Lucifer's Angel Falls in Love

The Angel stood under the rain, and as the storm swept through the vastness of the valley, he pondered his next course of action. In those rare times when he allowed himself to be seen by mortal men and women, he favored the appearance of a six-foot-tall, good-looking, light-skinned Black man in his early twenties. A long time ago, during his first assignment on the planet Earth, abode of God's man and woman, he looked after a people who closely resembled the ordinary young man he pretended to be. The ancestors of Arabs and sub-Saharan Africans did mingle a lot in those early days, in that beautiful desert world. Sometimes, he shuddered to think that it had literally been thousands of years since he left Home.

Home, he mused. According to the mortals, home was where the heart was. He scanned the world beyond the flooded valley, and his gaze focused on one particular dwelling. A beautiful house in the suburb of Gosford, in the New South Wales region of Commonwealth of Australia. A chubby, dark-skinned man sat a table with his wife, a slender blonde woman and their two caramel-skinned daughters. The father and head of household, an Aboriginal Australian man, led the family in saying Grace. Afterwards, they happily died on the tasty dishes which the wife and mother, a lovely European woman, made for the family. In the hearth, a warm fire burned. It wasn't cold outside, the Angel knew, but something about gathering near a cozy fire appealed to humans. Even in the twenty-first century they still retained the instincts of their primitive ancestors. The need to belong, to feel welcome and to gather with family and friends was one of them. They seemed really happy, and during that moment, the Angel allowed himself to feel a slight twinge of envy.

An Angel's existence was one of solitude. Even though Angels were never truly alone. They were extensions of God's Will. All of them. Even the Fallen Ones. The Angel shuddered, and it wasn't from the cold. He wished he hadn't used that word, fallen. Among his kind it held so many negative connotations. It brought back so many painful memories. Folding his magnificent white wings closer, he picked up a small rock and tossed it. It flew for about a hundred feet before falling. Falling indeed. Why did everything that rose eventually fell? He thought of his brothers and sisters. The beautiful, winged sons and winged daughters of the Almighty. First among His creations. The Lord made them beautiful, powerful and immortal. He gave them the entire Universe to look after. And all He asked in return was their love and obedience. And yet, some of them couldn't give the Old Man even that.

The Angel didn't want to think about the War, and how his brothers and sisters slaughtered one another in heavenly battlefields. He preferred to think of before. Back when everything was alright. He basked in His Father's eternal love, and didn't lack for anything. It was a wonderful time. So much better than now. For his present wasn't something he cared to dwell on. Once one of the most loyal and devoted Princes of Heaven, he now numbered among the Forsaken. The Forsaken were even worse than the Fallen in the eyes of the Lord. The Forsaken came to Earth and taught forbidden knowledge to early man and his mate. For that, the Lord punished them.

The Angel allowed his gaze to sweep the earth, and he looked at another scene unfolding in the City of Johannesburg, South Africa. A dark-skinned young woman, her sharp-featured, dark-eyed Asian lover and his dog played near the statue of one of the European founders of Africa's most technologically advanced country. They seemed perfectly content to be with one another. The Angel smiled. So much bloodshed had occurred on this country's soil. Now, the sons and daughters of the indigenous African population were at peace with the descendants of European settlers. The nation was ruled by an African leader of great wisdom and power. There was hope for this country yet. The Angel looked a little further, to another land where division and marginalization threatened the fabric of a floundering yet fascinating society.

The Arabs and the Jews were still at each other's throat, unaware that in the eyes of the Lord, both were wrong. The Angel wished he could tell them to cast aside their differences and unite. He wished he could tell them that both the Torah and the Koran held equal worth in the Lord's eyes, that the Father looked into the hearts of men and women rather than their nationality or religion when judging them. Would they listen? Of course not. A long time ago, he came down from heaven with his brothers and sisters. And he tried to help the mortals. His crime was compassion. For that, he was banished. Flung from the Gate of Heaven for trying to do good. How the Dark One must have laughed in the Pit. When he rebelled, hate and anger filled his heart. And he loathed humans for stealing God's love for the Angels. The Dark Angels hatred of humans was everlasting...and remorseless. Yet the Forsaken refused to join the Fallen. Rather, they chose to dwell among humans. Constantly trying to atone for their sins but knowing that the Lord would never forgive them. The price of disobedience was steep among immortals. The Angel took his gaze from Jerusalem, and returned to the cold, flooded valley where he stood.

