Log in to remove this sponsored message
Story Links
[In which Ray makes his choice between Heaven and Hell]
[In which Tim is a Horrible 80s Cliche, and a Samurai Rides a Moose]When you die, would you go to Heaven or Hell, if you had a choice? Back when I died, I had that choice. This is the story of how I got to where I ended up. It's certainly not the only story to be told, nor will it be the only story told. I'm not even the main character. I don't even know if you could say there is a main character in these stories. It's just a good place to start. The afterlife is basically one giant shenanigan after another involving innumerable people, forming a giant mosaic of cluster*bleep*ery. But I'm getting ahead of myself. The story of my choice. Right, well, I guess the best place to start would be...well, I had just died. Obviously. And then...Ray stared nervously about his surroundings, trying not to squirm in his seat too much. He was seated on some sort of strange white mist, staring up at a giant sign that read, "WELCOME TO CLOUD NINE. PLEASE TAKE A SEAT AND AWAIT YOUR TURN." Beneath that was a helpdesk manned by women. To the left of the desk and the interns was an escalator leading downward beneath the cloud, and to the right, an escalator leading upward infinitely. To his left and right, behind him and in front him, was an endless wave of people sitting, waiting to be serviced, just like him.
"Now serving Departed Soul 96,458."
Ray glanced at his ticket and sighed. He was number 46,129,677. It looked like he would be here a while, so he took the time to reflect on how he had died - at least he was pretty sure he was dead. He had uttered the words that had doomed thousands of seventeen-year-olds before him: "I can totally make that jump."
He hadn't made that jump.
Ray felt at his head and was still surprised when he felt slightly ruffled blonde hair. He was sure there had been a huge gaping hole there before.
"Now serving Departed Soul 46,129,677."
Ray blinked. The people that had surrounded him were gone. It was just him and his one, lonely chair. The woman manning the desk smiled and beckoned him forward. He stood and shuffled forward, all of his nervousness returning.
"Er...hi," Ray said awkwardly, unsure of whether or not he was supposed to speak.
"Hello, your full name?" the woman asked.
"Ray Odin Johnson." he answered nervously.
The intern chuckled, "Nice middle name."
"My parents said it was because they had huge expectations for me," Ray muttered, "Looks like that fell through."
"Hmm...maybe," the intern said through her smile, "Well, you're not exactly a paragon of goodness, Ray, but you're not the epitome of evil either. You get to go up top and make your case to the big guy. Thank you for dying, and have a nice afterlife!"
"The...big guy? You mean like God?" Ray asked. The bit of fluff Ray was standing on shot upward, leaving the rest of Cloud NIne behind,. "Hey!" he shouted at the intern still smiling at him from below as he sped upward, "Am I going to meet God!?" She didn't answer. Ray would have swore, but, well, given the circumstances. Instead, he hastily tucked in his shirt, wishing he had died in something more appropriate to meet God in. A death metal t-shirt with a burning skull eating a lamb on it was hardly God worthy.
The cloud stopped abruptly, throwing Ray to the ground. A hand reached down and Ray accepted it. Attached to the hand was a man who appeared to be around Ray's own age clad in white, beaming brightly, "Hello," he said cheerfully as he hoisted Ray back onto his feet.
"Hi..." Ray said, unsure of who this man was and looking around for one of the interns.
"I'm Jeff," the man said, "And I'll be your guide today." His eyes fell on Ray's t-shirt and he laughed, "Oh man, I remember when my dad actually did that! He'll get a kick out of this."
"Er...your dad?" Ray asked.
"God," Jeff nodded, and laughed at Ray's stare, "Haha, oh man, I love doing that to people! No, seriously, God's my dad."
"So you're...Jeff, the son of God?" Ray asked, staring.
"Yup," Jeff nodded, "The Eldest Son of God, if you must be specific. Then there's Tim, the Other Son of God, and then Baby Jesus, the Son of God."
"...Are you serious?" Ray asked as they trod along a road paved in glowing gold. To the left and right were houses perfectly arranged an equal distance apart with square lawns and puffy white clouds coming from the chimneys. People milled about and smiled and waved excitedly at Jeff as he passed. He laughed and waved back, and even called out to a few he seemed to know personally.
"Of course. You don't think I could get away with lying about something like that, do you?" Jeff asked. They had reached a massive set of stairs with a huge golden gate in front of it.
