Heaven didn't mourn.
It celebrated order, praised justice, and sang songs of divine balance.
But it did not mourn.
Gabriel walked the glowing halls and watched as angels returned to their duties, their formation tighter, their gazes sharper. There were no whispers of grief. No rituals of remembrance. No place carved out for the fallen.
As far as Heaven was concerned, Lucifer had never belonged.
And that was what hurt the most.
Gabriel hadn't spoken to anyone since the fall.
Not Michael.
Not Raphael.
Not even the cherubim that used to flock around him with endless questions and laughter.
He had become a shadow in the House of Light. A fragment left behind.
He didn't mind.
He preferred it that way.
But on the seventh day after Lucifer's banishment, he stood in the Hall of Memory—an endless corridor where the names of angels were etched in starlight—and stared at a blank spot on the wall.
The space where Samael's name once glowed.
Now it was gone.
Erased.
Unspoken.
Unwritten.
He reached out and traced it anyway.
"Why didn't you stop him?"
Gabriel turned slowly.
It was Anael, one of the Watchers. Young in grace, old in curiosity.
She stared at him—not with accusation, but with deep, raw confusion.
"You were closest to him," she said. "He would have listened to you."
Gabriel wanted to lie. Say he had tried everything. Say he had screamed until his voice cracked, thrown himself in front of the throne, challenged Heaven itself to stop the judgment.
But he hadn't.
Not really.
"I didn't stop him," he said quietly, "because part of me understood him."
Anael blinked.
"I didn't agree with his path," Gabriel went on, "but I saw why he walked it. He wasn't evil. He wasn't twisted. He was… tired. Of being told who to be. Of being shaped by silence."
He looked away, voice softening.
"And part of me was too afraid of losing Heaven to fight for the one who needed me most."
Anael didn't respond.
She just bowed her head and walked away.
Gabriel didn't watch her go.
Later, Gabriel stood before the assembled Host.
It wasn't a full gathering—just the higher choir, the ones with the authority to act should Heaven ever be threatened again.
Michael was there, armored and unreadable.
Raphael stood still as a statue.
The others waited in silence.
Gabriel stepped into the center, wearing no armor, no ceremonial robes. Just his wings and his truth.
He raised his voice—not theatrically, but firmly.
"I speak not as the Messenger, but as a brother."
Murmurs rippled through the ranks.
"I know what many of you believe. That the one who fell was lost long before the judgment. That his defiance sealed his fate. That the order has been preserved."
He paused.
"You are wrong."
Silence.
Gabriel continued.
"He didn't fall because he was wicked. He fell because he was wounded—and no one answered. Not Father. Not Michael. Not even me."
A few faces darkened. Some looked away.
"But that's not why I called you here," Gabriel said. "I called you because he's still out there. Still alive. Still powerful."
Raphael spoke then, voice calm and cold. "You believe he's a threat?"
Gabriel looked him in the eye.
"I know he is."
Michael crossed his arms. "What would you have us do? Hunt him down like prey?"
"No," Gabriel said. "I want you to listen. Watch. Pay attention. He's not hiding. He's building."
Michael frowned. "You sound certain."
"I feel him," Gabriel said. "Like a ghost under my skin. I don't know what he's planning. But I know this—Lucifer was born of light, cast into darkness. And in that void, he will forge something that will one day tear the sky open again."
He looked around the chamber.
"I don't know when. But it's coming."
The Host said nothing.
Michael said nothing.
And Raphael, as always, simply turned and walked away.
Gabriel remained in the center alone.
A warning delivered.
Ignored.
He stood on the outer rings of Heaven that night, staring into the deep stars.
He hadn't stopped Lucifer.
Not because he didn't love him.
But because love, Gabriel now realized, had never been enough on its own.
And now the story was shifting.
Slowly. Quietly.
But irrevocably.