Hezakiel was agitated about something again. Volesteus could tell because she was pacing in front of his desk. She had also bent\u00a0her halo from a circle\u00a0into something resembling an infinity symbol.<\/p>\n
Volesteus sighed and closed his minesweeper window. He\u2019d reached the maximum time limit already and still couldn\u2019t decide which of the last two boxes hid final mine. He hated when they all exploded.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat\u2019s eating you, Hez?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHave you read the news?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAbout the war? Horrible.\u201d<\/p>\n
Most heavenly beings didn\u2019t bother with mainstream human news, but\u00a0big events drew attention. This one was bad. People fleeing the country, demagogues raging, public executions. Volesteus tried to remind himself that the Creator had some sort of \u2018Plan.\u2019 It was best to keep his head down and focus on his chosen task.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo, no,\u201d said Hez with a dismissive wave. \u201cThe science <\/em>news. It affects The Spreadsheets.\u201d<\/p>\n Hezakiel sighed again. Of all\u00a0the human disciplines, most heavenly beings focused on human theology. The idea was\u00a0to learn something<\/em> about the inscrutable Creator from the beliefs of his human masterworks. But Hezakiel was an incurably nerdy angel. She read everything: pop culture, literature, all the news. She wore a robe made of black t-shirt material that said: \u201cWell-behaved angels seldom make history.\u201d Volesteus wasn\u2019t sure he approved of the satirized Ulrich quote. To his sensibilities, it smacked of Paradise Lost<\/em>.<\/p>\n Yes, Hezakiel was unorthodox. But she\u2019d alerted his Bodily Resurrection Department that humans were launching cremated remains into space. If the BRD ever hoped to retrieve the carbon atoms of Gene Roddenberry, Clyde Tombaugh, and James Doohan, they\u2019d have to start entering orbital trajectories into The Spreadsheets.<\/p>\n Plus, that accident that had scattered Eugene Shoemaker\u2019s ashes across the moon. Space ashes weren’t as complicated to retrieve as ashes scattered at sea. But\u00a0without Hez, the BRD might have overlooked the space-farers\u00a0entirely. Embarrassing.<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cOkay newshound,\u201d he said. \u201cWhat did you find?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThere.\u201d<\/p>\n Hezakiel dropped her iPad onto her boss\u2019 desk. It showed an article about how human fetal cells invade the mother\u2019s body and brain during pregnancy and stay with her even after birth.<\/p>\n \u201cWeird. But, so?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cSo? So? Look. This isn\u2019t just baby to mom. It\u2019s mom to baby. It\u2019s baby to mom to next baby. Sibling\u2019s <\/em>cells in people! Grandmother\u2019s <\/em>cells in people! We had amputations, blood transfusions, and organ donations all figured. But this! The human race is full of everyone else\u2019s cells!\u201d She dropped into the chair in front of him and gnawed her halo.<\/p>\n Volesteus knew she was right. Editing The Spreadsheets to account for this discovery was going to be a pain. And it had all seemed so simple on The Choosing Day.<\/p>\n On that long-ago day, all the heavenly beings had stepped back from worshiping the Creator and asked: \u201cBut what should we do?<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cRelax. It\u2019s all taken care of,\u201d the Creator had said.<\/p>\n \u201cBut no really. Oughtn\u2019t we be doing <\/em>something?\u201d They had all asked again.<\/p>\n \u201cUmm, Okay.\u201d The Creator replied. \u201cMusic is nice. Music!\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cBut shouldn\u2019t we be preparing<\/em> for the final days? For the unfolding of your Plan?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWell, that sounds interesting, at least.\u201d<\/p>\n That was all the Creator had said about it. Though it was said with a smile, which was all the encouragement the heavenly beings had needed. So they all chose something to do based on variations of human theology. Humans put a lot of stock in their holy books, and the heavenly beings followed suit. They became angels, djinns, demigods, demons, sprites, golems, and dryads. A bunch of them tried dancing on the head of a pin\u2014what a mess.<\/p>\n Whatever they reported back, the Creator laughed and told them how imaginative they were. And how much enjoyment their work brought the Creator. In the back of his mind, Volesteus began to suspect that they\u2019d all made a lot of busywork for themselves back on The Choosing Day.<\/p>\n But Volesteus nevertheless headed his department with dignity. It was an archaic, but respectable department, the BRD. Dedicated to the Christian eschatological concept that all humans would be resurrected in their original (restored) bodies\u00a0on Judgement Day. So\u00a0Heaven ought to keep track of all the atoms of all the humans throughout all of history. The BRD kept this heaping load of data orderly and searchable in The Spreadsheets.<\/p>\n \u201cSo we\u2019re going to have to edit The Spreadsheets from\u00a0the beginning of human history?