110: The Priest and the Vrŏzzōzite: Part One

The priest slid open the little door when he heard someone occupy the confessional. Waiting for the "Bless me, Father, for I have sinned...," it never came.

Instead, "I need information. I am not from Earth."

He'd heard many confessions throughout his priesthood, but this was new. Most madmen he encountered were religious fanatics, so he was curious as to how he might be able a man who fancied himself an alien. "How can I help?"

Information? the voice said.

"Yes?"

Tell me about religion? I try to reconcile religion to how we lived long ago, but I fall short."

"Long ago?"

In a manner of speaking. Are we not all immortals?

"That's what C.S. Lewis said."

I know.

"Oh, you do? You're well read. Was there no religion where you're from?"

No religion. Spirituality--that is identification.

"With what? With whom?"

The Being--from which.

"From which--what?"

No, what-from-which.

"Are you playing me? A Being? God?"

Everything.

"A Supreme Being who made all things?"

So it seems.

Familiar ground, the priest thought. "A Supreme Being who seems?"

Who, in the mind, is true.

"God?"

That is your word.

"What’s your word?"

So-it-seems. Then, a pause, followed by...our word for “so-it-seems": Vrŏzzōzed.

"If you're immortal, are you with this Vrŏzzōzed?"

At the same time.

"When?"

We're immortal, so...when we cease to be--and always have.

"That's contradiction."

So it seems. In Time Immemorial, Vrŏzzōzed is as external to Time Immemorial as we are to you.

"And this we? In the time of Vrŏzzōzed?"

We, in the time line. And above it. None--and all--a continuum of immortality.

"Different degrees of immortality?"

No, different degrees of eternity. We can and will live forever and ever, unless we die. The end of immortality is mortality. But eternity carries on, which is the real contradiction.

"So you die?"

We will be and are outside of immortality.

"As a human, who hasn’t even gotten to immortality, and certainly not outside of that, it seems I've lots of catching up to do, my un-Earthly friend."

So it seems.

"I absolve you," the priest blessed him, intending to pray for his madness.

Then I can go in peace.

That's when he saw the tentacles.

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THIS SUBMISSION

For Friday, April 19, Day 110 of the Story-a-Day Challenge. Now well into triple digits!

Companion piece to Part 2 at https://vocal.media/fiction/111-the-priest-and-the-vrozzozite-part-two; and Part 3 at https://vocal.media/fiction/112-the-priest-and-the-vrozzozite-part-three.

365 WORDS

All pictures are AI-generated, but the implications are not!

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• L.C. Schäfer, challenge originator
• Rachel Deeming
• Gerard DiLeo (myself)

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