Shun

I couldn't take my gaze from Lucy's lifeless body. Nobody knew where we went when we died. We all just left that topic alone, but it irked me to not know. I would have been satisfied with even a made up place as long as I could say we went there. Soon these streets are going to be flooded with bodies like Lucy's. "Mason, I want you to take a small group of Fallens with you North of the city until you see Tristan. Don't let him see you though. When you find him, hurry back and give us as much information as you can on who he has brought with him. Got it?"

Mason looked at me and nodded his head. He walked off into the dark street to round up more from our Clan. It wouldn't take him long to find four or five Fallens that are more than willing to help find Tristan. Since Tristan was the cause of so many lives to be uprooted with no cause.

I could guess the limits of the bloody fight that would take place soon. It most likely wouldn't leave the city until he had killed every last Fallen in my Clan. I had forgotten about Alice standing behind me, and didn't think to fold my wings back. I felt a small hand touch my shoulder, and I turned to see Alice looking at me with her brown eyes.

She told me, "If there's anything I can do, don't hesitate to ask me to do it." I marveled her bravery and spunk, but there was no way I could allow her to enter into this war. I had already put her in the line of fire just by making her a Bondage. This was the last thing I wanted her to get involved with. "Thank you for your offer, but this is something that's just too dangerous for a mortal to get involved with. There's no point in putting a human in danger when it's between us."

She looked down at the ground. Her head then came back up and she was looking in my eyes. Determination was burning in hers. "But I'm not just another human. Remember? You said there was something special about me. And besides I'm a Bondage. And not just any Bondage, your Bondage."

I couldn't help but mimic her smile of pride. "I'm not going to convince you to sit this fight out, am I?" She had her head held high when she said, "Nope. No chance." There was something different about her.

Alice

I felt like I had firmly made my point to Shun that I wasn't about to back out of this after being told and learning about this world that hid under ours. Shun stopped smiling and his face went back to a serious expression as he stared off in the direction that Mason ran off in. "It'll take Tristan a while to get here anyway. We might as well round up as many Fallens as we can and rest up before he does get here." The two Fallens that had stayed behind with us and Lucy's body, nodded their heads and picked up the body.

They seemed to of done this before, because it wasn't phasing them as all. One of them, had a light blue tinted hair color, but I couldn't see his eye color. The other had dark red hair and dark green eyes. He was probably the most normal looking Fallen next to Shun that I had seen in a while. As we were walking towards an old tenement building, I tried to remember if their names had been mentioned at all. I thought at one point I heard Mason call the blue haired Fallen Blakely and the red haired one Nathan.

They were skinny and tall, and didn't look like fighters. Unlike Shun and Mason, who seemed like they had been in a brawl or two. The tenement, was made entirely of brick, and looked abandoned with its boarded up windows. I leaned over to Shun and asked, "Are you sure anyone is in there?" Nathan and Blakely still held onto Lucy's body as they pushed open the door with their feet.

The door had looked locked tight, but it must have been a trick. That made me think the rest of the building was designed to look that way as well. The inside wasn't in the best condition with its spider webs hanging from corners and dust caking the walls. Shun told Blakely and Nathan, "Take her up to Bertha. She'll take it from there." The two boys nodded their heads and took the limp body up a flight of raggedy looking stairs that creaked with every step. I asked Shun, "What is this place?"

He started to walk into another room, and when I followed I saw it was a kitchen. The wallpaper was peeling away, but all of the appliances were brand new. "It's a hideaway I guess you could call it. A place for our Clan to hide out and rest if we need to. Most of the Clan lives here anyway despite the conditions."

So that's why he came here. All of the others are here already and it'll be easier for him to round them up. Shun reached into a cabinet and pulled out a coffee mug. "You want some?" He was pointed to a coffee pot filled with steaming hot coffee. I shook my head. "I'm not big for coffee. It's too bitter for my taste." He shrugged his shoulders and poured the liquid into his cup. Steam rose from the top and he slowly took a sip. I noticed a white rose placed in a vase with water at the bottom.

But it wasn't like any rose I had seen. It had what looked like red paint dripped on it and the tips of the petals were stained red. I asked, "What's up with the rose?" Shun turned and looked at the flower and put his cup down. "It's a Blood Rose. The symbol of our Clan." When I looked closer, the red did look like blood had been dripped on the flower. I put my nose to it. The rose didn't smell like a rose. It was sweeter and stronger. "How come I've never seen this kind of flower before?"

Shun rinsed his cup out in the sink and told me, "Humans can't see flowers from the Realm of Angels. And you've got to remember, you can see things from there." It was pretty though. The petals were soft like that of a regular rose, and the stem had red tipped thorns that looked like they had just pricked somebody and had blood on them. "If this is the symbol for your Clan, then what about the other one?" Shun held up his index finger, signaling me to hold on for a second. He ran into another room, leaving me in the kitchen.

When he came back, he held a book in his hands. It wasn't even an inch thick. Shun opened the cover and dust floated from the pages. On the very first page, was a black iris. "This is their symbol." Now I had seen black irises before. "But we have those here on Earth. They're not anything that belong to the angels." I looked on the spine of the book and saw it was a book of flowers. Shun closed the book shut, and a cloud of dust came up. "Exactly. They chose a flower from Earth as an act of rebellion to the Realm of Angels. When Tristan started to make his Clan, not only had he gathered some of the strongest Fallens around, he also gathered the ones with pure hatred for the Realm. All because they made them Fall when they deserved it. We on the other hand, Fell for minor causes and still consider ourselves as part of the Realm. Even though we may never go back there again."