\u201d He groaned.<\/p>\n \u201cNo,\u201d Hezakiel said bleakly. \u201cIt\u2019s worse than that. The cells become part of their new host, while retaining the genetic identity of their originator.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m not following, Hez.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIt means, sir,\u201d began\u00a0Hezakiel. She used\u00a0the slow,\u00a0patronizing voice she reserved for\u00a0stupid people.<\/p>\n Volesteus took no offense. He was a patient boss. An\u00a0administrator-type accustomed to managing underlings far more brilliant\u2014and volatile\u2014than himself.<\/p>\n \u201c\u2014that\u00a0to track the cells, we would have to assign<\/em> them to a single body. But we haven\u2019t the right to do that, because they belong both<\/em> to the current host and<\/em> the progenitor host.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m not sure I understand.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cHumans are literally all part of one another. You cannot separate human from human. They are individuals with individual bodies, yes, but each body houses a cellular, shared family tree. We cannot\u00a0sort them all out on Judgement Day like we’d planned. They are one.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cOh! So, it would have to be our call, or no call at all.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cRight,\u201d Hezakiel, having been understood at long last, deflated a little.<\/p>\n \u201cBut we haven\u2019t the right to make that call,\u201d said Volesteus.<\/p>\n \u201cI hoped you would say that, sir. Because I respect you. And I hate fake work. And I was hoping you wouldn\u2019t keep us tied up in defunct busywork.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI thank you for your vote of confidence,\u201d he said, dryly.<\/p>\n \u201cSo now what do we do?\u201d She asked.<\/p>\n Volesteus noticed that Hezakiel looked a little scared. She had been good<\/em> at her spreadsheet job. Brilliant, meticulous, detail-oriented. There were other departments out there, but few with such rigorous and empirical work as the BRD. Not since the Anubis Heart-Weight Standards of Measurement Department went under, anyways.<\/p>\n Volesteus considered this. Lately, humans put a lot of stock in holy books to study the Creator. But Volesteus remembered that humans first thought Nature and Divine Will were entwined. It was\u00a0the first theology, really.<\/p>\n Then, 600 years before Christ, the\u00a0Greeks explained the natural world by cause and effect alone, with no mythological origins. But the old concept reasserted itself again in Christianity in the Latin Middle Ages\u2014the Book of Nature. By studying the creation, you studied the Creator.<\/p>\n He thought of the human war. I wonder when they will learn that they are all one. <\/em>In the back of his mind, Volesteus imagined he and Hezakiel had scratched at a fragment of the deep and ultimate Plan. He felt the smallish grain of faith he had in the Plan grow. A little.<\/p>\n \u201cI think we should tell the Creator what we\u2019ve found,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cAnd then?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cClose up shop. Can\u2019t fight facts\u2014unless you want to waste your time.\u201d<\/p>\n Hezakiel looked stricken. \u201cBut what will you do next? What won\u2019t waste your time?\u201d<\/p>\n Volesteus smiled at her.<\/p>\n \u201cI think\u2026I think I will try making music.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Hezakiel was agitated about something again. Volesteus could tell because she was pacing in front of his desk. She had also bent\u00a0her halo from a circle\u00a0into something resembling an infinity symbol. Volesteus sighed and closed his minesweeper window. He\u2019d reached the maximum time limit already and still couldn\u2019t decide which of the last two boxes […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[55,57,133,510,587,975,1157],"class_list":["post-9970","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fiction","tag-ancient-history","tag-angels","tag-business-of-the-afterlife","tag-history","tag-judgement-day","tag-science","tag-theology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.confabulatorcafe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9970","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.confabulatorcafe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.confabulatorcafe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.confabulatorcafe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/22"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.confabulatorcafe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9970"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.confabulatorcafe.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9970\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.confabulatorcafe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9970"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.confabulatorcafe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9970"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.confabulatorcafe.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9970"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}