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Player Information
Your Nickname: Brig
OOC Journal: twopoinsettias@lj
Under 18? no
Email/IM: twopoinsettias@gmail.com
Characters Played at Singularity: O'Brien, Erik
Character Information
Name: Gabriel / The Trickster / Loki
Name of Canon: Supernatural
Canon/AU/Other Game CR: AU
Reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Characters_of_Supernatural#Gabriel
http://supernatural.wikia.com/wiki/Gabriel
http://www.supernaturalwiki.com/index.php?title=Gabriel
Canon Point: season 7 (ALL WILL BE EXPLAINED)
Setting:
On the surface, ordinary Earth in the 21st century. People go to work, kids go to school, the sun rises and sets and most humans live ordinary, oblivious lives.
Underneath that surface, there are monsters. Vampires, demons, ghosts, werewolves, wendigos, shapeshifters, angels and even pagan gods. Many of them prey on ordinary people and get away with it, fitting themselves into society or hiding away and only striking at the most convenient opportunity. The general public has no knowledge of what's lurking just outside their doorsteps, or under their beds, or in their walls, aside from the generic and often faulty pop culture awareness they might have of the supernatural. Strings of mysterious murders all too often simply go unsolved, since the local authorities are unlikely to believe witness accounts about ghosts or unnatural creatures.
Some of these entities are harmless or even benevolent. Many more are definitely not, and that's where hunters come in. Hunters are usually ordinary people who dedicate themselves to, you guessed it, hunting down the nasties that go bump in the night. Some of them have been trained since childhood to hunt monsters, some come into it as adults after exposure to the supernatural (a loved one being murdered is a recurring theme). Hunters are often lone wolves and there's no strict organization to their ranks, but occasionally they can and do coordinate. The current stereotype of hunters seems to be survivalists, living on the road or maintaining a base of operations, outrunning and/or manipulating the authorities, and doing what they can to hunt while being viewed by regular society as crazies or outcasts. Hunting is not a glamorous lifestyle in the slightest. For the two most visible hunters in the show, their lives are a constant stream of driving across the country from 'job' to 'job,' running credit card scams for money, staying in crappy hotels, impersonating anyone they can in order to get information on the case, getting the crap kicked out of them by various monsters and being chased by the police or FBI, and usually having the innocent civilians they're trying to save not believe them about impending danger. It's a thankless job, but someone's got to do it.
Enter Sam and Dean Winchester, two brothers from Kansas who were raised in the hunting life by their father, John Winchester, after the mysterious and traumatic death of their mother Mary in a "house fire," (which of course was really nothing of the sort). In an effort to track down their missing father and also solve their mother's murder, Dean and Sam crisscross the country in their trademark black Impala, investigating mysterious murders and disappearances, putting angry ghosts to rest, breaking curses, hunting witches and zombies and other things that kill people, and eventually working up to regularly tangling with demons. Their weapons are guns and knives and silver and salt, the occasional use of seals, exorcism, and witchcraft, and the willingness to barge into terrifying situations because, honestly, no one else is going to.
For the Winchesters an 'ordinary' job is investigating murders/disappearances/strange phenomena that make the papers or the internet, or following clues that local authorities have no reason to pick up (ex. every ten years someone goes missing in a certain area like clockwork). The usual culprits are ghosts, monsters, or curses. Ghosts and angry spirits are actually fairly run of the mill occurrences. Creatures like vampires and werewolves can be either individuals or small groups operating independently as they please, acting as your standard serial killer(s). The occasional pagan god will also make an appearance as a serial killer type, having been reduced from their former status to a standard monster by dwindling belief or dwindling sacrifices. Most of these have no particular tie to Heaven or Hell and appear as stand-alone monsters of the week. The boys ride into town, investigate, try to figure out exactly what they're up against, and usually get the crap beaten out of them anyway before finally defeating the baddie.
On the more complicated side of things, you've got angels and demons. While demons have plagued the Winchesters for years (their mother, grandfather, grandmother, and Sam's nearly fiance were all killed by demons), and hunters in general are aware of demons and demonic possessions, there is at first no real working knowledge of how demons function as an organized whole and what their motives are. Hunters rely on holy water, devil traps, and exorcism rituals to fight them, but when an average hunter goes up against a demon, the demon usually wins.
As for demonic motivation, most demons are actually human souls that have been tortured and twisted during their time in Hell until their humanity has been stripped away. Lucifer is considered by some of them to be a myth himself. The story goes that he was cast out of Heaven because he refused God's command to venerate humans, considering them imperfect beings and inferior to angels. Lucifer was then imprisoned in a cage by God for the crime of creating a demon out of a human woman's soul (Lilith). In Lucifer's absence demons proliferated, some of them worshipping him as their creator. Since few (or none) of the other demons had ever seen him or his cage, or ever encountered angels personally, not all demons even believe that Lucifer is real. Powerful demons give the orders to lower demons and the high rollers are individuals like Azazel and Lilith, who work to free Lucifer from his cage and bring about the Apocalypse without their minions being aware of what they're really doing. Some demons even have ambivalent opinions on Lucifer and the Apocalypse when they find out what's going on. Crowley, for example, maintains that he's "in sales" and has no interest in ending the world. Crowley believes that Lucifer being set free will result in all demons eventually being destroyed, as Lucifer has as little love for them as he has for anything else. At the end of the day Lucifer is still an angel, fallen or otherwise, and he cares nothing for his own minions.
In other words, factions in Hell. Since the Winchester family turns out to be integral to the Apocalypse (much to their horror), there are demons that choose to aid them in order to screw over other demons, and demons that want to kill them for the same reason. Demons don't like each other, jockey for power, and stab each other in the backs just like any corporate organization worth its salt.
