The guards led Zack, Father Kai, and Lucky to the center of the Arena and tied them to the three wooden posts that stood waiting there, by their wrists, above their heads. The other Makains were given free-range of the field and flocked together on their left, as far away as possible from the gate on their right.
Kerberus stood and hushed the crowd. “Good people of Sorkium. Before you stand the leaders of the Makain Church.”
The crowd released their boos.
“Be not troubled my good people. For today, none of their lies and heresies can save them!”
The crowd cheered.
“Now, as you know, King Sork is as generous as he is terrible and mighty. And I say, with all of you as my witnesses, that if any of these three charlatans wishes to confess and convert, I shall immediately release him with enough food and water to make safe passage back to his home.”
The crowd grew silent.
“Now…” he looked at the three of them, “… will you confess?”
“No!” Father Kai shouted. “Makaism is real, Hawaii is real, and God is real.”
Kerberus scowled. Then he turned back toward the crowd. “Very well. I leave it to you good Sorkians, who have come today to sit in judgment of these heretics. What say you? Guilty or innocent? What is your verdict?”
“Guilty!” cried the cacophony.
“Makaio is real!” Lucky yelled back, struggling to break through the wall of noise. “And he will return. You will find that out sooner rather than later!”
But Kerberus was not going to let them make any long speeches. “Release the dog!”
The gate opened, and the largest coyote that they had yet seen emerged. Yawning, it sauntered into the Arena and gingerly stretched its legs, first the front, then the back – as if it knew that it was an entertainer putting on a show. The people’s cheers made it impossible for the Church leaders to preach any more lessons, and there was nothing else to do but try and break free. Zack pulled and pulled at the ropes, but it was useless.
Then the coyote approached. It went for Zack first, but it still looked sleepy. Maybe, just maybe, it was not in the mood for killing. One could hope. However, when it got within biting range, Zack could tell that this dog was never too tired for a little fun. He froze. Terror gripped his mind, and he completely forgot all the tips that Lucky had given him. He just wanted the dog to bite him as quickly as possible so that he could get out of there; his greatest fear was that there would be a second or two in between the first bite and the instant that he unplugged his consciousness.
The dog sniffed Zack’s face. The crowd drew in its collective breath and held it in anticipation. Zack could hear the dog panting; he could feel its breath. Its yellow-green eyes were the size of tennis balls and nearly the same color. It licked Zack’s cheek, and the crowd, ground, and sky vibrated and spun. Then, unexpectedly, the dog stepped back and walked over to Father Kai. Had the guards trained it to toy with its victims like this? Could they really be so cruel?
“Makains!” Lucky cried. “Come to our aid! There are a dozen of you, and only one coyote!”
“There are women and children over here!” answered the no longer wealthy Lasintheus. “Do I want the beast to get you first? Hell yes, you self-righteous pieces of shit!”
Then there was a soft thud, and Zack looked over just in time to see Father Kai’s leg falling to the ground. He had kicked the dog directly in the face.
“I am sorry innocent creature,” Father Kai said, “but I must do what I may.”
The dog growled and moved in. Father Kai propelled his leg forward again, but this time the dog snatched it midair. Having no other defense, Father Kai discharged his second leg – and his second mistake. Now the dog had both legs clamped, and it whipped them back and forth violently, like a golden retriever playing tug-of-war with a sock. Several times, it yanked them all the way back, producing a hideous sound that reminded Zack of a rope being snapped. At last, Father Kai screamed. A large pool of blood began to collect on the ground, and its deep, rich color humbled the once seemingly vibrant red dirt.
Zack looked back at Lucky – he was free! How had he done it? Lucky wasted no time explaining, and before Zack could speak a word, he ran over, grabbed the rope around Zack’s wrists, and bit down hard. Lucky chewed even more ferociously than the coyote, and blood trickled out of his mouth. He stopped for a second, spit out a tooth, and then went back to work. Zack had never felt less manly in his entire life.
