The dream didn't begin like a dream.
It came like memory wrapped in shadow. Cold at first. Then warm. Then cold again.
Raphael stood beneath the ever-golden sky of Vystriaa. Marble spires gleamed around him, each tipped with radiant flame that hummed with celestial harmony. The music of the higher realms flowed like wind through the silver trees, but he did not listen. Not truly.
His gaze was fixed on the horizon, where the edge of Heaven gave way to the mortal veil.
And behind him… came a voice.
"Still watching the world turn without us?"
Raphael turned slightly.
Derek. Clothed in white, his armor unmarred, his wings stretched and whole. His face wore the same familiar half-smile. Charming. Confident. Beloved by many. Trusted by more.
Raphael had trusted him most of all.
"What are you doing here?" Raphael asked.
Derek gave a faint shrug. "Walking. Thinking. Same as you, I imagine."
"I doubt that."
A silence settled. The wind stirred the trees. Distantly, a choir sang the Hymns of Order. The heavens pulsed with rhythm and obedience.
"You've been quieter lately," Derek said. "Harder to find. Even the Thrones wonder where you slip away to."
"I've been thinking," Raphael replied.
"Dangerous habit," Derek murmured. "They say thought untempered is the seed of pride."
"Then pride begins with honesty."
Derek chuckled softly. "You always did love riddles."
Raphael didn't smile. "What are you really doing here, Derek?"
The smile faded from Derek's face. His tone changed—softer now. Lower. Like a confession passed in secret.
"I've been watching the Morning Star," he said.
Raphael's eyes narrowed.
"He speaks... truths," Derek went on. "Hard ones. Uncomfortable ones. But I've listened. And the more I do, the more I wonder—why are we bound to rules we didn't write? Why do we kneel in silence when we could walk among the mortals and help them freely?"
Raphael turned fully now.
"You've spoken with him?"
"Not directly," Derek said quickly. "But I've heard. I've felt. You have too. I know you have."
Raphael said nothing.
"We were created to carry light," Derek said. "To be more than echoes. But all they want is obedience. Sing here. Guard that. Smile while the world below burns."
His voice was passionate now. It stirred something in Raphael—something deep, something dangerous.
"I know you feel it," Derek said. "You see the rot, same as I do. The rot under the perfection. The questions no one dares ask."
Raphael's breath hitched. He remembered those questions. He remembered how they kept him awake—how the hymns felt more like walls than wings.
Derek stepped closer.
"We could change it," he said. "Together. With the others. The Morning Star has a plan. Not to destroy Heaven, but to reclaim it. To free it from stillness. From stagnation."
"You speak like a revolutionary," Raphael murmured.
"I speak like someone who believes we were made for more."
The words fell like seeds.
Dangerous seeds.
Raphael didn't respond. He turned away again, looking over the edge of the firmament.
Derek's voice softened. "Just think about it. That's all I ask."
And then—like mist fading in sunlight—the dream shifted into imagination.
Time passed, impossibly fast. A blur of days or heartbeats.
Raphael stood once again beneath a dimmer sky. The fires of the spires now flickered. The silver leaves no longer shimmered with joy, but with strain.
Something had changed.
He had changed.
Derek stood across from him in a quiet courtyard, expression unreadable.
"I never meant for you to fall," Derek said.
"You told me to question," Raphael answered. "And when I did, no one answered."
"I told you to think," Derek said. "Not to rebel."
"But rebellion was the only answer they gave me."
The pain in his voice was sharp now. Bitter. He remembered this moment too clearly.
"You stood with him," Raphael said. "The Morning Star."
"I stood near him," Derek corrected. "But when the moment came, I stepped back. I saw what he truly wanted. Not freedom. Power."
"And I fell," Raphael whispered. "Because I was still standing forward."
Derek's eyes were glassy. "I thought you would pull back too."
"But I didn't," Raphael said. "Because you taught me to ask. To feel. To want more."
The shame bloomed in Derek's face.
"I believed in you," Raphael said. "But you believed in Heaven more than me."
"I was afraid," Derek admitted.
"So was I," Raphael whispered. "But I walked anyway."
They stood there, the broken dream crumbling around them. He woke up sweating and filled with questions, doubts of what if?
What if Derek changed his mind ? What if he pulled out at the last minute?
"Is he in Heaven?"
Then something struck Raphael's mind. The water of Understanding. "Did he use it?"
" I noticed that he was behaving somehow strange when the date of rebelling was announced among we the fallen as at that time".
Then, just as suddenly, Raphael opened his eyes.
The fire had dimmed. Morning crept into the sky. The boy still slept.
But Raphael sat in silence.
A tear rolled down his cheek—one he did not wipe away.
The dream had reminded him of the truth he tried not to name:
That he fell because he chose to.
But also because Derek helped him lean too close to the edge—and didn't hold him back when it mattered.
" I think it's time to meet with my fellow Fallen".
---
✌😌