Chapter 17
In which the group is thwarted by warding sutras of red tape
LUCY
Having seen the Divine Border while looking from the mountaintop, when we went down to the bottom we navigated towards that. But of course, the horizon lowered coming down, so we weren't sure for awhile that we were on the right course. As it was, I may have complained bitterly about being lost. I got Nevras to comfort me, and tell me that things were gonna be okay.
Portia and Sastraneth came up to deck from being absent the whole last chapter. Apparently, Portia was healing Sastra, who had woken up with extreme seasickness. She had explosive nausea, which threatened to coat the ship in Hellfire. But Portia was a Seraphim, and she could handle her.
Weeks passed, as the view from up there had been further than it appeared. We had supplies, but by the time we reached the Divine Border, we were hoping to restock.
Ambrosia had bottled a lot of marmalade, so none of us would get scurvy. Thoughtful of her, because this trip was turning out to be longer than I thought. Aside from that, we had some bread, salted fish, pickled veggies, some very dry cheese. I cooked everyone a nice panini using the fish and cheese the first night, but now we had no source of calcium, as we were out of milk, yogurt, and cheese. Next, we would be out of protein, the way fish supplies were looking. And what we had of bread was starting to mold anyway, despite our attempts to ration. No carbs meant no energy. And we couldn't just eat sugary marmalade all day, not if we wanted to stay non-diabetic. I might not be as responsible a parent as Nevras or Ambrosia, but even I knew that one.
So I sighed in relief when Tamashii called out, "Land ho!" from the crow's nest. "I am not!" I responded, causing her to smirk. We were at our destination. Now, Heaven is filled with many plants and animals, but they tend to be lacking in cattle, pigs, or fish. But if you want fried chicken, they certainly know about it. The problem is, in order to get supplies from Heaven we had to pass a checkpoint.
I tried just pushing past the gate but was knocked back as the guards laughed. "You might want a Passport in order to enter," they said. I thought Ambrosia had a Passport! I checked my old dress, the brown one I swapped out for this one, but nothing was in any of the pockets. Nor was it in any of the bags that she had. When we split into three people, everything we owned was supposed to split with us. Why did that not also come along with me?
I headed right, and entered the office building. After explaining my situation to guy at the front desk, he said without looking up, "Divine Passports are a minor Artifact. You should not expect them to replicate with you, in the event of a doppelganger effect. I gather you also lack any magical items or First Materials, do you?" I fished through the bags, and realized he was right. Ambrosia's fishing rod and her knife were also missing from my supplies. "So... can I have a Passport issued to me?" I asked. Without looking up still, he explained, "In order to apply for a Divine Passport, you need to fill an DP-712 Section 64A. Waiting period is typically six to eight months." I complained, "But my other self got it immediately!" As he slid the form towards me, he looked up briefly, "Ah yes, your alternate is Ambrosia Brahman. I have her on file. Yes, she got a rush order in exchange for dealing with a problematic incident. Are you willing to likewise deal with our affairs?" I shook my head, "Fuck no! I have my own business to take care of. Just give me the form." I filled out my name, only to realize that as a new being, I actually didn't have an address. I pointed to it, and he wrote some runes in the line. The mail of New Earth had a tracked address option, so I had confidence that even if I was on a rock in the middle of the sea or underground, they would find me. But for now, getting supplies here was not happening.
JESUS
I did my best to spread my message. I healed the sick, preached, even raised the dead once or twice. But what I encountered was later discussed by a writer commenting on the difference between a Sage and a Bureaucrat. The Jewish leaders ignored the older Hebrew teachings in favor of a bunch of man-made laws. They had forgotten, for instance, that the Sabbath was arranged as a day of rest, a personal day off. Instead of punishing those who arranged work to be hard enough that people felt they had to work on the Sabbath, they punished people working on the Sabbath. That's like punishing people for owning drugs to use, when dealers are actively selling the stuff. They punished people for having tax money to the state (such coins were a profane object and not welcome in their temple), but also sought to trap me with a question about whether or not it was lawful to pay taxes. But mostly, they would go after me because I healed on the Sabbath. I was trying to tell them that the purpose of the law was mercy not scarifice, but they didn't listen.
There are some things you should know though. In Pangaea, the ruling authority was not Rome. It was a nation that sank into the sea, now known as Atlantis. The current city of Aquamundo is filled with people who followed me. The city of Atlantis eventually fell into decline, though it is still standing. It had to be walled off, because its enemies attacked in submarines. But the Atlanteans weren't the ones running the show. Pulling their strings were the lizard people, the enemy of free citizens everywhere. They in turn were often controlled by demons, although if you asked them (if you could get them to be honest), they would be convinced they were the ones with power. This multi-layer puppet show resulted in a lot of human misery. The lizard people, as mentioned earlier, desired human sacrifice as a food source. Since blood sacrifices were no longer socially acceptable, the way they managed this was through taxes and regulation, and by using a crematorium to cook up fresh human corpses before replacing it with generic ashes. Well, technically, they did leave the bones for burning, but the bodies were eaten. Nevertheless, even though these taxes caused human death, I never told the Pharisees that taxes were evil, just that their first priority ought to be God. But these taxes did feed creatures who had to eat, even if their food was not the same as that eaten by most humans.
I should also tell you that this Ancient Earth had no Maccabean Revolt or Babylonian Exile. So the writings of these Hebrews was different from that of the later Jews by several key features. In particular, many prophets wrote of the Messiah in terms of a military leader that would rescue them from their enemies. Those texts never existed in Ancient Israel, so my message was able to be heard without a lot of doctrinal reasons why they thought I wasn't the Messiah.
Lastly, I was able to banish demons in Ancient Israel. Rena later spread my story by posing as me on the cross, but in that case, the world had serious trouble changing because of a large number of demons. They all convinced people what they had seen was a lie, or they distorted the message.
RENA
We were with Jesus one day, when a creepy man possessed by a demon showed up. Well, maybe a demon is an oversimplification. He was possessed by thousands of demons, and his name was Legion. As demons had a solid body but a spirit that wasn't quite right, they could possess living humans and take their bodies. It was common practice for high level priests to perform an Exorcism. Exorcisms had varying effectiveness depending on how corporeal the creature was. Demons were notoriously hard to exorcise, but some talented priests could do so. But that wasn't the impressive part.
Legion saw that he was going to be exorcised, and his demonic energy would be obliterated. But he begged for mercy, and the demons were instead set upon a group of pigs, who drowned into the sea. Exorcism wasn't something that people could control. But Jesus did so, like it was nothing!
More impressive still was his mercy. Who was this man, who even forgave the sins of demons? Demons, who created much of human misery, who possessed everything from street people to politicians, demons who often kept people living on the outskirts or pushed them to suicide. And yet, Jesus wanted redemption even for them! Who was this man that I traveled with?!?
