I perched high on top of a tree, glaring down at you. I’d been assigned to you since birth and day by day I had begun to fall in love with you. Your laugh, your smile, your pastel blue hair against your evergreen eyes. I only had one rule. I couldn't reveal myself to you, I was to protect from the shadows. Yet it was growing ever harder as the violence around you kicked but a cloud of dust that I could barely protect you from. To be honest, I really have no idea how the world came to this, but nobody really goes outside anymore. Because if you go outside you’ll most likely get jumped. But you never stopped going outside you refused to accept fear, so you walked to the store to get food in a grey tank top, high waisted shorts, black combat boots and a shotgun on your back. I knew it was coming, this was supposed to be your last day on Earth. It was too early, you deserved more, you were only 23. As you make your way to the store past the scattered pieces of a broken world, a gunshot rings out. You duck down covering your head with you arms. I flinch and look away, this is it. You push up off the ground, reaching for your shotgun. 4 men surround you in the cracked road before you. One raises a pistol. BANG. The shot rings in my ears as I gase at you, my vision blurring from tears. You stumble backwards and drop your gun, clasping both hands to your blood stained shorts. Tripping on some rubble, you fall down as the men close in on you. I grit my teeth, this isn't how it should end.

“Goddammit…” I mutter and I leap off the tree. I freefall for a second before my wings unfurl behind me and carry me down to the ground between you and the gunmen. I land on one knee and push myself up to my feet. I turn to you, my back to the gunmen and reach my hand out to you but instead on taking it you throw the shotgun, clearly shocked. I catch it with inhuman speed. I spin back around to the terrified men, shotgun loaded and ready. I steady my breath and calm my shaking hands, I level my aim on the man directly across from me and my finger shakes uncontrollably as it closes around the trigger and then. THUMP. A body hits the floor. The next 3 drop like flies and once i’m sure the threat is completely gone, I turn back to you. You're bleeding a lot and looking at me very wide eyed with a huge grin slowly spreading across your face. I drop the shotgun and scoop you up in my arms and we take off into the air. I just the only rule I had. My wings begin to sting as soon as we land at your house. You invite me inside and I patch your leg up with the bitter realization that I can't go back to heaven. I broke the one rule of being your Guardian Angel and now I have to pay the consequences. And those are staying here with you, forever, as your very own Guardian Angel