This has been bothering me for some time. The idea came when I watched an amv (everyone go search on Youtube for 'Structure' by BlueExorcistStudio, it's an epic awesome amv that leaves you with your jaw hanging!), there was a small text saying:

"What am I?
Am I really the Devil?
Or an Angel...
In Disguise?"

So it got me thinking. And researching. Hope I'm not slandering my religion with this, I'm only using parts to incorporate into the anime. I'm not actually believing it... :S Anyway, enjoy!

Title: Angel in Disguise
Genre: Mystery/Spiritual
Pairings: None
Rating: K+
Warnings: mentions of religion
Words: 2634

You said in your heart, "I will ascend to heaven; I will raise my throne above the stars of God; I will sit on the mount of congregation on the heights of Zaphon; I will ascend to the tops of the clouds, I will make myself like the Most High."

But you are brought down to Sheol, to the depths of the Pit. Those who see you will stare at you, and ponder over you: "Is this the man who made the earth tremble, who shook kingdoms, who made the world like a desert and overthrew its cities, who would not let his prisoners go home?

~Isaiah 14:13

He hadn't been aware that he had started watching his brother until a voice shook him out of his thoughts.

"Still training hard I see."

He nodded from where he'd been sitting on the ground and grading some papers for the Exorcist Cram School. Rin was trying harder, but it was still only twenty points this time.

Shura plopped down next to him, clad into a new pajama she didn't bother to change out of. She yawned, ignoring Yukio's irritated expression, and glanced down at the papers in his lap.

"Grading papers? Man, am I glad I don't have to pretend to be some shitty student anymore." She looked around the training room they were in, eyes halting at the target practice area. "Want to have a match again?"

"No thanks, some of us still have to play teachers."

"Sucks to be you."

It was silent between them after that, Yukio returning back to his papers and Shura lazily observing and commenting on Rin's pathetic attempts to not turn the three candles in front of him into a mush of wax. The younger of the Okumura twins expertly ignored their banter until even that faded into silence and only Rin's occasional curses were heard.

"He's really something."

Shura's quiet voice made him look up, but the woman didn't take her eyes off of a hair-pulling Rin. Yukio turned to watch his brother as well, silently waiting for her to speak.

After some time Shura just snorted, shaking her head and making her hair fly with the movement. She watched Rin with fond eyes, but her words were cold.

"Wanting to become an exorcist despite all the odds, that kid really is something. To let a demon come into their ranks is hard as it is. The Son of Satan himself though?" She huffed, though it was in a fond way. "What redeeming quality does he have?"

Yukio's face gave no outward reaction to her speech, but in his lap, his hands silently clenched into fists, rustling the papers.

It was true after all. Out of all the candidates for the rank of Exorcist, be they demon or human, Rin was the least likely to get chosen. The Vatican had seen his grades, had heard of his scholar capabilities and poor control of his flames, but still they laid down the decision that he would have to take an exam in six months exactly.

It was a make or break situation, and until Rin reached at least a starting point with his control, they couldn't even begin with the actual training.

It all came down to Rin's heritage though, didn't it? Had it been just any other demon the Okumura twins had to call their biological father, it wouldn't matter as much. But being the sons of Satan himself, it put things into a much heavier perspective.

Many would love to dispose of Rin without further ado, just to spite Satan who might have had some kind of emotional bond with him. They didn't know that Satan could care less. They always forgot how ruthless the king of demons could be, how many children he'd slayed and how much he probably had fun making the 'experiment' that resulted in the birth of the Okumura twins.

It was disheartening really, to see a person being blamed for their father's sins.

…Even if none of the two really considered him anything other than an unfortunate biological connection. No, to them Fujimoto Shiro would always be their true father.

Thinking about their deceased caretaker, a long forgotten conversation came to his mind. At the time, Father Fujimoto had just tried to calm him down from his nightmares so he could go back to sleep, but the story stuck with him.

It seemed strangely appropriate for this conversation.

"Father Fujimoto once said..." he began, but then faltered.

What a silly story to tell. No, Shura'd just laugh at him for it.

"Hmm? What? Shiro did?" Shura turned away from Rin to regard him with suddenly curious eyes.

He debated telling her, but in the end just smiled and shook his head. "Nothing. It's nothing, forget about it."