"Well, it's just...your name is very...ordinary." Ray said.
"Yeah, well, Dad thought the same thing. 'Come now, 'Jeff, our Lord and Savior' hardly sounds very good, does it?' He always told me. That's why he gave Jesus a bit of thunder to his name so people would take him seriously." Jeff said, a tad bitterly.
"Huh...makes sense, I guess," Ray said. It really didn't, but he wasn't about to tell that to a son of God, much less the Man Himself, "So Christianity was right all along."
Jeff laughed as they passed through the gate, "Not really. Most of the religions on Earth are kind of right. My baby brother is a huge troll. He must have gone down to Earth and told some poor guy in a dream he's been chosen as a prophet of God a hundred thousand times now. His best one, in my opinion, was when he told the Mayans when the world was going to end. It was a joke a few hundred years in the making, but when we saw all of you making such a big deal about it, we laughed for days and-" Jeff must have realized Ray was staring at him incredulously and cleared his throat, "Anyway. We're here."
They had arrived at two massive double doors that opened when Jeff put a hand on them. He didn't seem to have pushed, though. Inside was a mass of bright, white light.
"AH, RAY. WELCOME." The Voice of God boomed in Ray's head, seeming to come from every direction, "IT SEEMS YOU'RE VERY NEUTRAL ON THE ANGEL-DEMON SCALE. THAT PUTS YOU IN A VERY UNIQUE POSITION. WE HAVE ACCOMMODATIONS PREPARED FOR YOU HERE IN HEAVEN, OR DOWN IN HELL. WHERE WOULD YOU LIKE TO GO? WHAT YOU SAW WITH GEOFFREY-"
Jeff groaned, "Dad, you know I don't like my full name..."
"-IS ABOUT ALL THERE IS TO MY HOME IN THE SKY."
"That's it?" Ray asked, "
That's eternal paradise?" This wasn't at all what he had expected. Come to think of it, his heart wasn't even pounding. Either God was using his Godliness to put him at ease, or his short experience with Jeff had left him a bit underwhelmed by the whole afterlife experience in general.
"INDEED. YOU MUST UNDERSTAND, RAY, I'M OLD. I DON'T WANT ANY OF YOU YOUNGSTERS ON MY LAWN."
"So Heaven is basically the Afterlife's Florida. Err...what's Hell like?"
"OH, YOU KNOW. FIRE, BRIMSTONE, DENTISTS, TAX COLLECTORS, LITERATURE SNOBS."
Ray shuddered. Neither place sounded very appealing, "That's it?" he demanded, "I have a choice of surrounding myself with old people or swimming laps in a lake of fire? I don't want to go to either place, honestly. Heaven sounds dull, and Hell is too Hellish." He suddenly got the impression that God was smiling, although he still couldn't see anything through the light. Jeff was beaming and nodded at his father, "WELL, THERE IS A THIRD OPTION, YOUNG RAY. THE PLACE INBETWEEN HEAVEN AND HELL: IDONKARE. I THINK YOU'LL BE HAPPIEST THERE."
"It's a giant city that constantly expands, and you can act however you like."
"I'll take it!" Ray said, jumping on the option.
"VERY WELL. GO FORTH, RAY, INTO THE AFTERLIFE. FAREWELL." The light dimmed and before he could blink, God's palace was in the distance and he was back on his cloud with Jeff standing beside him. Ray looked at the Eldest Son of God.
"I...don't care?" Ray asked.
Jeff chuckled, "Yeah. When Tim asked Dad what he wanted the city to be called, Dad said, 'I don't care.' So that's exactly what Tim called it."
"Tim? Your middle brother?" Ray asked.
"Yup. He's in charge down there. He'll get you settled in."
"Err...how do I get there?" Ray looked around for an escalator.
"Like this." And suddenly, Jeff shoved Ray off his cloud. He screamed as he fell down, down, down. His eyes widened as a massive lake of fire opened up before him. Swimming in its depths was a massive tentacle monster. It opened its maw as Ray fell straight toward it...
I thought I'd seen enough hentai to know where this was going. I was wrong, of course. I was wrong about a lot of things back then. Like that time I thought Jeff seemed jealous of his youngest brother and was plotting to take over Heaven. But I need a break now. All of this talking is making me hungry. Go fetch me some of that tentacle monster to heat up, would you?Edit: Mar 11, 13 6:11pm