An experimental short story.
“Why? Why do you let us go on doing such horrible atrocities?! We commit genocide! We destroy the most precious of creations! The very God you serve gave us this planet and now you mean to tell me you sit and watch, and enjoy, with pleasure as we rip it apart?” The human thrashed against a darkness.
The angelic creature paused, swirling a glass of white wine as it materialized out of the infinite. This thing projected fabrication; created for demonstrative purposes only.
“I know this may be difficult for you to understand, but we are not your caretakers. Your view of “God” is all wrong. It’s from the bottom up. There are no guardian angels watching over you, for any purpose, and as far as you should be concerned, I serve no one.”
Alone in a void in the presence of an ethereal being, the human failed to notice whether or not this projection of himself included the rhythmic rising and falling of his chest.
“Your world is like one of a series of fish tanks, but this one I like best.”
It walked along a sudden wall of aquariums illuminating the vibrant fish in the darkened room.
“What makes humans special is that no matter how vile, how sinister, how awful, how petty any of you are, you are trying what you genuinely think is best because human lives are precious. Each moment is meaningful.”
The angel paused, its finger caressing the glass of one tank, watching the fluorescent yellow and Prussian blue fish trail their brief connection. It detached from the aquarium, returning its attention to the human and stepping away from the dissolving wall.
“Immortal beings lack that.”
Taking a seat at a cafe table, the creature invited the recoiling human to sit.
“When humans destroy this world, we will create another. It is “old hat” as you say – a trick we have seen a million times before.”
The human gawked, but received rolled eyes from the unamused creature.
“And we will see it a million times more.” In a long slow sip, its eyes flared across the table. The angel’s face relaxed, an eyebrow raised then the shoulders, before it replaced the wine glass on the table and rocked itself up from its chair. Addressing the pantomiming human, it provoked, “we’re waiting to be proven wrong though.”
“So what about Jesus, and Muhammad, and God… and… and the Saints?” The human reached an arm out to stop the angel as it began to saunter away.
The angel paused.
“What of heaven?” The human and angel’s eyes connected for the first time revealing piercing eyes of not one color, but a sea of ever morphing reflections of all colors known and unknown.
“What of them?”
Those eyes relaxed as the human watched the most joyous and horrible of moments of his life laid out before him in blinding light and contrasting piercing darkness.
The human choked and knelt to the floor, reaching for his throat and crown as a once unencumbered mind drowned.
“Believe whatever you wish. What matters is what you do with that belief.” As the angel turned around it added with a smirk, “And as for heaven, that is the mystery even I am not allowed to reveal.”
That Cheshire smile evaporated and the human’s memory grasped at the descending details of the encounter, but his attempts were for nothing. Instead he was left holding only empty palms facing upward.
Story originally written in December 2019. Minor updates applied since.
