Chapter 5
A Delicate Ballet
A vast, sterile conference room floats somewhere that smells faintly of ozone and freshly baked cinnamon buns.
At the head of the table, God sits, staring at the report on the PowerPoint presentation. The title of the slide reads OPERATION DEAD WEIGHT: Pre-Mortem. The angels sit around the room anxiously. Some fidget with their pens, wings twitching. Others read an invisible script laid out before them. A few just stare dead ahead like they’re witnessing Revelation 2.0.
The nervous angel stands in front of them all again.
“...and so we believe some dark, malevolent forces are at play. We executed everything flawlessly. That barbell drop had a 0.00001% survival margin, Scott should be–”
“That’s enough.”
God’s voice is calm, but thunder rolls behind it.
A heavy silence. One angel coughs. Another starts mouthing a prayer.
After a long empty silence, She finally speaks again.
“You do not understand what his survival puts at risk. Anomalies like him are meant to be corrected, not prolonged. Had My will been done before, none of this would be necessary.”
She steps away from the table, gazing out a window that wasn’t there a moment ago. Outside: a swirling nebula, an impossible black hole, in the distance, a planet with 2 suns orbits around it in defiance of physics. She crosses her arms, fingers tapping her elbow in thought.
“Something has been interfering. Tell Raphael I want eyes on every realm. Including…the other one. Tell him to report back to me with any findings immediately. I think it’s time I handled this myself.”
The energy in the room shifts from mild trepidation to full-blown panic. A feather molts off someone’s wings and floats gently on the floor.
Gabriel speaks carefully.
“My Lord. You have far greater tasks to oversee. Please, let us help you carry the load.”
God doesn’t respond right away.
She remains at the window, watching the twin suns rotate around each other in a delicate ballet that could collapse at any moment.
Then, gracefully, warmly, she turns back to the room.
Her expression is serene. Her voice, sweetened.
“Gabriel, my child. Of course, I trust you all completely. But trust is not a substitute for results.”
She smiles. Behind Her, the suns collapse into a glorious explosion of lights and force– beautiful, and cataclysmic, final.
God turns away from the wall, now dark, like the lights had gone out on a stage. And exits the room, her robes trailing like white smoke.
Gabriel watches her, a flicker of unease in his reverence.
As she exits, “There is a shadow moving in defiance of Me. I will drag it into the light…or burn it out.”
———
Somewhere between dimensions, inside a red velvet-walled room, jazz plays softly from a dusty record player that hasn’t existed since 1963. The lights are low. The air smells faintly of cigarette smoke, brimstone, and takeout pad thai.
Hundreds of TV monitors line the walls, each showing a different feed; traffic cams, bathroom mirrors, glitchy reflections in bus windows. One screen zooms in on a familiar figure: Scott clearly attempting, and failing at flirting with a barista. He grabs his coffee as the lid slips, spilling the scalding coffee on himself.
The Devil lounges on a velvet couch, shirt half-unbuttoned, barefoot, a glass of something amber in his hand.
He watches Scott frantically pat himself down, hopping in place as steam rises from his crotch.
“Bravo.” The Devil says with a slow clap.
He takes a sip of his drink as some dribbles from his chin.
“And you’re the cockroach that She can’t seem to squash?”
A knock at the door. The Devil doesn’t look.
“Enter.”
A lesser demon pokes his head in, holding a manila folder that’s still smoldering around the edges.
“Sir, I have the report from the board meeting. Upstairs.”
“Leave it. Out.”
The lesser demon drops the folder and vanishes without a sound.
“She’s had it out for you for some time Scotty boy. And yet…here you are. A bug in Her perfect little system.” He leans forward, eyes glinting.
“Stopping that car from turning you into roadkill? Worth it just to see her squirm. But now…” Something catches his eye. He rewinds the footage.
Pauses it on a single frame.
A shadow stands behind Scott – too tall. Too still.
The Devil frowns. He stares at the screen for a moment, the ice in his glass slowly melting.
“Well. I guess even mortal men can have guardian shadows.”
He leans back, swirling the liquid in his glass.
“I’ve pulled a few strings here and there, but this?”
He chuckles, dark and low.
He raises a glass in a toast.
“To the shadow you don’t even know you’ve got.”
———
Back on Earth, near the same street as the coffee shop, Scott sits alone on a bench, shirt damp, a faint stain on his jeans from the spill. He bites into a sandwich with too much mustard and wipes his mouth with the sleeve of his hoodie.
Across the street, a man stands watching. Still. Unblinking. Gargoyle-like.
No one notices him.
A chill runs up Scott’s spine. He glances up.
The man is gone.
He shrugs, takes another bite, oblivious – the figure follows. A shadow stretching at high noon.
As he crumples the sandwich wrapper, he hears someone yelling, “Come back! Stop!” he sees a small dog running into the street. Without thinking, Scott runs out in traffic. Tires screech. Horns blare. He flinches, scoops up the dog, and dives back onto the curb.
“Oh my God. Thank you so much!” a woman gasps, jogging over.
Scott hands her the leash, still catching his breath. “It’s no problem. I couldn’t just stand by and watch a live Disney tragedy happen in front of me.”
The woman walks off, talking to her dog. A small moment, quickly swallowed by the noise of everything else.
Scott shrugs, wipes himself off, and walks away.
———
Somewhere far above, a single monitor flickers in an empty room. God watches him–again. Watches him survive yet again.
She turns the screen off without a word.
The silence stretches.
The monitor flickers back to life, repeating the scene. As if it wants Her to see it again.
She turns it off.
Then, slowly, She walks away.
Behind her, the screen lights up again, glowing in quiet defiance.
Chapter 6 - Jampocalypse
