don't." Gabriel shook Sam's shoulder. "Stay awake, Sam. You've got a concussion."

"Do not." Sam scowled and Gabriel angled his head towards the dim ray of light coming in through the window. Sam's pupils contracted, but sluggishly and unevenly.

"Yeah, you're the epitome of health." Sam jerked his head away from Gabriel's grasp, wincing at the sudden movement. "Come on, just until your muttonhead brother gets here."

"Piss off," Sam grumbled, his eyes half-open and focused on some point over Gabriel's shoulder. Well, that was better than nothing.

"Hey, remember what you told me at Elysian Fields to keep me awake?" Normally, Gabriel didn't like thinking about that night – about how blank Lucifer's expression had been as he had driven Gabriel's own blade into his chest, about how icy and terrifying the pain had been – but he figured desperate times called for desperate measures.

Sam snorted. "Yeah. I told you to quit being a drama queen 'cause it was just a paper cut."

It had been way bigger than a paper cut, but it had worked; it had kept Gabriel listening to Sam and awake long enough for Dean to arrive with the first-aid kit, and they had literally sown him back together on the floor of the Elysian Fields grand ballroom.

"Well, that..." Gabriel poked lightly at the cut on Sam's chest, causing the human to wince. "That is your paper cut. So man up and stay awake."

Sam huffed a weak laugh before doubling over as another coughing fit took over. Impulsively, Gabriel tugged him sideways until Sam's head was against the crook of his neck. With each shuddering cough, warm blood soaked his shoulder, but he couldn't bring himself to care.

"Easy, kiddo. I gotcha." He rubbed Sam's back until the coughing ceased. Sam attempted to draw back, embarrassed, but Gabriel held him in place.

"Sorry," Sam mumbled.

"Yeah, well. I might as well be useful for something." Truth was, even a year ago, he wouldn't have done this for anyone. He supposed Sam was bringing out the best of him, a part he'd kept hidden away for millenia now. It scared the hell out of him.

Sam wrapped an arm weakly around Gabriel in a valiant attempt to return the embrace, but couldn't quite manage it, so his arm was left dangling loosely around Gabriel's waist, not that the archangel minded. He could hear the faint whistling noise in each breath Sam took, feeling the weak rise and fall of the human's chest, and couldn't help but feel pangs of concern. He had never really thought of humans' lives as fragile, but now, holding Sam's battered and bleeding body, he was starting to see for the first time just how easy it was for life to be snuffed out.

Not that he had noticed back at the Mystery Spot. He had taken Dean's life like it was nothing, setting it back to the same Tuesday morning and letting Dean's death play out a hundred times without a qualm. But if Sam were to breathe his last now, with Gabriel powerless to stop a reaper from taking his soul...he didn't know what he would do.

But it sure as hell wouldn't be pleasant for anyone.

"You're thinking," Sam grumbled against Gabriel's neck, "It's loud. Shut up."

Gabriel huffed a laugh, squeezing Sam a little tighter. "You read minds now?"

"I beat Satan," Sam informed him wryly, "I'm pretty much awesome."

"Yeah, you are," Gabriel agreed, patting his back.

It was true; Sam had pulled off his leap into the Cage in a way no one could have predicted, and come out the other side without a scratch barely a month later when Gabriel and Castiel had teamed up to pull him out. Sure, there was the occasional nightmare about the Cage - and if Gabriel hung around some nights and fed Sam some nice dreams about sunshine and kittens instead, he was never called out on it – but overall, Sam was okay, which was more than Gabriel had given him credit for.

He really needed to quit underestimating Sam Winchester.

"Is Dean coming?" Sam asked suddenly, drawing him out of his thoughts.

"Yeah. Yeah, he's coming with Cas. They'll get us out."

Sam made a small humming noise of acknowledgment, closing his eyes and shuffling closer to Gabriel's side until he was fairly pressed against the archangel. His arm went slack around Gabriel's waist.

"Uhh, Sam?" Gabriel was frozen, startled.

"Tell Dean I'm sorry," Sam mumbled, his voice slurring with both exhaustion and the effect of his concussion.

"Sorry for what?" Then it clicked. "Shut up, Sasquatch, you're not dying. You're fine." Sam listed sideways, further onto him, and Gabriel smacked his shoulder. "Hey! You're not gonna die on me now, you drama queen, they're freaking paper cuts! Wake up!"

