The Heart Of Cain

It's hard to understand the dynamics of humans when they don't understand themselves.      My eyes flicker back and forth at the raging hallways, filled with teenagers that appeared around my age. Though, age is a mere reflection of who you wished to look like in the Above, it's easier to fit into mortals' consistency of measurements. Age reflects a biological sense of how much you grown, and long you've survived on earth—it has no meaning in the Above.      I clutch my notebooks into my hands, acting onto the forgery of a weak teenage girl. Though, I like to consider I've advanced beyond basic books in measurements and words derived of the Greek nature—I let it be. My father send me down with a role to play, and like a mortal actress, I'll play it.      I suck in my cheeks and presume my movements, across the hallways and to one of the classroom. As I begin to pass a couple of guys and girls, I begin to notice from the corner of my eyes—and the feeling of heat against stares—that people were noticing the new girl of school. Though, I've been down on earth for approximately thirty-one sols (or days, as mortals calls it), I've just freshly enrolled in a high school.      It isn't without reason, however. My father pinpointed that the demon—one of the most powerful, and in favor to the throne of the Below—is targeting teenagers for his chance to corrupt them of their nature. As angels and demons alike, we were supposed to act as forces of nature, not desires to send wildly to the mortal realm.      It is, with no surprise, the Below doesn't follow by our carefully crafted curriculum.      Demons.      Never trust them then, never trust them now.      I move without much obstacles, slipping into the classroom with a maximum of twelve people. Precisely.      I approach the head of the classroom—teachers, as they call it—and offer a slip of paper and a smile. Two things I am most terrible at. Papers are condensed from trees, and my smile are always fake when forced.      "Hello," I greet, holding out the whimsy paper that millions of trees have been cut for due to greed of wealth. "I am Seraphina. I am a new student here."      The man, somewhere in a biological age range of thirty to forty. A couple more seconds more, I process that he is thirty-seven; with dark rooted blond hair, green eyes snob behind artificial glassware that protects and advances vision impairment. He sported a little mole on his chin, a crooked nose and thin lips.      "Seraphina." He repeats my name, no interest in his tone. He looks at the slip, before greeting his green gaze with mine. "Where're you from?"      It took me a second to decompose his words. With it, I merely return with a grimace of a smile. "Somewhere far. You probably have not heard of it."      The teacher, whom I've still not recieved the name of, leans back against the leather of his worn-down chair. I don't even want to begin to imagine the manufacturing that went down—and the nature resources stolen—to make such item. Brittle and worn-down, just like everything made from mortal hands.      "Oh, really? Try me." I don't know if it's just a figment of my imagination—probably isn't; angels have a good concious at detecting languages and their obstacle meaning behind certain word play—but he seems a bit challenged. Threatened if you may say.      My brain begins to rack for an easy word-play of the Above, but the closest thing near it is the term: Heaven. Which I don't think describes the cultivation of Angels well enough. Heaven was formulated in terms of a religion being, to which we have no connection to. There's a systematic wiring that goes in the Above, different from any paradise Heaven is described as, and goes into a equality-like image.      I don't want to use a random finding and present it as my original source of origin, but lying is not in my nature. Literally. It's only been in my vocabulary due to the acknowledge of such habits.      However, I was able to ease away from the teacher's challenging gaze. Instead, I found an arm wrapped around my shoulders and pulled against their body, the heat of their skin almost grazing mine with a burning sensation. It wasn't so terribly that it could harm me—hardly anything materialistic and mortally-made could—but it was enough to provide a great deal of discomfort.      "You haven't heard? She's from Israel. It's hardly acceptable over there to pressure a student to reveal their source of origin," a deep voice answers for me, forging a lie on their tongue that doesn't make their skin crawled from the sound. "And isn't it, I don't know, a little weird to be challenging the new student? I don't know about you, but running a school and hearing a teacher asking personal questions seems a little weird to me."      The teacher gapped, offering little reply as he shoves the glasses back against his crooked nose. He stammers, "I-I,"      "Don't worry, Hendrickson, I won't be the one to tell. Just a little warning however, next time: just let it go." Without another word, the guy pulls back against our attachment and begins to walk me down the rolls of desks. I begin to wiggle from his grip, though thankful for his saving and convincing lie, I was quite uncomfortable with his skin on mine. Was a mortal thing, or was it something else.      "That's not a nice thing to do for a guy who just saved you," he declares, still have not be able to view his face. I turn to him, finally able to wriggle away from his touch before I begin to pinpoint the small details of his features. He owned black hair, tousled in a wild manner that seems upkept; bright blue eyes, a perfectly sculptured nose and full lips. His face was inhumanly beautiful, almost sculptured by the gods of craft. However, there might be futile claims to my inhumane statement.      As he offers a smile, a little glimmer at the edge of his eye radiate a small broken ring.      See, the thing about the image is not because it's a mirage of the eye. It's only seen through angels and demons, and the glimmer of color showcase it to all who wants to see.      That's not all, however. With it, there's an ability to differentiate between angels and demons. While if another paranormal figure looks upon me, and stares at the edge of my eyes, they can catch a small glimmering of a circle. Not broken—a connected ring. It means angels. From the Above.      If someone were to catch a broken ring—like the guy in front of me—it means the exact opposite. It means demons. From the Below.     It didn't take me a moment later to connect the dots.      He seems to notice to, as the grin of his lips grew brighter and my eyes begin to grow narrower. I step forward, a couple of—what humans call—inches shorter than him. I took this form because it's the average height to a mortal woman, but now, I begin to question why I chosen the statistics of average than an advantage.      It didn't matter however, as I raise my gaze to his. Not scared, not fearful of the havocs he's known to cause.      With my chin tilted upwards, my eyes frame to his, I utter the next words. "Adrian."