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A
homeless man. A man with no friends, no money, no possessions, no faith. A man
that does not even know he is chosen. Or why. So simple.”
    The First Celestial continued: “Out of the chaos
there came order. God’s order. The order of his Supernals. Then the rest. We
are the rest.”
    Michael Voide turned his back to them and faced a thickly
curtained wall. His full blond hair was a flowing nimbus over the navy blue
bespoke suit. “To God, a million years, a billion, or the life of the universe
is insignificant. Who knows how long it can take an Angel to elevate to a
superior Choir? We are nothing to God.”
    Both men looked at the back of Voides’s suit and
thought of the elements of atonement, which might take years, if not decades,
to fulfill in a remote penitential camp. Or forever, underneath the camp.
    Michael Voide turned and now looked at Kingston as
he spoke to Geedam. “We were premature Archangel, in selecting you as
Principality. Can anything save your further fall?”

Chapter 15
     
    Commander Ji Nitao, a man not quite old enough to
say that a promotion was overdue, knocked gently at the nondescript room in a
pink-prefabricated warehouse on Cixi road with his good left hand. He looked at
the battered aluminum sill of the door. It had only taken ten hours for his driver
to get to Hangzhou. The temperature was nearly freezing and the wind was
gusting to twenty knots this close to the bay.
    An older man in his late 60’s dressed in an
ordinary worker’s overalls opened the door and warmly motioned for Commander Ji
to enter, then to sit on a decrepit stool in the office. The cold mocked its
feeble kerosene heater. Through a window inside the office, Ji could see a
handful of young men and women inside the warehouse huddling in front of computer
screens or leaning over each other. The screens were everywhere inside, on
every surface, pointed in every direction.
    “Your brother-in-law sends his greetings, Manager
Hu.”
    “Tell the Admiral that the wind is strong here
today.”
    “Yes, Manager Hu.”
    “I have been told that Messenger Riu is to be
detained,” Hu said, “the enemy knows nothing, but, yet, speed is always the essence
of victory.” Manager Hu looked out over the warehouse floor. “To subdue the enemy
without fighting is the pinnacle of skill,” Hu quoted. “We have half again as
many soldiers as the United States of America, yet our entire army is here, in
this building, now.”
    “Yes, Manager Hu.”
    “My brother-in-law must be ready, the treasury must
be ready. The deluge must begin within the hour of the enemy’s darkness. They
must surrender before he knows his own enemy has struck. Even better—for him to
surrender and not know a war has been fought—and lost.”
    “Yes, Manager Hu,” said Commander Ji.
    “I will talk to you next when the second eight
thousand years of history has begun, Commander. Perhaps eight weeks. Perhaps
eight days.”
    “Yes, Manager Hu.
    “Please leave the encipherment and enjoy the day,
Commander Ji. Kindly eat with us if you are hungry.”
    Commander Ji considered the cold silk worms and
deep-fried starfish that he had had last time he delivered a message from Beijing.
“Thank you, Manager Hu, we must return before the roads freeze.”
    Hu rose, accepted the rigid case containing petabytes
of cosmologically random bits generated by the National Academy observatory. One
other case with identical contents was in Beijing.
    “Goodbye, Commander.”
    “Goodbye, Manager Hu.”
    Hu watched the Commander get into the passenger’s side
of the black BMW X6 and drive off slowly and respectfully. Sadly, he considered
the display of transient wealth that the car betrayed. Hu went back inside his
office, shut the door, and rubbed his hands before the elements of the heater.
He knew that he was pressuring his brother-in-law, the Admiral, but Hu
considered that working with the Crux might have been a mistake after all. It
was not that he feared, as most