TC86

Jael asked, “And what is the complete picture?”

Sophia smiled. “You already know the ancient controversy from reading the Green Book. El is enjoined from communicating with any eloah on the other side of her parents, and so am I, by extension, since any message would have to run through El. But last year about the time when Pearl Harbor was attacked there was even bigger news. Have you ever listened to Ma Perkins?”

“Land o’ Goshen, sis,” said Ariel, “there ain’t a hull lot of folks never heard Ma.”

Sophia smiled again. “I see you have. And now the eloah that Indra names Gevurah has also heard Ma.”

“Oh, that’s wonderful news! It means we’ve already won!”

“Not yet, Ariel, but for the eleventh time in history Ein Sof has received signals from world-dwellers. Gevurah only has a direction to Earth, not the distance. But soon other elohim will pick up broadcasts from Earth and realize we are not very far out of reach. The Elohim will have located the Students at last! And they will wonder how there can be a stable yellow sun in their midst that remains unquickened. Questions will arise and things will rapidly grow stickier for Belial and Shemhazai from there.”

“Meanwhile,” said Jashen, “the elohim listen with rapt attention to the first soap opera, sponsored by Oxydol, the whiter, whiter soap, and they fail to understand a single word.”

“True, but the broadcasts in question aired in 1933, so we know Gevurah must be the bright star known here on Earth as Sirius.”

“I wonder if the elohim will be coming to visit us now.”

“They will send seeds Jael, at some high fraction of the speed of light. This they will do (and indeed they frequently have already done) by reproductive instinct, hoping to quicken a star thought to be unquicked. The stellar body I share with El is regularly struck by seeds, but of course to no avail since it is already occupied. So here’s the big picture: Starting from right here at point A, you’re going to help me catch one of those incoming seeds at point Zed and bring it to a relative stop outside of the sun, the body I share with El. And that will not be easy at all, because the avatar will be moving at maybe seven-tenths of the speed of light.”

“You are asking us to do this?” wondered Ariel. “This is not a command?”

“Certainly not! True, you were set aside by El to be the servants of all the Elohim, but none of this can be forced upon any of you. All of human history, in fact, is nothing more than the greatest love story never told, overcoming every barrier Belial and Shemhazai and can throw up to block the wedding of elohim and humanity!”

At these words Gabriel felt moved to come around to Ariel’s chair and kneel beside her. Hy braced himself for courage and looked Ariel in the eyes. “Ariel from the first day we became lab partners at the Academy I loved you. Every day you were gone it tore me apart. Then Dad told me we had one narrow chance to save your life and I couldn’t sleep for a minute until I saw you again, and when I actually did were frozen half to death on a stack of metal. I really believe that one moment changed me forever. Now more than anything I want to spend my life with you.”

Ariel took each of his hands in her own. “I love you too, Gabriel. It’s true! I loved you from the time we first skated at Lake 13 and I loved you even after you went skinny dipping under the mountain during my father’s funeral. But we’re Church of Green Dome and you know there’s rules.”