Nemesis

[ToHoldNothing]

And He was there in the wilderness forty days, tempted of Satan; and was with the wild beasts; and the angels ministered unto him.-Mark 1:13





The Sabbath began on the planet of blue and green simply and modestly. Lights turned on and the time began; that of communion, of fellowship, of great rituals, chants and collective worship of a deity that might as well have not been there for all the exaggeration and excessiveness of adherence to churchgoing. But they continued in a constant attempt to validate themselves, in bondage to a necessary evil in their minds.

It was a stormy day, grey and white clouds overshadowing the sun that managed to peek through at times. It wasn’t the kind of weather you’d see in the spring and not worry about showers or rain at all, so most of the laity brought their umbrellas.

Lightning began to flash, the rain pouring harder as one flash rang particularly loud near the roof. A shadow manifested at the cross at the steeple, moving back to the middle of the roof, silent and unknown to those limited to those mortal lives.

The figure sat on the roof of the impressive sized chapel, looking up at the sky with a disinterested and almost blank gaze. He slowly closed his eyes, not sleeping, but contemplating the many places he had seen, the virtues and vices of the race created by the great Ineffable, called by many names, all unimpressive in describing the being that he himself knew all too well.

Satanel smirked gently, his teeth revealed slightly in a manic fashion as he reverted back to passive amusement as he watched the humans go along with this indoctrinated routine, this cyclical positive reinforcement of neurosis and psychosis that came about from someone that he respected a great deal and yet strongly opposed by his very nature as “the devil” that the humans tended to call him.

He walked down the precipitous edge where the two sides of the roof met, stopping at the edge, looking down as the humans continued to pour in. He crouched to get a closer look, though he certainly didn’t require it since he was already standing on top of a ten story chapel and in possession of vision precise enough that he could see the hairs on each churchgoer’s head.

He stopped as he sensed a new presence sharing the roof with him, his deep violet eyes narrowing as he stood up, brushing the dust off his jet black slacks, matched by an even darker black dress shirt, half buttoned and disheveled. Satanel was clean shaven in contrast to the beard his rival wore, a much more presentable appearance in contrast to the dark aura he gave off as a supposedly “evil” being.

“Didn’t think you’d be here Yeshua. Aren’t you supposed to be inside? After all, you are the main attraction and fixation of the sheep, aren’t you?” The dark entity ended the last statement with a grin that seemed only to make the righteously angry deity even more infuriated. Though the equally patient deity held its tongue and tried its hardest to suppress it or make it not as obvious.

“You know as well as I do that the humans don’t think I have to be in the church to be with them; you’ve read the scriptures as well as anyone. It’s remarkable that you come here on the day they go. It’s like you’re hinting that you might want to quit your job, even though it is equally as important as my own.”

The accuser shrugged it off as he scoffed, “Don’t try to make me feel better, negotiator. You’re the focal point of most of their arguments anyway. ‘Are you separate from God, are you God, are you below God, are you superior to God, are you crazy, did you even exist in history?’ It becomes quite exasperating. At least the humans aren’t fighting over me, they tend to agree with that ridiculous myth about me being God’s favorite and then rebelling and that I’m in a lake of fire. You on the other hand don’t always stay the same; Caucasian European, the beard and everything. There’s always the liberation theology or the progressive revelation ideas… And who can forget the claim that you’re an avatar or a bodhisattva?” He chuckled sardonically at Yeshua and turned to look at the sky again.

The focus of Satanel’s attacks smirked slightly and in a blink became clearly the opposite of the traditional portrayal he was before. One would initially think he was a Muslim more than anything like the historical portrayals of Jesus throughout time were. His hair was now worse than Satanel’s, disheveled and splitting all over, the bangs threatening to cover his eyes completely, deeply clashing with the deceiver’s neatly combed straight hair.

This was all merely for appearances and they both knew it, but Yeshua’s attempt at humor only worked slightly, Satanel chuckling once in sarcasm as he sat at the edge of the church, effortlessly tearing off the cross welded onto the roof and twirling it in midair playfully as Yeshua watched from behind. Satanel’s eyes relaxed slightly as he held the artifice gently and turned to see his proverbial opposite looking sympathetically at him, though he tried to hide that unconsciously. He moved the cross back to its place, fusing the metal back into the roof, though for all the humans knew the cross had always been there.

There was a long silence as the two listened to the introductions with their supernatural senses, both of them scanning over the followers with their own feelings, either of sympathy or disappointment. Yeshua silently observed marked differences in enthusiasm and agreement with the preacher at the pulpit, while Satanel slowly noted the skeptics and doubters in the congregation, marking them metaphorically in his mind as the “targets” he needed to later pursue.