Meanwhile, Father Kai’s screams turned into grinding, rattling, sputtering wheezes, and Zack shivered. Why didn’t he leave already?
“Go Father Kai!” Zack said, once he was free. “Go! You held out long enough! Look, we’re loose!”
“Carry on soldiers, carry on.” The head of the Makain Church went limp, and Zack and Lucky ran to the other Makains while the dog ate Father Kai’s remainders.
The reception was not warm. Lasintheus punched Zack in the face. Others spat on them. Then someone kicked Zack’s legs out from under him, and he caught a mouthful of Limbean dirt. He staggered to his feet, spit out the dirt, and looked up to see Lucky running toward the edge of the Arena where Kerberus sat.
“Makaio is real!” Zack’s oldest friend declared. “Hawaii is real! One day, Makaio will return, and it will be like the coming of the great flood! Lo, the righteous will rise in the waters of truth, and the wicked shall sink like silver! Makaism is your raft! Morality is your sail! God is your wind!”
Kerberus rose, and an archer stationed in the first row took aim.
Lucky dodged left. Then he dodged right. Then the coyote pounced on him from behind. “MAKAIO WILL RETURN!!!” Lucky screamed with his last breath.
Then, without any warning at all, Zack felt the weight of the entire universe converge on the left side of his torso – they had released more dogs. Zack looked down, and blood sprayed his eyes, forcing them closed. Then he was back on the hilltop with Lilly, Lucky, Father Kai, Debbie, and God.
20
After Lucky finished filling the others in, Lilly began to cry. “We failed those people,” she said.
“Yes,” said Zack, “but we can go back.”
“No we can’t. Don’t you realize? Sacat will never allow volunteers into that village again. We’ll have to start somewhere else.”
“Yes,” said Zack, “but by now there must be lots of other churches on Limbo, right God?”
“Yes indeed, all thanks to you Lilly.”
“There you go,” Zack said, “our efforts weren’t in vain.”
“Zack,” she said, “we didn’t save a single Limbean down there. Not even Klatu.”
“Really?” He looked at God.
God shook his head. “Klatu never really learned to be moral for its own sake. He only helped the Church because he thought it was a wise investment. To him, Makaism was just a business venture.”
And then it finally hit Zack: Klatu was really dead. He would be reborn on Limbo as a different person, but Zack would never know him again as Klatu. He felt a deep sinking feeling in his chest; it was a feeling that he had not known since his parents’ passing.
“But Klatu was a good man,” Lucky said. “He was just trying to look out for his family.”
“It’s true,” Zack said. “And what about when he gave me his cactus during the march? That was a pretty good deed, wasn’t it?”
“My son, Klatu only did that because he thought it would get him into Heaven.”
Lilly started to get angry. “Your honor,” she said, trying to remain as calm as possible, “Klatu was a good man!”
“Again with the ‘your honor?’ ” Zack said.
“I guess old habits die hard, huh?” Debbie said with a smile. “Totally understandable.”
“My children,” God said, “I am so sorry, but Klatu was not yet ready to enter Heaven.”
“How could he be ready?” Lilly persisted. “Limbo is too harsh for anyone to learn anything. How can anyone have any meaningful opportunit
y to choose to do good when they have to fight so hard just to survive?”
“Lilly,” God said, “I never told you that it would be easy to help them. Did you think that you could just walk into the very heart of hell itself, have a nice chat with the Devil, and convince him to be good in time for Christmas? I have been working on some of those people since the beginning of history. Klatu, for one, was a war criminal in one of his past lives. He committed unspeakable atrocities.”
“I understand all of that,” Lilly said, “but it’s just that we worked so hard, and suffered so much… and came away with nothing.”
“Lilly,” God said, “please remember that you pushed me to send you there before I had planned. I warned you that it was not a videogame. I did not design Limbo to contain the perfect amount of challenge so that you could go down, push yourself for a few months, and then come back to celebrate your victory. It might take centuries to save some of those people.”
