The City's True Name 8; Don't Panic

            Don’t Panic

           

            Sogwa said, “Really, there’s no need to panic.”

            Chaim said, “None at all.”

            Sogwa said “They don’t have to fly away.”

            Chaim said, “Probably not...”

            Overhead, flocks of Mischief’s batty friends were winging out the windows, eeking and squeaking. They flapped through three quirky turns and a fourth, and vanished into hyperspace.

            Chaim said, “...but they’re being prudent. They’re fleeing for their lives, just in case.”

            For on Channel One, Gop the Image was blasting out one heck of a rant; and this time he meant business. He’d cursed his staff, his friends, his allies and all of Hellen, and he was working up to cursing the entire world.

            Gop was bellowing, “O Not-Yet Humanity! O Homo Demi-Sapiens! O Missing Link! O Ape of Wisdom, how dare you call yourselves Human?”

            And Mischief had said, “Well, I think we corrupted his hell-bombs. I mean, we’re pretty sure. But you know, it might be a real good idea to fly a long way away from here, right away!!”

            For Gop was wearing a hell-bomb bandolier. Its detonator button glowed red.

            Sogwa shouted, “Come on, let’s go!”

            Chaim said, “No, I’m staying on watch.”

            “But Chaim!”

            “I can’t leave now,” the watchman said. “This is just when the Messiah might arrive.”

            On Channel One, Gop the Image was shouting, “O so-called Homo Sapiens, I call your bluff!  You, wise? HA! You, human? HA! You have yet to attain wisdom! You have yet to attain humanity!  Someday real human beings will show up, and then your kind will be obsolete!”

            Gop ranted, “You won’t intelligently redesign yourselves; you’re not intelligent enough! You will evolve the old-fashioned way; by natural selection!”

            Mischief squeaked, “Gotta go, now.” He hastily flapped through three quirky turns and a fourth, and vanished into hyperspace.

            Sogwa saw that Chaim truly believed in his job. There was no time to argue, so she said “Goodbye! Good  luck!” and she launched herself out the window at top speed.

            On Channel One, Gop the Image prophesied, afroth at the mouth, “It won’t take long, in cosmic terms; only ten hundred thousand years! Meanwhile you will suffer! Over and over again, century after century, your kind will make the exact same mistakes!”

            Gop roared, “You will spare yourselves nothing! Your far future descendants will earn their true humanity! They will be a better breed than you - because anything less died out!”

           The big red detonator button glowed bright on Gop’s chest.

            Sogwa spiralled kata along the fourth dimension, kata, kata, kata; the Pyramid cube grew bigger and bigger, and suddenly - pop! - she plunged back into Hellen - space.

            She saw a traffic nightmare. Huge crowds of people were clogging Church Way up and down, State Street east and west, and Market Avenue north and south. Traffic was molasses-slow in all three directions, because everybody was trying to fly away, fast.

            On Channel One, Gop the Image proclaimed,

            “And worst of your mistakes, most pitiful of your failures, most comic and tragic of all your follies and crimes, is having the raw nerve - the sheer stupid arrogance - the utter brazen effrontery - to create ME!”

            “ME -  King of the Universe!”

            “ME -  Creator of Heaven and Earth!”

            “ME -  Infinite in Wisdom, Compassion and Power!”

            “ME -  who just so happens to look exactly like YOU!!!”

            Sogwa flew as fast as she could down Church Way; then she met a traffic jam, so she turned east, onto a street. She rushed down the side-street until she met another jam; then she turned north onto an avenue. Sogwa rocketed in a spiral zig-zag, dodging traffic jams, seeking exit from Hellen, but trapped within the city by multitudes of others also seeking escape.

            On Channel One, Gop the Image howled;

            “O vain, proud and foolish race of half-wits, behold ME in truth, if you dare!”

            “ME in truth; the empty Boast!”

            “ME in truth; the unflattering Image!”

            “ME in truth; the Monkey in the Mirror!”

            “Uh, oh,” Sogwa thought. “Now he’s feeling sorry for himself, and here I am, still within city limits. Oh well.” She sighed.

            So Sogwa slowed down, and she approached the nearest cloud. It bore an abandoned lot, full of weeds; as good a place to land as any.

            Sogwa landed in the weed garden, and she sat down. Her heart raced as she awaited the outcome. “Not long now,” she thought.

            For Gop the Image was wrapping up his rant, thus:

            “So now I’m not good enough for you, right? Now you’re too grown up for me! Now you don’t need me! Now you’re philosophers, you dare to DOUBT me!”

            “Starve ME, will you? Deny ME belief? You think I’m weak? You think I’m stupid? You think I’m dead? Well, I’ll show you! I’ll show everybody!”

            “O you doubtful ones, now watch ME philosophize with a HAMMER!”

            And Gop slapped the hell-bomb’s big red detonator button.

            Then a great and holy miracle occurred.