Utility

I'm still incorporating stories from this series from my other fanfiction accounts onto this site. If I had a modicum of intelligence, I would have put all of the stories as multiple chapters in one consolidated folder - but they're disjointed because I started writing the series way back when I didn't realize it was a series at all, and I was playing around with "just fanfiction." Anyway ...

This is part thirteen of Post-Asmodeus Sabriel Feels. It was written and originally published way back in December 2018. More to come.

If you want to read the rest in the meantime, check out the series Post-Asmodeus Sabriel Feels on Archive of Our Own. Find me on Tumblr too, under UnityGhost.

Thank you for reading!

Daytime was getting to be more manageable. But Gabriel's patience wore thin as the nightmares continued to harass him almost every time he closed his eyes, more than half a year since he'd come to stay with Sam and Dean at the bunker.

Gabriel had been so sure that as his grace gradually returned – a process still ongoing – and he needed less and less sleep to function properly, the bad dreams would become shorter. Less vivid.

But almost every night, they did what they had since his rescue: broken up his sleep, made him need more sleep, and ultimately hindered the replenishment of his grace.

Practice made it easier to keep from disturbing other people – people who had already done too much to try to hold him in one piece. He grew accustomed to waiting out the rest of the night alone. It was now almost instinctual to lie in bed instead of collapsing to the floor, to roll over and throw up into the trash can instead of on himself, to wait patiently for any impending abuse instead of trying to fight back.

But sometimes Gabriel wasn't successful: he would succumb to a fit of panic, sobbing for help; he would vomit all over the sheets; he would grew desperate enough that he ran out of his room and stumbled over his own feet, pitching to the floor and inevitably waking someone up.

Castiel was usually the first to notice Gabriel's distress, since he was the only one among them that required no sleep at all. He never reacted with alarm or confusion, and never asked questions. Instead, he simply did what he could to get Gabriel through the worst of it: sitting with him, quietly insisting that he was no longer in danger, holding him steady while he got sick, remaining patient as Gabriel gave in to memories that refused to remain memories.

Gabriel appreciated his brother's assistance. In those moments of terror, he was grateful for a reassuring presence.

Still, it was no secret to any of them that Gabriel had an extreme preference for Sam.

It was Sam who had coaxed him out of insanity shortly following his rescue. Sam had seen him at his worst, worse than what the others thought was the ugliest he could get. Whereas Castiel, too, had witnessed the immediate aftermath of Gabriel's liberation, Sam had been the one to press on Gabriel's vulnerabilities just hard enough to show that he knew where they were, but not with enough force to increase the pain.

Gabriel had responded with the first of many violent seizures of fear and sickness, and Sam didn't leave. Nor did he squirm or look away. He did what he could to make touch seem a little less damning, to furnish at least the illusion of safety.

So at this point, especially now that this same process had taken place at least once every couple of weeks since that first episode of self-debasement, Sam was the only one Gabriel really wanted nearby in the fallout of a nightmare. It helped to have someone else, anyone else, because of course the alternative was being alone; but having Sam there was different from not having Sam there.