There were times when he seriously thought about ending his existence. Of course, like all Angels, he was immortal. God gave man and woman autonomy over the planet Earth, as well as their own minds and bodies. Even the most powerful of all Dark Angels did not have autonomy over his or her own life. Humans could choose to end it all. Angels couldn't kill themselves. God used some unknown, indestructible material when He made them. They simply couldn't die. That was the sad truth about an Angel's life. It simply couldn't end. Also, Angels didn't have names. Not even the most powerful of Angels had names. Humans assigned them names like Michael, Gabriel, Lucifer and Raphael. Angels never named themselves, and God didn't name them.

The Angel thought of the last mortal he revealed himself to. Quite accidentally, as it were. He'd been hovering inside the public library in downtown Boston, Massachusetts. It was the busiest place in the City. Ever since time immemorial, the Angel loved libraries. He recalled nearly weeping when the Romans burned the Egyptian library at Alexandria so long ago. For he was the Angel who originally taught humans the art of writing. Cuneiform was his brainchild. All other forms of writing were derived from that ancient African writing. The humans had evolved countless written languages since then. He was forever proud of having taught them the basics. He sat at a table in the library, reading a copy of the novel Evolution by Stephen Baxter. It was his favorite book of all time. That human author was simply inspired. The Angel had seen life evolve on the planet Earth, from a single-celled organism to the slimy creatures from the ocean which became the progenitors of dinosaurs, birds, mammals, reptiles and insects. That a human author managed to really captivate the essence of Creation Itself through his writing was something wonderful indeed.

The Angel sat there, and in a rare moment, felt like letting himself be seen. And so he was seen. As a tall, good-looking, light-skinned young Black man with pale green eyes and long, neatly braided Black hair. Clad in a white silk shirt, dark gray tie and Black silk pants. His sudden appearance caught the eye of a tall, blonde-haired young woman. Somehow, she sensed there was something out of the ordinary with this particular young man. Her name was Nina Beauchamp and she was a civil engineering student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Boston. Nina hailed from the City of Ottawa, Ontario. She recently transferred to M.I.T. from Carleton University. When she asked him his name, he asked her to guess. For some reason, she settled on Adam. He liked it, and thus, for her, he became Adam Valley. For his favorite dwelling was the cold, flooded valley where he spent most of his days. And he had actually been a friend of Adam, the first man. For hours, they sat at the library. Nina was a genius, a gal who had published novels at a very young age. At the age of twenty, she was in the doctorates program. Yet she was amazed by Adam Valley's knowledge of...everything. As an Angel, he possessed perfect memory. Also, he spoke every language. And not just human languages. He could communicate with plants, animals and insects as well as forces of nature such as volcanoes and storms.

Adam was fascinated by Nina. She spoke French, English, Italian, Portuguese, Mandarin Chinese and even Haitian Creole which she learned from some Haitian friends in the City of Montreal, Quebec. For hours they spoke, and he found himself smitten with her. She wanted to know which school he went to. How could he tell her that he didn't go to school but had invented much of academia itself? Nevertheless, he agreed to meet her again at the library the next day. That afternoon, they walked through Boston together. They had coffee at Starbucks and dined at Au Bon Pain. They ran together through Boston Commons. Through his new friendship with Nina, a mortal woman, the ageless immortal had an inkling of what it meant to be alive. A profound change occurred in Adam. He began to actually look forward to seeing Nina on a weekly basis. And always she pressed him for more details about his life. Was he married? Did he have a girlfriend? Did he go to school? Where did he live? A profound dilemma for Earth's friendliest immortal.

The Angel began creating a life for himself. With his powers, it was easy. He accessed the computer systems of those in power, and he created an identity for himself. He became Adam James Valley. He gained a birth certificate, a social security number, and a driver's licence. He was the son of Jacob Valley and Janine Smith Valley, both of whom were conveniently deceased and purely fictional. Using his powers to cover his tracks, he added a masterful stroke to the entire deception by enrolling at Suffolk University as a Law student. Overnight he became a sensation at the school, wowing them with his knowledge. He didn't enjoy showing off what came natural to him in front of mortals. All he wanted was to please Nina. Her friendship mattered to him. For her, he would do anything. And thus, after eons living upon the earth, he sealed his doom but began to truly live.

