The Wayward Son

People scrambled in the sand below. Hundreds of humans with skin, each one of a dozen or so colors, carried stone and buckets or clay to the ever growing building in the center of all the commotion. Above it all stood Remiel, draped in a set of white robes, seemingly untarnished by the shifting sands.

His eyes scanned over the humans, confused by the purpose the humans have by building this strange creation. The monstrosity only reached maybe a hundred feet into the air, but they acted like it was in the clouds. Remiel would never understand humans.

“Pitiful mud monkeys,” a voice broke into Remiel’s thoughts.

Remiel went to look behind him, yet as soon as he felt the heat of the desert rise even higher, he didn’t have to. “Uriel,” Remiel greeted.

“Hello, Remiel,” Uriel replied, stepping next to him on the edge of the clay building. Remiel turned his head away from the heat the Wielder of the Holy Flame was emitting.

“Careful. You’ll get ash on my robes,” Remiel comments, dusting his shoulder.

Uriel turned an eye to him, “You have been watching these creatures too much, Remiel. You are gaining their wit.” Remiel didn’t reply. “How is the tower coming along?”

Remiel scanned over the ugly work or architecture again. “Slow,” he finally answered, “What is the human’s purpose for this building?”

“They think it will let them reach Paradise.”

Remiel sighed. For all he tried to stand up for the humans, they still disappointed him every day. “The tower will collapse on itself in a matter of days,” Remiel explained.

“Yes, but while that may be true, the Maker thinks it may be time to show them what happens when they try to reach him through their own means,” Uriel said with a malicious smile marring his face.

“How do you intend on doing that? They are organized.”

Uriel’s smile grew even wider, “They should be considering they only have one language. Do not worry, Remiel. I have ideas.”

“As long as no one dies,” Remiel said quickly.

Uriel shot him a look, “And why should I waste my time in trying to keep these humans alive?”

“Because while you may be an avenging angel, Uriel, I am a guardian, and these people are under my protection,” Remiel flexed his fingers as he spoke, letting black fog and gold streams of light coil around his arm, “If you harm even one human, you answer to me.”

“I answer to the Maker,” Uriel replied quickly.

“As do I and the Maker gave me this task. Do you really think he would see his own orders ignored?”

Uriel faltered. Remiel was right after all. Turning back to the humans, Uriel conceded in their argument, “Fine. The humans seem to care for so much will live to see another day.”

Remiel shook his head and let his power subside back into his body. Stepping back from Uriel, Remiel watched as the Wielder revealed his wings. It was never a good idea to be too near to them when they arrived.

Uriel cricked his neck to the side as the air around his back began to simmer. Remiel waited intently, yet turned away when a wave of decimating fire blasted from Uriel’s back. As the inferno cleared, Remiel turned his attention back Uriel and stared in wonder at the blazing wings he now bore. Quelling the fire he started, Uriel took off into the sky.

As he shook off the melted dirt from his robes, Remiel walked back to the edge of the building and stared at the tower, curious as to what Uriel had planned. Nothing seemed to happen at first, but then everything fell apart.

A tornado of fire erupted at the center of the tower, ripping apart the stone, melting the clay, and blasting back the people inside. Everyone into a frenzy, screaming and yelling as the immolating vortex destroyed their work. They almost had it under control as they tried gathering water, yet that was doomed to fail as well.

Remiel didn’t see it at first, but noticed only when a man started screaming to another, each using strange words he’d never heard before. Remiel could still understand them, but they didn’t seem to understand each other. Trying to listen in, Remiel noticed the same thing was happening everywhere. It seemed like nearly each human had gained their own language. Only every so often did Remiel hear the same language twice.

“That was impressive,” Remiel admitted, though he would never tell Uriel that.

After several minutes of random languages being discovered and a tornado destroying the tower, Uriel returned to the rooftop and smiled. “Like what I did with the place?”

“You might have overdone it,” Remiel commented.

“No one is dead. Where is the problem?”

“The tornado of fire? Didn’t you do that to Sodom already?”

Uriel smirked, “No. I rained down fire. There is a difference, though I might use that one again some day.”

Remiel sat down on the building and made sure no one tried to kill each other. “Nothing wrong with the classics,” he joked. “Where did all these languages come from?”

“I do not know. All I did was throw syllables together. What they do with it is up to them,” Uriel explained.

“Anything else?”

“Yes. Return to Paradise when all this calms down. You need to meet your new teacher.”

Remiel turned his head to Uriel, “New teacher?”

“The Angel of Death has requested you as his student.”

“Why would he do that?”

“He sees death all the time. It is only natural that he be wary of his own demise. Apparently, he wants you as his successor to the Well.”

“Very well,” Remiel agreed and turned back to the humans.

Laughing at the sight of the frenzy, Uriel walked across the rooftop and disappeared as he summoned a stairway, leaving Remiel to his thoughts. ‘Angel of Death,’ Remiel thought. ‘I wonder what that will be like.’