Chapter Seven: IT ALL STARTED WITH A MOUSE


 

    Saint Francis of Assisi stood in the electric chamber holding a dying mouse. The emaciated looking little saint was just about dancing with excitement. "I have waited a long time for this day. Heaven NEEDS animals. Heaven isn't Heaven without them!

    Rodric flashed a series of hearts on his screen. "I agree. Once we have the process perfected we can go around the circle of time and preserve every last one of them. Psalm 36:6: Man and beast thou preservest, oh Lord."

    Even Starflame was unusually cheerful. "Forr hundreds of years Humans have done experriments on these poor wee creaturres. Finally you are doing one that benefits the mouse!" Sometimes the best laid plans of mice and men go straight!"

    Tubal-cain was bent down or Rodric adjusting things. "How did you get the mouse, Fran?"

    "I flew up and snatched it right out of the claws of a hawk. Was he ever surprised! Said a few bad words too. I'm glad I don't speak hawk."

    Fireflower gazed at the mouse. "Poor little guy! He has a broken back, a broken neck, and look at all that blood!"

    Saint Francis cleared his throat. "Ah, I'm afraid most of that is mine. These last two hundred years I've developed stigmata. Notice it disappears before it stains anything."

    Starflame inspected the saint's hands. "They'rre completely inaccurate. The nail holes went through His wrists, not His palms!"

    Saint Francis was amazed, "Are you sure?"

    "I was therre! It was not a prretty sight!"

    "Oh my! No wonder you are so grumpy all the time, and don't really Humans."

    "Hmmmmf! Nobody's perfect."

    Saint Francis stared at his bleeding palms. "No, Starflame. Even Angels and Saints are not perfect."

    "God is." Fireflower was watching the mouse. "How long is it going to be, Tubal- cain?"

    "Do I look like a prophet? I can't upload him until he starts to die, remember? And this little guy wants to live! He's got a broken back, a broken neck, and is now having a close encounter with alien beings. He's scared stiff, in more pain than he can manage, and he still won't give up. All we can do is wait!"

    Starflame smiled gently. "It can't be much longerr, poorr wee beastie! Any creaturre who wants to live this badly deserrves eterrnal life."

    Saint Francis cuddled the mouse in his strong, slim bleeding palms. I suppose he would die quicker if I quit loving him. But I can't stop loving him. It's just my nature."

    Fireflower and Starflame said together, "We know."

    Saint Francis gazed at Rodric. "How are we doing this anyway? I thought only Christ could give eternal life."

    Rodric spoke up, "We are the Body of Christ: I Corinthians 12:27. And we grow into the Head which is Christ: Ephesians 4:15."

    "You and your evolutionary theories!" Saint Francis was not convinced.

    Rodric pointed out. "Christ did call Himself the Son of Man on more than one occasion!"

    "But how can God be a separate person with a Consciousness all His own, if all He is, is Us?"

    Rodric explained, "When you were in the flesh, every cell in your body had its own separate nucleus, and yet you still had a brain; a very good one actually. God is a Gestalt. The All of Him, is greater than the sum of His Parts."

    Fireflower gazed at the little machine, "If your theory were entirely correct, Rodric, God would be within the Big Bang, a part of it just like Human beings and every other natural creation in this present universe, because time and space are within the Big Bang. But I'm from several big bangs back myself. How do you explain that?"
Rodric swung his camera eye around and studied Fireflower, "Maybe other dimensions beyond time circle too. But even if you are from several big bangs back, didn't you evolve on a planet, too?"

    Fireflower shrugged, "It's hard to say. Maybe. I don't remember what planet I came from, if any, or even what universe it was I am from. I can't  remember that far back."

    "You can't remember your own universe!" Saint Francis was amazed, "Doesn't that really really bother you?"

    "No." Fireflower shrugged, "You can't remember the first few years of your existence either. Does that bother you?"

    "No." the saint admitted, "But there's quite a bit of difference between two or three measly years and several trillion millennia!"

    "No, Fran, there isn't. It's the same thing. Really it is. After a few billion universes come and go, they all begin to look alike."

    "Except this one." Starflame added, "We neverr had a Fall before."

