The Event
By Josh Moger
The Event, which took place about three months after the Announcement (which
actually started as the announcement, but grew into a capital 'A' within,
oh, roughly half a second), began quietly enough. Indeed, considering what
would take place that day, the participants involved were quite calm.
Admittedly, She was close to throwing up, but then, so are most blushing
brides-to-be. Fortunately, She had some friends to help her out.
Unfortunately they (one a woman wearing a blue dress, the other a lion,
eagle, and two grazing sheep) were too busy arguing about the location of
the ceremony.
"Quit squirming. I'll never be able to button up this dress."
"I still don't see why you can't have it out here. I mean, the Halls of
Worship are so..."
"Human? What's wrong with that? She can have it anywhere she wants."
"Yes, but I thought it was He who decided it."
"You think He could have been able to change Her mind? Not in His wildest
dreams."
"Will you two stop talking about me as though I'm not here," pleaded the
white-clad bride. Well, mostly white clad. The gown, despite the best
efforts of the woman dressed in blue, refused to fit properly. Which,
considering that the participants were in Heaven, meant that each involved,
dresser and dressee, were entirely too nervous.
"Hey, kiddo. Relax. Here, B, Let me help with that." Smoothly, a
young-looking man stepped behind the bride and begin moving his hands over
the back of the dress. With a soft crinkling sound, the dress began
seamlessly closing up, and coincidentally forming designs of silver and gold
roses.
"Nice touch."
"Thanks, B. That feel alright? Wait, here you go."
The bride nodded, her voice obscured by the brown paper bag that the the
repairer of the dress had given her to breathe into. She mumbled a thanks
to both of her friends and sat down in a chair that was suddenly beneath
her. The friend who had objected to her soon-to-be place of marriage padded
the ground around her before curling up at her feet.
"You know, I never understood the reason you feel the need to manifest all
of the emotions that go with that silly form you insist on taking. Animals
never get so over stimulated for no good reason from their instincts. I for
instance feel absolutely no such nervousness or worry about the upcoming
eve-"
"HE'S COMING!"
The aforementioned curled up friend suddenly leaped to all fours, and twos,
and went to flight, and began running around.
"What?! WHAT'S HE DOING?! Doesn't he know it's bad luck?" Suddenly
realizing that each of the bride's friends were looking at his hosts, and
smirking, the startled friend sat down with just a bit of wounded pride and
began cleaning himself in his main host.
The bride put down the brown bag in order to reach out and scratch her
friend behind the ears, but was interrupted by a chuckle coming from her
other favorite Friend of Man.
"I hope I didn't miss all of the excitement."
The young-looking man glanced over his glasses at the approaching individual
dressed in a full tuxedo. "Kidding, right? These two," acknowledging the
bride with a nod of his head, "are going to be creating more excitement
today than we've had in the past 20,000 years. I don't remember the last
time one of us was..."
"I do." The woman dressed in blue shifted in her seat, lowering her head so
that none of her friends could see the sudden look of pain on her face. Of
course, her friends being what, but more importantly who, they are knew it
was there nonetheless. The smartly dressed man walked over to her and
folded his arms around her, quickly followed by the bride, the young looking
man, and the individual on the ground and in the sky.
"Such a strange display of emotion on a day which should be marked,
objectively speaking, for the amount of happiness that it will serve to
inspire."
The newcomer was a middle-aged blond man who wore what was, perhaps, a
smile. The members of the group hug managed to move, as one, over to the
blond man, faster than even his lightning reaction speed, and absorb him
into the bonding.
His voice, though muffled, came through clearly for his friends to hear.
"Ah, of course. The subtle difference between happiness and sadness.
Didn't your Soldier come up with that apropos equation? Shared pain is
lessened, but shared joy is increased?"
"You could at the very least have a proper ceremony."
"But unlike you, lad, I don't feel the need to trumpet one way of saying
God's Truth over another. Besides, She wanted this to be something unique
for us, our own vows and what not. How did she put it..."
"'A petal unlike any other, a rose with no thorns of the past to adorn it,'"
came the rumbling voice of the third man in the room.
"That's it. Ah, I see you've deigned to wear clothing today. Who do I have
to thank for that?"
The first speaker, a younger man with long black hair tied back spoke up.
"You won't like it."
"What do you mean?"
"She told him to."
"She? Who do you- oh." The man in the middle of the room, who was
attempting to get into his formal suit, looked up to see the door opening
and a blond woman enter followed by an older looking man with grey hair.
The dressing man directed his comment at the woman. "I Truly didn't expect
to see you here today."
