The Alpha and the Omega: An absurd philosophical tale about God, the end of the world, and what's on the other planets (24 page)

At one point, the line snaked as the guards at the rear spurred the prisoners a little too fast, and Zack had a chance to talk with Lucky. “Boy am I glad to see you. We’ve got to think of a way out of this. Any ideas?”

“Zack, I’ve been racking my brain this entire time, there’s nothing we can do. Maybe when we get to Sorkium. Hey, at the very least, make sure you learn as much as you can while we’re there. Any little bit of knowledge could help us when we come back.”

19

S
orkium was small and unimpressive. It had a red-stone wall no more than ten feet high, boxy yellow-clay buildings, and only three structures taller than two-stories. One was an obelisk that reminded Zack of a shorter version of the Washington monument. Another was a modest-sized pyramid with a flat top, and the third was a simple, brown, concrete arena. No bigger than half the size of an American football field, it was small by any objective standard, but here it was colossal and commanding from its station at the center of the city. The Arena. Zack knew what that was for.

As the survivors of the death-march passed through the red-dirt streets, bearded merchants pointed at them and laughed, and small children with funny tattoos and odd silver piercings ran alongside them, asking them where they had been. Zack looked everywhere for any sign at all of other Makains but found none. He was quite sure that he would meet a grisly demise here, but every time he started to feel sorry for himself, he stopped and thought of Klatu, Santanodis, and the others. For them, there was no
guarantee that paradise immediately followed the snap of death’s jaws.

The soldiers moved the prisoners to the Arena and down into its basement prison. One by one, they took off each of their backpacks and locked them in their cells.

“Put the Church leaders together,” Kerberus ordered. Zack could hardly wait.
Anything
to take off this backpack, he thought.

Soon his wish was granted, and Zack found himself in a red-rock cell with Father Kai and Lucky. A torch down the hall flicked haphazard shards of orange light into the little cell, and Zack suddenly remembered how much he hated small places. Lilly sat alone in the cell across from them, just as Kerberus had promised.

Once the soldiers left, they discussed their situation.

“I heard them talking during the march,” Lilly said. “They will throw us to the dogs over the course of a two-day event. They’re charging admission; there will be thousands of spectators. They will take the four of us on the second day, and give us a chance to confess our crimes and convert to Sorkanity in front of the entire city.”

“Well then, our mission is clear,” Father Kai said.

“Yes,” said Lilly, “we must go out there and refuse to confess. We must stay with the villagers as long as we possibly can. Only when the dogs’ teeth have actually penetrated our skin can we leave.”

“No, no, there must be some other way,” Zack said. “Maybe we can trick the guards or tunnel out of our cells.”

“Zack,” Lilly said, “this isn’t a cartoon. This is real.”

“But we can’t just give up!” Zack said, shaking the rusty iron bars in front of him.

Lucky joined in, but they were steadfast.

“Lucky,” Zack said, dropping to the ground with exhaustion, “did you see anything that might help when we came in?”

“No, nothing.”

Zack looked down the hallway. “Maybe we can bribe the guards,” he said.

“With what?” Lilly asked.

“I don’t know…”

This was an unusual position for Zack and Lilly. In the complex spheres of modern business and law, there was always some other option, some new strategy… some final appeal. But this iron age prison was very simple.

“There must be other Makains in the city,” Zack said. “The volunteers had plans to open churches all across Limbo, and that was weeks ago.”

“If there are, then there are,” Father Kai said. “If not, then we will meet the dogs in the Arena. There is nothing we can do now to change that. All that is left is to remain calm and meet our destiny with peace in our hearts.”

“One of us could go back to Earth,” Zack bargained, “you know, and then reappear in the city.”

“Zack,” Lilly said, “you know God would never allow that. That’s not like expanding the fountain room.”

“Hmmm…” Zack thought out loud, “what did Kerberus say? Feign weakness and offer an opportunity to exploit it? I know. We can pretend that we’re sick or something. Then the soldiers will have to open the cell.”

“Zack, they’re not stupid,” Lilly said.

