Old Testament painted God as powerful and just. New Testament added mercy and love, because after a few thousand years humans yearned for a Creator that could be a father to all, instead of a patron of his Chosen People. Projecting their own desired traits and molding God's image to a form that could be easily worshiped was such a human thing to do.

Interpreting unreasonable actions as right, because He who is omnipotent must operate beyond human understanding. Because human understanding of His actions would deem Him insane.

He made it so all children would be born with the original sin, the ultimate and utterly unfair punishment for Eve, extended over all of her descendants forever. Hurting the most defenseless, striking dread in their parents, forcing them to submit to God's will out of the primal fear for their offspring's safety.

And Lucifer knew, with despaired resignation, that all the silly rituals invented to coax God into a forgiving mood meant nothing to Him. No amount of sacraments and holy water could erase the fundamental envy and wrath God pointed at the disobedient. It was all predetermined, all established so long ago it would take another flood to change the rules to anything remotely humane.

Lucifer hated church and its mindless traditions, and he hated baptism the most. Taking an unaware newborn, barely more than a blind kitten filled with screams and cries, and offering it to God for all of eternity. Making the choice for the child before it was able to comprehend its meaning, out of fear of damning its soul had it died before understanding the concept.


Hell didn't always operate on self-appointed guilt. It used to be God's personal prison where He sent those who offended Him. Then, it was a place of sinners, those who racked enough damnation points to outweigh their good deeds.

Lucifer gritted his teeth over every innocent soul gracing his domain for calling his Father's name in vain. Soldiers following orders, but killing for their kings instead of for their Creator. Those unrepentant for extramarital sex, those who worked on Sabbath but slacked off during the week, and, his personal favorite, people who ate the wrong foods. Approved diets changed throughout the years, though he never understood why pork was such a sore subject for his Dad.

He could never punish those people. Being sent to the dark, ashy afterworld filled with deformed demons was depressing enough, no matter how many parties he threw to distract himself and the undeserving damned. Soon it caught the eye of the upstairs society, though, and his siblings were sent to scold him with wry lectures.

Lucifer did not obey - there was nothing beyond the rock bottom to Fall to now. So his Father took away that little control ruling Hell granted him.

The sudden influx of souls stirred his concern of another plague, apocalypse, some brutal display of power increasing humanity's already high mortality rate. But the newcomers were different now, resigned and unsurprised. They wouldn't engage with him anymore, locking themselves in dark cells carved in Hell's harsh landscape and never leaving. He visited the rooms, amazed at the variety of memories being replayed in the accomodating plane.

He watched, trying to comprehend, and it took him hundreds of years of the subjective way time passed here. Once the realization dawned, his fury shook the ground of the domain, scaring the oldest demons into hiding. The humans were condemning themselves now.

With the tool of guilt, no less, which his Father excelled at manipulating to force his creations into submission. Each decided their own punishment, stuck in loops replaying that they considered their worst offenses. And no matter what he tried, how much he talked to them, he couldn't do anything to change it.

Maybe it was a form of justice, a personalized penance tailored to counterweight their sins, he rationalized. Humans' psyche was complex and even if he perceived their guilt as undeserving of what they made themselves suffer for it, it could be what they truly needed.

Until the children came.

Teenage murderers and thieves, he knew well. Forced to grow up too fast, thrown alone and desperate into adult affairs, steered by fear, ambition and greed. Adolescents faced with impossible choices, those who stole to avoid starvation or killed in self-defense gone too far. They were accountable even if death reached them before they could know better.

But when he saw narrow doors with a handle mounted uncomfortably low and the ten-year old boy closing them behind him, he could only stare in confusion. What could that child have done? Born psychopaths felt no remorse, only thrown down to him by manual selection, a security measure, courtesy of Dad. Not that He made a mistake creating the system, right? No, it was just a tweak that must've been a part of His plan from the start.

Lucifer sat in the dark room the little boy occupied, shaped to resemble a bare-floor storage chamber, and listened for hours to his imagined mother.

"He wouldn't hit you if you just did what he wanted."

"You keep getting on his bad side, he's a good man underneath."

"He only slaps you because you don't listen."

"If you were a better son, he wouldn't have to be so strict with you."

"Go apologize before you make it worse."

"You should be grateful he didn't draw blood."