Unfortunately for everyone, Heaven is much the same way. God has been absent for a long, long time, and only the four Archangels (Gabriel, Raphael, Michael, and Lucifer, in this particular interpretation) have ever seen him in person. Some angels believe that God is dead, or that he has ceased to care what happens in Heaven or on Earth. Without God, orders come down the chain of command from Michael and Raphael (Gabriel having long since fled Heaven and vanished somewhere on Earth) and angels are expected to obey without question and have faith that their orders must be the will of God. Angelic society is structured like a military, and disobedience is strictly punished by torture or even execution.
There are very few people on Earth, hunters or otherwise, that know or believe Heaven is real. Dean is adamant that if angels actually existed, someone would have seen some proof over the centuries. Castiel states that angels have not walked the earth for thousands of years (wiki says it was forbidden for them to take vessels and do so). All the same, the small portion of humanity that happens to be in the know about the supernatural has all kinds of definitive proof about the existence of demons, but apparently none about the existence of angels.
Angels enter the series abruptly when Dean is brought back to life (his soul rescued from Hell, no less) by an unknown power, which the Winchesters at first believe to be an abnormally powerful demon. The lead up to the Apocalypse plot has been a slow burn since the first episode, without the boys realizing why demons had such an interest in them and their family. When angels finally enter the picture, they explain their presence as being required because the Apocalypse has begun and the Winchesters are destined to be smack dab in the middle of it.
Just like demons, angels have to manifest on the physical plane by occupying human vessels. Unlike demons, who can possess anyone they want, angels can only possess vessels from certain bloodlines. The explanation is that only these particular bloodlines can contain the raw power of the divinity inside. Less suitable vessels are slowly burned up by the power inside them, so vessels are a big deal, and they have to give their consent before an angel can possess them. This includes Lucifer, which is a major Plot Point later.
Angels are easily capable of dispatching demons, able to perform exorcisms with a touch, but they can be killed, trapped, de-powered by certain tiers of beings (such as Eve), locked out of locations with the use of seals, and even forced to manifest by witchcraft. Angels derive their power from their connection to Heaven, and since Heaven is full of squabbling factions and even corruption, any given angel can be "unplugged" and their powers significantly reduced. A rebellious angel can have their powers reduced without actually being banned permanently from Heaven, so there are degrees of Falling. Lucifer was cast out, Anna voluntarily left Heaven and ripped out her Grace which turned her human (but she was able to become an angel again by getting her Grace back), Gabriel voluntarily left Heaven but retained all/most of his angelic powers, and Castiel disobeyed Heaven's orders and had his powers greatly reduced but was not actually cast out. Out of these, only Lucifer and Anna count as fallen angels, while Gabriel and Castiel are merely rebellious.
According to Castiel angels don't exist simply to help people but to serve God's will, and in his absence that means Michael and Raphael's will, and what Michael and Raphael (and a number of other angels) want is the Apocalypse. End of the world, Lucifer walking free and everything. They want the showdown between Michael and Lucifer, and all the disasters that lead up to it because it will mean eternal peace if Michael wins. Or eternal suffering if Lucifer does. To most of the angels, the misery of humanity caught in the crossfire is simply collateral damage. Sure, thousands of people might die when the Four Horsemen are unleashed on the world, and a whole slew of people are going to have to die in order to get Lucifer out of his cage, but that's destiny, and most angels aren't very fond of humans anyway. Michael and Raphael didn't actually agree with God's command about venerating humans above angels, but they refused to support Lucifer's argument because that was disobedience to their Father. This attitude of resentment towards humanity is apparently widespread in Heaven. Also the angels are fairly surely that they'll win (having any opinion otherwise is forbidden), so everyone will have eternal peace in the end and that's totally worth the death toll.
It's also apparently worth murdering other angels in order to allow the 66 Seals to be broken and get the Apocalypse ball rolling. Michael and Raphael didn't simply give the orders to let Lucifer rise and let the Apocalypse happen, even if they secretly wanted those things, because they are determined to follow God's will to the letter. They command their soldiers to go to war against Hell and do everything in their power to keep the Seals intact, which in some cases ends up pitting angels against angels. Some angels are alright with this. Some angels feel no compassion for humanity but balk at murdering their own kind, and some angels draw the line at all of it being corrupt and wrong.
Our heroes of course want to stop the Apocalypse at all costs, being sensibly concerned about a destined showdown between two divine superpowers that will fry half the planet. Also it turns out that they have a very personal stake in the coming duel between dutiful older brother Michael and estranged younger brother Lucifer; dutiful older brother Dean is Michael's vessel, and estranged younger brother Sam is Lucifer's. Both Heaven and Hell are determined to force the Winchesters to consent to be used as meat puppets and fight each other to the death, so when they aren't being kidnapped or tortured or threatened by demons, they're being kidnapped or tortured or threatened by angels. Which is often worse. While the various demons can be manipulated by their own senses of self-preservation, angels are hard to fight and harder to convince to back off for any reason. When they can't force Dean to agree to be Michael's vessel, they bring his half-brother Adam back from the dead and coerce him into agreeing.
In the end, the grand duel between possessed Sam (who had said yes to Lucifer in hopes of gaining a moment of control so he could throw himself-and-Lucifer back into the original cage) and possessed Adam is interrupted by Dean being Dean, who decides that if he can't save either of his brothers then he's at least going to die with them. Sam gets his moment of control, and both he and possessed Adam are sucked down into the prison God built for Lucifer. Hypothetically forever.
Tl;dr angels are dicks.