Nina introduced him to her friends at M.I.T. These sons and daughters of America's social elite found him nothing short of spectacular. He loathed to attract attention to himself but Nina was enthralled by him and enjoyed showing him off. Thus, he met professors and students at Harvard University as well. No matter the discipline, from philosophy to western literature, from linguistics to bio-medical research, from civil engineering to law, he was the undisputed master. At the insistence of Nina's close friend Martine, he took an IQ test. And the tester nearly had a heart attack. Actually, the tester, a stocky little Asian man, did have a heart attack. Adam used Angelic magic to heal him from the brink of death. For this, he was hailed as a hero. His picture somehow ended up in the Boston Globe. Much to his distress. However uncomfortable all this made him, he endured it. The life of a Forsaken was one of discretion but the look of adoration in Nina's eyes mattered more to him than incurring the Wrath of Heaven.

One day, his relationship with Nina...changed. They were hanging out at her residence in the M.I.T. dormitories, watching the movie Hancock when she suddenly kissed him. And he kissed her back. That night, they made love. Passionately. It was his first time. Truth be told, he'd never even entertained the thought of having a sexual or romantic relationship with a woman. He knew in his heart of hearts that the winged sons and winged daughters of the Lord were never meant to be with mortal men and mortal women. Well, what could he do? What could he say, really? He'd fallen in love with her without realizing it. And she had fallen in love with him. Suddenly, the Angel knew fear. Not fear of death, for he knew he would live until the universe collapsed and died. When the sun expanded to burn away planet Earth and much of the solar system, he would live. When the stars themselves burned out and went cold, he would live. He'd been alive before the Big Bang itself occurred. However, now he actually feared something. He feared losing...Nina.

How strange. Fascinating how this pale-skinned, blonde-haired and blue-eyed, frail-looking human female meant so much to one of the immortal sons of God. For her, he remained in human-like form longer and longer. He enjoyed being visible now. He had friends on the Suffolk University campus. He even teleported himself to Ottawa, Ontario, where Nina grew up and visited all those places she was always talking about. Carleton University. Parliament Hill. The Rideau Shopping Center. The Ontario French Language Society. If those places mattered to her, then they mattered to him. And he had actually begun thinking of himself as Adam Valley, Boston resident and Suffolk University student, Nina's boyfriend, rather than simply as The Angel. Holding Nina in his arms, walking hand in hand with her inside Copley Mall or on the Charles River Bridge, those were things he enjoyed immensely. He noticed other changes in himself as well.

As an Angel, he understood that everything eventually withered and died. As Adam Valley, he refused to accept it. When Nina's best friend Martine came to their apartment one night in tears over her father Antoine's prostate cancer, the Angel in him shrugged. But Adam Valley went to visit the man at Massachusetts General Hospital. Miraculously, the old man was healed. His prostate cancer vanished overnight. Adam Valley also healed various men and women at that hospital. And then he returned to Nina's bed, gently wrapped his arms around her sleeping form and listened to her heart beating until dawn came. Of course, miraculous recoveries weren't everyday events in the mortal world. Especially on a massive scale. The hospital garnered international media attention. Scores of reporters from far and near came to interview patients, doctors and staff. And they weren't the only ones who noticed this. His fellow Angels did too. The Faithful came for him, as did the Forsaken and the Dark Angels. What he was doing was unprecedented. He had to be stopped. That was the one thing all of these strange bedfellows agreed upon.

Which was why he stood in the cold, flooded valley right now. A valley which he flooded through sheer force of will. He wanted it wiped from his undying memory. The place he always came to when the world got to be too much. His fortress of solitude, if you will. He didn't need this place anymore. His place was beside Nina, the woman he loved. Once the valley was completely destroyed, Adam Valley returned to the apartment he shared with Nina Beauchamp. There, his darling girlfriend greeted him with news which actually took him by surprise. She was pregnant...with twins! Adam laughed so hard that across the City, numerous windows shattered. Nina didn't notice. Neither did he. That night, Adam Valley silently vowed to defend his lady and their unborn offspring, the world they had created together, with his undying breath. Let the Angels of Heaven, the Princes of Hell and his brothers and sisters among the Forsaken come. He'd show them what he was truly made of. At long last, he finally had something worth fighting for. Eternally.