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| Whom God Destroys Teaser! [message #55682] |
Wed, 21 March 2012 01:32  |
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 E. E. Nalley
Messages: 603
Registered: July 2005
Location: Atlanta, GA |
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Whom God Destroys
An Erinyes Adventure
By E. E. Nalley
He said: "Thou petty people, let me pass.
What canst thou do but bow to me and kneel?"
But sudden a dry land caught fire like grass,
And answer hurtled but from shell and steel.
He looked for silence, but a thunder came
Upon him, from Liège a leaden hail.
All Belgium flew up at his throat in flame
Till at her gates amazed his legions quail.
Take heed, for now on haunted ground they tread;
There bowed a mightier war lord to his fall:
Fear! lest that very green grass again grow red
With blood of German now as then with Gaul.
If him whom God destroys He maddens first,
Then thy destruction slake thy madman's thirst.
Stephen Phillips, The Kaiser and Belgium
A Treasury of War Poetry: British and American Poems of the World War 1914-1917. Boston and New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1917
St. Ignatius Chapel, Holy Trinity Catholic Church, Old D.C. 10:42am, May 19th
The white plaster walls of the small complex of buildings that made up Holy Trinity Catholic Church gleamed in the mid-morning sun. Nestled in the massive, vaguely rhomboid shaped 'bowl' that protected Georgetown University framed by the Reservoir, Wisconsin and M Street Canals. Holy Trinity took up the entire block of the old roads and those walls had seen a lot of changes over the centuries. Its first building having been erected in 1794, it was the oldest Catholic Church in the area, and one of the few that could boast both slaves and Presidents had been parishioners.
It was not as ornate a building as some of the others of the Old Capital that had been saved from the rising oceans, but its classic Greco-roman edifice stood with a quiet dignity that went beyond embellishment. Having been built and run by the Society of Jesus, such an austere dignity was fitting. Still, austerity gave way to practicality in the late twenty first century; the sanctuary was full of cool air from the campus's central HVAC plant against the May swelter.
Father Joshua Leonard, SJ, was glad of the cooler air as he made his way into the sanctuary, regretting briefly the traditional black suit that was the hallmark of a Catholic Priest. The Jesuit vow of poverty had been expanded by Papal Bull to include personal air conditioners which made crossing the quad of the church's campus quite a chore in late summer. In spring, it was merely unpleasant.
"Lead by example," the priest told himself quietly as he paused to kneel and cross himself towards the altar before continuing into the chapel proper. Father Leonard was nearly sixty, the very image of the kindly old parish priest; slightly overweight, balding and blessed with a round face that was never in want of a smile. Despite the slight paunch, he was very fit for his age, perhaps because of the austere lifestyle of self denial he had led. It had been his intention to make a sweep through the chapel to replace burned out prayer candles but as he rose from paying his respect he noticed the subtle signal that someone was in the confessional.
Father Leonard made his way there first, mentally preparing himself to be of aid to whatever brother or sister needed of him. He settled into his place, sent a silent prayer upward for God to place the right words in his mouth, before closing the door with one hand and opening the small partition between his booth and the next with the other.
Immediately a rich, lightly accented voice drifted from the decorative screen that separated the two. "Bless me, Father, for I have sinned, it has been three weeks since my last confession."
A smile of recognition pulled at Father Leonard's cheeks, "God forgives all things so long as we continue to strive towards His perfection, my daughter," he told her. "What trespass weighs down your heart?"
There was a slight pause from the screen before the woman's voice asked, "How much time do you have, Father Leonard?" Joshua couldn't contain a soft chuckle at the worried tone of her voice.
"I have as long as you need me, Elisa," he assured her.
She seemed to think about that for a moment, and then finally continued, "I have committed fornication, Father." Joshua frowned for a moment as he dug out his PDA from a suit pocket and consulted it. He called up the records he kept only to find his memory was not as faulty as he imagined.
"It's been some time since you fell to that particular sin, my daughter."
"I...I think I may have found a husband, father," she admitted. "I guess I couldn't restrain myself."
"I'm glad this isn't some passing fling," the priest told her from making his notes. "I would be very disappointed if you had fallen so far after all the work we put in. Has this young man given you indication he seems interested in more than carnal knowledge of you?"