History:
Gabriel actually appears in the series long before any angels show up, masquerading as the trickster god Loki. Having witnessed Lucifer's rebellion and the very start of the grand plan to have Michael and Lucifer eventually kill each other, Gabriel chose to flee Heaven rather than take sides in a conflict between his brothers. He went into 'witness protection,' in his words, presumably taking a vessel and disappearing entirely from Heaven's notice, infiltrating pagan cultures and mimicking or becoming one of their deities using his angelic powers. The exact details of the Trickster's past aren't given in the series, but he's been hiding out on Earth for thousands of years, blending in with the natives (both humans and non-Christian gods) and generally living the high life with wine, women, and chocolate. As Loki, Gabriel spends his time playing the trickster role with pranks and targeting arrogant humans, meting out poetic justice to dicks that deserve some karmic revenge. He runs into the Winchesters when they stumble onto some of his work, believing him to be an 'ordinary' demigod preying on humans like those they'd encountered before, and they promptly try to kill him. Rather than cause any permanent damage, Gabriel allows them to think they've won and that he's been killed by their awesome demigod slaying sharpened wooden stake. They figure out they've been had when they keep running into him.
Later, when angels are on the scene and it's been revealed that Heaven and Hell are trying to force Sam and Dean to become the vessels for Lucifer and Michael, Gabriel's true identity comes to light as one of the four Archangels. Dean and Sam try to convince him to help them against Lucifer and stop the Apocalypse, since Gabriel clearly isn't the dutiful angel soldier type and doesn't really want the world to end, but Gabriel has been running away from this conflict and his family for his entire life. He seems convinced that his older brothers will have their way in the end and that he, the youngest, couldn't stop them even if he tried.
Nevertheless, when the other non-Christian gods rally to try and fight Lucifer, Gabriel makes the decision that they and humanity are worth defending, and challenges Lucifer so that the Winchesters (and his ex-girlfriend Kali) can escape. Gabriel accuses Lucifer of simply being jealous of the "new baby Dad brought home," ie humans, and that destroying a planet because Lucifer is angry at God and Michael is childish and also doesn't have to happen. As Gabriel puts it, "no one makes us do anything." Lucifer and Michael both are deliberately choosing to set themselves on the path to destroying each other, and they wouldn't have to if either would make an effort to get over their butthurt.
Lucifer refuses to change his mind. He hesitates over murdering Gabriel, but not for very long.
Personality:
As might be expected from a character hiding a secret identity, Gabriel has two faces. His public image is Loki or simply "the Trickster," a mischievous and chaotic demigod, invested in his own amusements and happy to indulge in all the fine things life has to offer. He likes beautiful women and sex and desserts and getting away with anything he wants, all the time, and knocking down arrogant humans with clever punishments. He can also be unflinchingly cruel, especially when he's trying to teach someone a lesson (trapping Sam in a timeloop so he could watch his brother die over and over again, just to teach him that sometimes people can't be saved), and some of his prank punishments for wrong-doers end in murder. As most of the other non-Christian gods and demigods in the series are portrayed as a higher tier Monster Of The Week, complete with a taste for human sacrifice, Gabriel presumably picked up some of the native habits after hanging around Earth so long. He doesn't find it contradictory to be an angel rubbing elbows with entities that eat people or cause suffering. Rather, all these pagan gods and even ordinary humans are so much more interesting and complex than anything Heaven had to offer, and if blending in with the locals means killing someone or allowing someone to be killed, well, when in Rome. Gabriel has an image to maintain and a secret to protect, since angels aren't exactly looked well upon by other deities and Gabriel himself isn't looked well upon by Heaven or Hell. Playing a role has kept him hidden and kept him alive, especially considering that back in the day, all those other non-Christian gods had a lot of believers and raw power at their disposal. Letting his mask slip would have been disastrous, and after so many centuries some habits become ingrained.
In the modern day era, when other gods are having difficulties maintaining their powers without millions of humans believing in them as they used to or proper sacrifice/worship, Gabriel seems to thrive by having adapted to the times (it probably also doesn't hurt that angels don't require worship to survive). He can blend in with ordinary humans seamlessly when he wants to, understands pop culture, matches Dean snark for snark and insult for insult, loves bad television and tabloid magazines and crazy urban legends. Theatrics and performance are a major part of his existence. Everything is about making an entrance, playing a character, playing to an audience. It wouldn't be incorrect to say he's turned himself into a deity specifically associated with pop culture and television, as his last legacy is a goodbye message to Sam and Dean on a porno DVD. He's very fond of illusions and prefers to not do any fighting himself, especially if he can try to charm his way out of it instead. When he does have to fight he's more likely to sneak up behind someone than face them head on. He considers himself a shameless, suave bastard and an excellent lover, or at least he's happy to present himself this way to others.
Gabriel also apparently had a relationship with the goddess Kali at one point. He is probably a sucker for dares. As a secret angel, his self-appointed vigilante stance against the prideful is basically a version of his former angelic duty: reminding humans that there are higher powers that can cast them down in an instant and bringing wrong-doers to deserved ends. He can be an asshole and a dangerous, vindictive creature, but usually only to those who've brought it on themselves. Compared to the ruthless indifference of other angels, especially the ones that consider humans little more than insects, Gabriel can at least be bargained with or talked down and isn't allergic to changing his mind.
On the other side of the coin, you've got the Archangel Gabriel, youngest out of the four brothers Michael, Raphael, and Lucifer. God apparently loved Lucifer best out of the brothers, at least until he created humans and commanded his angels to adore them as he did. Michael became the authoritative Dad stand-in when God vanished, and Raphael apparently sides with Michael in everything, which left Gabriel in the midst of squabbling older brothers. Unable to bear the conflict, Gabriel fled Heaven and hid himself away for thousands of years, trying to distract himself from the past (and what he knew was coming in the future) with humans and shiny things on Earth. Oddly enough, out of all the angels in the entire series, Gabriel is one of the few that sincerely believes that God was right about humans and that they're worth something. He's usually pretty careful about not letting that opinion slip, however.
