This is the alternate fic to my other story, Counterpart. The actual first chapter will be up as soon as I can post again. Let me know how you like it.
Disclaimer: I own nothing that has not been spawned by my own twisted mind. This goes for everything in this story.
Prologue: Guardian Angel
"Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord... I pray the Lord..."
Feeling frusterated and abandoned, the seven year old girl plopped right down in the middle of the golden field, the long stalks of weeds scraping against her little legs. Fresh tears welled up in her puffy eyes, rolling down her cheeks which were still beet red from the last bout of crying she had done. Too frightened to come up with any new strategies, she gave up searching for the right words to the prayer that made the monsters go away and hugged her purple teddy bear tightly. But just thinking about the prayer made her think of her mother and the sobs began.
Mommy didn't love her anymore and Daddy didn't care. She didn't want to go. If they took her, the people would put those ugly big stickers all over her, the ones without the smiley faces, and then they'd hook her up to this big beeping machine with wires attached to the "pinchies" that looked like clothespins. And some old lady would do it so she would miss and pinch her again and she would scream because it would hurt and Daddy would mutter under his breath and roll his eyes and say something to Mommy about the lady being too old but Mommy would be trying not cry because the dark man with the funny accent and the "stetheoscope" would come and say they'd "just like to run some tests." So then they'd take her to another room that was dark and she'd have to lie down on a bed that was too high and was covered in the rough crinkly paper. And a younger lady would stick more ugly stickers on her and rub that icky warm snot stuff all over her chest and another big machine would make funny swishy noises that lasted forever. And after all of that, Mommy and Daddy would take her to the McDonald's in the hospital and give her a happy meal and tell her she had been a big girl, even though she didn't want to eat it because it smelled too much like hospital. And late at night, Mommy and Daddy would "talk" and they would "talk" really loud and she knew they were yelling and she knew they were fighting, and she knew it was about her and it was about money. She had told them she didn't want to go see the doctors anymore, but they always took her anyway. And they would always fight.
She hiccuped, clasping her little hands and remembering what Daddy had told her about God. That even though the people at Mommy's church made you do that funny thing with your hands and said God won't listen unless you do that, that God would listen even if you didn't and you didn't have to talk out loud to him like the teacher made you do every Sunday with all the other kids. But then she remembered the time she prayed to God about her grandma and how grandma didn't get better. Her little throat tight, she did what Nonna had always told her to do and prayed to her Guardian Angel, the angel that was supposed to be with her all the times she went to the doctor's even though she never saw him.
"I'm sorry I'm a bad girl," she sniffed, not realizing she had been talking out loud. "Please protect me from the monsters and talk to God and make me all better if you can. And if not, then make my mommy and daddy happy. I don't want them to be sad and angry anymore."
Suddenly, a bright flash of light opened up in the night's sky. The little girl scrambled to be on her feet, staring at the spectacle in awe. As the light began to dull, little flakes of white slowly descended toward her, splattering gently onto her skin. Blinking, she crossed her eyes to examine the little cold puff of white that was melting quickly on the tip of her nose. Snow.
And then something happened that would change her life forever.
A young angel tumbled from the sky, landing none too gracefully before her. With his fall, the light in the sky seemed to close up as if the rift had healed. The little girl stared in awe, making a small note in the back of her mind that from now on, she would believe whatever her Nonna told her.
Lucemon blinked, struggling to keep his head from spinning. Where in the name of Fangloungmon was he? Finally able to focus, his gaze settled onto the tear-stained face of a small, somber looking girl. She was unlike any digimon he had ever seen, even for a humanoid. Unless the teddy bear she held loosely at her side was her form of defense and attack, releasing some unseen force, he highly doubted she was capable of protecting himself. Which... if she didn't have any powers, that mean that she couldn't be a digimon.
Wildly, he looked around the field, taking in the wide expansions of dead grass and beyond that, a black road and odd geometric structures that somewhat resembled houses, but each "house" was connected to the black road and was much too far apart from the others. His wings gave a small ruffled noise as he stood, his stance ready to deal with whatever may be hiding in the darkness of this strange place. So this was the human world. Interesting.
Startled, Lucemon abandoned his ready stance, stumbling a bit at the sudden contact. His arms remained in the air helplessly, not ever having dealt with such an occurrence before. The angel digimon blinked, completely stunned at the little girl clinging to him. "Uh..."
Her soft sniffles found a soft spot in him that he didn't even know he had. His heart was slowly breaking and he found himself unable to push her away as she clung to him and cried. At first he thought she was mewling, but from what he knew, humans didn't were capable of speech and surpassed such noises. It took him a moment to realize that she was, in fact, speaking words.
"Thank you. Thank you so much. I'm so scared."
Before he even knew what he was doing, Lucemon found himself embracing her back, the feeling not as odd as he had thought it would be. In fact, it felt... right. He murmured softly in her hair, rubbing her back in calming useless circles as her soft crying sounded against his fluttering heart. "Hush little one. Shh, everything will be okay. You are safe now. I promise, I won't let anything happen to you." As her crying faded, he smiled, finding her tiny, odd features to be strangely adorable. He brushed her bangs back from big, blue-green eyes, meaning every word of it. "I will always protect you."
