Chapter 398: Uncertainty, Part 10
Heaven - 31 December 1945
"Gabriel concentrated hard on what he was typing..." Gabriel concentrated hard on what he was typing. His assistant entered the room, finding him writing in a fury.
"So, uh, Gabriel," said the assistant, "Gabriel?"
Gabriel continued typing.
"God?" said the assistant.
"Just a second," said Gabriel.
"Is that the new angel OS you're working on?" said the assistant. "I can help if it's in Python--"
"No, no, this isn't code, Neil, and if it was, it would be in Java, which is obviously what God used to write GenesOS," said Gabriel, "This is a story. A marvelous story, full of love and heartbreak and...more love. And even more heartbreak. And even more love. You get the idea."
He grabbed two horrible looking outfits from the chair and held them up for Neil to look at.
"Quick," he said, "Which makes me look more pathetic?"
"Why do you want to look pathetic?" said Neil. "You just reunited angelkind. You're basically God. I mean, that's like--"
"Winning a people's choice award?" finished Gabriel. "Not quite the real deal, now, is it? All set?"
Neil adjusted the dials on the radio and handed Gabriel and microphone.
"Flip the switch and wait for the light, sir," said Neil.
"And every angel in heaven and on earth will hear me?"
"You and only you. The signal blocks out all other voices on angel radio. Come on."
Gabriel tested the microphone. "Hello?" he said, only to get terrible reverb.
"Sorry," said Neil, adjusting some dieals.
Gabriel cleared his throat. "Ahem," he began, "I'd like to take a moment to welcome you all back. I want you to know how moved I am that you've accepted me as your new God. My heart, as they say, is full, which is why I want to share some wonderful news with you. I'm going on a short trip. Heaven's door will be temporarily closed pending my return, but rest assured all will be explained. And it will be...tremendous. Believe me. We're going to make Heaven great again."
He put down the microphone and gathered up his outfit.
"Where are you going?" asked Neil.
"To finish this story arc," said Gabriel, "I can't leave it hanging, obviously."
Friedrichstrasse, West-East Berlin border - afternoon
Berlin had seen better days. The once mighty capital had been divided between the Reich and the Soviets. Red Army guards patrolled the border (arbitarily set by Zhukov), preventing the two sides from interacting with each other. Of course, this was met with a lot of protests. Most of the big mobs, though, had been ruthlessly pacified over the last year. A cloud of fear pervaded the capital. But fear didn't dissuade many trapped in East Berlin from trying to escape to the west, especially on New Year's Eve.
"Good afternoon, you're watching IBC live from West Berlin..." An IBC camera crew was busy filming a segment near the border, where the Soviets were setting up a barbed wire fence and machine gun turrets in some places. Zhukov had publicly announced that this was to "reduce the influx of fascists flooding into East Berlin," but everybody knew it was to keep in the Berliners stuck in the east. Of course, Adenauer's government protested this announcement, but like with other announcements the Reich was powerless to prevent its implementation.
As the cameras rolled, a boy, barely a teenager, charged the border, armed with nothing but his bare fists. The look in his eyes wasn't as much as hate as it was desperation, a desperation to flee oppression and tyranny in the east. He got five seconds before the guards noticed him and reacted. One guard, named Valentin Varennikov (whose post here was just temporary), calmly pointed his rifle in his direction and fired, shooting him in the head. The boy's body thudded lifelessly to the ground, just a few steps short of the border. The Reich guards on the other side of the border, meanwhile, were powerless to intervene, as any attempt to infringe on Soviet "sovereignty" (which was basically where they set the border that day, though they were always quite "reasonable") would probably lead to a nuke being dropped on Constantinople, Vienna, and/or Berlin.
Bystanders rushed to the border, only to be held back by the guards. The reporter stopped talking, and his crew ran over to film the incident in progress.
"Oh, my God!" shouted a boy. "Oh, my God. He's dead, Joachim! He's dead."
"The humanity!" shouted a woman, shaking her fist at the Soviet guards, who calmly stood on the other side, watching. "You barbarians!"
"As you can see here, it appears that the Soviets have just shot an innocent boy trying to cross the border..." said the reporter, as calmly as he could.
"He was not!" shouted Varennikov. "He was a fascist sympathizer trying to kill us!"
Gabriel stepped out of the crowd, wearing his 'pathetic outfit.' "I'm not so sure about that," he announced.
Heads turned as he walked towards the border, prompting the Reich guards to respond. They tried to stop him, but Gabriel snapped his fingers, and they stopped walking. That got the Soviets' attention. They too raised their weapons and shouted in Russian to stop, but he didn't stop. He stepped over the border, and they opened fire. All of the bullets missed him, his powers turning them away from him and into the ground. The Soviets recoiled in shock, not knowing what they had just seen.
He reached the boy's lifeless body and put his hand on the head. White wisps of energy, accompanied by a high-pitched ringing, flowed from his hand into the boy's head, and the bullet wound gradually closed, the blood disappearing and the bullet popping out. After a few seconds, the wound was entirely gone, with nothing to show that there was once a wound there, and the boy opened his eyes.
"What...what?" muttered the boy as Gabriel helped him get to his feet.
Gabriel whispered something in his ear in response.
"Is he ser--is he freaking serious?!" said the boy.
"Did you see that?!" shouted the reporter, barely containing his excitement. "Holy...did you get that? What's your name?"
Gabriel looked straight at the camera. "Just call me...Zen. Zen the Phoenix."