“They are quite impressive when you think about it,” Yeshua spoke first, knowing Satanel was more the one to respond to something than start a conversation himself, “Mortal, tangible, temporary and overall very limited and yet they can perform amazing feats with the virtue of who they originated from. Even those who lack faith in us can create such amazements as antibiotics and knowledge of their very physical nature.”

“And yet they’ve maintained that mental dysfunction even over all the years of acquiring new knowledge. They all fight
with each other over if Elohim exists, if it’s necessary, if it’s coherent, if we can know it. The list goes on. The very revelation given to all those people that was supposed to serve as one of many guides to the humans, not the law as a whole, has now caused multitudes of problems, all of which the Ineffable knew of in the first place. And yet it created them…out of love…or was it merely to showcase this remarkable plan that we messengers know only a fraction of,”
Yeshua nodded slowly as he responded, “But you know the humans can perform all these good things, acts of charity, of love, of compassion even without Elohim, which is all the more of a testament to the intrinsic nature they possess, that soul of love, of autonomic will and yet a necessary consideration of others, knowing they are all in this together.”

The conclusion was met with raucous laughter from Satanel, making Yeshua sigh in exasperation, “What’s funny now? You know we can’t read each other’s minds; that would make this whole conversation pointless,”

Satanel grinned as he turned to face Yeshua, shifting from his depressive and misanthropic façade to a new mask of mania and euphoria at his own revelation.

“You really can’t believe that [bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse] without observing them and ignoring that they have always been self interested. The “Chosen People” killed the others to raise themselves above the pagans. They took on the idea of me and taught it to your followers to create a further elitism with me at the bottom rung, influencing everything but your idealism. Even Mohammed put a new spin on me, a freaking djinn, not even an angel in Muslim mythology. Every new system just tries to make itself seem better, to isolate itself, to overcome the previous traditions in their new wave of influence. The Mormons are the closest in accuracy, but that’s what they want to think. We’re not brothers, God’s not the father. We’re all just in a Council; that’s as close as they got to accuracy.”

 

[ToHoldNothing]

“But that aspect of their character would have come from you…at least that’s what they tell themselves,” Yeshua replied, knowing that the Genesis argument would fall apart instantly, but he thought it was worth a try, seeing as the Accuser himself was one of the 12 since the beginning, one of Elohim’s advisors, practically older in one manner than Yeshua, though they were created all instantaneously, only a few new angels coming about with the necessity of the Architect’s power failing him.

“No need to bring up that; it never even happened. There were “Adams” and “Eves”, not just one set of each, and frankly the only reason humans have the aspect of the will to power, the desire for dominance is in their physical incarnation. But remember, they are the shadows of their creator, the Architect, the true precursor to ordered
existence.

“That would certainly support the idea that they are power hungry, since Elohim would probably admit that a good deal of its motivation was from just the power that it had. The love came after the pawns came to decide that worshipping the single God was superior to the multiple deities theory that just created tribal wars all over..”

“And yet, you admit that God created humans because he loved them,” Yeshua spoke with a slight smile coming to his face, “that God in essence is love, is compassion, is all the things I argued humans focus on in a great deal of their actions.”

“And yet aren’t those actions simply performed to prove to people, if even just to themselves, that they are great, to raise their own self perception higher? Even the altruistic actions can be boiled down to self interest in their own status. The only way the love nature can work is if we redefine love to apply to egoistic and altruistic love, which might work…but it seems to fall away with the strength of this idea that the creations are just advanced animals. The nonbelievers have gotten that part right, especially that German who had a mental breakdown and died alone.”

“Regardless of where this goes, the problem is in that we can’t really generalize everyone and yet that’s the only way to get a true idea of what their nature is… It’s difficult if not untenable to suggest humans are just one thing: compassionate with the altruism natural in communal life or self interested, even if they were just animals in a race for survival, Elohim loves them all the same, doesn’t it?”

“It loves them because with a good deal of them, it gets itself a free and easy fan club for as long as they procreate which is practically eternal if Elohim planned it that way. Seems that would not make the big guy very good on reflection by the humans that have a capacity of reasoning and critical thinking that it gave them.”

Yeshua shook his head again, “There’s no need to be so pessimistic about them just because they don’t like you.”

“Don’t underestimate them,” Satanel responded with a smirk as he reverted to a calmer demeanor, a curved sheath appearing at his side as he unsheathed the elegant and sharp katana and motioned it towards Yeshua. “I’ve got quite a few followers overall myself. And if the “Christians” are right, I’ve practically got the same number of followers, ranging from Buddhists to all the Reconstructionist Pagans and Wicca’s getting more popular too. I may be the dominant deity in the future, but that’s just what these sheep want, to be the oppressed minority, so the big hero “Jesus” will come and kick my ass.”