"If you recall my confession from last year about the company Christmas party he is the same gentleman."
"As I told you then, Elisa, that was not sinful. You had no control of yourself, and you did not seek out that state. God does not hold you accountable for the actions of others. But, when we had last spoken I gathered that you were more interested in keeping this relationship professional."
"I was," she affirmed. "We had to go through a very difficult piece of work and we finally came to an agreement about what had happened then." Joshua felt his eyebrows ascend his forehead.
"And this agreement included fornication?"
"No!" She paused again gathering her thoughts to try and explain the situation better. "He let me know that he had been interested in me for a long time, more so than I had realized, to be honest, Father. I guess I had been using him as a yardstick, even though he was really everything I could want in a husband but I hadn't let myself consider him because he was a co-worker as well as what had happened."
"After your parents passed on," the priest said slowly, "I was worried that perhaps you set your sights a bit too high. Still, I must admit to being very proud of the strides you have made in your walk with God, Elisa."
"It has been very hard," the young woman admitted. "I hope I haven't accidentally ruined something by letting a beautiful place put me off my guard."
"Elisa," Joshua told her, "if you'll allow me a bit of indulgence, let me quote his Holiness, who said, 'the body, and it alone, is capable of making visible what is invisible: the spiritual and divine. It was created to transfer into the visible reality of the world the mystery hidden since time immemorial in God, and thus to be a sign of it'. Now, what John Paul was saying, better than I could, is that our bodies are all we have to perceive the wonder that is God. The unity of the act of physical love is the closest we poor mortals can come to the love God holds for us. We of the Church encourage young people to hold off only because marriage is the best framework to understand something as monumental as that. Sex, to use the vulgar term, is not of itself sinful. It is a wonderful and glorious thing. As wonderful as I'm sure you thought your time with this young man was, it would be so much more so if he were in fact your husband."
"I know, father. I am sorry I lost control, or rather I gave up control."
"A small, but important difference, my daughter," he chuckled. "Still, if this young man is in Our Lord's plan for you, I doubt you've done any damage to that. I, however, must encourage you to be more mindful in your further dealings with him."
"I will, father."
"I think one Our Father and one Hail Mary will serve as a good penance for this, my daughter."
"Yes father," she replied before looking up into the screen. Joshua could just make out her glistening, dark eyes before he forced himself to look away as was proper. "Father, am I a good person?"
Her question drew his gaze back in surprise, proper or not. "Goodness, child, what would make you ask such a thing?"
"Do you think I am a good person?" she pressed. "I try to be a good Catholic, father, I really do, but there are times..." She looked away for a moment before her eyes returned to the lattice board that separated them. "I have always trusted you, Father Leonard. You know more about me than anyone walking this Earth. What do you think of me?"
"In many ways, my dear child, I think of you as the daughter I did not have," he told her kindly. "Having watched you grow up, I had taken pride in your successes, and agonized with you in your failures. I suppose I should confess my own pride there in my next confession. I knew for a good while that you were not fitting into the First Born Son mold your parents had made for you. I was worried that perhaps you would have to struggle with repressing homosexuality through your adult life. When you came to me with your decision to seek out a place with Themis, I understood my error."
He sighed and shook his head at his own wandering thoughts. "I know you weren't looking for a repeat of the Church's stance on homosexuality and transgender issues. Yes, Elisa, I think you are a good person, a good Catholic, and a good and dear friend. Now, what brought this on; something at work?"
Her face was obscured by her voluminous black hair as she nodded and then forced her eyes up to meet his gaze again. "Father, I want to kill a man."
That gave the priest a moment of pause. He took in the cold fire in her eyes and he realized this wasn't some fit of pique as he might address in one of his other parishioners. Elisa was a killer, her job demanded it of her, and there was murder in her eyes. The priest had spent many an hour in this booth helping her see the difference in the lives she had taken to save others. To compare her with the traditional policemen of old and how the violence their job demanded of them was no different. But he knew it was a very fine line he walked. More to the point, deep down through years of hearing her confessions he knew that if she desired to kill someone, they were only a few short steps from the Pearl Gates.