Gabriel uses the Trickster persona to hide the fact that he ran from his family and his responsibilities, and he hasn't ever gotten over it. Part of him is still deeply pained, furious at, and even afraid of his brothers, especially Lucifer, who claims to have taught Gabriel all his tricks. Gabriel at first refuses to help the Winchesters try and stop the Apocalypse because he's so resigned to the idea that his brothers are going to stubbornly bull their way into mutual destruction and no one can stop them. Possibly Gabriel knows this from personal experience. Possibly he's still operating under angelic hierarchy, where older and stronger angels have the natural right to command their younger brethren, and possibly it's plain old youngest sibling psychology. In a moment of anger, Gabriel bursts out that he doesn't care which side wins, he just wants everything to be over because it's all going to turn out bloody and awful and he's going to lose brothers either way. The war between Heaven and Hell is a sibling grudge that's gotten entirely out of hand and Gabriel is the kid hiding on the staircase with hands over his ears while his family throws dishes at each other.
Or, you know, celestial armies.
In any case, Gabriel has spent a damn long time plastering over these inconvenient things called emotions and other vulnerabilities and trying to prove to
Despite being the runaway, Gabriel is the one who feels abandoned. His brothers are too concerned with fighting each other to really give much of a shit about him. Even if he let them find him (and who knows how much or how little effort they actually made to do so), they would only want him to choose a side in their war. God has vanished and left everyone to the mess of their own making. The non-Christian gods tolerate Gabriel's company and while it's possible that some of them care for him sincerely, Gabriel is constantly aware of his own precarious position. If they ever discovered what he really is, they could attempt to destroy him or cast him out. More to the point, none of them are angels, which were not created to thrive as individuals. Angels' natural instincts are towards cooperative unity, pleasure in obedience to their superiors, and the constant empathic/psychic/angelic/whatever reassurance of each others' presences. Having forced himself to be solitary and behave against his own nature, Gabriel has in some ways lessened and warped himself, just like Lucifer did, and probably damaged his Grace. He's not entirely an angel anymore, having steeped himself so deeply in humanity and pagan magic and free will. He doesn't consider this a good thing or any kind of accomplishment, although he'd loudly proclaim otherwise if anyone tried to needle him about it. It's something that he feels was forced on him, because he had to flee Heaven, because he had to go into hiding, because he had to maintain his disguise etc.
The Archangel Gabriel, the Messenger, is actually a third mask to him, a stern and unhappy marble statue as inhuman, implacable, and detached as his older brothers and invested only in their concerns, but Gabriel doesn't fall into this personality often because it's no longer him. He's spent too much time on Earth to ever go back to being a normal angel. There are contradictions in him now that won't allow it. His true personality is somewhere between Archangel and Trickster, softened from the high-ranking angel he once was and not actually as self-sufficient and maliciously cheerful as the demigod he pretends to be. He's a creature that doesn't belong in either sphere anymore. Other angels would find him corrupt or inexpressibly strange, other gods would never be able to forgive his origins and the way he weaseled into customs and religions not his own just to save his skin. Humans, of course, aren't much in a position to understand him at all.
On some level Gabriel knows that both Michael and Lucifer are only acting the way they are because they also felt forced. But just as Gabriel doesn't want to acknowledge that he could have chosen differently (and lashes out at Dean for suggesting it), Lucifer and Michael are defined by the choices they made and both are far more stubborn and terrifyingly implacable than Gabriel ever was. Part of Gabriel's obsession with theatrics and television and even fair judgment is the promise of a neatly wrapped up story where the characters get what they deserve. Heroes win in the end, threats are eliminated, the world is saved to turn another day. It's nothing like the reality Gabriel knows is waiting for him, and he'd rather retreat to fantasy and/or be the one meting out appropriate fates to hapless humans than acknowledge that his brothers will drag him and everything else down in the end.
Nevertheless, Gabriel makes the choice to stand up to Lucifer in the end, mostly because Dean bitched at him and Dean is apparently really good at corrupting angels. While Gabriel doesn't hold onto much false hope that he might actually win, he gives it his best shot and dies with the conviction that he'd finally made the right choice.
OC/AU Justification
If AU, How is Your Version Different From Canon, and How Will That Come Across?
Given the fact that cheating death is one of Gabriel's specialties, and in order to avoid being deluged by post-death canon information, I'd like to AU him so that a small piece of his Grace (an angel's soul, essentially, the stuff that makes them an angel rather than a human or a tuna fish) was preserved in the DVD that he left for Dean. Knowing that going up against Lucifer probably meant certain permanent death, it's logical that Gabriel might have tried to take precautions and that he'd have some pagan magic tricks up his sleeves to do it with. Supernatural's general rule about gods is that they exist by the power of belief in them, so Gabriel's choice to stick his image on a volume of Casa Erotica (a popular porno series repeatedly referenced in the show) could easily be explained by 1.) the fact that he has no taste and 2.) god of pop culture and 3.) if enough people watch Casa Erotica (as a form of worship), Gabriel will slowly but surely be resurrected.
He might have actually mentioned this on the DVD itself, but neither Dean nor Sam ever actually watched it until the end, because ew Gabriel pornography.
With his consciousness having been stuck in a DVD in the back of the Impala/stuck inside television for all this time, Gabriel would be aware of most of the major events that have taken place in the series after his death, but he wouldn't have the power or higher cognitive functions to do anything about any of it. When he arrives on Sacrosanct, his limited powers will simply be par for the course for a divinity very slowly recovering from the brink of non-existence. And he'll be severely claustrophobic.
