❛ I’ve ruined much more than just you, Neriah. ❜ Not wise words. No. This wasn’t said out of the intent to HELP her, or help HIMSELF. A rare feat of SELF DESTRUCTION. For a moment, b l u e e y e s were leveled with her– A colder than stone look. For a moment all features of this angel seemed unchanging even despite her emotional response. The hurt she must’ve felt because of him… The damage he KNEW she went through. Naomi had done much of the same to him. If not LESS…
He knew perhaps there was much more to pay for. Because where did one begin to even list the effects of his actions upon HEAVEN ? Once home to him and many of his brothers and sisters. Now thousands were gone. Thousands by HIS hand.
Her heartbreak had his eyes AVERTING. He couldn’t look at her. Just like before, with home… After his reign as GOD . Removed from Purgatory … Never able to go back out of the fear of what damage he had done to them, and the damage he might do to HIMSELF. The situation with Neriah was similar. And perhaps worse… Because in this instance. Facing her was a blink away. ❛ Yes… You were wonderful . ❜ He finally says out loud. The tears she shed had b r o k e n what’s already crumbled in his grace.
❛ BUT… ME? I … I am a fallen angel . And yet… – ❜ Castiel looks to her with oceanic eyes CLOUDED with vague thoughts. ❛ –YOU…? are fallen , too. ❜ His eyes narrow, the intensity of his knowing stare increased . ❛ We do not need to be bound by FATE… DESTINY… Or some ❝RIGHTEOUS PATH❞ . Neriah– This is your choice. With your freedom… WE can make this RIGHT . ❜
It’s now that the anger melts from her features, replaced with hopeless CONFUSION. She opens her mouth with the intent of yelling, screaming until her throat was raw ---- “I AM NOT FALLEN, I AM NOT LIKE YOU, I AM A GOOD ANGEL, I AM A GOOD ANGEL, I AM A G O O D ANGEL --------”
Yet her tongue is met only with silence, for she knows that Castiel speaks only the truth. Her halo is CRACKED and MANGLED, her wings stripped of their GLORY. Neriah is not a righteous warrior of Heaven; she is an outcast, an abomination, UNWANTED and BROKEN.
❛ I don’t . . . I don’t know what FREEDOM is anymore, ❜ she speaks at last, softly. The word invokes something within her; a quiet stirring of longing for a concept she can just barely cling to. Perhaps she had been FREE, at one point ---- before she had been yanked apart and sewn back together again, countless upon countless times. But any memory of such bliss is FUZZY. She is unsure of many things; but she is quite certain that she’d like to REMEMBER.
She inhales a sharp, rattling breath, shaking her head. ❛ I don’t know what to do. ❜