Fallen

Chapter Fourteen

Ashton

I had a simple plan. I was going to take Hayden to the cave, explain everything to her, and see how she reacts. Then I show up at her house and she isn't there, something I hadn't been expecting. Then she shows up with him, and I got angry.

"Last time I checked, you weren't in charge of me," she says sliding past me.

"You don't know what you've gotten yourself into."

She turns to face me, fury burning in her eyes, "I think I know how my life is going."

"But you don't! That's why I came here!"

"Oh you came here to help me? Because I didn't meet you after school? Well I'm sorry the fire alarm went off! You're just mad because I have done what you told me not to, I have gone on a date with Colton. Do you act this way every time you don't get your way?"

"You went on a date with him?"

Hayden smiled, knowing she struck a bone. "Yes, I did. And you know what we did? We kissed and he asked me to the Winter Ball."

My anger spiked, she had no idea. "You are so stupid! You just don't understand! Your aren't normal!"

Hayden scowled, this time I struck the bone. "You're right, I'm not normal. I lived 16 years of my life with my parents as my best friends, not meeting anyone else; that is until my parents, my best friends, are brutally murdered. I watched my mother die in my arms, that's not normal is it?" She shakes her head. "You say I don't understand? But I think I do, I think I do perfectly fine. Colton was the one person in this town, other than Ryder, who treated me half decently. Not like some freak who's parents were killed." The she stormed away. I take a deep breath, that did not go as planned.

"Smooth dude," I hear someone say behind me. I spin around to see Ryder sitting on the couch an amused expression on his face.

"Do you think you can get her to the cave?"

Ryder smiles, "Easily."

"I'll meet you there."

I drove straight to the Cave and sat there waiting. 15 minutes later I here people outside.

"What is this place again?" I hear Hayden ask Ryder. I smile, he actually did it.

"It's just a place where my friends and I hang out sometimes."

The duo rounds the corner and into the cave.  At first I can tell that she doesn't see me, but as her eye adjust to the dark I see her face turn into a scowl.

"Why didn't you tell me he was going to be here?"  She turns to Ryder furiously.

"Would you have came if I did?"

Hayden purses her lips, "No."

I take a step towards them, "Look, I want to apologize for earlier. No got a little... Out of hand."

She quirks her eyebrow, "You have Ryder drag me to a cave, just to apologize?"

"No, I had him bring you here to show you this."  I pull out my flashlight and shine it on the wall.  Immediately the expression on her face changes into a kind of awe.

"What is this?"  She asks as she approaches the wall.  She seems to trace something with her fingers, but I'm too far away to tell.

"It maps all of our families histories over the centuries," Ryder tells her.

"Like a huge family tree," she murmurs.  "But why is it here?"

"It maps the descendants of the original hunters in the area," I say.

"As in hunting animals?"

"No, Fallen Angels."

She turns to face me, her eyebrows furrowed in confusion.  "What the hell are you talking about?"

"Fallen Angels don't belong here, they were cast out of the heavens and sent to Earth.  It's our job to," I pause trying to think of the right wording, "round them up."

"And kill them?"  She seems horrified, but I have to tell her the truth.

"Yes."

"B-but my father is on the wall.  He wouldn't hurt a fly." She runs her hand along the name Chris, a name that is right next to Olivia, Taylor and Ryder's mom.  "Where is my mother?  If you are trying to tell me that I am a Fallen Angel hunter, shouldn't she be on this wall too?"

"Well you see," I once again am a loss for words.  "You see that is what confuses us.  We have reason to believe your mother was one of them, which makes you..."

"Half hunter, half fallen angel."  She never removed her gaze from the wall.  "Then why haven't you killed me?  If I'm one of them, why am I not dead?"

"Because you are one of us too," Ryder says before I can respond.  "And we love you.  You're my family."

"I just don't believe it.  They would have told me."  The look on her face betrayed what she was saying.  I could tell that she believed everything we were telling her.

I try to think of something calming to say, but all I can think of is one thing.  "They didn't tell you because it makes you a target.  And they didn't want to put that burden on you."

She turns abruptly to face them.  I am surprised to see tears in her eyes.  Something in her mind must have clicked exactly at that moment because she starts to sob.  "They're dead because of me aren't they?"

I can't respond to that question.  I look over at Ryder who looks just as stunned as I do.

Hayden falls to her knees covering her face with her hands, "Oh my god.  It's all my fault.  The feather, the murders, it all makes sense now."  She looks up her eyes red from crying.  "One of them murdered my parents because they wanted me."