"I have to admit, at first I thought it went against my better judgment, but
someone seemed to believe it very important for me to come. And who am I to
argue against destiny?" The grey haired man smiled at the last comment.
He looked at the dressing groom.
"I trust that you would not turn away any who wish to come to your day of
matrimony?"
"No, no I suppose I wouldn't. Or at least can't, without alienating my
future wife, eh? She does get peculiar about that sometimes." The man
broke off from his musing when he realized that a low hum that had begun
softly in the background was building to a crescendo of a gust of wind.
"Hope I'm not late."
"Don't worry about it. I'm still trying to show the kid how to tie a bow
tie."
"A bow tie, commander? I never thought that would be your style."
"The good groom... stretches the truth to cover days past. But his wordplay
fits. As you can see, I'm going in my formal wear-"
"Give or take a thousand years or so."
The man with the black ponytail looked at who commented on his wardrobe and
smiled ruefully. "At least it didn't take me a month of trying to find
something that would even fit. That's what you get for untold millennia of
nudity."
The man who had arrived with the wind turned to the groom. "I've seen your
bride-to-be. She's still getting ready, but we've got a tinker, a trader, a
dreamer, a creator and a growler trying to help her."
"How does she look?"
"After all these years, you actually have to ask? She looks beautiful. She
looks radiant. She looks like a setting sun over a field of roses. Now,
tell me the Truth. Which is more fearful- the past twenty millennia, or
this moment?"
"The Truth? I don't think I'm going to answer that question."
"HA! He backed down!"
"Shoo. I gave him orders today that he could honorably withdraw from any
conflict. It seemed like a nice way of forcing him to relax."
"Ah, commander, you're too kind to him."
Suddenly, a lone candle upon a table in the room flared into a bonfire
releasing a wheel of flame which coalesced into a brunette woman. She wore
a red gown and sparks leapt from her eyes.
"Really, Gabe, do you have to be so dramatic? I mean, the day's going to
have plenty of that as it is."
Before the woman of flame could speak, the door opened once again (causing
the future groom to curse about locks in Heaven beneath his breath) allowing
another to enter. This one appeared as a tall man of Arabic origin. He
bowed to the groom and spoke:
"She has arrived. The ceremony awaits your presence to begin."
Considering who was in attendence, it could have gone several ways.
There could have been a great deal of screaming.
A great deal of questioning.
And a great deal of flaming swords.
Instead, there was a great deal of peace and faith. As each celestial sat
in their row, some by Word, some by Choir, but most by friend and love, some
of the older ones remembered when last they attended a ceremony such as
this, and the pain that inadvertantly resulted from it. To be sure, this
would be different, and hopefully the bittersweet part of it had already
passed.
His two best men behind him, the groom waited near the forefront of the
Hall. Silently passing 'notes' in Tongues, the three men considered the
long history that had brought them to this moment. They looked over their
lives. Their battles. Their fears and doubts. Not in what they served,
but in themselves. And they realized that it had all been worthwhile, if
for no other reason than that today would happen.
Finally, after a subjective eternity of patience, the music began, held
aloft by a song sung by Song, and the grey haired, battle scarred man turned
towards the back of the Hall and contemplated his future bride as she walked
towards him.
When finally she stopped in front of him and the hundreds of relievers and
ofanim who had carried the back of her dress let it gently flow to the
floor, he took her veil and lifted it, exposing the face and a facet of the
beauty of his bride.
The vows were in Old Angelic, but translated for all of those assembled.
~Where once there was cowardice-
Now I see your courage.
Where once there was pity-
Now I feel your awe.
Where once there was fear-
Now I see your wisdom.
Where once I was blind-
Now I see your all.
~Where once there was rage-
Now I see your Truth.
Where once there was pride-
Now I feel your faith.
Where once there was despair-
Now I see your hope.
Where once I was blind-
Now I see your all.
Yves, who had, after a bit of gentle prodding by the bride and a weary and
resigned nod by the groom, agreed to preside over the ceremony, now
completed it with:
"And let all who witness this marriage now know-
Where once there was War so too shall there be Peace.
Where once there were Factions, let there be Unity.
Where once there were Archangels, now shall there be Wife and Husband.
You may kiss the bride... oh, I see you already knew that part was
coming..."
Yves chuckled as he closed his book and bowed his head to the rolling sound
of the waves of laughter, cheer and applause which were near deafening even
to the Archangels who had gathered to see this-
The Wedding of Michael and Novalis.
Back to the INC Mainpage.
Back to the Fiction page.
Send mail to the Curator