The Fall
I sat atop a building, and watched the march of death happen below. Mindless death that I was helpless to stop. Man killing man in the name of a God who wanted no such thing.
Calling this a building was probably generous. It was a single remaining wall, and the sharp points of rebar poked out of it like stitches.
My wings hung behind me, unseen by man. I sighed heavily as another bomb fell on a civilian building. I sent my senses toward it, but none inside lived. Sadness washed through me, a helplessness that plagued me like a disease necrotising my organs.
Beside him, Gusion appeared. I dragged my eyes from him quickly, lest he see the guilt that lived there permanently.
“To what do I owe the honor of a visit from Hell’s Fallen?” I asked softly, my eyes still trained on the gunfire below. An armored vehicle navigated the debris.
“I’ve come to request a favor,” Lucifer said quietly. His words echoed through the streets, though none below would hear it. Once, he’d been an Archangel. If Michael was the Father’s right hand, then Lucifer had once been his favored son.
“Why would I need a favor from the Lord of Hell?” I said it a lot more evenly than I felt. Could he see it already? Could he see my doubt? My pain that I couldn’t heal? I tightened my expression. “By my count, the Fallen already owe me enough favors, though who’s counting?”
Gusion smiled brightly at me. “Come on, Raph. A voiced favor from the Devil himself will come in handy one day. If anything, you owe me one.”
I resisted the urge to let out a bitter snort. He didn’t even know. “Fine. What do you need?”
“Help delivering a baby.”
I frowned. “There must be human doctors that can undertake this? Unless you’ve somehow managed to claim one of those firstborns that humans are so fond of promising you?”
Gusion laughed, even as Lucifer shook his head. “I wish they would stop. What would I want with a child in Hell?” He hesitated. “No, it is for a more…delicate matter. Please, old friend.”
I sighed. “Fine.” I could deliver a human child in my sleep. Maybe seeing a life enter the world will heal some of the heavy bruises that so much death left on my soul.
Latching onto their energy, I followed them across the world.
When we appeared in a room filled with the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, I hesitated. Was I walking into a trap?
When one launched themself at us, Lucifer sighed and froze them all. Then I saw the woman on the bed. Her soul reached toward me, and I knew she was so close to death that it would be mere moments before Azriel appeared.
I halted as her energy wrapped around me. I almost laughed. On the heels of that emotion was such a bitter sense of irony, I could have cried.
The child. She was here. My first regret in a millennia of regrets. Or perhaps, the only truly pure thing I’d ever done. I walked toward her, stroking my hand over her stomach. I’d heard whispers of Uriel’s folly. I had no idea that this is what he’d done. What he’d created.
The life inside her was angelic. The progeny of an Archangel. The sum of so many sins. Yet the child’s energy was so pure, like that of his mother. Neither of them had asked to be born. Both had continued to be wronged by angelkind because of my moment of weakness.
I looked over at Lucifer. Did he know? “You know I can’t do this, Luc. The idea that I would save either of these creatures would be to spit in the face of the Father himself.”
Gusion stepped forward, and I watched the color drain from his face as he took in my patient. His indrawn gasp was the final nail in my coffin. “It can’t be.”
I nodded softly, guilt and pain pulling at my body like a weight. “Yet it is.” His child. The one I stole.
Sending my power deep inside her, I could see the tenuous hold she had on life. I could refuse to intervene. Right the wrong that had plagued me for so long.
Gusion and Lucifer were arguing behind me.
Lucifer stepped up beside me, staring down at the woman like she was a ghost. “It cannot be,” he echoed.
Pain swept over me. The reason they had fallen was right here, in front of them. The child that had split the heavens, carrying another child who would surely split it again. “You see why I cannot help her, Luc. I have already defied the Father once, over another child who should not be.”
“She’s Gusion’s–”
“She’s my daughter,” Gusion said, drawing his sword and lifting it to my throat. “You will save her, Raphael, or I vow that I will slaughter you where you stand. You have stolen her from me once, I refuse to let you do so again. Save her now. Save them.”
I wanted to cry. I wanted to beg him to do it. Anything was better than this torment. “You can’t kill me, Gusion, otherwise I’d happily let you run me through.”
