Chapter 2; Little Angel
"Alena!" Worried and frazzled, Darcy, an attractive dark-haired angel, looked around. Her frantic calls were drown out by the air of the tiny world where she had seen her best friend fall. She was terrified for the frail girl that she had grown to love so much.
Since Darcy was a dark angel and not a guardian angel like Alena, she hadn't had any idea exactly what to expect when she heard Alena's "protectee" had died. She had been told soon after it happened, though, that it meant Alena would never become a regular angel. The young, wonderful girl would never learn to talk or fly or heal or any other abilities that other angels would have. No one had ever told her that it meant she would be gotten rid of, though.
Only a few people knew of Alena's true stature and why she didn't quite fit in with the rest of the angels. If she had only known—she could have protected the girl, her best and truest friend. Now all she could do was look for her friend and pray that no one else would figure out her true weakness—her humanity.
"Alena!!!" Once again, Darcy tried to call for her friend. She sincerely wished that she had seen who the person that had carried her off looked like. As she looked through the faces of the people on the tiny main island, she realized that she really didn't know if anyone would know who she was talking about. The sun would be going down soon, and she was growing more and more anxious. All she could do was pray to God that he had kept Alena safe.
The cool outside air helped to calm Riku down as he looked at the ocean from the hill where his house was located. He could smell and taste the salty breeze coming from the waves. The sky was pink and purple all around, giving it a pretty, peaceful feeling. All the houses down the street had their lights on—it made the twilight seem normal. If Riku hadn't known better he would have thought that only Daryl and Renee were inside. One would be fixing to start breakfast and the other would be talking or watching tv. However, that was not the case after the day before.
Riku had tried almost all night to talk to the mysterious girl he had met with his father the day before, but, through the entire time, she said nothing but her name. Frustration was getting the best of Riku by now—especially when he thought of the irony of it all. He wasn't even truly over Kairi yet and this weird, beautiful girl falls from the sky, literally. Still, he tried to be as patient as he could with her because he knew she was scared.
Exhaustion was making Riku's mind useless as he tried to take in the scenery. He was starting to wish he had just went to bed when he had gotten home instead of deciding to attempt to talk to Alena, the girl, for so long. He stood in the middle of the empty street and watched the sun rise slowly over the water just visible past the houses.
Just before Riku turned to go inside, he caught sight of a girl, who was dressed in the weirdest clothes he'd ever seen, walking down the street. She looked as if she had been crying for a while before then, and right then she sobbed. He groaned internally as his gentlemanly side made him turn to the girl—he didn't have the heart to leave her without asking what was wrong, no matter how tired he was.
"Ma'am, are you okay?" He murmured, walking towards her. With wide eyes she looked around and then looked back at him. "Can I help you with anything?" His voice sounded snippy and annoyed, he knew, but he was tired of the weird responses from people.
"You can see me?" She asked after a moment, surprising Riku with the strange question.
"Of course I can! You have the weirdest get-up on I'VE ever seen." Once again his words came out harsher than he meant them to be.
"If you can see me… Have you met a small blond girl lately? Her name is Alena." The woman ventured, her tears stopped and a sort of fire lit up her purple-ish colored eyes.
"Yes, I have. She fell from the sky." It struck Riku as funny as he said this and he started laughing. "Oh God, I need to sleep…" He muttered, shaking his head.
"Don't say the Lord's name in vain." The woman snapped for the first time since she'd seen Riku. "I can't believe you humans—poor Alena's had to stay with you all night."
"Excuse me?!" He cried out, anger boiling in his chest. "I've done everything I can to help that girl! I haven't slept all night, in fact, because I've been trying to figure out where to return her to!" Taking big steps towards the girl, he heard his voice raising in volume and, for the first time in a while, didn't care if it bothered someone. "I don't even know your name yet and you're already saying such ridiculous things! And what the hell—you humans?! What does that make you, then?"
Once again, it seemed that he had shocked the girl. She regained her composure after just a moment, though, and the anger left her face. She bowed her head and murmured an apology to the handsome, weird human in front of her. She knew for a fact that normal humans couldn't see her—much less have a whole conversation with her. What was this boy?