    "That's true." Fireflower nodded.

    "Therre must be some REASON for it."

    "Yeah." said Fireflower.

    "But what?"

    Fireflower shrugged, "I don't know."

    Rodric flashed smiley faces on his screen. "I'm glad I remember the exact moment I became conscious. It would bother me no end, not being able to remember something like that."

    Saint Francis gazed at the computer. "There's no mystery in your universe, Rodric! No mystery and no magic. Everything is science and evolutionary theory, and rational explanations to you. To you, even God is explainable as just another Life form that evolved."

    "And that comforts me no end," Rodric explained. " You lack sufficient data to explain anything. Even a thunderstorm seems miraculous to you. Lightning bolts are portents from God, not simple electrical discharges. With you, EVERYTHING is magic and mystery."

"And that comforts ME no end." The Saint replied quietly.

    Tubal-cain continued to adjust Rodric. "Whether He evolved or not, God is very real, Fran. Anyway you know that."

    "I believe that. I don't KNOW anything. I'm not one for all this scientific stuff, the way you and Rodric are."

    Tubal-cain smiled, "There's a ‘how' to building Heaven as well as a ‘why.' ‘Why' is ‘Because God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life. For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world should be saved through Him.' ‘How' is what we are doing here."

    Fireflower nodded, "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from Heaven."

    Rodric commented, "I am not my hardware. I am my software. All I am is information. All this mouse is, is information. All you are, is information. Even God is information. ‘In the Beginning was the WORD and the WORD was God.' Information can be stored in a multitude of ways, and....."

    Saint Francis interrupted, "Gentlemen. Our mouse is dying."

    Tubal-cain pushed Rodric's left mouse button.

    Fireflower giggled, "Hey Tubal-cain, you just used a mouse to save a mouse!"

    The little mouse ghost rose out of its dying organic body and suddenly found itself in a new one. Squeaking with fear, it jumped out of Saint Francis's hands and went scurrying away."

    "Hey, come back here!" Starflame sputtered.

    Fireflower started slapping his knees and giggling furiously. "He was the first, the very first! And he had a chance to meet Saint Francis, and yet off he went!"

    Rodric made smiley faces dance across his screen. "His chance for fame, and he blew it!"

    Tubal-cain grinned wryly, "Well at least we know the process works."

    "And it all started with a mouse." Fireflower was grinning from ear to ear.

    "Didn't Walt Disney say that, too?" Starflame wanted to know.

    I don't know. Why don't you ask him? But you'd better ask him quickly, before he has to go back down!" Fireflower was giggling.

    "Huh." Saint Francis asked.

    "He's working on Disney Galaxy right now. And he's doing it rather frantically. Rumor has it, before he died, he had himself cryogenised. Now he's afraid they'll thaw him out."

    "Oops," said Saint Francis.

    "Yeah," said Fireflower. "Oops."

    Tubal-cain sat down. "Well Rodric, we've done it! One mouse done, and only one hundred and fifty billion zillion more of them to go!"

    Saint Francis added, and foxes, and wolves, and otters, and dogs and cats, and...."

    "Lions and tigers and bears, oh my!" Starflame and Fireflower grabbed each other by the crook of their arms, starting marching around the cave chanting it together. "Lions and tigers and bears, oh my! Lions and tigers and bears, oh my!"

    Saint Francis's jaw dropped and he turned to Tubal-cain with puzzlement in his eyes. The Caveman shrugged, "What can I say? They're alien intelligences. We don't have to understand them. We just have to love them."

    Tubal-cain turned to Rodric and smiled, "Buzz Box, I think we're going to have to clone you a few times."

    "A few times." the little computer admitted. Yellow smileys and red hearts danced on his screen. "Don't forget we have all the animals from ALL the planets to do."

    Fireflower commented, "Saint Francis, get your team together. You've got enough things to keep you busy and occupied now for the rest of several eternities."

    The Saint nodded, "Now Heaven really IS Heaven."

    "Squeak!" said the mouse. He was back.

    Suddenly they understood what the mouse was saying. The mouse wanted a house. "So.'s that's how it's going to work! The mouse squeaks and suddenly we understand ‘squeak.' " Saint Francis was amazed.