Sam didn't respond, and something in Gabriel's chest tightened painfully. He cupped Sam's face in his hands, pulling the hunter's head up and seeing that Sam's eyes had drifted shut despite Gabriel's best efforts to keep him awake.

"Damn it, Sam!" He tapped Sam's cheek, trying to draw him back into consciousness, and Sam barely moved aside from a faint flutter of his eyelids. "For the love of-!" Gabriel leaned forward, crushing their lips together impulsively, and Sam seemed to come alive against him abruptly, stirring and pushing weakly at Gabriel's chest in an attempt to get him off. Gabriel reluctantly broke the kiss to see Sam's eyes wide open and stunned.

"I...wha...?"

"Guess this makes you Sleeping Beauty," Gabriel joked, but Sam was still staring at him, his mouth half-open in shock. "Okay, I get it, I won't do it again, I just figured since you weren't listening – mmph!" Sam's lips were pressed roughly against his once more, the once-lax arm around Gabriel's waist tightening as the hunter forced their mouths together. The kiss was by no means perfect; it was way too much tongue and teeth and hardly coordinated at all, but Gabriel couldn't care less.

It was only when Sam winced slightly that Gabriel forced himself to pull away, trying not to feel too smug when Sam unconsciously leaned forward after him, a small noise of protest leaving his lips.

"Sorry, kiddo, but maybe when you're not bleeding out on me." He tapped Sam's too-pale cheek lightly and Sam scowled at him, the bitchface Gabriel had come to know as number 261, a.k.a "You're a trolling midget and I swear I will never indulge your sweet tooth again." The gesture was oddly reassuring, given the situation.

Ten minutes later, though, Sam was barely awake again, drifting into unconsciousness and then starting awake whenever Gabriel purposely shifted against him. The archangel wished he could pray for the first time in his long and extensive life, if only to be able to see where the hell Dean and Castiel were. Sam didn't seem to be holding out for much longer, and the long pauses between each breath were beginning to worry Gabriel.

Finally, and Gabriel dared to say even blessedly, a sharp tapping noise came from the cracked window. Dean peered in from outside, his eyes lighting up when he spotted Gabriel and Sam.

"Hang on!" he called, his voice muffled through the glass, before he covered his own hand in his sleeve and shattered the window. Sam stirred at the noise, squinting.

"Dean...?"

"Get him out first," Gabriel ordered as Dean slid into the room carefully through the broken window. "Get Castiel to heal him, he's hurt pretty badly."

Dean rolled his eyes at Gabriel as if to say "I can see that, obviously, don't tell me how to take care of my brother" before reaching out to help Sam up. He took the weight off Sam's bad leg as if he had done this several times before – and Gabriel supposed he probably had – and helped Sam limp over to the window.

"Dean-" Sam rasped, listing against his brother, and Dean shushed him with practiced ease.

"Shut up, Sammy, I gotcha." Castiel leaned in from outside, hauling Sam out carefully, and Gabriel watched as Castiel pressed two fingers to the hunter's forehead, healing him immediately. Sam sat up on the grass, relieved, and Dean hauled himself up before holding out his hand. "C'mon, shorty."

"I am a powerful archangel of the Lord," Gabriel threatened as he grudgingly grabbed Dean's hand.

"So how come you didn't get yourself out sooner?" Dean raised an eyebrow and Gabriel decided that powers or not, he was going to punch the smug asshole in the face.

Unfortunately, when he was outside at last and his powers came flooding back, Sam was all over him immediately, crushing their mouths together as if they hadn't just made out less than fifteen minutes ago. He pulled back for air and grinned at the startled expression Gabriel was probably wearing.

"You did say when I wasn't bleeding out on you," he reminded the archangel breathlessly and accepting that, Gabriel tugged him back down to kiss him again eagerly.

Dean gagged. "Ugh, Cas, get me brain bleach."

"I...don't believe there is such a thing," Castiel replied blankly, bless the awkward little angel.

"Ignore him," Sam said as he came up for air, an arm wrapping around Gabriel's shoulders lazily. "He's just jealous 'cause Gabe and I figured out our epic gay romance before you two did."

Dean spluttered, embarrassed, while Castiel tilted his head, bewildered. Gabriel couldn't stop laughing.

I don't know, guys. This story just sort of came to me.

Leave reviews!