As for his reactions to major events in seasons 5-7, Gabriel's personality won't really change much. The fact that the Winchester brothers were able to fuck up Michael and Lucifer's super plan with the advice Gabriel gave to them will surprise him as much as it surprised everyone, and will go a long way towards making him reconsider his cynical stance on destiny and fatalism. Although he's not going to admit that to them or anyone, ever. All of Heaven and Hell reels from the Apocalypse being averted and the "natural order" being disrupted, and Gabriel will be no exception, but he'll get over his shellshock much faster and go right back to his usual plan of making crap up as he goes along. He'll probably be the only person anywhere actually mourning both Michael and Lucifer, although he understands very well that letting them out again would only cause a bigger shitshow. He'd also have no intention of returning to Heaven to help with clean up, ever, even if he wasn't stuck inside a DVD, because it's not his job to take command of angels that won't ever forget his desertion and it's definitely not his job to fight his last remaining brother, Raphael. Just because he challenged Lucifer doesn't mean he wants to go home and get all the dirty looks from other angels for defending humans and pagans, and deal with a civil war. Someone else can volunteer for that bullshit.
As for Cas going nuclear and the Leviathans, welp, it's always something going wrong around the Winchesters, isn't it.
Abilities, Weaknesses, and Power Limitation Suggestions:
Flight: technically angelic flight, but to an ordinary observer's eye it simply looks like teleporting. Gabriel would be limited to a single Zone and further limited by the fact that it's suddenly incredibly exhausting to zap everywhere, and he can only transport two or three people at a time. Anyone who knows any kind of magic can probably lock him out of a given area or bind his wings, or even feel him coming.
Angelic strength/durability: punching an angel is ordinarily like punching a statue, and they have strength and stamina above an ordinary human's. As Gabriel is still recovering, he can only push his vessel to superhuman abilities for so long (maybe five minutes, maybe an hour or two) before he knocks himself out. Gabriel is still a hands off type and would much rather spend his energies using an illusion than trying to punch someone in the face anyway. Angels do bleed and can be beaten unconscious or their vessels killed if someone tries hard enough.
Occult knowledge/exorcism/pagan magic: angels can exorcise demons from a body with a touch, being holy and all that. That probably won't be happening in-game any time soon, but either way Gabriel has an extensive knowledge of random occult stuff, like how to kill a vampire and how to draw a particular seal in ancient Enochian that wards your house against angels or termites. Since any sort of magic depends on the power of belief, and Gabriel is pretty far from home and running low on his own batteries, any Trickster-esque magic he uses or seals he casts will have a 50/50 chance of not working, or fizzling out quickly. Trickster magic would include low level spells like manipulating elements (water, wind, fire, etc), shapeshifting (he might get stuck or fail to achieve the shape he wants) and transforming small objects/other persons, which will take up a lot of energy and only be used against another character with OOC permission. Again, 50/50 chance of any object he transforms snapping back to its original shape after a certain amount of time, and all transformations against a living being will be temporary. For the most part he'll stick with energy efficient illusions, rather than real transformations, but there are times when you just gotta turn Sam Winchester into a car, okay.
As for seals and devil traps and such, these can be easily undone by anyone by merely smudging the lines. Devil traps only affect demons, sigils to banish angels are only going to work on angels. Like his brethren Gabriel has healing abilities, which will be greatly lessened on Sacrosanct. He can't miracle away injuries anymore, only make them less severe, and if he runs out of juice he won't be able to do anything at all.
Archangel sword: a holy blade that all angels can manifest from hammerspace. Archangel blades are supposedly stronger than ordinary angel blades, but that's going to mean jack squat without other angels around, and Gabriel's will be a slightly holy paperweight when he can't get up the juice to charge it properly. If he's too exhausted, the sword will disappear entirely. Against non-demonic creatures it won't be anything more than a chunk of metal, against demonic creatures it will function as a holy object. Gabriel also hasn't been practicing, he's not really that keen on sword-work.
Dreamwalking/telepathy/prayer: While Gabriel is ordinarily capable of appearing in someone's dreams with a message and/or reading someone's mind, on Sacrosanct he'll have to be touching them to do it. In his severely weakened state the chaos of a human mind can easily overwhelm anything he might be trying to communicate or perceive. Also Gabriel hates reading minds, it spoils the surprise. As an angel with a distinctly non-human mind, it's going to be very difficult for anyone else to read his mind. No angel has canonly been shown to use telepathy to force human minds to do anything, only to communicate and alter memories, so it's possible that angels can't simply take control of someone's thoughts the way an ordinary telepath can.
Gabriel can hear prayers that are directed specifically towards him, which is apparently like paging for angels. Whether he chooses to answer is another story. If the prayers are more generic, he may or may not be able to hear them, as he's probably spent a long time training himself not to listen to those. For lulz, he might also be able to hear 'prayers' or summons relating to Loki.
Telekinesis: typically used by angels and demons to fling people across rooms or hold them pinned to walls. On good days, Gabriel won't be able to 'lift' anything heavier than a few hundred pounds, and he'll tire extremely quickly, on bad days he might not be able to use telekinesis at all. Brute force is really more of an angel thing, not a trickster's, so Gabriel's not inclined to use it anyway, and he'll be clumsy if he does. No fine precision here. A telekinetic or biotic can probably cancel him out in battle, or wait him out until he's exhausted himself, and even someone with ordinary super strength would probably be able to do the same.
Reveal: as a last ditch defense/finishing move, angels can reveal their wings in battle and flatten or even incinerate an entire room of enemies, if they happen to be demons. Being de-powered, Gabriel's wings can act as a non-fatal concussion blast, but it will immediately knock him out or drain his angel mojo down to zero.