    Fireflower giggled, "It never dawned on you, Fran, that you understand me, even though I am speaking to you in who knows what, and you understand Rodric even though he speaks in Japanese, and you understand Starflame here, who speaks in Ruffles potato chip commercialese? Of course we understand the mouse!"

    Tubal-cain prayed, "God, please readjust my cave to include several miles of mouse sized tunnels."

    God's warm presence filled the cave. "It is done. I will not add warm grasses for bedding because collecting those will give Bobby Burns something to do with his eternal life for a few million years. Gradually he will get smarter and find other things to do with his time as his intellect develops."

    The tunnels appeared. The mouse scurried into one.

    The caveman smiled, "Well that takes care of experiment number one. Its going to take Rodric and myself quite a while to do anything more complex than a mouse.

    Fireflower smiled, "Well you've got forever to do it. Come on, Starflame, all the fun stuff is over here. Lets go out to the Sombrero galaxy in the year 2020 and go to that intergalactic science fiction convention again."

    Starflame pouted. "You've been therre ten thousand times!"

    "But I go as a different character each time!"

    "By now half the costumed creaturres therre are you!"

    "So?" "Didn't anybody everr tell you, it is weird to talk to yourrself in public?"

    Fireflower giggled.

    "Why not go out to the Horsehead nebula and play asterroid football?"

    "Oh come on Starflame. Why do they play it in a nebula? No one can see more than a hundred miles ahead and all that dust gets all over us."

    "That's most of the fun."

    "I'll go with you to that one out in the O J solar system. At least there we can see what's going on."

    "Hey great." said Starflame. "I neverrr thought I'd hear you say you'd play! Take note, everrybody! This doesn't happen very often. The couch potato is going to exerrcise."

    Fireflower giggled, "Who said anything about playing? All I want to do is watch it."

    Starflame groaned.

    Fireflower took off. Soon they were at the O J star system watching the football game. A Venus like planet near its sun-star was one goal. A Saturn like planet on the outermost rim of the star system was the other goal. Several huge asteroids were the balls, and about ten billion glorified life forms from various planets, space stations, rim worlds and Dyson spheres were the players. This particular star system had no life forms so there was no danger of the "balls" causing a dinosaur-destroying type tragedy.

    "Football is no fun." Fireflower complained, "It only has two possible outcomes. Either one team wins or the other. And what difference does it make which wins?"

    "Fireflower you are a party pooperrr."

    Fireflower nodded, "This particular game has been going on for ten thousand years, and there are people fanatical enough about watching football  who have actually floated here and watched the whole thing. This is their idea of Heaven! I don't get it."

    Well yourr idea of Heaven is to dress up like a fake alien and go to a science fiction convention full of real aliens dressing up like fake aliens, I don't get that eitherr!"

    Fireflower giggled.

    Ages passed. Time and space danced their eternal circle over and over again. Soon there was a not a spot in the Kingdom of Heaven that did not contain a mouse or an octopus or a bird. Angels rode horses who danced through a gazillion skies with wings the color of rainbows. Unicorns and goats danced in silver moonlight on a multitude of planets. Owls hooted from the tops of a zillion temples in a trillion universes. Lions and tigers purred like pussy cats and lay down and rolled in the happy green grass with lambs and little children. Snakes slept in the sunlight on rocks and hissed their joy to God a billion trillion gazillion times. Larks soared past the sky, and peacocks, ostriches and penguins found they could soar like eagles past the plains of Mars.

    God watched over the mewing, cooing, growling, yipping, yapping, whinnying wonder with deep eternal joy and satisfaction. Saint Francis, Tubal-cain and all the Humans forget they ever had anything to do with it. To them the Kingdom of Heaven had always been this way. Only God who remembered the alternate time-lines remembered a time when the Kingdom of Heaven did not contain animals. The Angels and Rodric also remembered a little bit, though their memories of a different Heaven faded a little bit more with each circling of time. Rodric sat on God's lap and watched the marvelous melee and smileys flashed on his screen.

    "It is Good!" said God."

    "Indeed!" said Rodric.

     "Yup!" said Fire flower.

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