“Ok,” Lilly said, “I understand. But what happened to Santar? None of us have seen him since the village.”
God shook his head.
“Tell us! You owe us at least that much!”
“Very well. While Kerberus chained you and the other Makains up, Santar robbed the villagers blind. He buried the loot just outside the village, and no one knows of this besides us. When the dust settled, and Kerberus’s army left, Sacat found Santar and banished him. Santar’s mother took him to a neighboring village where the Chieftain enslaved them both, and when Santar grows older, he will try to escape and return for the treasure and Sacat’s life.”
“Didn’t we get through to him at all?” Zack asked.
“No. Santar never believed in Hawaii. He thought that you made the entire thing up to get everyone’s money. He only went to the Church because his father told him to investigate the free water, and in both of their minds, if you could lie about something as important as Hawaii, then you could lie about anything and were completely untrustworthy.”
“Jeez,” Zack said, “what about Sot?”
“Sot,” God said, “was perhaps the most duplicitous one of all.”
“But he died fighting to protect the other villagers. And he was the only one that tried to warn us.”
“Sot was Kerberus’s spy within the village.”
“But we saw Kerberus brutally slaughter him!”
“His traitor’s reward. Sot had outlived his usefulness, and Kerberus despises turncoats, even those that turn to him.”
“That’s impossible! Sot was the first one to think that Sork’s army might be… oh.”
“Didn’t you think it strange that he held his tongue until the eleventh hour? At which point the warning was least likely to be heeded?”
“He seemed so scared… he even had me scared too.”
“Exactly,” said God.
“I was such a fool,” said Father Kai, hanging his head. “Sot was the one who suggested that I choose the 18th for the festival. He said it was a ‘lucky’ number.”
“Sadly,” God said, “Makaio Day on Limbo will forever mark the day of Kerberus’s own birthday.”
“Kerberus…” said Lucky.
“What a douchebag,” said Lilly.
“No wonder he kept calling me his birthday present,” Debbie said. “I just thought he was a Tolkien fan in a previous life.”
Lucky laughed, but the architecture of his smile showed that he did not get the joke.
“Wow,” said Zack, “Kosos – Sacat’s spy, Santar – his dad’s spy, Sot – Kerberus’s spy… and no one knew.”
“Sacat had his suspicions about Sot,” said God. “That’s why he sent him onto the battlefield first.”
“Unbelievable,” said Zack. Those Limbeans… we were so naïve.”
“We tried so hard,” Lilly said, “we were making so much progress. What about the festival itself? The villagers were opening their hearts; I could feel it. We were so happy that night, we were so close.”
“Sunshine makes shadows,” Father Kai said.
“Well put,” said God.
Lilly remained obstinate. “I don’t care what you say, Limbo is too harsh.”
“Perhaps it’s time that Lucky, Debbie, and I leave,” Father Kai said.
“Yes, please do,” said God.
“Where are you going?” Zack asked.
“To find another village of course,” Lucky said. “We will grow in number, and in turn, take Sacat, Kerberus, and Sork all down. In this sign…” he grinned at Zack and drew an outline of a dolphin in the air, “… we shall conquer!”
“Ok, but we’re coming with you,” Zack said.
“No,” said Father Kai, “you two have been through a lot. I think it’s best that you both take a break for now.”
God nodded in agreement.
“Lucky,” Zack said, “you’re the best friend that anyone could ever ask for.”
“Right back at you man.” They hugged. Then Lucky turned to Debbie and put his arm around her shoulder. They glowed in a way that could mean only one thing, and Zack was deeply envious.
“Be at peace,” Father Kai said, waving to Zack and Lilly.
“I love both of you,” Lucky said. Then they were gone.
“God,” Zack said, “what’s on the other planets? I think we deserve to know by now.”
“I am sorry, but you are not yet ready for that knowledge.”
“Why?” Lilly asked.
“It would be too much for you. Please be patient. In time you will know them.”
Zack looked at his feet; there were no ants at all. “Where did they go, God?”
