First mission

Well I went on my first mission today. What a joke. It was screwed right from the start, probably designed to fail. In fact, it went so badly wrong I'd be inclined to say there was a leak. It wasn't my fault. It wasn't anyone's fault, not Red's, not even Imran's though I'd like to blame him.
Our team got scrambled to intercept half a dozen demons who were causing trouble in the Den, which is basically this pub where loads of people from the force and loads of angels who want a boyfriend in the force so they look cool hang out. Others go there too, me included, and I don't want a boyfriend in the force. Or at least, I don't want to get one in the way they do, all mini-skirts and mini-tops and plastered in makeup. If I get a boyfriend, I want him to like me for who I am.
Anyway, we went, wearing helmets, guns in hand. When we got there, we found a small team of demons all right, but there were a bunch of angels there too. Red gave the order to use close-quarter weapons - our guns won't hurt humans but they do hurt other angels - so we all drew our blades and shoved our guns away. Despite the seriousness of the situation, Imran burst out laughing when he saw my weapon of choice. Asked if I was too weak to use a real blade. It's a dirk see, a smaller one than a sword, but still longer than a dagger. I couldn't think of anything to say in response. One, I was too busy watching the demons, and Red, for what we were supposed to do now. Two, what the heck could I say? I can use a big sword, probably better than him, because I'm fairly strong for my size. Comes of being made to do manual labour from when I was about seven or eight. And I've got the stamina to use it for the full duration of a battle. A dirk just suited me better when I was asked to try out a few weapons and see which I preferred. Besides, while it may be fine for me to use in battle, you still have to carry it everywhere with you, and a sword is big and obvious and quite a weight to carry around, especially since my left leg can be a bit dodgy from being broken and never healing properly. I wasn't going to say anything like that. So I just kept silent and took it. I seem to be doing a lot of that recently. Normally I'd have just battered anyone who dared insult me, fought the guards to the best of my abilities in manifold attempts to escape or to help others escape, but I'm trying not to let my temper get the better of me. It doesn't seem angel-like. Nor does taunting people, but there you go.
Red had a big sword too. In fact, they all did. Well, I'd made my choice and it was too late to change it. Besides, I wouldn't change it for them.
"All right," he said, raising his sword so it glittered in the late afternoon sun. The others did the same, so I copied them hesitantly. What was the point of doing this? Were we trying to show the demons that we were the ones who they were going to fight? I would've thought it'd be obvious from the helmets and the uniforms. "There's enough for one each. Take them out any way you like, but try not to get in each others way, and keep the civilians out of it. Understand?"
A chorus of 'Yes Sirs', myself included in them.
"Get them then." We ran forward together, splitting up, me in the rear, waiting to see which demon would be left for me. Great. A tall one, with a huge battle axe. Maybe I should have gone for something a little more hefty. Too late now.
He swung at me, and I ducked, and it missed. He staggered slightly, such was the ferocity of his swing, and then I stabbed upwards, but he blocked it with his arm, that I now saw was armour plated. He swung again, and I parried with my dirk, meeting his axe mid-swing. We stood there, locked in place for a moment, each of us trying to force the others away, then my blade slid down his and his down mine and they both fell away. I leapt straight in on the offensive, not aware of anything but the need to defeat this demon as quickly as I could, to prove to the others that I was their equal, that I was competant, not a target for any bad feelings they might have.
He leapt back on the offensive too, and we were leaping around, fighting hard, me having to learn fast as he threw stuff at me that I'd never seen before. They didn't go into much detail on the whole sword-fighting front during training. Figured it wasn't something we'd ever really have much use for. Well, they were wrong.
Boy was this demon fast for his size, swinging the battle axe as easily as I swung my dirk, countering everything I threw at him, either with his armoured arm or with his axe. And then he made his move, when I was in mid-air, blocking my stab with his arm, swinging his axe round. I saw it coming towards me, and did the only thing I could think of - curled up in a ball and leant back. I could only pray that I was far enough off the ground for this to work. I felt the sharp edge of his axe cut into my arm, and stifled a cry of pain. I wasn't having anyone thinking I was a wimp. No way. It'd just be even more ammo for Imran to throw at me. I could see I wasn't quite high enough, I wasn't going to make the flip all the way round to land on my feet. My bum, perhaps, but that'd knock the wind out of me and the demon'd be in a fantastic position to just finish me off. So I whipped out my wings and stroked down once, as I was flipping, sending myself flying backwards and slightly up with enough velocity for me to finish the flip.
It was then I realised I was the only one still fighting. Well that was just great. Now they were going to analyse my technique. Best thing I could do would be to finish this thing with a huge great blow and kill the demon before he had time to recover from seeing me suddenly evade what he thought was his killing blow and do that strange thing with my wings that shouldn't have been possible (flying is a lot harder than you humans seem to think, and I should by rights have crashed to the ground on my bum). I ran at him, he raised his axe. This could be interesting as I had no intention of stopping. It'd be a little like playing baseball. He was going to try and swing down at the right moment to decapitate me, I was going to try and avoid being decapitated at all costs. I guess that's what it looked like to the others, because that's what it felt like to me, and I knew what the last part of my plan was, while they didn't.
"Try and get him alive," came Red's voice. Ok. That's what my plan would probably do anyway. "And try not to get yourself killed," he added in something of a panic as he realised I looked very much like ramming the demon and getting my head chopped off for my trouble. No worries Red. I had no intention of ending my career in the force like that.
I leapt into the air as I approached, soaring up a good few feet, over the axe. He was a big demon, easily seven foot tall. I got higher, higher, as the demon struggled to work out what I was planning on doing. And then I hit him square in the face and he went down like the proverbial ton of bricks. I landed on top of him, held my dirk to his throat. I didn't say anything. I didn't need to. My intention was clear enough.
Red came across and manacled him. He looked at me strangely, as though he were expecting me to have fainted at the sight of a demon or something.
Before he could say anything though, about thirty demons came swooping in from the sky. You could tell they were demons, because they had big black wings. He quickly gave the order to use guns, and to fire at will. One of the team was killed straight off by a bullet to his head, and another injured. We shot up at the demons, firing hard and fast, picking them off one by one, like we'd been taught in training. Well, we managed it, got the whole lot of them between us, but we sustained further casulties. Fact, a bullet skimmed my shoulder, but it didn't really do any damage. No, the real problem I had was my left arm. It had gone pretty numb, which I had to ignore - we were in a life or death situation, now wasn't really the time to examine injuries - and my shirt sleeve felt damp. I just kept on shooting at the demons, aiming and firing and hoping that no more bullets came near me. There wasn't any shelter we could hide under, it was just a straight 'see who can get enough bullets off to kill all the others before they kill all of you' type battle. We'd been told to avoid these in training, but there wasn't all that much we could do about it. From the fact that I'm here, I guess you can tell that we won. Well, we did.
I'm now the proud owner of fifteen stitches in my left arm and with more than enough morphine running through my veins to make me feel absolutely dandy. Red took a nasty wound, bullet to his gut, but the doctors say he'll be just fine. Same about the other ones. Simeon went to visit him, and told me that he wants to see me soon as possible. I'm putting it off, I admit it. I've come home to get changed, and cleaned up a bit, and now I need to go and see him. What's he going to say? I guess the only way I'll find out is to go and see him, now that I don't look like something that's been dragged out of a dingy alleyway.