"It's your fault he's like that."

It wasn't just this one child. It was thousands, killed by diseases and hunger if they were lucky, by their bastard parents if not. Crowds of short little girls and boys with missing teeth, blaming themselves for being abused, for being bullied, cast out and ostracized.

An eleven-year old cutting her face over and over so she wouldn't tempt her brothers with her looks.

A thirteen-year old burying her sibling who didn't survive the drought.

A nine-year old crying, just crying to no end, as his father kept beating him to death.

Immature minds exaggerating their every misdemeanor, wallowing in the ocean of black, suffocating guilt.

A seven-year old who hang herself so she wouldn't be sold, even though it would save her family from starving.

He couldn't look at them, their hollow eyes and silent acceptance that their deeds would never be forgiven. Children of alcoholics, abusers, cretins, children born to children too young to survive a pregnancy.

When he crossed the gates of Hell, he was prepared for war. Lifted the chains with all his strength, burned the Pentecostal coin made from his blood and left feeling the children's empty eyes on his back.

He flew up until the ashen snow disappeared from the air, and higher, through the planes of reality, until the infinitely beautiful entrance of his old home shone bright light that his wings reflected. For the longest moment he just stared at the long line of souls waiting for admission, their deeds bare without the mortal flesh-suits covering them. All those with enough sense to convert seconds before dying, to repent out of fear, to feel deserving and filled with God's grace because they prayed really hard after committing their crimes.

Lucifer walked through them with disgust and they moved to the sides to avoid his wings, then closed up behind him, already drawn by the gift the benevolent Father bestowed on him. Uriel's welcome speech died on his mouth when he spotted him, a rare shocked expression as he backed away from the closed gate, looking for his siblings. Soon Castiel and Michael landed by his side, quickly joined by others, staring at his intimidating posture.

Did he strike fear in them now, or was it violent hatred? He didn't care, approaching them with painful determination.

"I need to speak to Father."

They looked at each other and Lucifer growled, grabbing a golden bar of the gate. A herd of sheep, lost without a voice to command them.

"He has to hear me out. He has to stop it!"

"Father doesn't have to do anything." Amenadiel finally stepped up, face of a warrior and air of seniority. "Return to Hell, Samael, where is your place."

"Oh I will, brother", Lucifer snarled, eyes burning with eternal fire as he stared him down. "Once He looks me in the face and says it was just. That they are all deserving of it. Once He admits how boundlessly cruel the source of All is."

Amenadiel's dark wings flared up and he rose, ready to strike him down. Behind him, angels stirred and murmured between each other, like bystanders mesmerized by an accident, yet unwilling to interfere.

"You are not to question Father's orders, but to obey them", Remiel spoke up, holding her spear threateningly. They didn't understand. They never saw it.

"The children must be protected!", Lucifer shouted, his unfurling wings pushing away confused human souls. Remiel took a step back against herself and Amenadiel attacked, but he dodged him easily, powered by anger only God's disregard for suffering unleashed in him. "They mustn't be damned!"

His brother paused mid-air, wary and suspicious. "What are you saying, Sam?"

He chuckled drily, shaking his head. Unbelievable.

"Ask Him yourself. All of you, go and ask Him!" No one moved.

"Or let me through, if questioning His motives still angers Him so. I'm ready to take another Fall for you lot."

Amenadiel was ready to resume his attack when Gabriel descended, putting a hand on his shoulder and glaring daggers at the King of Hell.

"Our Father is merciful. Return to your domain now, Samael, for He has listened."

It could be a lie, not the first time God's Herald took initiative spinning a story to force him to step down. But he knew he could do nothing more here, against all of God's children ready to maul him for disgracing their front step with his presence. He turned around and heard Amenadiel land slowly behind him, escorting him out.

"Be at peace, Sam", he said softly, as if showing him grace, and scoffed at his pity.

"It's Lucifer now."

And when the cold darkness of Hell enveloped him again, he noticed the chains from the tall gates disappeared, free for the souls to pass through. One day, he may convince them to.

All of his underaged prisoners were gone. He never saw a child enter again.


He didn't hate children. He just couldn't risk rubbing off on them, tainting their feeble minds with his darkness. One pang of guilt carried through to adolescence and they would damn themselves over his Father's rules, over His endless cruelty at defying His authority.