God turned his back and sighed. “They migrated to another hill. I could not allow them to damage the ecosystem, so I changed them back to normal.”
“But ants don’t migrate.”
“These ants were different Zack. When you change one part of a living creature, it affects other parts.”
“Yes,” Lilly said, with a wild look in her eyes, “there’s an answer for everything, isn’t there? Except of course, for that one… other thing.”
What a weird thing to say, Zack thought. Then he peeked into Lilly’s head and saw an unholy thing. It was a red book with black trim and silver leaves on the cover, and somehow, Zack knew that it contained everything ever known, including even the things that were not in the Library… and some things… that were secret even to God. Yes, God might not have known it, but the three of them were not alone on that hilltop.
“Why my creator,” Lilly continued, “did you choose to bring your kingdom to Earth now? If the suffering was so wonderful, and it taught humanity so well, then why not keep it? Why choose to end everything on the exact day that you did? Why March 28th, 2016?!”
God took a deep breath. “Lilly, the history of me and the universe is not a neat little package that I can explain to you in an afternoon.”
“Try!”
“How about I show you? Open up your hearts and minds to me, and I will let you feel it.”
“No,” Lilly said. “I think it would be best if you left us.”
“Very well,” God said, slightly taken aback. “But please accept these words: I am truly sorry that everything could not be as you had hoped, and I thank you for your service on Limbo and hope that you will return.” Then he disappeared.
“Lilly, what was that all about?” Zack asked.
“It’s just so hard Zack. It’s no different than my life before God came. Trying to do good is like trying to fight the tides of the ocean. It’s like trying to lift the weight of the world. It means fighting everyone, including God… including yourself. To ever succeed would be suicide.”
“Lilly, the battle on Limbo is not over yet.”
“Zack, someone once said that mathematics is the language with which God has written the universe. I disagree. I think that evil is the language with which he has written it. Evil, pain, suffering…”
“No Lilly, that’s too much. Come on now. We suffered a heavy defeat, sure,
but it’s only temporary.”
“Do you know Zack, that I even had this idea… this stupid fantasy that I never told anyone about, that maybe down there on Limbo there would be a legal dispute? Like maybe someone would be accused of stealing, or someone would challenge the Church’s right to exist… and I would get to come to the rescue and teach them about law and do a trial… and win? Can you believe that? Can you believe how stupid I was?”
“Lilly, Lilly… let me tell you a story. When I was ten, I had a friend who lived next door. His name was Errol Glayston; he was a second cousin, or first cousin once removed or something… I can’t remember. But every day after school, I would go over his house and play Nintendo with him – Mario Brothers, Zelda, Metroid – all of them. He was twelve, but he didn’t have any friends his own age. The kids at school bullied him because he was overweight. They called him ‘Meryl’ and ‘Meryl Weighs-a-ton.’ They taped signs to his back, they beat him up, they stole his lunch-money. They pinched his nipples and screamed ‘titty-twister!’ ”
“This is supposed to cheer me up?”
“No, let me finish, there’s more. One day he hanged himself.”
“Zack! Oh my God!”
“I know. I fell into a deep depression after it happened. I didn’t come out of it for several years; I thought I would never ever be happy again. And years later, when my dad died –”
“Ok Zack, stop. I don’t need to hear anymore, you’re making me feel worse.”
“No, listen, please. The point is that as bad as things were, they got better. God came; I saw my parents again. Then I met you.”
“Ok Zack, thanks for trying.”
“Come on, it’s not so bad. How about some Easter candy?” He reached into the air and plucked out a wicker basket filled with colorful eggs and bright-green plastic grass. “I think there’s some Cadbury eggs in here,” he said, sifting around.
“Zack, I don’t think that’s going to do it. I don’t want candy. I want… I want…” she looked up at the sky and the perfect yellow sun nestled in the puffy white clouds, “… I want rain!”
The Alpha and the Omega: An absurd philosophical tale about God, the end of the world, and what's on the other planets Page 19