Thank God for the Sinners!
Part II: Profit & Loss
This is the second part of a new short story on Fickle Futures. We’ll run a new installment every Monday. Please share & enjoy!
← READ PART I: At the Sinners Pit
“Thank God for the sinners,” Mr. Ratsid beamed watching as Mr. Jordan inspected the sigil over the glass display counter of his pawn shop, The Lord Saves.
“Yes, we are truly blessed today,” Mr. Jordan agreed distractedly while studying the sigil. Mr. Jordan had appraised the chain and pendant and made the seemingly reasonable offer of two-thousand and forty-six bits for both.
Mr. Ratsid could barely contain his joy.
“And if you slide that little button on the back, it collapses back into a cross,” Mr. Ratsid said trying to be helpful.
“You didn’t flip it to the right did you!?!” Mr. Jordan asked looking at him severely and with a note of panic.
“Well, no, just the one way — to the left — to open and close it,” he said slightly taken aback, “Why? What happens if you slide it the other way?”
“This will work, then…” Mr. Jordan said, opening and closing the object with fascination, ignoring Mr. Ratsid’s question, but he did catch Mr. Ratsid raising an eyebrow at his admission of needing it to ‘work’, “…in my collection… of degenerate art… for study… of course.”
Mr. Jordan slid the ₿it¢oin hub intently across to Mr. Ratsid, hoping his little faux pas would pass unnoticed. Mr. Ratsid casually scanned his ring, and the two-thousand and forty-six crypto₿its were added to his private account, unseen by the powers that be.
“So, do you collect a lot of these trinkets?” Mr. Ratsid continued as nonchalantly as possible after a count of ten.
Mr. Jordan looked at him intently. They both knew that any such collection, no matter how small, would be cause for excommunication. Mr. Ratsid could tell that Mr. Jordan knew he had slipped up mentioning the collection. Mr. Ratsid also knew that he would never turn in Mr. Jordan, at least not as long as there was this much money to be made.
“Have no worries, my brother. We are both Devout Apostles of the One True God. If you had such a collection I could only assume you keep it as a reminder of the sinners’ wickedness so you do not fall for their pleasing words,” this was always his best tactic with nervous sinners: convince them that you understand that their wickedness was justified as long as it is in the name of the Lord. Mr. Jordan’s expression softened but did not completely relax.
“No,” Mr. Ratsid went on, “I simply ask because in my line of business, some of these little knick-knacks may come my way…” as Mr. Ratsid spoke he looked down at the heavily scratched glass surface of the counter display case, “from time to time.”
Mr. Ratsid could just barely make out a few pre-Great Revival objects through the stochastic patina of random scratches that frosted the entire surface of the glass counter top. Might be illegal to sell, but not enough for excommunication and really not worth the bother.
“…and it would be very convenient if I had a reliable, and, of course, righteous person,” Mr. Ratsid followed one particularly deep gouge in the glass counter with the edge of his thumbnail until a tiny sliver of glass stabbed under the nail. He savored the sharp prick of pain for a second.
“…with whom I might dispose of them,“ Mr. Ratsid, smiled, looking back up at Mr. Jordan to gauge his reaction.
Mr. Jordan was not smiling as he stared him straight in the eye and asked Mr. Ratsid to leave his shop immediately.
“Thank God for the sinners,” read the neon sign over the bar Mr. Ratsid had decided to spend a bit of his windfall in to celebrate. The bar was a favorite of deacons because it was an electronics dead zone and served real beer from Canada.
Life was good. He couldn’t use his ¢rypto₿its to pay off his indenture, of course. Only ¢hurch¢redits could be used for legal transactions, and they were almost impossible to exchange. But there was still plenty you could do with crypto₿its that was not, strictly speaking, legal.
Like play poker.
“I’ll… call,” Mr. Ratsid spoke with caution to belay his excitement and throw Deacon Davies off his game. Davies regularly cleaned the table with him, but Mr. Ratsid had him this time, holding the four aces.
Life was good.
“You sure, Ratsy?” Vapor poured out of Deacon Davie’s mouth while he spoke, like some noxious toad. He held his pipe tightly in one hand and his cards tightly in the other while grinning malevolently across the table.
That smug grin. Mr. Ratsid couldn’t wait to wipe it right off of his frog face with four aces.
“You know, Ratsy, that a lot of ₿its you can’t afford,” Mr. Ratsid’s internal temperature spiked at Deacon Davies’ use of that nickname. The one from seminary.
“I call,” Mr. Ratsid smiled definitively. There was no way Davies could beat this hand unless he had a…
“Read em’ and weep, Ratsy!”
…Royal Flush.
“Thank god for the sinners,” said The Most Holy Archapostle Barney H. Trippgood III, CPP, CPAC, OOTTC, MBA, DOT, PMH, and Senator of the Congress of the Devout, who was sitting behind his massive mahogany desk, “is a blasphemy I will not tolerate from my deacons. Do you hear me Deacon Ratsid!”
“Will! Not! TOLERATE!!!,” He thumped his desk with each word.
“You would never hear me using such sacrilegious words, Archapostle Trippgood,” Mr. Ratsid said with relaxed self-satisfaction, “In fact, I was just correcting young Mr. Clem’s inappropriate use of language last night. He was referring to the sinners as ‘her’ and ‘him’, and I told him he better not let you hear him talking like that,” Mr. Clem, wearing his resting puzzled face, stood beside him in front of the desk at attention. Mr. Clem’s time in the Army of God had taught him never to relax around his superiors.