"May I please see my dear friend, Alena?" She whispered, changing her entire approach. He closed his eyes for a moment and relaxed, seeming to be asleep on his feet.
"We let her go to sleep a few hours ago. She was really tired and I didn't have the heart to keep her awake any longer." His response made the dark haired girl smile softly. Behind his yelling and bad language, he was very kind—humans were so strange…
"Can I at least come in until she wakes up?" She murmured, looking up at his serene face, waiting for him to open his eyes again. "I don't need a place to sleep or anything—I just want to wait until Alena wakes up…"
"Fine, go in and sit on the couch. I'm going to bed, though—I can hardly keep my eyes open. I really hope I didn't have anything planned today; I don't remember if I did…" He turned slowly and walked back into the house, the girl following him.
Daryl and Renee were both on the couch when Riku came back in with her. Renee was laying on her fiancé's lap, fast asleep, while Daryl was sitting and watching TV. When the 25-year-old looked down at Renee, Riku had to look away, though. The love he held for the woman was apparent on Daryl's face. It made Riku uncomfortable and embarrassed—not to mention the fact that it reminded him of how he used to look at Kairi, and how she didn't notice.
Darcy looked at the couple on the couch and smiled softly. Humans were such confusing creatures. They would lie, cheat, steal, kill—but they also could love with their whole hearts. The particular man in the room showed such love that she could feel the emotion herself—a gift that came from being an angel—from across the room. There was another emotion—a stronger one—that drew her attention away, though.
Such sadness was normally only felt before an unfortunate person would end their life. Darcy had witnessed it many times, but there was such confusion in the aura around the young man beside her that she knew he was indecisive on that. He hadn't yet made plans to do anything drastic.
'How long would it take, though?' She wondered absently as she was being led to Alena's room. 'How long could anyone survive such sorrow?' Darcy began to feel depressed herself.
Just when Darcy was about to cry from distress, Riku's emotions became jumbled again. This time, though, there was no trace of depression. He was frustrated and guilty for some reason. Also, when he opened the door and saw little Alena, a feeling of awe and embarrassment washed away the rest. Darcy giggled softly, knowing that it was normal for a person to feel that angels were beautiful. Some unfortunate men had even fallen for them from time to time, but she couldn't trace any love in the emotions—just care and responsibility.
"She's pretty isn't she?" She had asked this to get a blush out of the handsome young man, but she was given an opposite reaction. He smiled softly and nodded.
"She's kind of a hassle, though. She won't speak." He put his hands in his pockets and closed his eyes again.
"She can't." Darcy whispered, as if saying it would hurt the girl. "She hasn't ever learned how—she couldn't learn how, more like." She knew that the young human boy wouldn't understand what she was talking about, but she felt the need to defend her helpless friend. "Alena has other ways of telling what she wants, but… Sometimes they're hard to understand."
"Perhaps you could teach me more about that later…" He murmured. "I would very much like to understand her—some new friends are just what I need…" The sadness had returned to his aura even stronger than before. He sighed softly and left the room with a heart full of self hatred.
"How can he deal with such sadness?" Right as Darcy asked this Alena's eyes opened. The look on her face told Darcy that she had been awake while Riku had been in the room. "Did you feel it too?" She asked. Alena nodded slowly before giving Darcy a meaningful look. The little girl touched her friend's hand gently, making the angel gasp at what she saw. "Don't be ridiculous!" She cried out, shaking her head. "What do you think you could do?"
"D-…D-…Darcy…" The girl mumbled, concentrating hard on saying something—anything. Unfortunately, that's all she could manage; she was still unable to speak. Her face turned into a determined glare and she huffed, crossing her arms.
"Why do you want to stay here? Where will you live? You have to keep a job, you know. You'll need to know how to read and write and talk—those are just a few of the things you can't do!" She whispered harshly, refusing to let her friend do as she pleased. "Please, listen to reason! Why would you want to stay here?" Once again Darcy was touched a warm hand. After just a second she pulled away and shook her head vigorously. "There's nothing you can do to help! He's beyond help!"