Illusions: having honed this skill as the Trickster, Gabriel can create solid or non-solid illusions to either deceive enemies or gang up on them. His weaker illusions are only as real as the target's mind allows them to be. Stronger illusions are still bound by the general laws of reality, so if he creates a solid illusion of a zombie bodyguard, it can be set on fire or cut in half or punched through a wall and that'll be it for that particular illusion. He hasn't got an infinite supply, either, the more he has to create or the more complicated and realistic it needs to be the faster he'll tire. His favorite combat tactic is creating an illusion of himself and letting his enemies kill it while he gets away, which goes to show how he prefers to fight his battles. Given his fluctuating powers, it's entirely possible that other characters might be able to see through his illusions at any given moment.
Other limitations: Angels can be summoned, captured, controlled, locked out of locations, or forced out of their physical vessels by certain seals and rituals, which on Gabriel's arrival, will suddenly become public knowledge available in Hypatia's online database/libraries for anyone who cares to investigate the occult. He's probably also subject to some of the mythological Loki's weaknesses, or for example a binding spell specifically tuned to 'Loki' rather than 'Gabriel' might still catch him. As he's recovering from near death, he'll be constrained to eat regularly, sleep regularly, and tire as quickly as a human invalid, and he'll constantly forget/deliberately ignore the fact that he needs to bow to these requirements. If he tries to use any powers without having sufficient energy stored up, he'll knock himself on his ass. And then turn around and do it again the very next day without having learned a thing.
After his time stuck in a DVD, he'll also be severely claustrophobic.
ALSO I AM HAPPY TO DISCUSS FURTHER LIMITATIONS AND/OR LOCKING CERTAIN ABILITIES just give me a shout on aim or plurk or w/e. Angels are overpowered final boss fight characters in SPN and Archangels are even worse.
Inventory:
clothes on his back, one DVD of Casa Erotica, one false mustache and one pair of neon green shutter shades
Appearance: 5'8" and fairly ordinary looking, unless you happen to be close enough to see his eyes, which are slightly more gold than the brown they're supposed to be. Anyone with extra-sensory perception or with energy reading tech is free to pick up on the fact that he's got hueg invisible wings (which fandom assures me are gold) and/or weird energy swirling all around him.
Age: physically in his thirties, otherwise immortal.
And What Did You Score?
Samples
Log Sample:
One of the problems with being stuck inside a DVD, Gabriel reflected, aside from the part where you were stuck inside a DVD, was that you were always at the mercy of whatever happened to be connected to that particular DVD player, like the TV, which was at the mercy of the hands holding the remote, like Dean Winchester's. Channel surfing took on an entirely new meaning when there was nothing else to do but watch whatever happened to be on the screen at any given moment, and you had absolutely no control over it. Even for a connoisseur of horrible television such as himself, reruns and CNN and paid programming after midnight soured quickly without the chance to discriminate.
Mostly he hated the feeling of being confined. Angels weren't meant for it by their very nature, and Gabriel had made a profession out of running away from anything and everything that tried to hold or corner him. Tucked inside his little sanctuary/prison, wings folded tightly around himself to keep from emanating the slightest bit of angelic energy where his brothers (or worse, his ex) might sense it, he spat out a mouthful of insubstantial feathers and squirmed restlessly, wishing he dared order his energy into a bendier shape. Maybe not a horse this time. Or a salmon. Something without a spine.
Not a good idea, though, when he was still recovering and his Grace needed to be let alone to repair itself. If he forced it to contort into something that wasn't its natural inclination, he might end up the victim of one his own favorite pranks, the face your mother told you would freeze that way.
He ran through the worn out pantomime of his own movie for the millionth time, separating himself from his image with a frivolous flicker of power and flopping on the carpet that wasn't really there while his mustached double got busy with the blonde pornstar who also wasn't really there. The entire Room (the Set, really, the one he was trapped in, as he didn't like to remind himself) was less substantial than his weakest illusion, two dimensional and faded and boring. The only sensations it could inspire were memories. Even the prospect of watching his own admittedly flawless double perform had paled eventually once he'd seen the show from every possible angle, and several impossible ones. It just reminded him of how much he fucking missed being tangible.
He told himself the carpet he wasn't really lying on was comfortable, and that the phantom aches he'd get from watching the Room's flatscreen TV upside down weren't really there because he didn't actually have a neck to strain. For a long time (and in here, even a few seconds counted as a long time) the TV in the Room had shown nothing but white snow when he flicked it on. For a long time, Gabriel's tiny little scrap of self had been too small and damaged to even notice or care about anything beyond regeneration, a mote of divine energy buried deep inside his own mindless image. When consciousness finally started to trickle back in, piece by piece and memory by memory (and oh, that had been fun, patiently stringing together flashes of memories that made no narrative sense, it was Memento all over again), he'd spread himself through his image cautiously, water flowing in to fill a container, needing the reminder of his vessel's shape. He'd been too many different things for too many years, and painfully non-angelic for most of them.
Once he'd been able to coax his energy back into form, the next task was stepping outside of his double and existing independently, trying to remember where his silhouette ended. He had the double to use as a model, of course, but the double couldn't remind him how organs were supposed to fit together (imaginary organs, but necessary that he remember them, or they wouldn't be there when he finally became physical again) or how hair was supposed to feel or how his significantly larger angel form had to stay on the inside of his human sized imaginary skin.