Shura narrowed her eyes and scoffed. "Like hell it's nothing! Come, tell me, you said Shiro said it, right?" she started whining. Yukio wondered if she'd already had something to drink. It was only late morning. "Tell meee, Yuki-chaaan!"

His eye twitched involuntarily. "Why do you want to know so bad?"

"Because!" Yukio would have sweat-dropped, but her next words surprised him. "Because Shiro always comes up with these crazy theories that actually make sense! I wanna know what he said, it's always interesting to know how his brains works!"

"You really think that?"

"'Course! Just look at the brat; Shiro said I'd love to train him 'cause he's funny, and would you look at that, years later I take him on just because of that reason. Just look!" As if to prove him right, Shura proceeded to insult Rin's poor control of flames and then laugh when he fired a lame insult her way. Yukio just shook his head exasperatedly.

When he looked back up, Shura was regarding him with a much more serious expression.

"So let's hear it," the voice was encouraging.

"Alright," he sighed. It was useless to deny her anything. "It's just… It was just a story Father Fujimoto came up with to help me with my nightmares. When I was little, I often dreamt of Niisan being taken away if they found out who he was, or Niisan losing his humanity because of the flames. For a few nights I had to be taken to sleep separately from my brother because he wouldn't stop worrying about me. That was when Father Fujimoto told me a story."

"So it is one of his theories," Shura commented. "Continue."

Yukio gave her a weak glare, but she ignored it completely. He sighed, turning to look at his brother instead. He was still working with the candles on the other side of the room, well out of range should the flames get out of control. Yukio had not been amused when he'd almost lost his grading papers to an impromptu conflagration.

There was no chance he could hear their silent conversation. Yukio wasn't sure whether to be glad or not.

"He told me," he continued in a quiet voice. "He told me that once upon a time, Satan had been more than a demon."

He glanced at Shura's face. It showed only confusion, no sign that she recognized where he was taking this story. He smiled.

"The night he told me the story, Father Fujimoto had asked me: why do you think Satan is so powerful he is the king of demons?"

He waited for her to guess.

"Because of the blue flames, right? Everyone knows that." Shura said, scrunching her nose in at the obviousness of the answer.

"That's what I thought too, so I told him that. But Father just laughed at me and told me it wasn't all because of that. When I couldn't think of a better answer, he instead asked me why the flames were so powerful. Why were they so strong that Satan always came up on top? I mean, there must be thousands of other demons that would love to be called the lord of Gehenna."

He could see that Shura was at a loss, just like he'd been back then.

"He then laughed at my clueless face I believe," he smiled at the memory. "He asked me if I'd ever heard of the species Satan belonged to. Of course I didn't. No one really knew Satan's origin. We could all guess that he was clearly a fire demon of sorts, but even the blue flames were different from the usual ones. It just didn't fit."

He studied Shura's face now, sure she'd get what he was trying to imply. Meanwhile, Shura was trying to figure out Shiro's theory.

It was true no one knew how Satan had obtained the blue flames or which two demons had ended up together to produce such a result. It was also a mystery why none of Satan's children (for there had been many reports of those appearing in Assiah here and there, proudly proclaiming their origin) shared his powers as well. Only one had ever inherited those, and he was standing in the same room as them, cursing and training so he could one day defeat the king of demons himself.

But there had been many theories at least. Some said it was just a lucky match between two powerful demons, but it wouldn't explain why it wasn't inherited further. Some said Satan had gained power through an obscure ritual (and it would explain his other abilities, like being the only demon capable of summoning the gate to Gehenna), but it was never actually proven.

"Look at the bigger picture."

Shura couldn't help but think Yukio was getting off by using that high and mighty voice with her. Should she drag him off to target practice again so she could remind him who his better was again?

"Yeah, yeah, hold on. You had the old man explaining it all to you anyway."

"And that's better?"

He had a point. Shiro always delighted in leaving people flabbergasted at his actions, or coming up at a loss when he did something his way. Age didn't play a role and Yukio had surely been a victim to his sense of humor.

Alright, so think of the bigger picture. What's that even supposed to mean?

