"Ava, wait up!" One of the other angels called out to the figure flying far ahead of them.
Catching up with her, another cradled her in his arms fifty kilometres above the ground and asked; "Are you ok?"
The angel managed a feeble smile, "Ben, he didn't even want to talk to me."
"Hey… don't talk like that, you don't know what he was thinking," a third angel said.
"It's not that hard to guess, Kai," the fourth argued, "It was all in his face, his eyes…"
The angel began to sob.
"Ruth, you made her cry. It's ironic how you're so… ruthless." The first angel commented.
"Nice pun," Kai laughed.
"Shut up!" Ruth punched him and his wings almost began to weaken in their strong beats, "You too, Faye!"
"Don't listen to them. Not everything is on the surface alone, you know that." Ben cooed.
"Do you ever think he'll give me another chance?" The angel looked up, very small sparks of hope emitting from her eyes.
"Of course, Ava, maybe it wasn't the right time."
"What if he never wants to join me again?"
"Stop being so negative. Please? How are you going to get anywhere by being like that?"
Ava frowned. Of course she would achieve nothing by being negative.
She thought through what she had done more thoroughly. Maybe she shouldn't have caught so much attention and made a more discreet entrance. Would it have been better just to see him alone?
Her heart ached remembering that it had been a year since they had last spoken. So much has happened since then; she had been on a carefree journey.
Her father had finally forgiven her for her so called betrayal and secretly shown support.
She had also met the guinea pigs of the scientists who wanted to combine animal and human genes together.
Ava had learnt that the best way to end the war between her race and family and the 'superior' humans was to join these two sides together as one and show the world that they can co-exist. Demigods were not better than what human technology has created nor were they better than the demigods. They would all be half-humans one day, whether their other half was that of a celestial being or a mere mammal walking or flying above the earth. There was no reason to fear each other. This whole war was ridiculous and futile.
Her train of thought was interrupted as Ben shouted, pointing at a spot on the cliff, "Guys, they're here!"
The others followed his finger to see men in lab coats preparing their tranquiliser darts.
"Let's go!" Kai yelled.
The bird-like shapes in the air each flew in a rehearsed pattern, dodging bullets and nets.
However, being new to the team and never having been hunted down by humans before, Ava was completely clueless from panic and stayed stationary in the air.
Consequently, one of the scientist's darts pierced the radiant skin of her neck. She flew a few metres higher in shock before she began to plummet forty metres per second through the air.
Her vision was failing her. Her body felt so inert. Why couldn't she move?
She felt a scorching pain around her neck. What was that?
Ava pulled it out of her and yelped. That hurt a lot more than expected.
She heard incoherent shouting coming from everywhere, anywhere. She wasn't actually sure where, but somewhere someone called out;
"Ava, take my hand!"
"Can you flap your wings?"
"No!"
"Ava!"