The double also reminded him how tall his vessel was supposed to be, and Gabriel frequently considered cheating. Not that it wasn't useful to be constantly underestimated, but there was something enviable in the way everyone, even little Castiel and Lucy, had to crane their necks and look up at a person of Sam Winchester's height. Even if bloodlines and gritty modern stage adaptions of Cain vs Abel weren't involved, it was right up Lucifer's alley to choose a vessel that would tower over Michael's.
Gabriel resolved to make up for the lack with a hat, a really tall one, when he got out of here. Some show on the BBC had informed him that Stetsons were making a comeback.
Television was also his first reconnection to the outside world, when he stretched his recovering Grace just enough to press up against the walls of his prison (he couldn't call it a cage, not like Lucifer's, he couldn't think about it like that without losing time) and felt something press back, a tiny trickle of energy. The flatscreen in the Room flicked on, grainy picture quality and crackling static through the voice of a daytime talkshow host, but it was something new and coming from the outside and Gabriel flung his insubstantial arms around the damn thing and made out with it more passionately than his double had with blondie. When he got a little stronger he didn't have to bother with the mental metaphor of importing images to the flatscreen, he could pick up the signal all on his own and watch it broadcast across his mind's eye. Dean bitched about the angelic network and the fact that their mojo screwed up electronics (Cas had accidentally shorted out the Impala's radio once) and how angels were a fucking menace to be around, but there were times when it paid to be a living energy conduit.
So then he had some entertainment, at least. It still got old quickly, especially with someone else controlling the channels, and he went back to pacing and wondering why it was taking so long for the Winchesters to get to the instructions he'd hidden in the credits of his movie, the ones that told them how to speed up his resurrection.
Then he didn't wonder, because he knew. In hindsight he probably should have seen it coming, what with their track record with following directions and/or making good decisions, ever.
Neither of them actually watched his movie, the bastards. He'd even given the girl the visage of one of Dean's favorite actresses and everything.
So Gabriel was obliged to sit and stew in his self-made prison, waiting for his Grace to regenerate mote by ethereal mote and thankful that the layers of resurrection spells he'd coated his colorful candy shell in would work on their own time, even if certain idiots weren't helping things along to speed up the process. Waiting, and forced to channel surf along with Dean in crappy motel after crappy motel, watching whatever Dean was watching and only getting glimpses of the bigger picture whenever one of the boys would leave the news on. He tried not to complain aloud, mostly because he couldn't complain aloud and make himself heard, which was technically the entire point of complaining. Instead he made snide comments inside the space of his own mind and critiqued the porn Dean watched (never his, of course, and Gabriel sulked over all that wasted effort) and announced the obvious revelations when Sam watched the news. Natural disasters! Lucifer. Death roll rising! Lucifer. Unexplained accidents! Michael.
"Seriously," he told the Winchesters, ignoring the part where he didn't have a voice, "this is so by the book it's a B movie. I hope neither of you paid full price."
Being oblivious to bits of static occasionally interfering with their TV reception, they ignored him.
He rode in the back of the Impala in the bottom of Sam's bag when they left him still in the laptop's DVD drive, or in the bottom of Dean's bag when Sam bitched about Dean leaving angel porn in his stuff. He got back to Sam's laptop as part of a prank war, which was much better than flexing his sliver of Grace to switch on the TV when the boys were out of the room in order to channel surf on his own. Commandeering the computer was a much more efficient medium for digging up information, and didn't take nearly as much energy.
It was only right that he should get to know how the story ended, after all. He'd died for it. Quasi-died. Made an enthusiastic effort in the direction of death. The other gods had been cast low (not destroyed, even Lucifer couldn't entirely destroy what the belief of millions maintained) and were down for the count while the Apocalypse rolled onwards. Heaven and Hell mobilized and even in his weakened, pathetic state, Gabriel could feel them like a weight pressing down on the body he didn't have, every energy current on the planet disturbed and roiling like the mother of all brewing storms. The boys were only human, and didn't know. Even vessels couldn't feel the way time itself ran heavier, circling down, every individual moment that made up destiny tightening up like a chokehold. Hunkered in his little plastic prison Gabriel could still feel it, and his metaphysical shoulders ached with the effort of bracing metaphysical wings above his metaphysical head. In the real world, the brothers fought each other and fought angels and fought demons, and they didn't feel a damn thing.
It didn't matter. Gabriel had gambled on his hand and he'd lost, badly, as badly as he could have predicted if he'd allowed himself to think ahead. Lucifer 1, little brother Gabe fuck all, just like how it had been back in the good old bad old days.
Getting Kali and the Winchesters out alive didn't feel terribly much like a victory. Each of them had tried to kill him at one time or another, and after every disaster the Winchesters extricated themselves from they'd just run right back into a new one. It was like rescuing lemmings. Kali wasn't much for learning from past mistakes either. And now Gabriel had to be a spectator for the rest of the show in karmic mockery of how he liked to conduct his pranks, sitting on the sidelines after his fifteen minutes of limelight, which had totally not been flattering.
The look of regret on Lucifer's face had been as much of a sword to the heart as the actual sword was. It wasn't regret over his actions. It was the same look Gabriel had seen on self-righteous human after self-righteous human, usually right around the time Gabriel decided that said human needed their narrow little worldview shaken up, Trickster style. Or. You know. Ended permanently, also Trickster style.
'Don't make me do this,' Lucifer had said, honestly, as if Gabriel was the one standing there with blood drenched hands with a massacre at his back. As if Gabriel was the erring child crossing a line that his loving, dedicated, principled older brother would have to punish him for. Lucifer had a martyr complex the size of Heaven and Hell combined and for all the melancholy in his eyes, there'd been nothing but surety in his hands, pushing the blade in. Invading Gabriel's Grace and ripping it to shreds in a burst of whitehot light.
