ONISM

(CA, Part A)

There are some things in life that you can't question. They are irrefutable and the law of the land: 1) The air gets colder the higher you fly, 2) Angels weren't built to swim, 3) I will protect Penryn's life for as long as she lives, and 4) Penryn will always find a way to put herself into a dangerous situation. Two of those laws contradict each other.

San Francisco, CA

September 18, Year 2 PA (Post-Apocalypse)

Penryn wasn't talking to me and she wasn't sleeping either. Her tense form was curled up against the wall in an attempt to get farthest away from me. I made no effort to get closer or farther away and I didn't even try to talk to her. I stared at the ceiling and wondered how we had gotten to this point, how we had gone from a slight disagreement to a full-on fight. I could go upstairs and get shit-faced with my men but they would probably take Penryn's side, the butt-kissers.

But I wanted to stay with her. I wanted to stay with her even though she was silently fuming in the bed next to me, probably going over options to convince me to appeal to what started this whole mess in the first place. But I wouldn't agree to her dumb idea even if I wanted to. It was way too dangerous. I didn't want anything to happen to her for a long, long time and gallivanting around the country trying to sway people in a political campaign was just asking for death to take her. Penryn was only looking at the positive side of things. She forgot that nobody actually knows what kind of condition the rest of the world is in and there's a high chance that we'd all be shot at. We're in the same situation as when there was still a possibility I'd be Messenger, except if she goes on this trip, there would be no possibility of me not going with her.

She sighed, clearly frustrated at her inability to sleep and at me. She wanted me to apologize but I wasn't going to apologize for wanting her safe and apologizing wasn't going to solve this argument anyway.

"You know, I'm not talking to you until you talk to me and if we don't talk we're just going to be lying here silently all night and neither of us will get any sleep." She said to the wall.

"If you're not talking to me then why did you just talk to me?"

"I didn't."

"Uh, I think you did." She rolled onto her back and gave me an annoyed glare.

"Well, now you're talking to me so I'm allowed to talk back."

I rolled my eyes but continued to play her game, "So, what do you wanna talk about?"

"Raffe," She whined, exasperated.

"Penryn," I said back, mocking her tone and shaking her arm, which had made its way to the middle of the bed. She had calmed down from level "I'm either going to punch you or cry" angry but she still gave me a cold glare at the contact. Instead of relenting, I grabbed her hand.

She sighed and looked at me a little nicer before speaking, "But why? Why do you think this is a terrible idea? The Council thinks it's a great idea."

"From what I've seen, the "Council" doesn't know what they're doing. They're all diplomats who barely survived, and if I remember correctly, none of them have wings on their backs that make for good shooting targets." I said a bit more bitter than I intended.

"But that's why I have to do this!" She argued, her voice gaining volume, "Am I just supposed to stay in one place for the rest of my life because everywhere else is too dangerous?!"

"Yes! That's exactly what's going to happen."

She let out a small gasp and let go of my hand. A thick silence settled between us for a moment. The heat of a small ounce of guilt was creeping onto my skin; I didn't intend for my words to come out that way. I usually control my tone and words easily but fighting with Penryn was making me flustered.

Penryn bit her lip as she came up with a rebuttal. Finally, her voice piped up, matter-of-factly and irritated, "I am almost nineteen years old-"

"It's just too dangerous!" I said, cutting her off before she could go any further.

"I know you see me as a fragile child but-" She said, her voice a little more heated.

"What?" I interrupted, surprised, "No I don't. Why would you think that?"

"Um, yes you do. Remember that time I was late getting home after a council meeting?" She paused, the tension in the room slowly melting, "You thought I was dead!"

"In my defense, you were about two hours late." A lot could happen in two hours.

"Same difference." She muttered. All of the tension from the earlier fight was gone and Penryn was snuggling a little closer to me.

"It's not - and how does that one time justify what you just said?" I asked.

"I mean, you're always worrying about me like I can't handle myself," She said with a small voice, "It's depreciating."

"Penryn," I grabbed her hand again; she didn't resist this time, "I don't view you that way. I haven't looked at you like that since- I don't know, maybe when you fought off three men twice your size, definitely when you killed an angel. You're usually capable of handling yourself," I squeezed her hand, "I just worry about you sometimes is all."

"Okay, so if I'm capable, don't fight me on this trip." She had authority in her voice and countered it by squeezing my hand back.

"That's not what I said."

"Raffe, it can't be as dangerous as going into the Pit and we got out of that." She pointed out.

"You weren't even supposed to go down there, and that was because we had a very short term problem." I reasoned.

"Well this will become a long term problem if we don't do something now," She started her spiel again, "If we stay in California for the rest of our lives and don't even attempt to mend the rest of the country, we could experience Medieval Era stuff with everyone claiming to have their own country. More dangerous stuff than traveling around the country, like war."

"You don't even know what kind of condition the rest of the country is in."

"That's what I'm trying to say!" She huffed, looking at the ceiling, and then back at me. She tried to give me a hard look, but it came out to look more like plea.

I could see it in her eyes that she was exhausted. I was exhausted. We had been arguing about this for hours, (well, really only discussing the topic 7% of the time; the other 93% was spent stoking our prides and giving each other the silent treatment), and our points were starting to exhaust as well. She wasn't going to budge.

I sighed. It actually wasn't a terrible idea to try to mend the country, but I wasn't going to tell her that. This was obviously important to her and I couldn't really stop her. The best I could do was go with her to keep her out of trouble and safe.

Plus, this wasn't really worth fighting over again.

I took a deep breath before interrupting the silence, "I might be willing to compromise with you."

"Go on…" Her voice was tired but had a hidden tinge of excitement when she spoke.

"Kevlar-"

"Wha-"

"-and you're carrying my sword."

"Well, that's easy-"

I interrupted her, "Oh, and please listen to me while we're on this trip."

"Raffe, I'm not going to do anything stup-"

"Little Miss 'Killer of Angels, Daughter of Man', you sure as hell won't. " I said.

She squinted at me from her pillow. I don't know if she was weighing the disadvantages of the compromise or glaring at me to let that one go, but her eyes eventually softened and she nodded.

She squeezed my hand (since she was already holding it) and, through a yawn, said, "Deal."

I squeezed her hand back, closing negotiations, patching up the feelings that were keeping us from sleeping, and wondering what the hell I had just got myself into.

A/N: I'm going to try and keep these to a minimal, but yay I'm starting a story with plot ! Anyway, this intro is a little dry and boring but I needed to start somewhere. Stick around because the journey starts next chapter woo !

P.S. the research for this fic is fascinating.

P.S.S. Onism is a made up word from John Koenig's "The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows." it means: the awareness of how little of the world you'll experience. so, lit :)