“Well what if we pretend we’re going to confess? We could say that we’ll do it if they release the other Makains
first, and then just not confess. Wait no – scratch that. If they’re willing to release the other Makains, we could just confess plain and simple.”

“Zack,” Lucky said, “it wouldn’t work. They hold all the cards here. They can let the other Makains go, have us confess, and then hunt them down in the desert the next day.”

“Well what about the law?” Zack asked. “Maybe there’s some kind of Sorkian law that we could learn about, with some loophole that Lilly could find?”

Lilly smirked. “That’s idiotic,” she said.

“But –”

“Zack, my legal skills are just as useless here as they are in Heaven,” she said, prompting a long minute of silence.

“Look Lucky,” Zack said, when Lilly’s words had finally left the air, “you don’t have to go any further with us. You don’t owe me anything. You’ve done way more than anyone could’ve possibly asked, and we don’t need four Church leaders up there refusing to confess. Three is fine.”

“No Zack, I’m coming. I wouldn’t miss this for the world. I’m still an animal at heart, and I want action. So far, the only regret that I have in this entire thing is that we gave up at the village without a fight.”

“Ok buddy, ok.”

Then there was a sound.

“What’s that?” Lilly asked.

“Footsteps,” said Lucky. “Heavy ones.”

“Ah,” said Father Kai, “the Angel of Peyote returns.”

“What’s that, a joke?” Kerberus said, rounding the corner.

“Now is as good a time as any,” Father Kai replied.

“Oh fatalistic one,” Kerberus said, as his guards appeared behind him, “soon will be just another fatality… lying in a coyote’s belly! Let’s see you philosophize your way out of that one!”

The guards laughed.

Then Kerberus approached Lilly’s cell, leered in, and gently ran the back of his hand up and down the bars. “And then there’s you kitten.”

Zack got angry, but then he got an idea. “You win Kerberus,” he said. “I’m going to confess, and I don’t care what you do to my wife.”

“No?” Kerberus asked, turning.

“We fell out of love a long time ago, and I just want to live for myself. You can kill the other prisoners too. Just spare me.”

Lilly rolled her eyes behind Kerberus’s back, making it clear that she had no faith whatsoever in this unrehearsed scheme.

“Hmmm,” Kerberus said, “let you live? Is there anything in it for me? Besides the confession?”

“Sure. I’ll join your army. I’ll help you in the peyote trade or Sorkanity – whatever you want. I’m pretty educated myself. I can be useful.”

“Well, it
is
tempting,” Kerberus said. “You’ve really impressed me so far with your
usefulness
, but I’m going to have to decline your offer.”

“Why?”

“Because it’s a Saturn’s day.”

“Huh?”

“And because you have brown hair.”

Lilly rolled her eyes again, and she and Kerberus waited for Zack to get it.

“Oh dear!” Kerberus said, when Zack’s face finally sank. “So
that
was your feigned weakness and offer to exploit it? My, I do hope in your next life that you come back as something with a brain, or at the very least, a spine.”

The guards laughed again.

Then Kerberus led them to the end of the row, and Zack and the others heard the rusty creak of a lone cell door opening, followed by a woman’s cry. It was Kosos.

“No! No! I helped! I named the Makains!”

“Indeed,” Kerberus said, “and now you shall receive the most glorious and handsome reward of all… me!”

The men carried her away, and she writhed, wriggled, and squirmed like a fish being reeled to shore.

“Lilly,” Zack said, when there was a safe distance between them and Kosos’s muffled sobs, “I want you to leave before he comes for you.”

“Zack, I need to go up there with you. I can’t abandon the villagers now.”

“Lilly, you can’t, it’s too much. The price is too great, and the benefit is too small. You have to leave.”

“Zack, you can’t tell me what to do.”

“Lilly, I will never let it happen. I’ll go back to God. I’ll break up with you.”

“Go ahead.”

