Hell's Army

Chapter Eleven- Back to School

Samael liked teenagers.

They had so many feelings. All their emotions built up inside them like the tower of Babel. Fear, anger, rejection, insecurity. They were slaves, mindlessly following the path their emotions set out for them.

A path anyone could manipulate at any time.

And there was a darkness bubbling away in their hearts. Creeping up and threatening to devour them in its hungry jaws. He could see it in their faces, in their eyes. Darkness.

Of course, there were some things he didn't know. Like how they found each other in the sea of millions of identical soldiers and formed friendships, how the food chain of popularity worked, and who the hell Kim Kardashian was.

He sat at a little table at the back of the cafeteria. Rather unsavoury nicknames for various teachers were messily scratched across the surface, as well as some less than detailed parts of human anatomy and an angry proclamation that Hillary Scott was a boyfriend-stealing hoebag.

A cacophony of chatter echoed around him as he pulled out his lunch box. Ingleseid had insisted on making him lunch each day, which irritated Samael to no end. He didn't like human food. He could smell the fats and preservatives pumped into them, taste them in his mouth. It was all so...artificial. Not like the food in Hell. In Hell, you could taste the blood and sweat with every bite, the fear on the tip of your tongue as your meal was slaughtered.

A boy in a sporting jumper with slicked hair and mean little eyes strutted into the cafeteria, and eyes trailed on him and his group like they were gods as they wandered over to an empty table save for a blonde girl with an almost disturbing amount of black makeup on.

The boy, Wiggs, Samael vaguely recalled his name was, leaned over her shoulder.

"Hey, freak," he said, poking an old fashioned looking book on the table. "Watcha reading?"

"Stuff off, Nolan," she snapped. The little eyes of the plastic skull around her neck glinted dangerously.

But Wiggs did not want to stuff off. He snatched the book as his friends giggled nastily. "The Official Guide to Vampire Mythology," he read aloud. "Ooh, scary. What's wrong, Chloe? Scared the vampires are gonna come and eat you?" He shook her shoulders.

Samael stood up and walked over to them, the eyes of the cafeteria following him all the way. He tapped Wiggs on the shoulder, and he turned round, his beady little eyes gleaming.

"You're not being very nice," Samael said.

"What?"

"I think you should apologize to Chloe."

Chloe's head snapped up, and she stared at him from underneath her hoodie like he'd just grown an extra head. The blonde girl with a denim skirt and red nail polish next on Wigg's right barked out a laugh.

"Yeah?" Wiggs murmured. "You gonna make me?"

Samael shrugged. "I was hoping you'd do it out of the goodness of your heart."

"Think you're a tough guy, huh?" Wiggs shoved him.

"Don't touch me," Samael said very, very quietly.

"What're you gonna do about it, huh?" He shoved him again.

And then Wiggs was on the ground with blood spurting out his nose and onto his pretty little jacket. Samael's fist exploded against the side of his head again, and the girl screamed from somewhere far off and-

He was being hauled off, a firm hand gripping his shoulders like a vice.

"What the hell is wrong with you?!" Wiggs demanded, cradling his nose in bloodied hands as the girl knelt down beside him.

Everyone was staring at him now. But they weren't looking at him like he was nothing, a meaningless cog in the grand machinery of the student body, no. They were looking at him with something new.

Fear.

"Samuels," a gruff voice said behind hum. "My office. Now."

The hands guided him out of the cafeteria and into the empty hallway, to a squashed little office far too many inspiration quotes on the wall.

"Louis," the teacher said sadly. He was a beefy man with a head like a poached egg and minty eyes magnified by his full moon glasses. Samael recognized him from social studies, Mr Stein. "Louis." He shook his head in an attempt to show Samael just how disappointed he was. "It's your first day. What happened?"

"I didn't like them," Samael said.

Mr Steins took off his glasses and cleaned them. "I don't like people. There are loads of people I don't like. But I don't go around beating their heads in. You know why? Because I have something called self-control."

Samael looked at his feet. "I'm sorry," he murmured. "They just kept talking about my parents, and I-I-" His voice died away, and he sniffed into his jumper.

Mr Steins eyes widened, and he said as if he were talking to a wounded animal, "Oh my God. Louis, I'm sorry. It was hard for you to lose them, wasn't it?"

Samael nodded, sniffed again.

"Listen," Mr Stein said soothingly. "I'll let this one slide on account of it being your first day. But after that, no more freebies, got it?"

He nodded, and Mr Stein said, "I want you to come to me if you ever feel like you need to talk, okay?"

"Okay," Samael mumbled. "Thank you."

"Now, run along. You have English starting in ten minutes."

Samael made his way to English with a few minutes to spare. The class slowly filed in, and they kept a safe distance from him, but shot him sideways glances of curiosity and awe, like he was a deadly animal in an enclosure they were desperate to peer into.

"Right," the teacher said at the front of the room. Samael didn't look up. "As you're all aware, Mr Garrett has gone off on a walkabout, so I have the joy of taking up his position."

Samael frowned. He knew that voice. He looked up.

"The name's Mr Ingleseid," the teacher said. "Now, who wants to talk about Twelfth Night?"