“Jesus!” Azrael growled.
“No kidding,” I muttered. “I mean, Jesus H. Christ! This is bizarre.”
“Thank you, Carus.” Azrael waved a hand at me.
“Is this a bong or a sexual device?” I held up the thing I'd been referring to. It was glass, long, and filled with water but also phallic.
“Oh, I was wondering where I left that.” Jesus took it from me. “I'm glad you didn't touch the end. I haven't sterilized it yet.” He waved a hand over the thing and the Light of God coated it before winking out. “There you go. It's copacetic now.”
The room went silent.
The Re exclaimed, “Why have I never thought of that?! Damn it, I could have been cleaning my sex toys with sunlight this whole time! Centuries I've wasted. Centuries!”
“Okay, so that answers my question.” I looked down at my hand and wondered if I should set it on fire. Just briefly. I was also glad that I had put my gas mask back on.
“Have you lost your mind?!” Azrael shouted. “Have all of you lost your damn minds?”
“Babe, relax,” I said and went to pat his shoulder. Then I realized what hand I was about to use and jerked it back. I encased my hand in fire, let it burn away anything that may have transferred, then commenced with the patting. “I think it's brilliant. No one would come in here looking for the Ark. In fact, if anyone did invade the, er, inner sanctum, they'd probably take one look and turn tail.”
“Exactly.” Jesus waved a hand at me. “Expand your mind, Brother. The Ark is safer here than behind a ward.”
“It's not even warded?!” Azrael shrieked.
“Is it really that important?” I asked. “What can this thing do? I'm assuming it doesn't melt faces like the one in the movie.”
Jesus looked uncomfortable.
“It melts off faces?” I gaped at him.
“No, of course not,” Jesus said. “That's human imagination.”
“Oh, okay.”
“It just obliterates. More like an atom bomb.”
“What?!” I screeched.
“A verypreciseatom bomb,” Jesus hurried on. “I guess it's like a laser-bomb.” He made his hands into the shape of guns and said, “Pew, pew, pew.”
“This is the best day of my life,” Morpheus whispered.
Mrs E. grimaced at Morph, but he was too busy staring at the Ark to notice. I wasn't sure if he was reacting to the Ark or Jesus Christ going pew, pew, pew with his laser fingers. For me, it was the latter. And I had to agree with Morpheus; best day ever.
“Um, are we going to open it?” Finn asked. “Or are we going to continue to discuss the King of Heaven's sexual deviancy?” He tapped a macrame swing and set it to swaying.
“There is nothing deviant about love,” Jesus said.
“You tell him!” Re said.
“Just open the fucking box,” Brahma huffed.
With an annoyed look at Jesus, Azrael went up to the Ark and unlatched the lock. He opened the lid, then cursed, “Oh, for fuck's sake.”
I hurried over with everyone else and we peered into the Ark. Inside was a can of Pringles, a plastic fairy wand in neon pink, and one of those fake stone grave markers for pets. It read, “If love could have saved you, you would have lived forever” and it had a picture of a Pomeranian on it.
“Oh, fuck,” Jesus said.
Chapter Ten
