EXCERPTS
In her garden, she is King. She is Hatshepsut, she is Boudica, she is Joan of Arc. Her subjects are faithful and happy in her benevolent monarchy, and she celebrates her reign daily, ensuring all her charges are well and all is in the order she wants.
She understands that she is responsible for her garden, but does not own it as property because the garden is alive: she is the caregiver, and the garden represents the care she is giving it.
For Djika, responsibility is caring, not owning.
Owning fell out of fashion long before Djika was born.
The garden does not provide the stimulation of a holo game like Adventure (her favourite) or the daring escapes of story, but even so the garden space welcomes her into its embrace, and truly it feels more like home than her bedroom, or the living room where she will sometimes settle down next to Mom and Dad to see the latest news and views from the many universes outside, or even the bubble she and Pal play in most of the time, safe and separate from the rest of the multiverse.
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“I just killed ten thousand people,” Djika says. “I did it to save eighty thousand. Can you make that mean something?”
“I can,” the Queen answers.
“Good,” Djika says. She looks out into the night, the Queen next to her. “Because I don’t know if I can.”
“You have saved us,” Boudica says in wonder. “You have given us a great gift!”
“I wasn’t supposed to,” responds Djika. “I was only supposed to ask questions.”
The Queen is confused.
“Why?” asks Boudica. “Were you supposed to ask how I felt before watching me die? What is the point in that?”
“I don’t know,” Djika admits. “History is confusing, isn’t it?”
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Joan considers the request.
She wonders about the child, the lack of respect for authority, for God.
She wonders about love and what it means.
She considers, for the first time, the responsibility of power, what makes nobility, what makes a sacrifice.
“I will,” she answers. “I will not forget the reason we fight. I will not let the reason be lost.”
“How?” Djika asks.
“Women and children first,” Joan answers. “Men forget, and think it is all about them. I will teach the women to fight. The men will do what their women tell them.”
“Does God want that?” Djika asks.
“God understands,” Joan says.
“Good,” comments Djika.
Djika brings out a shiny metal cross, and offers it to Joan. There is a click, and Joan’s chains fall open.
Joan reaches out and takes the cross.
:... Hello, the cross says. My name is Pal. What can I do for you today?
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“It’s not about pride,” Jacob says. “It’s not even about sin. I mean, you say my soul must be cleansed before entering Heaven, right?”
“Yes,” the angel answers.
“So it’s about being clean enough to enter just another gated community worried about keeping the riff-raff out. But purity must be paid for, so somehow in life it becomes money which you have to have in order to join all the right clubs. And sin is now some sort of anti-money, which you have to shed so the carpet won’t get dirty. And God is just another holier-than-thou elitist hypocrite who won’t clean up his mess and blames everyone else for being dirty.”
“You speak heresy,” declares the angel.
“You have to believe for it to be heresy,” Jacob answers.
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What is the Reckoning?
I can tell you what it isn’t. It isn’t religion. It isn’t submission. It isn’t giving your self, body and soul, to a higher power. It isn’t insisting your way is the only way. It isn’t about forcing or being forced. It isn’t about moral judgment. It isn’t about blaming.
The Reckoning is about responsibility. All of us have great power: the Reckoning is the moment we come to terms with what that means. With great power comes great responsibility.
Our generation has reached the pinnacle of human possibility. Each of us has access to more power than anyone in the past ever had. The question now is, what do we do with it? Are we the civilized beings we have professed to be, or are we all budding Caligulas convinced that the only seat worth having is the seat on top of empire? Do we now forget our obligations to community and each other and become self-obsessed vanity wanderers, going where we feel, doing what we want, connecting to nothing, participating only in temporary pleasure and excess? Or do we recognize the meaning of our civilization and its possibilities, and reach for the moment when humanity as a species can finally grow up?
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Ego, for example.
Far too many leaders are convinced leadership is about them, as opposed to the populations they are leading.
After much back and forth, the Council rejects assassination and replacement as general options and instead starts to consider how to bring the most numbers into the fold.
By introducing ways to enable the powerless to reach their potential, the Council decides that there might be a chance for the people to override the leaders and produce better results.
At least, they figure, it might change the equation the leaders worked on.
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“Do you think there is anything to be gained from faith, Bob?” asks Christian in response.
“Me?” asks Bob. “I’m a demon. Of course I think there is something to be gained from faith.”
“What?”
“Followers,” states Bob.
Pause.
“Okay,” Christian answers. “As a demon, you can take advantage of a human’s beliefs to access the human psyche. Then you can manipulate the concept of sin inside the psyche to produce your profit and derive satisfaction from the human suffering that results from the sin. Is that about right?”
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Djika’s Pal receives the instruction, acknowledges and complies within a second, and turns off while Lisa and Djika are finishing up their lunch.
“That was good,” Djika comments. “Are we ready to get our hands dirty?”
Lisa laughs.
“You like playing in the dirt, huh?”
“Sure,” Djika answers. “Don’t you?”
“All gardeners do. Best to do it yourself, by hand, if you want to make it your own. Right?”
“Right,” responds Djika. They leave the Smarthouse carrying their tools and head towards the patch of ground they have chosen.
“You know what I like about making a garden?” asks Djika.
“What’s that?”
“I like that everything is important. It’s not just dirt. It’s also the light, and the seeds, and the water, and the care. I like that you have to pay attention to all of it and not leave anything out. You know what I mean?”
“Sure,” agrees Lisa. “It all has to fit together. It all has to cooperate to work.”
“I wish people were like that.”