I always thought that getting smote would be more painful, the Creator being all-powerful. But I guess when reality warps with the snap of your fingers and time is but a forgotten grade school project, a painful smiting isn’t exactly enough to justify divine attention. 

To be honest, I still wasn’t sure what I’d done that was big enough to attract HIS attention. I was created, or born if you pleased, approximately half a second after the Big Bang. From that moment onwards, I’d spent my entire existence following HIS orders and guarding the gates of heaven.

Guarding it against what, I never discovered. Why defend something . . . that could never be found without his blessing? I guess I would never know, I mused, as I hurled downward faster than the speed of light. 

With my wings, distance had been nothing more than an afterthought. As in, when I wanted to be somewhere, I was there. But that was in the past. Those wings were, at this very moment, dissipating into a shower of golden light. 

A jolt of pain suddenly coursed through my body distracting me from the loss of my wings. It was something I’d never felt before, quite dissimilar from the pain I’d experienced fighting during Lucifer’s rebellion. This pain emanating from deep inside me, accompanied by a sense of immense heaviness as I gazed upon my lost wings.  

With a start, I realized that the pain was coming from my heart . . . an organ that I never had before . . . an interesting development. Staring ahead, I watched as the pearly gates slowly distorted from my view. I knew it would be the last time I would see the entrance of Heaven, the celestial energy emanating from it still enough to bring tears to my eyes.

It was the most beautiful thing that had ever existed, I knew this deep in my spirit despite never having seen anything else. I gazed at it, knowing that as my wings slowly disappeared, so did my connection with the Nexus. Throughout my entire life, I’d been connected on a fundamental level to everything in the universe, aware of its ebbs and flows, conscious of the everlasting cycle of creation and decay, listening to the eternal battle of order and chaos. 

But that was all ending, as my wings were stripped for good, and I crashed through the Nexus into material reality. Spinning around, I gazed forward at the azure planet which I was catapulting toward. Lights shined throughout, illuminating its towering mountains, steady land, and rolling oceans. I’d heard of this place, everyone had, but I never imagined I would ever see it. 

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

I never imagined that I would, someday, become a Fallen Angel. Staring at the incoming clump of stardust, I realized that I would be experiencing many new things in the times to come. And while this Earth was nothing in comparison to heaven, it was still . . . beautiful in its own way. 

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Tien hummed quietly on his skarn, relaxing as he stared into the night sky. He was supposed to be looking for dinner, but the fish weren’t biting tonight and his old bones could only sit for so long before they began to ache. He’d have to settle for Kaila’s corn and bread stew for tonight which, despite his mumblings to the contrary, was quite good. Though he’d never tell his wife that. For now, he simply lay onto the sheepskin covering for the skarn, content to watch the stars twinkling. He’d lived here since he was a boy, making his living selling fish to the big cities, just as his father did, and his father before him. 

Even now, people were willing to pay more for the real thing, untrusting of food that was genned. He didn’t blame them, he was only too familiar with the many horror stories of Corponations that had skipped steps with disastrous consequences. After all, he’d started some of them. Gazing into the sky, Tien suddenly stiffened. He’d watched this sky for untold nights, he’d named every star in its tapestry and given them stories to befit their shine. He knew it better than he knew his face, which he actually hadn’t seen in quite a while. Mirrors could get expensive nowadays. 

Tien knew these stars . . . so why was there a new one glowing brighter than all the others? It wasn’t a shooting star, those wouldn’t glow so bright and wouldn’t be growing bigger . . . and bigger? Tien’s eyes widened as he leaped off his skarn in the knick of time before the burning orb slammed into it causing it to disintegrate like it never existed. A keening sound of despair pierced through the air, which Tien realized was coming from him. That was one of his last skarn, and a personal favorite. At that moment, with a start, Tien realized that he was not alone. Bobbing where his skarn had previously been was . . . what looked to be a person. 

Tien debated just swimming away, drying off in the confines of his home while Kayla fussed over him, eating corn stew next to the warm fire. He knew deep in his bones that this was far beyond anything he’d ever seen. With a pause, Tien cursed and began swimming over to the figure. After all, if he didn’t help them, how would he get paid back for his favorite skarn!!