It was nice to know exactly where you stood with your family. Really. Gabriel had definitely wanted that reminder keeping him company during his time trapped in the Room. In his moments of weakness (which were rare, rare, and no one was ever going to report otherwise) he wondered what would happen if he tried to crack his shell prematurely, if he pushed and screamed and called for Michael and Raphael, if either of them would swing low and rescue him. If they would feel the awful raw scarring of his Grace where Lucifer's murderous intent had ripped him open as no angel should ever do to another, and take him under their stronger wings to let him heal. They could do that for him. They were elder, and even though the harmony of the Four had been disrupted since Lucifer's absence, Michael and Raphael were still strong enough to weave their youngest back together. If he begged sweetly enough, if he played the role they wanted (and he could, he could kneel and show them the tatters of his Grace and tell them Lucifer's attack had changed his heart, and part of it would be true), they might even let him come home.
He dared not. If he thrashed his way free and spread his hurting wings as wide as they were meant to be in his true form, from horizon to horizon, the attention he attracted might be the Morningstar's.
More likely than either was the simple, terrifying prospect that no one would come at all, and he would destroy himself in the act of struggling free. Plummet to the unforgiving ground like those blind, wrinkled infant birds that clambered over the protective lip of their nests and fell from the tree.
There was a metaphor in there that he refused to think about. He wasn't Fallen, not yet, he knew God's existence as a solid fact written in the fiber of his being, so he was in no danger of losing his faith like little Castiel. Nor did he particularly feel like becoming a mortal, even if he'd made a speech about wanting to protect them. He could choose to stretch his hand forth and protect humans, or fluffy retarded kittens that liked to ride on Roombas, or whatever, without actually wanting to be one.
There were other ways to become less of an angel. Gabriel was pretty sure he'd just discovered a new one, crammed into the Room with no space to spread his growing Grace and no outlet for his frustrations and every day the ceiling getting lower. He felt the world spinning down. His feathers were ragged, bent against the walls, snapping in half when he squirmed helplessly against the ache, and he couldn't make himself any smaller when he felt Lucifer and Michael both approach.
He was there at the end of it all, crouched and wordless inside his thin layer of plastic, forgotten in the Impala's backseat while destiny held her breath and Sam Winchester, whipped and spurred into it like the champion Thoroughbred he was, did his level best to beat his older brother to death in a cemetery. Gabriel didn't get to see, but he could feel. He would have felt the outcome of that battle even if he'd been unconscious or possibly dead. Lucifer fell a second time, and Michael with him, and Gabriel was still silent when the Cage door slammed shut on them. For once, there was nothing he could think of to say.
Getting free of his own prison suddenly didn't seem quite as important after that. He let the better part of a year pass on the outside before raising his head from beneath his stiff wings, stagnated to metaphysical marble in that position. The realization hit him like a ton of bricks that he now had enough juice to slip free from the plastic, if he wanted. There were power lines buzzing and wires laid in the ground and a radio in the garage with him. There was an entire spared world out there that had continued turning, full of people and events that the Trickster in him whined over missing out on. Hubris to punish, petards to hoist. Ex-girlfriends. Distraction. There was a brand new future, one Gabriel hadn't skipped ahead to visit.
The marble cracked carefully. Gabriel found the Room dark and grainy, like old film, and his double and the girl were mere shadows, as if they'd gone through the motions of their scenes so many times they'd burned themselves to nothing.
He looked beyond all of it, outside. His eyes hurt as if he hadn't used them for a long time, except he didn't actually have eyes so they couldn't really hurt.
There was a distinct lack of his Father anywhere, as usual, and Gabriel thought briefly about Lucifer and Michael in the cage, tearing each other apart for all eternity and/or whenever the next idiot managed to get the lock open. Being confined in the same space wouldn't make them stop and compromise. They probably weren't even trying to get free.
He thought about Raphael still Upstairs, probably still reeling from what had happened, probably still refusing to believe that two humans could have thwarted the divine plan and all the will of Heaven. Raphael wouldn't take any hints. He'd probably keep the war going if he could, just to thwart any kind of peace that had been accomplished by humans.
"That's what you get for underestimating mud monkeys," Gabriel muttered into his feathers, brushing chunks of marble from them, and the radio on the table sputtered static. Underneath the Impala, Dean tried to sit up at the sudden noise and promptly hit his head on the undercarriage.
The cursing made Gabriel feel a little better. He flexed his Grace and found it strong and willing, for a given value of low level poltergeist strong. The radio switched over obligingly to a country station, which didn't make the cursing stop.
Tomorrow, he told himself. Tomorrow he'd get up (metaphorically) and spread his wings (slightly less metaphorically) and zap through a power line or a radio signal and find out what he was missing. It might be another six months or even a year before he could materialize physically, at the rate he seemed to be recovering. In the meantime he'd have to lurk in electronic signals, no longer bound to the Casa Erotica DVD. There were probably new daytime TV shows he'd missed. New reality TV and gameshows and carbon copy medical dramas and police procedurals. Things with comfortable, familiar endings.
Tomorrow.
Network Sample:
[ The video clicks on to reveal a man with a fabulous (and fake) mustache, twirling it cheekily as he speaks. ]
Now this, this is what I call craftsmanship. Nobody appreciates a good quality layered illusion these days. I mean look at this, I could poke this wall all day long and it's going to feel like a wall the entire time, am I right? [He demonstrates by, well, feeling up said wall suggestively.]
That's dedication to your deception and you get full marks. But I do have to make a suggestion. Just a small one, I'm not trying to say anything about anybody's robot fetish going on here, but needs more aliens. Female aliens. You know what I mean.
It's Loki, by the way. If you'd like to cut the cutesy sci-fi stuff and tell me why I'm here.