Her life force was weakening, and my power stretched toward her, urging me to heal her. Every day for centuries I’d fought this feeling, between knowing what I was tasked to do, and knowing what should be done. I was being torn in two.
Lucifer turned me toward him, something knowing in his gaze.
He knew my torment. He pointed to one of the Horsemen.
“That one says that the Archangel Michael already knows of her existence, and that of the child, so you can be sure the Father knows. They did nothing wrong, and have not slighted the Father in any way. There have been no orders about the girl or the child from above. You are free to do what is right this time, old friend.”
I shook my head, because Lucifer had always been compelling. It was how he’d gathered angels to him, who loved him so much that they fell with him. “And how could you know about the orders of heaven, Lucifer Morningstar?”
He smirked at me, and it was an expression I’d seen a million times since the dawn of time.
He winked, like we weren’t discussing defying the orders of God himself.
“It does not matter how I know, Raph. Just save the girl. You know in your heart that it's the right decision, that sentencing an innocent woman and child to death due to Uriel's abhorrent actions is wrong. It is the Legions of Heaven who have put her in this situation. Right the wrongs of your Brother, Raphael. It is the only righteous choice.” He paused, as if weighing his words. “Let us not pretend that we all don’t know what you do in the Middle East. You are constantly defying the Father’s plan, even if you aren’t using your gifts to do so. ”
I froze as he poked at the wound in my heart.
He was right. Every day I spent mending those who would have died without my interference was defying Fate and the plan.
Why stop now? I sighed, and put my hand on Gusion’s shoulder.
An apology, or as close as I could get. “Okay. I shall do this for you, my Fallen brother.”
I stood over the body of the child I’d once saved.
We were irrevocably intertwined, me and this child of Angels.
This Nephilim. This wasn’t going to be like defying my orders the way I did in war zones.
This would be using the power given me by the heavens themselves to defy its plan.
But I couldn’t find it in me to care. This was the right thing to do.
I held my hands over her stomach and pushed my magic toward her, using it to slice open the impenetrable barrier of her womb. The angel inside her was strong, his own soul grabbing onto my power and pulling it toward himself. He wanted to live.
It will be okay now, little one. Come and greet the world.
Her flesh parted and I reached in, lifting the tiny infant into my hands. It had wings. Beautiful white and blue wings. Fallen from the moment he came into the world. Or perhaps, he was perfect?
“Hello little one,” I murmured to the baby. He looked like his mother, and her tiny face had been burned into my mind for millennia. I turned to pass her to Gusion.
One of the Horseman shook off the restraining thrall and snatched the child from my hands gently. “He isn't yours,” the man growled, almost like an animal. “He belongs to Serendipity, and we will guard him until she’s better.”
Her name was Serendipity. I almost laughed at the irony. I went back towards her, staring down at the flickering light of her life force. She was close to death, and it would be a test of my power to save her now.
Gusion gripped my arm. “You must heal her now, Raphael. If you ever loved me at all, you will fix her.” His voice was a desperate plea, and I wanted to tell him that it was my love for him that made me save her in the first place.
Sucking in a fortifying breath, I nodded. I could grant him this.
I pushed a wave after wave of healing light into her, and even then it was barely holding her together. More and more I pushed into her until my knees shook. My power spluttered, and I knew I was dragging her back from death's domain.
I was breathing heavily when I stopped, but I straightened, standing tall.
I swallowed hard, giving the room a neutral expression.
“She should live, but her body needs time to rest.” I cast one more look in the direction of the angel child.
He was perfect. The very image of innocence, and he might have just damned me forever.
The big Horseman glared at me. The child could not ask for better protectors. “Until we meet again, Horseman.”
I traveled from the room back to my clinic in my current city of death. I collapsed to my knees, drained of every ounce of healing light. Lifting my wing, I wasn’t surprised to see the snowy white of my feathers tinged pink.
My damnation was now complete.
I was unsure how long I lay prone on the floor of my makeshift clinic. There was a generator in the corner, but I didn’t waste it to keep the lights on. They were bombing again on the streets, percussive explosions rattling the ceiling and dust settled over my body.
There was a heavy slam on the door above me. Probably shrapnel hitting the outside of the building. Or what remained of the building above ground.