Fallen
Chapter 1: The Awakening
Slowly, I woke up; unsure of what it had been that brought me to consciousness. It could have been the cold, the lone coyote baying at the moon, or the pain in my back that felt as if strips of skin had been torn off. I wished that I could go back to the comfortable darkness of unconsciousness and get rid of this mind numbing pain, but I knew that was impossible.
Something struck me as odd though; heaven had neither pain nor cold in it, and since when were there coyotes? I mulled this over in my brain, thoughts coming to me as thick and clouded as molasses. I suddenly became aware of the rest of my body as if my nerves had been turned on with light switches. My arm was bent at an odd angle and I was splayed out on my stomach, the material beneath me hard, dusty, and unforgiving. My body was not covered by the usual robes it would have been and felt vulnerable. A few sharp things poked into my stomach and arms, but it was the least of my worries. Liquid dripped down my back, thick and hot, pooling around my body. The pain was turning from a small sharpness to a full on blaze that tore through my abdomen.
I thought that it was probably time to open my eyes. They refused for a while as if they had been sewn shut, but after a few minutes, I was able to open them. My vision was blurry at first and I could see nothing but a bright light and a few shadows. After a moment I could start to make out the scene before me. It was night time and the stars were winking at me, the full moon a bright white orb in the sky. The ground beneath me was sandy and had many cracks as if it hadn't drunk water in ages. At first I thought there was a person in front of me, impossibly tall with his arms held out from his sides, one elbow bent at an odd angle. Quickly however, the tall man's details came in focus and I could see it was a large cactus with long arms and deadly looking spikes covering its thick hide.
I realized that I was in a desert, but had no recollection of getting there. I sat up too fast, pain tore apart my head and back and I keeled over, retching in the pool of dark liquid surrounding me. After the sound of emptying my stomach had passed, I could hear scrabbling of small creatures, probably large bugs or small rodents. A few feet in front of me was a borough. Out of it popped a small nose that sniffed and a rabbit that was about the size of a cat, poked its head out before seeing me and quickly retreating. Slowly, I became aware of more details of my surroundings, dead thorny bushes, hundreds of giant cacti with many deformed arms, a rotting corpse of a young coyote, mountains rising in the distance.
I recognized this landscape as Arizona or maybe Utah. I instantly hated it and its ugly scrub land that was either freezing cold at night or blazing hot during the day. It reminded me of hell even though I had only ever been there once. It was both hot and cold at the same time. You would shiver and sweat with the odd feeling of wanting to take your clothes off and put more on. I didn't get to meet the Gatekeeper, the human equivalent of Satan. I heard many stories of the Gatekeeper. It appears to everyone differently, taking the form of your worst nightmares or your sickest and darkest desires.
Suddenly, as my head started to clear and the thoughts in my mind really started to come forth, I remembered why I was in this horrid desert. Heaven had always been ruled by a council of angels and their leader, the Archangel. Malik, the current Archangel had obtained his position through lies and murders. He had an incredible silver tongue and could convince almost anyone to do his bidding. I was not one of these angels and saw through his deception. I was the leader of a rebellion that had mounted against his tyrannical leadership. I was betrayed by one of my most trusted comrades. Malik took care of me himself, finding me and ripping the wings out of my back. Feathers flew everywhere; I could hear the bones shatter and splinter as if they had been nothing more than toothpicks in the Archangel's hands. Quickly, I had found myself falling from the heavens, screaming and then darkness closed in on me.