Even after they were seen as disgraces, they still consider the Realm their home. I placed my hand on Shun's and said, "Kind of like they did to you." His eyes widened and he looked at me. "How do you know what they did to me?" I smiled slightly and said, "Lucy told me." Shun was smiling a sad smiled and looked up at the dusty ceiling. "Lucy….She never could keep her mouth shut."

I saw a tear roll out of his eyes. I didn't know if it was from the loss of his friend, or from how he Fell. Somebody was coming down the stairs, and Shun quickly wiped away the one tear stain on his cheek. A gray haired elderly lady that was wearing a thick tan coat had just stepped off the last stair. Shun tried to make his voice sound sturdy. "Hello, Bertha." I took a good look at her. Her eyes are normal. She's human. She smiled. "Hello, Shun. I'm sorry about Lucy." Can she see their eyes and wings like I can?

I stood up and cleared my throat, "Um, can I ask you something ma'am?" She looked me over just as I had her. "Go ahead child." Shun was looking at me and wondering what I was going to ask. "Are you a Bondage like me? Can you see what they really look like? Or do you just know about them?" Her wrinkled face smiled and she turned to Shun and said to him, "So this is your Bondage. She's some kind of something." I felt like I was blushing, and Shun was.

He nodded his head and told me, "Bertha is one of the last few people that were first chosen to be a Caretaker for Fallens. More won't be picked until that group is all gone. She was given the ability to see us without a Bond." I thought about how many Fallens she must of seen and taken care of. "Thank you, Shun. I couldn't of said it any better myself. How about you take our guest upstairs and introduce her to the rest?" Shun stood up from the table and held the flower book in his hand.

"Ok. I need to speak with them anyway." He stopped by a small bookshelf and slid the book into a small opening before he walked up the stairs. I wasn't so easy when I walked up them. I was afraid that they would break under me. When I finally made it up to the top, I still wasn't too sure about my footing. The floor under me was bending slightly. I kept reminding myself that Shun weighed more than me, and if it hadn't broken under him, then it wouldn't break under me. Shun turned into a room, and I followed him.

There were several new couches placed around, and every one of them were filled with a body sitting in them. There had to be eight or ten people in the room minus Shun and I. Shun waved out his hand to them, and said to me, "Alice, these are my Clan mates." I found Nathan and Blakely easily among the crowd, but that was all I knew. Shun started to point them out one at a time.

A smoky haired girl with orange eyes was named Fiona. Another girl named Serenity had platinum blonde hair and white eyes. That's kind of creepy. Shun then pointed to a guy who had hair about the same color as his and brown eyes that went by the name Thatch.

He finished up telling the rest of the Fallens names and introduced me. "Ok. Now that everyone knows everyone, let's get down to what's really important. Tristan is on his way here right now as we speak, but after seeing Lucy I'm sure most of you figured that out. We need to work quickly and get the rest of the Clan here as soon as possible. We don't have any more time to waste to get this done. In a little while, Mason will be back and have some information about Tristan, but we won't have much time to react after that." I felt like I was watching a military plan coming together.

Somebody in the back of the room raised up there hand. A dark brunette with hazel eyes stood up. I think Shun said her name was Ebony. "I hate to sound negative, Shun. But Tristan kicked our asses when the Clans started to form. And his Clan has been doing it on a daily basis while he's been gone. So what makes you think that we stand a chance against him now if his Clan and power has grown?"

Shun sighed and said, "We can only just give it all we have. Now, decide among yourselves and make a group of four and choose one to cover the North, East, South, and West. The one assigned to that cardinal direction will have to round up other Clan members of ours in that area and return back to here. This has to be done before daybreak. Understood?" They all nodded their heads and Shun walked out of the room. I chased after him. None of them argued with him. They all listened without adding in a single word.

I asked Shun, "How did you get them to listen to you like that?" He turned into a storage room and moved some boxes. Behind them, was an iron ladder with a door on the ceiling. He told me while moving one more box, "They have to listen to their Clan leader." Now it made sense to me why they didn't hesitate his orders. Shun had climbed halfway up the ladder and held out his hand to me.

"You gunna come on up or just stand there?" I took his hand and climbed up the last rungs on the ladder. It was still pitch black outside, and the only light given to us was from a dim streetlight. The wind had picked up outside since the last time we were out. And I had no jacket. I was looking out into the main part of the city and shivering, when I felt something wrap around me.

I looked down to see a pair of black wings around my body. I turned my head around and found Shun's face. He noticed I was looking at him and blushed. "Uh. You looked cold." I smiled and looked back out into the city. I was warmer now though. "Thanks. I was a little chilly." I wasn't uncomfortable about the wings anymore. Actually, I thought I may have been uncomfortable if I didn't see them now.

I could feel Shun's breath behind me, and then a set of lips on my neck. My face heated up with blush, but I didn't stop him. I wanted this to happen for such a long time, and I wasn't about to let this moment slip away from me.

I turned the front of my body around in his wings, and placed my hands on his chest. Our lips then met almost immediately when I turned around. It was as if electricity went through me, and I didn't want this to end. But I knew it had to.

aw. touching moment that was sadly crushed by reality. -sad face- but nonetheless, touching. sorry for being a tad late. Just took my time with this. i felt like i rushed into the war too quickly so i'm trying to span out the time before the fight. well, read, review, and other things. ~Copperpelt~