After another sleep-barren night, morning arrived with the sounds of an entire city aglow. The Sorkians were filtering into the Arena overhead, and their laughter and song
rained down on the prisoners like the ten plagues. For those above, this was a holiday, and the Makains’ thoughts and feelings were no more important to them than the turkey’s had been to Zack and Lilly on American Thanksgiving.

The noise grew louder and louder, and weighed heavier and heavier on the lobsters in the tank, until at last the guards came for the day’s first og. Soundless as the Reaper that now employed them, they glided to the end of the hall, congregated a small group of men, women, and children, and led them back toward the stairs, allowing each of them to stop along the way at the Church leaders’ cells to take one last look at the shepherds that had led them so far astray.

“Curse you all!” Santanodis screamed, when it was his turn.

“Santanodis,” Zack said, “be brave. There’s a whole ‘nuther world –”

“No! No more stories! At least have the decency not to lie to me at my funeral!”

“But I’m not lying.”

“Stop! All I want is to hear you say it – just once. Say it just once before I die. Makaism is a lie. The fountain was an illusion! You have never met God! Say it!”

“I can’t.”

“
Roarglvuk
! You took everything from me! All but for a lie! A dirty, corrupt, murderous lie!
Roarglvuk
! Curse you all to hell!
To hell!!
”

A minute later, they were gone, and the crowd was chanting. “Hrash og! Hrash og! Hrash og!” Then silence. Then a gaggle of “ohhhhhhhs!” Then a blood-curdling scream. Then cheers.

This went on for some time. Then there was a lot of clapping. Then the noise dissipated. Intermission?

The guards came back an hour or two later – it was impossible to know which – and this time, Zack, Lilly, Father Kai, and Lucky were forced to watch Klatu walk past them.

“How could you lead me to this end?” He was crying.

“Klatu –” Zack started.

“Don’t! I won’t hear any more of it. All I wanted was to provide for my family. All I wanted was to sell a little more cacti. And this is the price I pay for putting my faith in you? Damn you! Damn Makaio! DAMN GOD!!!!”

“Klatu!”

But he was already gone, and the crowd was already tuning up. “Hrash og! Hrash og! Hrash og!”

Zack jumped up and shook the bars. Lilly and Lucky did the same, but nothing happened. Then Zack looked at the ceiling, walls, and floor; he was clutching at straws. How could it end like this? How could Klatu die without them getting one last chance to do something?

Zack looked down the hallway. Had anyone gotten out? Were there other volunteers from Heaven in the city? Would they come flooding the Arena and the prison at the last minute? Would little Santar suddenly and miraculously appear with some crazy last minute plan?

No. This was not a movie or a videogame, it was real. Soon Klatu would be dead, and Zack and Lilly would be responsible not only for his painful end, but also for widowing Tarta and depriving Klatan of a father.

They waited.

“Hrash og! Hrash og! Hrash og!”

Then silence.

Then the “ohhhhhhhs,” “ahhhhhhhs,” screams, cheers, jeers, hoots, hollers, and claps returned, and the four Church leaders knew that they had more blood on their hands.

None of them spoke for the rest of the day. Then, when night fell, Zack pled his case again.

“Lilly, when he comes for you, leave.”

“You don’t get to tell me what to do Zack.”

“Lilly, you’re not going to take a rape for Makaism. That’s completely absurd. After the Arena, we’ll come back down. We’ll fight again another day. Father Kai, Lucky, and myself will refuse to confess. That’s enough. You’re not going to let Kerberus have his way… you’re not going to let him win!”

“Zack, I don’t care about Kerberus winning. He’s a dumb animal, don’t you realize that?”

“No, he’s actually pretty smart.” Zack hesitated. “In the desert,” he fished, “he played this joke on me…”

“I
know
,” Lilly said irritably. “I wasn’t awake for it, but I heard about it the next day.”

“Yeah, well the soldier was so convincing –”

“Zack I don’t care. I would never judge you for something like that. And I know Kerberus is smart… maybe smarter than anyone in this room. But it’s just IQ-wise, not morally. Kerberus lived his entire life in the wild and no one ever taught him how to think like a human. He doesn’t make moral decisions any more than his coyote does; he never had the chance.”