Writing prompt: A long time ago, every human had wings. When you were born, they were white, but they changed to all colours of the rainbow given what kind of life you lived, from a light yellow to a dark blue. However, in this time, only marks of those wings are left, coloured a muddy grey. No one remembers why humans left their wings. That is, until a young man appears, seemingly without memory, with wings as tall as himself...coloured the darkest shade of black.

I awaken on the ground.

At first the only thing I feel is the hard stone beneath my body...no, not stone, this is a material I cannot quite place.

Then come the sounds, faint at first, but as my ears remember how to hear they grow louder. Again, most of them I cannot place. It is as if I have awoken in a world utterly different from my own, a world that is a complete mystery to me.

The smell hits me a while afterwards... and it feels the same way I imagine getting run over by an ox must feel like. If this is how this new world smells like, I would very much like to go back to the void whence I just came.

I lay there, feeling the ground beneath my body, listening, breathing, trying to recognise something, anything. I hear human voices, speaking words I understand, even though they seem strange to my ears. I start to recognise some smells too, like that of rot, which gives me hope that there is fresh air somewhere out there. I also come to realise just how vulnerable I am, weak, alone, lying on the floor with no awareness of my surroundings; I need to open my eyes.

So, I do. I imagined it would be difficult, seeing as my entire body feels like it is made of stone, however, slowly, I start to see the world around me. The strangeness of it becomes even more apparent. In the dim light of the day's end – I believe – I see that I am lying among rubbish, hence the horrid smell. I seem to be in an alley between two buildings, though what purpose they serve I cannot imagine, since they seem rather as empty of life as they are of beauty. Ahead of me, I can see people walking hurriedly, in clothes completely different from those I know, many holding things that, again, I do not recognise. The strangest sight of all are the large shapes – machines? – that thunder down the street and are the source of much of the noise I could not understand.

No matter how strange this place is, lying on the ground will not make it less so, it can only serve to make me much more vulnerable. It is time I got up.

That is easier said than done, however. My body feels like stone, my muscles refuse to obey my mind. Slowly, I bring myself to a sitting position, though every move hurts. My skin is clear of bruises and wounds, yet I feel like I have fallen from the sky. I attempt to stand, but it seems like sitting is as far as I can go without assistance; I am going to need help. For as long as I have lived, I have loathed depending upon others, so of course I would be forced to do just this in order to survive...how typical of the gods.

Just as I take a moment to curse them – something I do quite often – I hear footsteps approaching. A small person, judging by the sound of their feet hitting the ground, carrying something heavy, judging by the sound of their breath. I catch a whiff of flowers, a scent that stands out in the middle of this stench, at the same moment that the footsteps stop.

"Not again! I swear this dumpster spends more time on the ground than upright- "

(prompt can be found on writing-prompt-s.tumblr.com or on their Instagram)