notes— found this draft from two years ago in an old folder and wrote it out a little. it's like... half canon compliant? ish? also dan shows up but it's like w/e, just go with it, i just needed more angel and cobra in my life.
when i grow wings
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( 1 ) i'll never touch the ground again
stop sending me your love, boy;
i only deal in poison.
"He's still following us."
"Yeah, I figured."
"Could you get rid of him already?"
"He's not my problem."
"It's thanks to you he's stalking us."
"It's not like I asked him to come along, Cobra."
The young man shoots a broody glare to the dense forest on his right. "The bastard's giving me a headache. He couldn't be louder if he tri—" He winces slightly as if someone's shouting in his ear. "Scratch that. Idiot just tripped over a tree root."
The corner of her lips curl. "If he's bothering you so much, then get rid of him."
Cobra makes a show of the handcuffs around his wrists. "He's not my problem."
Angel shakes her head, a humourless giggle hiding in her throat. She raises a hand to move her hair out of her eyes, and the shackles around her own wrists clink and clatter. The sound makes her freeze for a second. Her face pales, her eyes dull, and almost as if nothing had happened, her hands drop back to her sides listlessly.
A shiver runs down her spine as she hears Cobra chuckle under his breath. He noticed, and he understands.
Angel is a prisoner.
Again.
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( 2 ) i'll soar across that horizon and beyond
i'm not a leader, not a hero;
just a violent girl with pretty words.
Crouched against the wall, covering her head, hiding in the dark. When she hears the panting of her friend running back into the cell, she has to lick her lips twice before her voice will come out of her sandpaper throat.
"What's happening out there?" she whispers.
He runs to them, to their group. "It's an uprising, I think. I can't tell." He shakes his head.
"We could make a run for it," the fastest of them says.
"Or sneak out,"mumbles Macbeth, who has never been fond of fighting in the light.
All Sorano can do while her friends talk it out amongst them, hissed conversations for adults coming out of children's lips, is curl into herself, hiding her head, covering her eyes. Against the back of her eyelids is the smile of her sister, and how the sky looks broken up with prison bars.
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( 3 ) i won't have to turn around
forgiveness doesn't happen in a day;
it takes years to topple cities.
"Hi," he smiles at her through prison bars.
Angel cocks an eyebrow, glaring. "Go away."
Cobra nods emphatically from the cell across from her. No doubt he still bears a grudge from the headache he had to endure during their incarceration.
"I'm Dan," the man continues, undeterred. "What's your name?"
She can't help herself, she really can't; the stare comes unbidden, but it's so deadpan and horrified and wholly incredulous that she hears Cobra snort in amusement and Racer yell something inappropriate from his own jail cell.
"Why don't you check the prison data?" Midnight offers mildly from down the hall. "And leave us in peace?"
"Peace," Cobra mouths blissfully.
The man just pouts, and turns around. Same as he did yesterday when she ignored his repeated insistences of, "You're the most beautiful woman I've ever seen."
When he does finally leave them, Cobra and Racer burst into laughter, and Midnight just rolls his eyes in a clear show of pity for Angel. Hot-Eye, on the other hand, is going on about how lovely it is that even in the dark despair of prison, Angel can at least find love~ and honestly, all of it's enough to leave her with a twitching temple and grinding teeth.
Why are all of her friends loud, raucous, violent men? And why is it her who has to deal with even louder, hopelessly infatuated ginger knights? Nevermind ginger knights who had a hand to play in getting her arrested in the first place.
When he sees her clenches fists, Cobra's laughter quietens down to a satisfied smirk. "Look on the bright side," he grins at her. "At least you've got the bars to protect you."
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( 4 ) i shall never look down
the sky is full and the stars are falling;
i just want to be with you.
He doesn't stop showing up, not when the prison bars change to manacles, not when the manacles change to a big house with a kitchen and a garden and a bedroom each but no front door. It doesn't change when the Magic Council decides, one day, far away, that perhaps child slaves should be allowed a chance at living free.
He doesn't stop visiting her, doesn't change — but everything else does.
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( 5 ) and i will not fall
who or when does not matter;
it is that healing happened at all.
"Sorano," she whispers eight years later. "My name is..."
He glances down at her. She doesn't meet his gaze, instead leads him to the centre of the park, tugging on interlocked fingers. She's ready to tell him. She wants him to know. The world needs to hear about the little girl who crouched against walls, about how a sky looks when seen through prison bars, why a jail cell becomes home when your neighbours are all you needed anyway — the world needs to know, it just needs to know.
"My name is Sorano. I had a sister." She takes a deep breath of sweet summer air; smiles, wide and free. Ready to start her story for real this time.
She opens her eyes to look up at the sky, unbroken and broad and stretching forever.
"And when I was little," she tells the world, "I loved to fly."