Fallen Angels

It was a quiet morning in China.

The funeral burned quietly. Everything was simple, as it should have been. Red and white robes fluttered faintly in the draftless hall. The air was thick with incense, so thick she couldn't even breathe.

Lena sat in the back, her metal body rigid against the sea of mourners bowing their heads. The doctors said anything more advanced and she'd die on the spot. Her brain couldn't handle touch features. What a sick joke.

She didn't belong there. She barely held a candle to everyone else here what it came to time spent with her. She was family, but they didn't know the truth. Didn't know of her neglect. Of her running away like a coward. 

The small bench beneath her creaked faintly with the weight she didn’t feel but couldn’t escape. Margot lay at the front, draped in white silk, her face serene in a way Lena had never seen. It was wrong. It was impossibly wrong that her sister could look so at peace when every fragment of Lena was screaming.

The monks struck a hollow bell. Smoke curled from the incense in thin tendrils. She watched it rise, her gaze unfocused, her mind blank except for one terrible thought:

She would never touch her sister again.

The prayers ended quickly. The mourners shuffled forward one by one, bowing before Margot’s body. Lena waited. 

When the last mourner passed, she pushed herself forward, the mechanical hiss of her frame slicing through the quiet like a cruel reminder. Each step toward Margot was a trial, each sound her body made a desecration of the stillness.

She stopped at the edge of the altar, staring down at her sister.

Margot’s hands were folded neatly over her chest, her fingers curled lightly as if they were still capable of holding. Her face was pale, too pale, but there was a softness there—a calm Lena couldn’t reconcile with the sister she knew.

She reached out, metal fingers trembling, but stopped inches from Margot’s hand. The cold sheen of her own limbs mocked her. She couldn’t feel the warmth that had already left, couldn’t grasp what had already slipped away.

“Jie jie... Wǒ hěn bàoqiàn."

She leaned forward, closer to Margot’s still face, her tears refusing to come. Not because she didn’t want to cry, but because she couldn’t.

She hovered there for ages. Everybody else there felt polite enough to give her time at least. 

It amazed her, what absence could do. How it could fill a room so completely, make every moment stretch unbearably long.

At least now she’d be with Papa and Mama, forever. Someone like Margot wouldn’t go to Hell—not her. Lena wanted to believe so badly that Margot would come back as something free and eternal. 

A falcon, maybe, soaring endlessly beneath the glow of the Sun, her wings cutting through the sky with all the strength she carried in this life.

\\

Too long had passed.

The Chongqing skyline stretched out before Lena, its jagged, neon-drenched peaks clawing at the hazy night sky. But beneath it, nestled in the crook of the Yangtze River, lay the last true green of China—an oasis untouched by concrete and industry.

Its grass shimmered faintly under the glow of low-hanging lights and a patch of life breathing in the shadow of the city’s choking sprawl.

Lena sat slumped in her wheelchair, a faint hiss accompanying each slow inhale from the tubes snaking up her nose. The rhythmic beep of her portable monitor was a cruel reminder of her body’s fragile state. The wind toyed with her hair, now unkempt and silvering at the edges. No layers of makeup, no synthetic enhancements to obscure the truth. Not anymore.

Her fingers tightened around the wheelchair’s armrest, the cool metal grounding her. Everything else—the stage lights, the rehearsals, towering infernos of holographic beasts—felt like a distant, feverish dream. Her empire was dust. 

She closed her eyes. No point chasing thoughts that circled endlessly, carving fresh wounds each time.

"Lena."

Her eyes snapped open, and she turned sharply—too sharply, pain blooming across her side. 

She stifled a gasp, her gaze locking onto the silhouette stepping out from the dark.

“Caden?” Her voice cracked. “What—how are you—?”

“I wasn’t allowed to see you,” he said, his tone unyielding. “I didn’t care.”

The faint hum of his internal systems punctuated the stillness as he moved closer. His frame, usually so immaculately maintained, bore scuffs and scratches. She did not want to imagine what he did to get here in the first place. 

But his glowing blue optics were steady, fixed on her.

“You’re going to get dismantled for this,” Lena said, her words edged with both disbelief and fear. “The court order—”

“Means nothing to me,” Caden interrupted, his voice resonant... as though testing the weight of his own words. “Not when the one who... matters most to me... is like this.”

He knelt beside her, his movements measured but full of purpose. His gaze swept over her, taking in the tubes, the pallor of her skin, the faint tremor in her hands. Something in his optics dimmed, his voice dipping lower.

“How did you even get here?”

“I was... careful,” he replied, the faintest smirk brushing his words. “And very, very discreet.”

She exhaled sharply, a bitter laugh escaping her lips. “Well, congratulations. You’ve won the stupidest risk-taker award for the year.”

“Then I suppose I’m the champion,” he said, stepping closer, “and you’re my reluctant presenter.”

Her breath hitched at his answer. So flowery. So direct. She turned away, her arms crossed tightly against the weight of his words. “You can’t save me, Caden. Not like you always did.”

“I know,” he said simply, the quiet conviction in his voice making her falter. “But I can sit here. I can carry some of this with you.”

Lena shook her head, her lips trembling as she looked away. “Why? Why do you care so much? I’m... nothing anymore.”

He tilted his head slightly, his gaze steady and unflinching. “You’re not nothing. You’ve never been nothing.”

She let out a harsh breath, her hands clenching around the armrests. “Look at me, Caden. Astra’s gone, my career’s gone, and soon, I will be too. I killed Margot. Big Jie Jie. What’s left to care about?”

“You,” he said, his voice impossibly soft. “Just you.”

