CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE:
ARIEL

HE HAD LIED TO HER. She should've known better but she'd been thinking with her heart instead of with her head. She should've known that they would have never let Bucky go. Was it because she was selfish and she just wanted to see him one more time before they both forgot the other existed? Is that what it was? She didn't know. What she did know what the pain that coursed through her veins made her cry out in pure agony. Everything hurt. Her healing powers were failing her, everything was failing her. She was being tortured and all she wanted was for death to come and take her by the wrist so that the pain could be over with.

Were they doing this to him too? The thought made tears swell in her eyes. She couldn't protect him. She failed at her job all because she had been too busy falling in love with him. She silently cursed her father, wondering why he had put such a task on her when he knew what the outcome was going to be. Did he know where she was? And if he did, would he come and save her or leave her to fight her own battles? She knew that he wasn't supposed to interfere with the human world, but every part of her begged him to bring her home.

Her body glowed with cuts, bruises bloomed on her arms and legs, one was beginning to form on her right cheek from where she'd spit in a guards face and had gotten roughly slapped for it. She barely acknowledge it when they'd taken her to her cell. She laid on the hard cold concrete floor, body curled up in a fetal position. Her eyes were closed and exhaustion took over her, forcing her to sleep even though her mind stayed awake, racing the entire time. She had to find a way out of here. She had to find Bucky, she had to get them both out of here.

It had been a year since she and Bucky had fallen off that train. Only a year. It felt like she'd been in this place for an entire lifetime. Her matted blonde hair caught in her face, making her nose scrunch as she forced her eyes to open. She wasn't sure if she was hallucinating or if there was actually another angel in front of her. Ariel stood there with knitted brows, hand placed on Celeste's shoulder as she tried her best to wake her up.

     "Celeste." Her voice sounded far away.

     Celeste blinked multiple times, wondering if it was a figment of her imagination. "Ariel?"

     "Celeste, you need to get up. You need to get out of there." Ariel glanced around the cell, nose scrunching up in disgusts. She looked back towards Celeste, eyes filling with worry. She'd never seen Celeste like this, so disheveled, defeated. She'd always known Celeste as the rebel that could do anything and everything that she wanted with no harm coming towards her. Now, it was like all of that was a façade. "Celestial, are you listening to me?"

     Celeste pushed herself up into a sitting position. "How are you here right now?"

     "I'm not. I'm just appearing in your mind right now. But that's besides the point." Ariel kneeled down before her. "You need to find a way out of here, Celeste. Once you're out of this place, I can come for you, I can bring you home."

     Celeste shook her head. "No."

     Ariel frowned. "No? What do you mean, no? Celeste, this is your best chance at coming home."

     "I can't leave him."

     "Leave who? Celeste, you're not making any sense."

     "Bucky." Celeste answered weakly, closing her eyes as pain shot through her entire body. "I can't leave Bucky to these people, Ariel. You've seen what they can do to me, an angel. There's no telling what they're doing to him. I have to save him, Ariel. I have to. It's why I was sent here in the first place."

     "Well, you're not going to be saving anyone when you're weak like this." Ariel told her sternly. "Do you know how much power it took for me to even try to enter your head because of how badly these people have scattered your mind?"

     Celeste narrowed her eyes dangerously at the other angel, jaw setting in determination. "I'm not going anywhere without him, that's final. I'm going to get the both of us out of here. Somehow. I'll come up with a plan. I don't need your help."

     Ariel scoffed. "I know you're the loner rebellious angel and all that, but you shouldn't deny help when it's being handed to you on a silver platter, Celestial." Ariel paused for a moment, closing her eyes as she sighed. "The other angels are worried about you. Father is worried about you. You've been off his radar for months, and when God can't see you, no one can. You might as well not exist."

     Celestial laughed in amusement. "The other angels are worried about me? Please. They were enthralled when Father sent me to Earth. They wanted nothing to do with me. They've never cared about me or even liked me for that matter. Nothing in the universe could ever change that."

     "Celeste, please. Don't be difficult. Just cooperate."

     "I don't need you. I don't need anyone but Bucky. And I'm going to get him out of here. If it's the last thing that I do."

     Ariel stared at her for a moment before ultimately realizing that no matter what she said, she wasn't going to be changing Celeste's mind anytime soon. The angel clenched her jaw before sighing in defeat. "Fine. What if I make a deal with you."

     "The last deal that I made ended me in here." Celeste recalled, pushing herself to stand up and ignoring the dizziness that wanted to take over her body. She walked over to the door of her cell, peaking out of it and noticing a guard down the hall with a gun in his hand. She pushed herself away from the door and sat down on the small metal bed that had a thin mattress settled on top of it.

     "I'm not one of them, Celeste. I'm your sister, you can trust me."

     Celeste looked at her for a moment before asking, "Can I?"

     "Celeste―︎"

The sound of footsteps approached and Celeste immediately forced her fellow angel out of her mind, laying down on the mattress and closing her eyes, pretending to be asleep. The sound of the cell being unlocked made regret fuel her body. They were here to torture her some more. She didn't fight when they grabbed roughly onto her, putting cuffs around her wrists before shoving her out the door. She'd given up on fighting a long time ago. This is who she was now. An angel―︎could she even call herself that anymore?―︎who couldn't use her powers and who couldn't protect herself or the person she loved.

Celeste was going to die in this place. She had forced herself to come to terms with that.