Generally, Satan was known as the lord of the demons. He resided in Gehenna, otherwise referred to as Hell, and according to many religions made it his life mission to bring people away from the path of God. Most of the holy books depicted him as the epitome of evil and none had anything good to say about him. Well, not after…

After the beginning.

Yukio could see the moment it had all come together in her mind. The woman gained a bewildered look on her face, as if she couldn't believe what she was thinking. She turned to the male exorcist with a blank face, not knowing how to feel about her revelation.

"No… No, don't tell me…!"

Yukio just nodded, turning back to look at a hard-working Rin. "Yeah. Once upon a time, before the beginning of everything, there was an archangel named Lucifer," He remembered this story well. "As time passed Lucifer grew tired of the commandment of God and soon he strived to make his throne higher than the one of God-"

"-and higher than the clouds themselves. But God found out about his disobedience and threw him down from heaven itself, down below to the Pit, so he could have his own kingdom as he wanted, only not as a ruler but as a prisoner to be tormented day and night, forever and ever."

There was an uncomfortable silence between the two, full of questions that wanted to be asked. None spoke though, because they didn't really know what to say.

Satan had many offspring, that was true, but none of them had been conceited with anything other than a demon. There was only one successful attempt to impregnate a human, and if Yukio knew the bastard well, he'd say he'd gone as far as to ascertain he still left her a virgin after the act. A pure body, for a child of Satan's pure power.

In the end, Shura gave a deep sigh and cynically smiled at Yukio. "Even if I asked you anything, I doubt you'd be able to answer. Shiro ended his tale at this point, right? Left you alone to think over it yourself, then avoided the subject whenever you'd think of bringing it up. I'm right, ain't I?"

Yukio just smiled placatingly, but both of them knew it was true. At the time little Yukio had thought nothing of it, his nightmares calmed and the story left to lie forgotten in the back of his mind. Father Fujimoto never brought it back up, so there was no reason for the memory to ever resurface.

"Damn that old man," Shura cursed. "Him and his crazy theories."

Both of them looked up as Rin caused a particularly large burst of blue flame to light up his side of the room. The teen didn't notice it though, solely focused on the scorched piles that were once candles.

"This is… heavy."

The younger of the Okumura twins nodded, understanding Shura's emotional state completely. The raging inferno of flames soon dissipated, leaving only small trails in its wake. They'd already cleared the room of anything flammable, so there was no way for the fire to spread.

One small trail of flame had strayed near them, burning on the cold tiles and slowly growing smaller by the minute. He was sure both of them were seeing it in a slightly different light by now.

It wasn't a flame of Satan anymore, the flame of the lord of Hell itself. It was more than that; a weapon not to harm humans, but demons as well.

Thoughts of angels and holy fire drifted through their minds, but none voiced their thoughts.

Maybe Rin was being blamed for his father's sins, but maybe he was there to atone for them as well. If Satan really was an angel fallen from God, who's to say they hadn't got an angel in disguise in their midst, fighting for his right to rise to his rightful place one day?

Shura gave a silent grunt as she rose up from the cold tiled floor. Yukio did so as well, placing his grading papers away at the moment. Silently, they both agreed that Yukio should go fetch the fire extinguishers with holy water while Shura went to reprimand Rin for his slip-up.

It was halfway to the door when the woman's voice stopped him.

"Hey Yukio," he turned back to regard her. "If he's a fallen angel, what does that make you?"

'What does that make the brother of a fallen one?'

He resumed his walk. He was almost out of the room before a quiet answer came her way. "While he's down on Earth, doesn't everyone need someone to watch over them?"

She stared at the empty doorway, then snorted in amusement. Turning back to Rin, she shouted out in a mocking voice. "Hey brat, what was that spectacle back there? You want to roast the school or learn some control?"

"Shut up, you slave-driver! It's harder than it looks!"

"Then try harder!"

'A guardian angel, huh?' she inwardly laughed while continuing her shouting match with the Son of Satan. 'You thought this through more than you'd care to admit, my little Yuki-chan.'

Shiro always came up with the craziest theories. They turned even crazier when they actually made sense.

Damn that old man.

Prepare slaughter for his sons
because of the guilt of their fathers,
lest they rise and possess the earth,
and fill the face of the world with cities."

~Isaiah 14:21

This leaves us with a very strange question. Do angels have tails?

Review!