#(( idk where the inspiration for this thing came from but here some val background lol

[itokunii-a]

( headcanon/drabble: ascension ).

War is a terrible orchestra, he had realized the moment the first gunshot blended into the never-ending rain of artillery cascading from the skies, the very second he had trouble differentiating the stressed gallop of the cavalry from the tanks splitting open the earth with their haunting, rattling roars. And so, so loud, bordering on ear-piercing but never showing him mercy and deafening him to this awfully cacophany of sounds but then again, even silence belongs to this raging horseman ( not quietude, sweet and lulling, when he worked on his students’ papers, basking in the warm sunlight that crept through the glass of his window, rays breaking, softening the sun’s warm touch; no, silence is sharp and claiming, grabbing you by your throat and making you paranoid of the things it hides within its cloak ). And even now as he lays here buried in the grass below, feeling the drizzle of the rain soak through the layers of his uniform, mixing into the warm pool of blood that collects beneath his ribcage from where the bullet had pierced through the frail armor that is his body, war still rampages on without giving a second thought to his dying body. Ah, what a pity, he had hoped that the more of him disappeared into the wet mist of the morning, the less he would hear, see, feel; as though he is waking up from a dream, slowly as the images crumble from his mind. But death perhaps has less mercy than war.

He grits his teeth, clawing his fingers into the salt of the ground below as the voices of his men echo to his left, their cadence making his breath hitch, his heartbeat quicken as he realizes he cannot die like this, cannot let them die like this. This is not about him. It is his duty to save them, isn’t it? This horror has neither rhyme, nor reason but if he could keep them from this plight, if he could just get up and move, he needs to get to them, he HAS to GET UP and MOVE----.

And, suddenly, something shifts within the atmosphere. He barely manages to roll himself onto his back and grant the heavens above a pained, half-lidded stare when he sees it between the clouds. Light breaks and falls onto his face but unlike its gentle counterpart this fire is overwhelming, blinding, a flame that steals both attention and mind and fills his head with the loudest ringing imaginable, a static hiss and his body succumbs to its will. But, alas, this is only the beginning for when the clouds part the murmurs, the commands, the singing of the archangel possess him completely and he is crying, screaming, begging in terror and in awe at the ghastly beauty of the celestial creature above. And it chooses him as its fiery sword and it does not care that he is scared and dying ( is it not made in god’s image? Is it not like god? And does he not let them slaughter each other without interference? ), it feeds on his virtue and his dedication and his devotion. Its hand ( or perhaps something that his mind constructed as a hand ) grazes his eyes and all he can do is give himself in as its vessel.

He wakes with a gasp, the cool air filling his lungs ( dry, and he is already heaving and shaking and shutting his eyes tightly before his body allows him an exhale ), the skin on his back burning with the intensity of a thousand dying suns. There are worried, prying hands all on him, voices he cannot pinpoint an identity to asking him something, yelling, spluttering, Sergeant, what the fuck happened here, how did you--- but all he can do is lay on his stomach and tremble in tune to the ringing still persisting in his ears.

Someone is carrying him, medics he assumes, but he passes out before he sees the rivers of red, the burnt-out corpses and the mad wailing of an enemy still alive quivering with a single noun stuck to his lips.

Angel. They claim the wing-like burns on his back are from a grenade.