"Love is a power."

☆

"I'm a what?" Adam laughs at the notion. Even with Zander standing in front of him as plain as day, owning wings the purest of white, spread out wide, it still seemed impossible that he too was... "An angel?"

"Like I said. That's an old fashioned term. We prefer the word guardian." Zander takes a step forwards, placing a hand on Adam's shoulder. "It's been a while for you. You have forgotten your purpose. You have forgotten who you are."

"Don't touch me." Adam jerks his shoulder away. He looks Zander up and down. "Does Isaac know this about you?"

"That I'm a guardian? No. He has enough going on in his head, thinking he has lost his mind without knowing this too." Zander takes a step back once again. He lets the large wings slowly fold in on themselves before they eventually embed themselves back into the crescent marks on his skin. "You and me. We are part of a collective responsible for the hearts and minds of humankind. Our duty is to guide and protect, sometimes sacrifice and when we are done, we move on to the next soul in need.

"What do you mean by move on? Isaac is not a problem to be solved. He is a person who deserves friends, love. He thinks he is something to use, has feelings and.... What? We just leave him?" Adam turns when he hears the door behind him open, to reveal Jojo. She approached the male, again taking his hand in hers.

"Guardians live a long life Adam. We outlive any human but we are not immortal. We cannot stay by one human's side forever for our own health. The pain of seeing someone you protect grow old and die in front of you would be too much for any guardian, with it happening over and over. That's not our purpose..." She begins as she manages to get eye contact with him. "Only you know what happened to Isaac that night. Only you can mend his fragile heart." She suddenly looks down as if in shame as she confesses. "The drink from Miss Fine. The powder you took from me. They are a gateway to that memory. A memory which can be replayed and changed. You see what you see because you were there. You are connected."

Adam takes in the words being said. He felt the sudden weight of it all pushing down on him. "If you knew I would have to leave him, why did you let me fall in love?" He feels a tear roll down his cheek.

"Love is a power." Zander smiles as if to reassure the other. "The more you love someone, the stronger the power." He again approaches Adam, resting a hand on his shoulder. "His heart is in your hands."

"How am I supposed to fix this?"Adam pushes the fallen tear away from his cheek with the palm of his hand.

"You may not think so at this moment, but you already know what you must do." Jojo replies, as she places her hand in her coat pocket and pulls out a small sachet. She hands it to Adam. "You have one more chance to put the past right."

Adam takes in the small packet, the blue shades putting him in mind of the clouds in a blue sky. He exhales a defeated sigh. He didn't like this truth. He didn't want to do this. Why couldn't things stay just as they are? There had to be another way. "When am I supposed to..." He looks up but finds he is on his own. No sign of Jojo or Zander. Just him left alone with this new revelation. He is an angel. Or guardian as they had called it. He had seen the wings come out of nowhere from Zander's back. Spread out, wide and white against the grey sky. But did he really possess such wings too? Adam shakes his head, refusing to believe such a notion. He begins to doubt he had ever seen it in the first place but those marks on his own back he knew to be true. Scars he could not remember getting, but they weren't scars at all. "This is ridiculous." He drops the sachet to the ground, in order to pull his own sweater over his head, along with his t shirt. They fall to the ground in a heap as he now stands, clothed only from the waist down.

"Ok..." He takes a deep breath and closes his eyes. His mind focuses on the moment. Wings. If this was true, he needed to grow wings. He slowly starts to feel his body temperature rise then dip. He tries his best to control any feeling which washes over him, then the tingling sensation starts as Adam feels the hairs on his neck stand up.

Suddenly a shiver so sharp shoots up his spine. Adam begins to pull and claw at his skin, wishing to tear it clean off. He holds out his arms either side of him to stop his own assault and starts to shout so loud "AAHHHH..." Adam continues to shout, the noise turning into a scream, as what could only be described as daggers were piercing his skin.Two sharp bones begin to push their way out of his back, as the bones spindle up and out, with large wet white feathers attached to the skeletal frame. Now behind Adam were a huge pair of cream coloured wings.

The screams stop as he comes to the realisation that he knows who he is and he knows exactly what he must do. "Isaac..." he utters under his breath. "I will save you."

***

Jojo looks to her left at Zander, who was finishing his excuse of a coffee from the hospital vending machine. She sighs heavily. "Have we done right? Bringing them together? Maybe we should have told him the whole truth." She looks down to the floor by her feet.

"Jojo, both you and I know a guardian of the heart is the most complex. It can't be forced. We have told him all we can. Adam isn't a fool. He will work out the rest, I have faith he is on the right path."

"Adam's love for Isaac is without question, it goes with the territory, but Isaac? I didn't see it coming. He loves Adam as if he were a human. He cannot stay with him. That's impossible."

"It's unheard of." Zander taps his finger on the side of his paper cup in thought. "But remember, Isaac will forget. No one retains a memory of us once we have fulfilled our duty."

"But...."

"Hey!" Zander halts her words. "Isaac's mind is my responsibility. You just make sure Adam is doing what he is supposed to for now. Ok?."

Jojo gives a slight nod. On paper she knew what Zander was saying was true, but he hadn't seen what she had seen. True love at play. True love was the rarest love of all and if this went wrong, it could break Isaac's heart all over again.