Fallen

The story of Cain, the Father of Murder

The bar soon emptied as midnight struck.
Drunk men have left their seats defiled with the essence of their unruly gullets,
The bartender polished the mahogany bar, carefully scraping the dried blood from the fist fight earlier.
He returned the stools to their place, cleaned every table.
Except one.
One man, perhaps even a teenager, sat in the corner table alone.
The bartender had noticed that no one dared to even get close to this man in the early hours, while the night was still young.
He kept cleaning, actively avoiding looking at the man again.
"Nice place." The man said, his voice sounded young, between the age of 16-18.
The bartender managed a grunt of approval, but deep inside, his heart raced.
Something about his voice instilled wisdom, like a monster beneath the still lakes.
"Kid, you better run off now, I'm closing soon." the bartender said to the boy.
Though he couldn't see him, the bartender knew the boy was staring at him.
The kid sighed.
"Guess the curse still works. I am but to wander the earth, never finding peace where I go." the kid said.
"This damned mark, surely there is something I could do to destroy it."
The bartender, filled with utmost curiosity, looked at the boy.
He stared at a tattoo on his arm, opposite of where the elbow would be.
The kid shifted on the table's leather seats.
"What is that, some kinda gang mark?" the bartender asked.
The kid shook his head while smiling.
"Sit, I have much to tell you."
The bartender obliged to hear out this boy, and once he settled in his seat, the boy looked much older than he first thought he was.
The boys eyes where black, like an eternal abyss, he was handsome, his features seemed to indicate he was famous.
But his faced was filled with sorrow, like he was trying to forget a past he regretted.
"I am Cain, you might've heard of me in the book of my God-father. Let me tell you what really happened."

"Cain! it is time to offer!" Eve said to Cain. Already Abel was up, offering his first born to the altar. God, having been pleased, showered rain upon the land where Cain grew his crops.
Abel looked upon Cain, and he smiled.
Then Cain offered his own crops, and God too was pleased, he made the greenest of grass grow to the fields where Abel took care of his lambs.
When the offerings ended, Cain and Abel went to the river to bathe.
"Cain, brother, do you think there is someone more powerful than God?" Abel asked.
Cain replied, "Let me ask you Abel, who makes it rain so we may have crops?"
"God," Abel replied.
"And who makes the grass grows so our lambs may be fed?"
"God." he replied again.
"Who brings the angels to protect us when the basilisks come?"
"God." he replied.
"You have your answer, there is non more powerful than he." Cain replied.
Abel didn't seem satisfied. He left Cain all alone in the river.
When night finally came Cain heard Abel walking outside to the river.
Quietly, he followed Abel, and on the riverbank, he saw Abel talking to a twin-headed raven.
"Your brother lies, I am more powerful than God, that is why I left heaven, I created a place more beautiful than it is!" the raven said.
Abel's faced twisted in concern "But-"
"Abel! Do not listen to the lies of the enemy!" Cain burst forth from the trees, and shouted at his brother.
Abel reared back, the raven seemed like he was expecting this.
"Brother I-, A place more beautiful than heaven can this be true?" Abel asked.
"No! He lies, Satan, stay away from my brother!" Cain shouted.
"Who will you believe Abel, your brother, the slave of God? Or me, who will set you free like your mother and father." the raven said.
Abel looked back and forth between the raven and Cain.
"Brother please," Cain said, holding his arm forward to Abel.
"I'm sorry brother, but I choose to be free!" Abel came forward and tackled Cain to the ground.
They wrestled for what seems like hours, when Abel was finally on top of Cain, choking him with both hands.
Cain's hand flew to the ground, then he gripped the jawbone of a donkey, which he then stabbed in Abel's neck.
As Abel lay dying, Cain cried over his body.
"This didn't have to happen." Cain said.
Abel coughed for the last time, spewing blood towards Cains face, and he perished.
Without looking back, Cain went home.
Then a bright light lit up the night.
"Where is your brother Cain?" asked God's voice.
"I-, I do not know, am I my brother's keeper?" He asked God.
"What have you done! Your brother's blood weeps to me as it is swallowed by the earth!" God's voice fills with wrath.
"God, I beg you, let my brother's soul reach heaven, I will take his place in hell." Cain pleaded.
"You would do that to yourself?" God asked Cain in genuine curiosity.
"Yes! Please Lord, I never asked from you anything! I love my brother, he must not perish because I failed to watch over him!" Cain begged.
"Very well, I will give you this mark, as long as the earth lives so will you, cursed to walk over this land, the people will hate you, you bought suffering and pain to this world, the murder of my own creation." God said.
"But for this, you have saved your brother's soul. May he remember you as you burn in the depths of hell." And with that the light was gone.
Cain looked at his forearm to see the mark instilled on his arm, A straight line with a triangle going though it, indicating Cain's wound over Abel's neck.
Then Cain wandered, for what seems like millennia over the land he had cursed.

The bartender sighed.
"So, you will leave, you will wander again, then what?" he asked.
"Then I wait for my end, Hell." Cain replied.
"You did that to save your own brother, condemned your own soul? Why?" the bartender asked.
"It's not so bad, my brother is safe in heaven, that makes me happy, and you should be too." He answered.
"Why should I be happy? I barely know Abel." the bartender replied.
"Because God used me as an example. Jesus condemned his own soul with the sins of billions of people to save them all. I did it first." Cain answered.
He looked at the bartender as he walks out the front door.
"I am the father of murder, yet I too fathered salvation. Without me, everyone would be cursed to hell."
The wind picked up, and the front door slammed close.
The table had a bone in it, the jaw of a donkey.
Hurriedly, the bartender opened the front door and saw nothing but empty street.
He took the bone, swearing that he would frame it upon his bar as a reminder to himself of the boy named Cain.
The father of murder, The father of salvation.