“Is this correct, young Deacon Clem?” The Archapostle tented his aged fingers in a contemplative manner, but his reddened face still showed the emotion of his earlier declaration. He looked at Mr. Clem with what he imagined to be a piercing stare.
“Umm… I guess… Archapostle,” Mr. Clem’s expression shifted slightly to uncomfortable puzzlement. The Archapostle was an imposingly round figure, even when not beet red.
“Well, young Clem, you are truly blessed to have such a pious, righteous, and…” The Archapostle looked wearily at Mr. Ratsid, “experienced partner as Deacon Ratsid overseeing your training,” The Archapostle picked up the invoice from the desk inspecting it.
“We’ll let this go,” he looked back up at Mr. Clem, who had relaxed slightly, bringing his piercing stare back to bore through him, “for now.”
Mr. Clem felt every sphincter in his body clench at the words.
“Now, to the matter at hand,” The Archapostle returned to their invoice, “Thirteen sinners judged and punished… very good work, gentlemen, very good,” The Archapostle handed them a receipt, “Your indenture will be credited directly from the Treasury of the Devout.”
“We won’t get the credits?” Mr. Ratsid asked, confused.
“You, will, but through me. We found it was too easy to game the system by paying deacons directly, so the Congress of the Devout, in our great wisdom, has decided that all future payments to indentured deacons will be made directly to their masters,” The Archapostle said as if simply confirming the obvious, “And then I will give you a monthly stipend for expenses, and the rest goes towards your indenture.”
Mr. Ratsid’s stomach sank.
“Here’s your next list of sinners to excommunicate,” He handed another piece of paper across to Mr. Ratsid, who immediately handed it to Mr. Clem who folded it and put in his jacket breast pocket, “and we have a new side-mission for the deacons,” Mr. Ratsid’s looked up with a gleam of hope in his eye’s as The Archapostle looked intently at them. Side-missions always meant more money; usually good money. His stomach began to be happy again.
“We’ve detected a rise in the Abrahamist cult and we will stamp it out, gentlemen.“
“Stamp! It! OUT!!!”
The Archapostle pounded his fist on his desk to emphasize his point, causing heavy objects on its surface to rattle and the two gentlemen in front of him to jump slightly.
After calming and re-tenting his fingers, The Archapostle continued, “but we are having… difficulty identifying the heretics.”
“We learned from one of these blasphemers — who we captured at no great expense to the Church — that they have a sigil they all wear; a cross with a Muslim crescent on one side and a Jewish star on the other.”
Mr. Ratsid felt his stomach leap into his throat pushing his heart roughly out of the way.
The Archapostle waved his hand across his desk and a hologram of the sigil appeared hovering over it, spinning slowly. Out of the corner of his eye, Mr. Ratsid noticed Mr. Clem’s puzzled face begin to open its big stupid mouth. Mr. Ratsid discreetly kicked Mt. Clem in the ankle, their universal signal that Mr. Ratsid is the one who does all of the talking. Mr. Clem’s mouth wavered slightly then shut tight.
“But the moon and star fold behind the cross, so that it just looks like a normal cross,” the holo of the sigil folded like a puzzle into a perfect cross, unrecognizable from the ones worn by the True Faithful.
“This sacrilegious sigil is how they identify each other, but only after a very particular signal is received that it’s safe for them to reveal their profanity to each other.“
“We learned from our source, during his confessional session, that when two of the sigils are in close proximity, they warm slightly. He also told us that if the switch to open and close the sigil isn’t pressed in the right way, it overheats, melting the sigil to a blob and destroying whatever it is inside that makes it react to other sigils. That’s why we haven’t been able to capture one intact yet. Whenever we get close, the damned blasphemers self-destruct it,” The Archapostle stared at the cross for a moment before whipping the holo away with a disgusted wave of his hand.
“So, I want you both to pray for guidance to find one of these, these, sigils of Satan on any of the sinners you excommunicate. This is such a top priority that I’m authorizing a finder’s fee of ten-thousand credits for the first Deacon to bring me one… intact.”
“INTACT!” He pounded the desk again, “Understood, Deacon Ratsid?”
“INTACT!”
He bashed his fist down.
“Yes, Archapostle Trippgood,” Mr. Ratsid’s stomach was now in his shoes and his heart was about to erupt from his mouth.
“That’s enough to pay off both your indentures and have a tidy sum left over to rise in the church ranks,” The Archapostle paused briefly and looked straight at Mr. Ratsid, “isn’t it, Mr. Ratsid?”
“Yes, Archapostle. Yes, I believe that’s about enough,” Replied Mr. Ratsid as The Archapostle attempted a beneficent smile, but couldn’t completely obscure his predatory nature. He wanted his tithe.
“Check all the sinners you excommunicate thoroughly before burying them in the sinner’s grave yard. It is your exigent duty to find one of these sigils… intact. Do you understand? *INTACT*!”
“Yes, Archapostle. Completely. We won’t let you down,” Mr. Ratsid spoke calmly and confidently while his whole body boiled in unreleasable dyspepsia.
“God damns all sinners, Deacon Ratsid” The Archapostle waved them away and looked back down at the papers on his desk.
“God damns all sinners, Archapostle,” Mr. Ratsid responded emphatically, taking Mr. Clem by the arm and hurrying him out of the room.
“Amen, bro” the Archbishop responded perfunctorily, not looking up.