That meant her own soul, which he cherished as if she were his own flesh and blood, was entirely in his hands. Joshua forced his dry tongue to lick his dry lips. "Murder is a very terrible sin, my daughter. I'm glad that you have come to me first. What can I say to keep you from throwing your life away in such a manner?"
A single tear escaped her eye and rolled down her dusky cheek. "He is evil, Father, an evil as pure and rancid as you could ask for."
"It's not his soul I'm worried about, Elisa, it's yours. Tell me what has happened to put you in this state. We will work through this and then, I promise you, we will find some way that this villain is brought to heel."
After a long moment she nodded, with a small, tired sigh. "I suppose it all started about two weeks ago. I had just gotten back from a well deserved vacation that was cut short due to the pressing needs of the company..."
Be a dreamer who DOES, not a dreamer who dreams!
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| Re: Whom God Destroys Teaser! [message #55726 is a reply to message #55682 ] |
Wed, 21 March 2012 17:51  |
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Nicky82
Messages: 1402
Registered: May 2011 |
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Welcome back, it's good to hear about you again, your silence had me worried.
Looking forward for the whole story.
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| Re: Whom God Destroys Teaser! [message #55739 is a reply to message #55700 ] |
Wed, 21 March 2012 23:38 |
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Sir Lee
Messages: 3059
Registered: May 2005
Location: São Paulo, Brazil |
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| E. E. Nalley wrote on Wed, 21 March 2012 11:26 | I work in print preview mode
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You are the second person I know of that does that.
True story. Last year an acquaintance asked me to spec for him a faster machine. He gave me the specs of his current machine. I did a double-take: the machine he wanted to replace was, well, it was about top of the line for a "regular" machine: big, fast hard disk. Lots of RAM. Fast processor. Very good graphics card.
We ended up assembling for him what was essentially a dream gaming machine, except we didn't go for dual video cards. Top of line CPU, motherboard, hard disks, SSD, the *case* alone cost the price of a standard computer. And he paid it with a smile.
The surprising part? The main app he uses is Word. The reason he needs all that power is that he is constantly revising the big, thick, law reference books he writes (there's an updated edition every year, you know), all crammed with footnotes -- and in print preview mode. Word slows to a crawl under those conditions.
Don't call me Shirley. You will surely make me surly.
--
Sent from my Bugs Industries® bPhone™
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| Re: Whom God Destroys Teaser! [message #55755 is a reply to message #55739 ] |
Thu, 22 March 2012 10:29 |
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Cockle
Messages: 646
Registered: July 2011
Location: UK |
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| Sir Lee wrote on Thu, 22 March 2012 03:38 |
The surprising part? The main app he uses is Word. The reason he needs all that power is that he is constantly revising the big, thick, law reference books he writes (there's an updated edition every year, you know), all crammed with footnotes -- and in print preview mode. Word slows to a crawl under those conditions.
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Not really my area of expertise, but might he not do better with specialist publishing software?
One of the biggest problems with Word, IME/O, is that it's an all-in-one program. In an attempt to do all those things quite well it gets horribly bloated and inefficient.
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| Re: Whom God Destroys Teaser! [message #55760 is a reply to message #55755 ] |
Thu, 22 March 2012 11:21 |
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Sir Lee
Messages: 3059
Registered: May 2005
Location: São Paulo, Brazil |
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| Cockle wrote on Thu, 22 March 2012 11:29 | Not really my area of expertise, but might he not do better with specialist publishing software?
One of the biggest problems with Word, IME/O, is that it's an all-in-one program. In an attempt to do all those things quite well it gets horribly bloated and inefficient.
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Possibly. But then, he would have to convert his books (remember, those are not new projects, they are constantly revised reference books). And then check if the conversion needs to be tweaked. And then learn the new program. And then rewrite his macros. It's just more cost-effective for him to buy a new gaming monster every year or two -- those books give him a very good income, and delaying one would cost him way more than the three of four thou for the machine.
Don't call me Shirley. You will surely make me surly.
--
Sent from my Bugs Industries® bPhone™
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) Currently the story is at 37 pages and I'd guess it's just over or right at half way and Elisa is being persistent in wanting to get this story out, so soon.
