My feet still kicked for ground, though I had been falling for some time now. The warm air turned cold the second I passed through the clouds, and it now whipped my bare skin. My golden arms and torso faced upward, my eyes still staring above me in disbelief as the light gradually faded from whence I came. The golden gates that once opened upon my arrival were now locked forever to me. The soft clouds seemed to look down on me with a shame that broke my heart as they went from blinding white to dull gray. My long blonde curls billowed around my face and framed the top half of my vision. Through them I saw my wings shedding their pure white feathers. They spiraled above me, taunting me with their departure. The glow of my skin faded the longer I fell. Soon it would lack luster completely and I would be left with the ashen hue of disgrace.
This was it. This was what falling really felt like. I had always caught myself with flight, but this time I couldn't. And never again would I be able to. I closed my long lashes over my eyes before seeping into the unconscious. I thought that maybe this way I wouldn't feel the impact as much.
I thought wrong.
Not only did I collide with the ground with the impact of a thousand steel pallets, I broke through it and continued falling into caverns deep beneath the crust. The air got hotter and hotter the deeper I fell - not the warmth of Heaven, but rather the burn of Hell.... Finally I landed with a spine-crushing thud. Flames leapt around me, climbing up the walls with no ceiling and licking at the hard floor below. My arms shook as I struggled to pull myself up with the help of a staggered stalagmite and looked around frantically. I squatted low to the floor and pushed up with as much force as I could but got no higher than a few yards before falling down again. This time I stayed on the ground. I was lying down, looking up at the abyss above me. No, I was in the abyss. And I would never get out.
Never again would I see the light I once brought to this earth.
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You're the Only Angel That Got Away
Short StoryMicrofiction inspired by the band Mayday Parade's song "12 Through 15" (2013).