Stuart Slade - Pantheocide

“Michael-Lan. We want to clarify some points with you. It appears that humans haven’t entered Heaven directly for many years. Is that correct.”

“It is General. Yahweh closed the gates of Heaven to humans centuries ago. About the fifteenth century by your calendar.”

“We thought it was earlier than that. Never mind. The humans who arrived here after that, how did they get here?”

“I went down to the Plateau of Minos and collected them. I had a deal with the Fallen Ones who worked there. I took the humans I wanted in exchange for opium. It worked out quite well, I had no intention of telling anybody about my pipeline and the Fallen Ones knew if they gave me up there would be no more clouds of bliss for them,” Michael struck a penitent and regretful note that fooled nobody. “I only wish I could have saved more.”

“I’m sure,” Petraeus was sarcastic. “So, there was a time when humans arrived here directly. How?”

“There was a gate here, like the one on the Plateau of Minos. It still is there in fact, but no humans have arrived through it for many centuries. Poor Peter is really bored down there. I used to slide him a few shots of cocaine now and then, help him pass the time.”

Petraeus shuddered quietly. “So, it’s possible that Yahweh ‘closed’ the Gates because no more humans were coming through? That his ‘order’ was just a recognition of what was already established?”

“The order came first. Once Yahweh had given it, the number of humans coming through slowed down and stopped. At the same time, the number turning up at Minos increased.”

“I see. Michael, I’m going to assign a military unit to take over guarding the site of that gate. You will take them there.” Petraeus paused and thumbed his intercom box again. “Duty Officer, get me the commander of Third Armored. I’m going to be borrowing one of his tank battalions again.”

Spearhead Battalion, Heaven

Her command had grown again. She now had an engineering company attached to what was still laughingly called a battalion. That meant the Spearhead ‘battalion’ now had eight full companies plus an assortment of platoon-sized attachments. Colonel Keisha Stevenson had the uneasy feeling that the only reason why it wasn’t reclassified as a larger unit was that doing so would mean she got a General’s star.

“This is it.” Michael-Lan stood in front of the black ellipse, one that was guarded by a pair of pearl-encrusted metal gates. “Until Yahweh closed everything down, this used to be quite busy. It’s only got a caretaker now, Peter. Nice old boy.”

“That would be Saint Peter, I suppose.” Stevenson wondered what her old church preacher would have said about this situation. He’d often waxed eloquent about what Saint Peter would do when faced with various members of his congregation but ‘obeyed orders delivered at gunpoint’ hadn’t been one of the options considered.

“That’s what you call him, sure.” Michael’s voice was slightly distant again. In the long drive up here, Stevenson had noted that. It was as if Michael’s mind was elsewhere. Given what she had learned about him, that probably didn’t bode well for somebody.

“Take me to him.” Her voice was blunt. Her orders were to secure this entire area. She had the force needed to do it and those orders included clearance to do whatever that task required. Behind her, the tank transporters were lining up and unloading her vehicles. Getting here had been a ten-hour drive and if she’d brought her armor up on its tracks, half the vehicles would be left by the roadside as mechanical casualties by now. The tank transporters had been an optimal solution and Stevenson understood that being General Petraeus’s go-to commander meant that her ‘optimal solutions’ had a very high priority.

Michael led her over to a hut built beside the gates. It was a small, ramshackle affair, one that would have been condemned as a slum in New Jersey but Stevenson’s expectations had been changed by her time in Heaven. For here, and in the eyes of most of the human inhabitants of Heaven, this was as good as it got, better than anything they’d known in their earthbound lives. The door creaked open and a figure with a flowing white beard emerged.

“Michael-Lan, Great General, welcome to the Gates of Pearl.”

The voice was obsequious and that made Stevenson’s hackles rise. Humans didn’t have to tip their caps to Angels any more. There was a more-than-necessary snap to her voice when she spoke. “You are Peter, the guardian of this gate?”

He looked at her, initially almost with belittlement. Then he saw the uniform and the guns, and he took in the sight of the vehicles unloading. “You are a soldier, a woman soldier.”

“I am Colonel Stevenson, commander of this position. From now on, you report to me, not him.” She gestured at Michael and saw him nod. “Now, you are?”

“I am Shimeon Kepha Ha-Tzadik. Also known as Simon Peter and follower of Jeshua.” He smiled sadly. “I am also caretaker here.”

He looked hopefully at Michael who responded by producing a small packet of white powder. Peter whinnied with delight and produced a mirror, knife and a plastic drinking straw from a pocket in his robes. Slightly disgusted, Stevenson watched him cut a line and snort it up through the straw. Peter caught her expression and offered her a line.

“No.” Her voice was even sharper and the dislike in it more obvious.

Peter looked at her, then his face brightened. “I have some liquor here if you prefer that. Built the still myself.”

“Hokay, when did you learn to do that?”

“Back in the old days, when we were roaming around Galilaea with Jeshua. He used to do his preaching and the rest of us would brew up and sell the moonshine. Only, Jeshua would never stop in one place long enough for us to set up a decent business. As soon as we got the still set up and established ourselves, he’d move on and we’d have to do the same. That’s what finished us in the end you know.”

“Do tell.” Despite herself, Stevenson was beginning to like him.

“We kept moving on and we never paid the tax duty on the moonshine we were selling. That really upset the Romans. They didn’t care about the preaching but tax evasion was something quite else. Then it turned out that Judas had been skimming. He was responsible for giving the local administration their share of the take but he was short-changing them and pocketing the difference. He’d made thirty pieces of silver on the deal before they wised up and sent some Maccabee killers out to whack him. Anyway, Judas decided the only way to get away was to sell the rest of us out to the Romans for tax evasion. Didn’t help him much, the Maccabees got him and strung him up anyway. Anyway, the Romans were about to crucify us all but Jeshua talked them out of it and took the blame himself. He took the fall, we all got to walk so we carried on preaching his message for him.”

Stevenson laughed delightedly and the old man seemed pleased. “You have got to tell that story to everybody down on Earth. I suppose Jesus – Jeshua is up here in heaven somewhere?”

Michael shook his head. “He never turned up; I suppose he’s down in Hell somewhere. He was only a tool you know, he was possessed by an angel called Elhmas. Once he’d finished with Joshua, he just abandoned him.”

Stevenson’s head snapped around at that, so she was looking at Michael. “And what happened to Elhmas?”

“Most everybody thinks you killed him. Oh, not you personally, you humans. He was in command of the Incomparable Legion of Light when it was nuked. The Host is certain that he died there.”

Stevenson nodded and tried a sip of the moonshine. It was surprisingly good. “Peter, got any more stories about the days in Galilaea?”