She turned to him, her chest tightening. His face—smooth and metallic, yet so familiar—was inches from hers now, his presence grounding in a way that made her want to scream and cry and laugh all at once.

“You shouldn’t be here,” she whispered again, though her words had lost their bite. “You’re putting everything on the line.”

He tilted his head, the faintest trace of amusement in his tone. “What’s the use of a line if you never cross it?”

She couldn’t help the faint, broken laugh that slipped through her lips. “You’re ridiculous. And hopelessly corny.”

“So I’ve been told, many times… by a certain someone,” he said, his eyes narrowing in a mock gesture of solemnity. “But I’m also stubborn. And if that means being here despite the protest of some court order meant to shield me from harm? So be it.”

Lena’s breath caught, her heart stumbling over itself as she felt the sheer weight of his words. “Caden,” she murmured, her voice trembling. “I don’t know if I can keep going. I mean literally; I don’t think I can walk.”

His hand reached out, hovering near hers, and when she didn’t pull away, his fingers curled gently over hers. The contact was cool, deliberate, and steady—the opposite of everything she felt inside.

“You don’t have to. I will carry you,” he said. “But as for what comes next… Not tonight. Not now. Just let me stay. Please. Before you do something I will regret.”

Tears burned at the edges of her vision, but she blinked them back, turning her gaze toward the skyline again. The neon lights blurred with the faint, unreachable green below, the view shifting as her eyes swam with unspoken fears.

“Before this,” she began, her voice barely audible, “before everything... I thought I’d have more time. To figure it all out. But now, it feels like I was just... borrowed. Like this was all borrowed, and now I have to give it back.”

Caden’s voice was quiet, cutting through the noise in her mind. “Borrowed time is still time. And you’ve done more with yours than most people ever dream of.”

“I don’t know who I am without it.”

“You’re Lena,” he said, his voice like a steady pulse. “And you’re still here. That’s enough.”

She let out a trembling sigh, the words pulling something loose in her chest. Slowly, she leaned forward, resting her forehead against his shoulder. His frame was unyielding, but there was a warmth in the gesture, a quiet solace that cut through the weight pressing on her.

“I don’t deserve this,” she whispered, the tears finally slipping free.

“That’s not your call to make,” he replied, his hand brushing lightly over hers. “Let me carry this, Lena. Just for tonight.”

She didn’t answer, but she didn’t pull away. 

\\

They went a short ways back up the hill before she saw what Caden had done.

There it was. Her motorcycle. The same scuffed frame, the same worn seat, gleaming under the faint glow of the streetlamps like it had been plucked straight from her memory.

“You didn’t."

“I did,” Caden replied calmly, stepping beside her. His glowing optics swept between her and the bike. “It’s yours.”

She shook her head, her breath catching in her throat. “How? How is it even still—”

“I tracked it down. Refurbished it. Only had a small amount of time to fix it, but it runs. Exactly as you left it.”

...

...

"Fuck it."

\\

Lena held onto Caden for dear life.

The motorcycle glided like a whisper across the glass-smooth streets. The soft hum of the bike was the only sound in that stretch of road they were on, blending into the hush of dawn.

"...faster."

Caden, shaking his head, complied.

Her arms wrapped tightly around his torso, the cool, unyielding metal of his frame pressing into her palms. 

She leaned her cheek against his back, her breath brushing faintly against the scuffed plating. 

The movement was effortless—no bumps, no jolts, just the seamless flow of the road beneath them. It felt surreal, too perfect, like the world had softened itself for this one stolen moment.

Then he laughed.

It started low, barely a ripple, as though his systems were testing the boundaries of something they weren’t designed to do. But it grew, blooming into a sound so warm and human it caught her completely off guard. It spilled out of him like a burst pipe, unrestrained and impossible.

It made no sense for him to laugh. He didn’t experience emotions like humans did. He was above this. Above her. 

And yet, he did anyway.

Lena’s breath hitched, her grip on him tightening. She wanted to tell him to stop—to ask how he could possibly laugh when everything felt like it was crumbling.

But she couldn’t form the words. She pressed her face harder against his back, her chest tight and her eyes burning.

His optics glowed brighter, catching the sunlight as it filtered through the canopy of rooftops and terraces. He lifted one hand, letting it cut through the air like a child reaching out to touch the wind. The light spilled through his fingers, fracturing into small, golden shards that danced against the smooth surfaces around them.

Lena closed her eyes, feeling the laughter reverberate through his body and into her own. It was ridiculous. He had no mouth, no muscles to pull into a smile, yet he laughed like the world wasn’t breaking beneath them. Like there was still something left to hold onto.

It was stupid and ridiculous and contradictory and the most achingly beautiful thing she had ever seen.

Tears pricked at her eyes, hot and unwelcome, slipping free before she could stop them. They tracked silently down her face, carried away by the breeze. She clenched her jaw, trying to bury the weight building in her chest, but it was no use.

Caden laughed again, louder this time, the sound cutting through the quiet like a sharp intake of breath. His shoulders shifted slightly under her grip, his entire frame radiating something she couldn’t name.

Joy? Defiance?

The road stretched on, endless and smooth, curving gently as the skyline gave way to the river. The green patches below shimmered like a mirage, their reflections rippling softly in the water. The sun dipped lower over the horizon, its golden light spilling over everything, making the city glisten.

And still, he laughed.

Lena buried her face against him, her tears now unchecked, her chest rising and falling with uneven breaths. The sound of his joy—so absurd, so profoundly out of place—wrapped around her like a blanket.

Her arms tightened around him, her body trembling as she let the warmth of his laugh wash over her.

She didn’t ask him to stop. Not once.