"Who is?" Much to both of their surprise, Riku stood outside with a grim look on his face. Both of the girls could tell that he knew exactly who they had been 'talking' about. His glare scared Darcy to the core, making her go rigid. She didn't fear for herself, but for her foolish friend that refused to listen to her.
'This man is dangerous!' She thought with wide eyes. His stare didn't soften as he directed his gaze to her.
"Am I beyond hope, then?" He persisted, taking a step forward. Darcy backed away and tried to put herself in front of Alena—she may feel pain, but Alena could be killed. She would never let that happen. "I could tell there was something off about you two when you first came here—what the hell ARE you?"
"S-stay away!" The older angel stuttered, shaking her head enough to move her hair around her face.
"No." He answered simply, walking toward them. "What have I done wrong? Did I glare too cruelly while you were talking about me? Is my anger unjustified?" Sarcasm dripped from his voice and he came to a step beside the bed, looking down at the two surprised faces.
"If you dare lay one finger on her-!" Darcy shrieked, making Riku raise his eyebrow. Alena reached out and grabbed her hand then, pulling her away from him. She stood up to her full height—a mere 4'5—and looked up—right into Riku's eyes. The next thing that happened was something that he could never explain to someone else.
A warm sensation entered his body—first from his head and traveling all the way to his toes. Calm spread through him and the anger dissipated. All at once, his head was filled with colors. They were everywhere. There were blues and greens and yellows and reds; he stood watching them, not knowing what it meant. Finally the color settled on one, a dark green.
In his heart, emotions that weren't his started to fill him up—anger and sadness and confusion and pain. Then one drowned the rest of them out; it was determination. For some reason, the color and the emotion fit so well together that Riku knew exactly what she wanted, exactly what she meant. She wanted to stay somewhere near him (though he didn't know why), and she didn't want anyone to fight or yell anymore.
After a few moments, the colors disappeared. Riku blinked a few times in confusion and looked down at the tiny smiling girl before him. At first he was at a loss for words. What could someone say to something so miraculous? Then, he realized he didn't have to say anything at all. He felt his lips move on their own, returning the smile. The calm he felt when she had first laid hands on him was still there, surprising him with its strength.
"Amazing," he finally whispered, shaking his head softly. "That is the most unique way of communicating I've ever seen. I almost wonder if I have been dreaming all of this—that would be the only logical explanation I can think of…"
"It's not logic that you should be thinking of. Miracles can never be explained through such a useless thing." Darcy snapped, still not happy with her friend's decision. Just because she caught him off-guard doesn't mean that she was anywhere near safe. She couldn't just step aside and let Alena make such a mistake.
With a venomous glare, Darcy strode over to her friend and pulled her away from the boy. Alena seemed to know exactly what she was thinking, though, and yanked away from her with a puff. Her innocence made her anger seem almost as fragile as she was—like she would smile any moment—but, as her best friend, Darcy knew better. With a sigh of defeat, the older of the two looked down.
"Fine." She growled, refusing to look at the blond beauty. "I'll let you stay for now. I'm going to be keeping an eye on you, though—both of you." As Darcy said this, she stormed toward the door, hitting Riku in the shoulder as she walked out. Alena seemed to have not seen this, so he just sighed and shook his head.
"It's so easy to make enemies these days…" He grumbled, looking at the doorway. "Anyways, you and I need to get back to sleep—I couldn't survive school today anyway." He closed his eyes, finding the silence from the girl strange, but expected. When he opened them again, he found a curious look on her face—like she didn't know what he was talking about.
"M?" She made a noise like a question. Riku knew what she was asking about.
"You know, school… The place where every person has to go in order to learn things like Math and English and reading and writing…" He trailed off, wondering why her eyes were lighting up like that.
As for little Alena, Darcy's earlier words were still echoing through her head:
"You'll need to know how to read and write and talk—those are just a few of the things you can't do!"
It was as if someone was willing it to be, begging her to stay. Everything seemed to make sense. She would go to school, learn to read and write and maybe even talk, and then she'd get a job! Then she'd be able to stay as long as she wanted on the little island—no one could stop her!