said dryly, looking at Todd.
“I serve nothing but myself,” the large man said. “Amon chooses to travel with me, but I neither serve it nor command it.”
“You travel through hell.”
“I also travel through heaven. They’re only a handsbreadth apart.” Todd shrugged. “However, it’s inconvenient to walk through heaven with Amon at my side.”
“So you’re a moral relativist?” Jack asked.
“No. Is my moral philosophy really important, given what’s happening outside?”
“Yes,” both Andy and Jack replied at the same time, their voices flat.
Todd sighed.
“There is a very narrow horizon between the gravitational wells of Creation and Destruction,” he explained as the headlights played over the strong planes of his face. “Or of God and Satan, if you prefer, or Change and Entropy. I choose to walk that horizon. Sometimes I slip and begin to spiral toward one well or the other, but so far I’ve always managed to pull myself back into neutrality.”
“But why wouldn’t you want to serve God?” Andy asked, troubled.
“Or ha-satan,” Amon hissed, its ears flattening against its bony skull.
“Having freedom of choice means being free not to make a choice,” Todd pointed out. “Like Schrödinger’s cat, I find it more comfortable to keep all my possible states of being in existence at once, rather than collapse them and perhaps discover I’m dead.”
“Do you know what he’s talking about?” Jack asked, turning to his friend. He thought he’d seen Schrödinger’s Cat play at a bar once, but he didn’t know what that had to do with life or death. It hadn’t been the bar outside Reno.
“But if you reject both God and Satan, what gives you the power to pass through the other planes?” Andy asked, ignoring him.
“Science.” Todd smiled. “Postmodern magick. Or quantum magick, if you like. The metaphors work either way.”
“That’s bullshit.” Jack shook his head. “If you were using magick, my wards would go off. The only thing jangling them right now is your familiar.”
“Your wards are old-fashioned. They detect...particles, not waves. Absolutes, not possibilities. In postmodern magick, the practitioner understands the signifier is empty and endlessly iterative, but as long as it’s treated within its discursive context as if it were material, then at that moment, for all practical purposes, it’s material. It’s a case of hypostatized signification.”
Jack wondered if his leg was being pulled, but Andy acted like he understood.
“All right, Edward,” his friend said. “Play your word games. But remember what I said earlier. Hell is the absence of God. There is no in-between. If you’ve chosen to remove yourself from God, then you’re in Hell, whether or not you’ve consciously chosen to serve Satan.”
“I don’t perceive the world in terms of binary oppositions. Your religion sets up a false dichotomy.”
“Just because you choose not to accept an opposition doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. A blind man can argue all his life that there’s no such thing as light, but those of us who can see know better.”
For a moment Jack saw Todd’s cheek twitch, as if Andy had scored some kind of point. Then the theologian turned away.
“It seems to me that the more important question is why that giant snake is here and what we need to do to stop it.”
“It comes from the bones.” Amon gnawed at its long, skeletal paw, sending flakes of burnt skin scattering across the floor. “The bones screamed and the worms answered.”
“Worms, plural?” Todd asked. Amon worried at its paw, rolling its eyes up at him.
“We saw a field and worms in our vision,” Jack told him, starting to pace across the floor, kicking books aside to see their spines and covers. “And a bone staircase and a series of doors slamming shut.”
“What vision?”
“An angel’s vision.” Andy stared at Amon, then at Todd. “But maybe you know something about the
“I serve nothing but myself,” the large man said. “Amon chooses to travel with me, but I neither serve it nor command it.”
“You travel through hell.”
“I also travel through heaven. They’re only a handsbreadth apart.” Todd shrugged. “However, it’s inconvenient to walk through heaven with Amon at my side.”
“So you’re a moral relativist?” Jack asked.
“No. Is my moral philosophy really important, given what’s happening outside?”
“Yes,” both Andy and Jack replied at the same time, their voices flat.
Todd sighed.
“There is a very narrow horizon between the gravitational wells of Creation and Destruction,” he explained as the headlights played over the strong planes of his face. “Or of God and Satan, if you prefer, or Change and Entropy. I choose to walk that horizon. Sometimes I slip and begin to spiral toward one well or the other, but so far I’ve always managed to pull myself back into neutrality.”
“But why wouldn’t you want to serve God?” Andy asked, troubled.
“Or ha-satan,” Amon hissed, its ears flattening against its bony skull.
“Having freedom of choice means being free not to make a choice,” Todd pointed out. “Like Schrödinger’s cat, I find it more comfortable to keep all my possible states of being in existence at once, rather than collapse them and perhaps discover I’m dead.”
“Do you know what he’s talking about?” Jack asked, turning to his friend. He thought he’d seen Schrödinger’s Cat play at a bar once, but he didn’t know what that had to do with life or death. It hadn’t been the bar outside Reno.
“But if you reject both God and Satan, what gives you the power to pass through the other planes?” Andy asked, ignoring him.
“Science.” Todd smiled. “Postmodern magick. Or quantum magick, if you like. The metaphors work either way.”
“That’s bullshit.” Jack shook his head. “If you were using magick, my wards would go off. The only thing jangling them right now is your familiar.”
“Your wards are old-fashioned. They detect...particles, not waves. Absolutes, not possibilities. In postmodern magick, the practitioner understands the signifier is empty and endlessly iterative, but as long as it’s treated within its discursive context as if it were material, then at that moment, for all practical purposes, it’s material. It’s a case of hypostatized signification.”
Jack wondered if his leg was being pulled, but Andy acted like he understood.
“All right, Edward,” his friend said. “Play your word games. But remember what I said earlier. Hell is the absence of God. There is no in-between. If you’ve chosen to remove yourself from God, then you’re in Hell, whether or not you’ve consciously chosen to serve Satan.”
“I don’t perceive the world in terms of binary oppositions. Your religion sets up a false dichotomy.”
“Just because you choose not to accept an opposition doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. A blind man can argue all his life that there’s no such thing as light, but those of us who can see know better.”
For a moment Jack saw Todd’s cheek twitch, as if Andy had scored some kind of point. Then the theologian turned away.
“It seems to me that the more important question is why that giant snake is here and what we need to do to stop it.”
“It comes from the bones.” Amon gnawed at its long, skeletal paw, sending flakes of burnt skin scattering across the floor. “The bones screamed and the worms answered.”
“Worms, plural?” Todd asked. Amon worried at its paw, rolling its eyes up at him.
“We saw a field and worms in our vision,” Jack told him, starting to pace across the floor, kicking books aside to see their spines and covers. “And a bone staircase and a series of doors slamming shut.”
“What vision?”
“An angel’s vision.” Andy stared at Amon, then at Todd. “But maybe you know something about the
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