Yeshua shrugged again as he sighed, knowing these arguments never ended with any real conclusion, but he was happy they never ended with bad blood between them. His eyes turned back to Satanel’s as they made eye contact and Yeshua’s gaze lightened and became slightly envious and yet sorrowful at the same time as he spoke, his own broadsword in a clash with Satanel’s, “You have no idea how much I want to be like you; nearly every day.”
Satanel became more somber as he looked down, trying to hide his own concern, pushing away as he motioned the blade towards Yeshua again and speaking “It was the damn politics. If you had been known for being a rebel and not the good boy then you would’ve gotten the position. It’s fate, if there’s such a thing for angels when we’re created just to glorify the creator and talk to the humans so they don’t think they’re completely crazy. But me,” he leapt into the air, bringing the blade down as Yeshua blocked it deftly.

“You are the progress that Elohim wanted,” Yeshua replied as he pushed Satanel back again, “Humans need to doubt in order to fully recognize what kind of faith is good and what kind is destructive. God wants people to use their brains as much as their feelings and you’re just motivating them to do that…The problem is the whole horns and a tail image you get after all these lies from humans made up. Especially that one about you being Lucifer, the greatest angel, who fell from grace because of his arrogance. Definitely doesn’t cover any of us really, not even the real Lucifer, though we don’t call him that anyway, better to call him Helel.”

Satanel nodded as he turned to face away from Yeshua, “You’re loved by them. I’m not even really loved by any Satanists, they just worship me, and they raise me up on a pedestal…you…you’re the human that sacrificed itself to save them from this idea of sin.”

“Humans tend to love what is beneficial to them, as you said. Of course they won’t like you. The problem is that life isn’t just about what helps you for good, it’s also about what the bad things that happen to you can do to help you. Don’t you think that’s a better way to think about it?”

Again, Satanel shrugged and nodded as he faced Yeshua, noticing the humans were leaving the church. The two fought for a bit longer and like the broadsword and katana’s clashing showed, Yeshua’s will was wider, more powerful, while Satanel’s was malleable, and narrower as he utilized Yeshua’s power against him, Yeshua always striking back stronger each time, the unending cycle abruptly stopped. The blades were both reversed suddenly by the air, turned to the user’s necks as the new masters materialized behind Satanel and Yeshua. Behind Yeshua stood a darker, masculine figure and a mirror image behind Satanel, brighter and feminine. The fighters relaxed and the weapons were relinquished back to them. The clouds parted and the rain subsided as well with a final roll of thunder.

“Looks like we’re needed…” Satanel spoke as he narrowed his eyes.

Both Metatron and Sandalphon, Metatron the more metallic appearing and Sandalphon the more crystalline, had no glint or emotional affect present in their eyes, both the pairs of eyes dark and metallic in appearance almost. The pair was, if the phrase could be coined, artificially created angels, the messengers for the aging voice that spoke through the normally mute automatons.

“Metatron,” Yeshua spoke a bit simply as if speaking to children, which is what the more recent angels that stood before them were in retrospect to the elder seraphim, “Sandalphon. What does the Ineffable desire?”

The darker one, Metatron, spoke, Sandalphon completely mute, serving a different purpose in regard to their creator.
“This conflict is a pointless endeavor to continue here, Christos, Nemesis,”

Yeshua and Satanel turned aloofly away as their expressions became a bit sour, mostly like children who had grown up and left the parents’ house, but couldn’t avoid the authority that those parents held over them in one way or another.

“And yet, you must have heard us through the Grigori standing before us, Elohim,” Yeshua spoke first, Satanel still somber and angst ridden, looking up at the clearing sky, “The conflict exists, does it not?”

Sandalphon nodded and motioned to the clouds that Satanel watched and utilized further slight waves and jerks of the arm to indicate what Satanel quickly realized as he spoke for Elohim, wanting to assert himself in the conversation in some manner.

“No need to speak further Metatron, at least about the moral of the story. Sandalphon’s talking about how darkness doesn’t exist without light to serve as a contrast. Those Daoists hit the nail right on the head with the idea that there are no opposites, no dichotomies. Everything is different in some manner and yet we’re all in the same boat, so to speak. There’s no need for us to have any endless squabbles over this, verbal or otherwise,” He shrugged, a bit of sheepishness crossing his face as he quickly sheathed his blade, Yeshua snapping his fingers and dematerializing his into the numen.

Metatron and Sandalphon nodded as Elohim disappeared with them, their forms fading into the air, the Christos and Nemesis left silently as they turned to each other and silently disappeared as well, the threads of reality torn and stitched back up as were the wounds that had been inflicted there, healed in a voiceless truce between the adversaries and yet the differences recognized, not set aside, but affirmed.