Skinwalker ch. 2 (standard:travel stories, 6274 words) [2/5] show all parts
Author: Eutychus	Added: Jan 15 2018	Views/Reads: 1840/1226	Part vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
Jerry and Moe make it to the edge of the River Acheron and must deal with Charon to allow for passage into Hell proper. After a successful crossing (albeit not without a little drama), they make it to the castle of Minos.

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("He descended into hell") and smiled at the event Charon was 
describing. 

"Sir, I was referring to an Italian poet from Florence. Since we both
know what the waters will do to living human flesh, we know that Dante 
must have taken your ferry across." 

"Oh, him... But that was a special situation, and I don't think yours
compares," Charon said. 

"If you would observe closely, you will see that he bears witness of
Another who almost certainly made provision for him to be here." 

Charon leaned down and inspected me more thoroughly. "I see. Alive and a
believer. That is indeed rare in these parts. Certainly you may cross, 
but you must stand where I tell you or we may not make it safely to the 
other side." 

We walked alongside the ferry and I read the letters  "**id o*  **e 
**st" painted on the bow, scorch marks having eliminated the missing 
letters. Though the passengers were elbow to elbow on the first level, 
as Charon stepped aboard a path opened before him. Moe and I followed 
close behind and I noted that when I stepped on board the ferry listed 
noticeably to starboard. 

"The Maiden's center of gravity lies directly below my feet. You must
stand here during the crossing," Charon said grimly. "Now I must 
address the rest of my charges." 

He made his way to the upper deck and stood behind the pilothouse. He
turned, faced the passengers below and shouted, "You have blasphemed 
your Maker by ignoring Grace dearly purchased and freely offered during 
your lifetime. Redemption is now beyond your grasp and deliverance from 
what awaits you will NOT be forthcoming. Enjoy the ride." 

The whistle sounded, smoke rose from the smokestack and the ferry began
to move. There was no discussion among the passengers but the tension 
was thick. I could feel it in each person that was in contact with me. 
They were either rigid like someone having a tonic seizure or they 
quivered from fear. As soon as the shore was several ship lengths 
distant some guy five bodies away panicked. 

"No. This is wrong. Death is supposed to be the end of everything! I
shouldn't even be able to think about this garbage. I'm out of here," 
he yelled, shoving his way to the rail. He was up and over the rail in 
a heartbeat. A second later came the splash immediately followed by a 
surprised scream. Then silence. 

"Gone." "Sank like a rock." "Did you see his face?" "Don't touch the
water," different voices near the railing observed. 

"Any idea what happened to that guy?" I asked Moe. 

"The waters of the Acheron are very cold. They never freeze but their
temperature is rumored to be well below the freezing point of water. 
They would crystallize living human flesh immediately." 

"Then what happened to him?" 

"He is unable to move, cold, and resting on the bottom of the river with
others who made the same foolish choice. If the current is right he may 
find his way to one of the lower levels, but he will more likely become 
entangled in some rubbish on the bottom of the river for eternity." 

I tried to imagine the situation and as a cold shiver ran through me I
turned my back to that side of the ferry. As I looked over the other 
rail the curved spine of something enormous traveling the opposite 
direction rose into view and then sank back down into the water. I 
initially thought ceolacanth but there were neither scales nor dorsal 
fin. In the midst of the nervousness the large beast caused among the 
other passengers I remembered something about another water creature 
from an Old Testament account. 

"Moe, does your knowledge of the Bible include the book of Jonah?" 

"Yes." 

"Do you recall what was said about the great fish?" 

"At the end of the first chapter we are informed that 'the Lord prepared
a great fish to swallow Jonah'." 

"Right. So if God prepared a fish for a specific task, up to and
including altering it in some way to accommodate a reluctant prophet 
for a three day and three night stay in its belly, is it possible 
Charon is another such special creation fashioned for the specific task 
of ferrying damned souls across this river?" 

"There is some sense in that speculation. It may very well be, though
that fact will matter little to those for whom he provides his 
service." 

As Moe was speaking I glanced in the general direction in which the
ferry was headed and noticed that the far shore was 
approaching...quickly! There was a lot of loud activity in the pilot 
house, Charon barking orders and underlings confirming the enacting of 
those orders. The ferry suddenly seemed to pivot on the bow and turned 
a quick ninety degrees like one of the Goodtime excursion ships that 
gave tours of Lake Erie and the lower Cuyahoga River, though they 
effected such maneuvers with  200 horsepower bow thrusters. How could a 
paddle-wheel ferry powered by a simple steam engine pull the same 
stunt? 

The ferry came to a gentle mooring against a stone pier. I looked up at
the pilot house to see Charon glowering at me and pointing to the deck. 
The message was clear. Stay put! 

People began to climb over the rail out onto the "dock" and walk away
from the river toward a pass between two cliff faces twenty some feet 
high and fifty feet from the water's edge. It seemed to take a lot less 
time for the deck to empty of passengers than it had taken for the 
ferry to load, which was odd given that the damned were walking in the 
direction of eternal punishment. I mean, why hurry? 

"You may now approach the rail," Charon called out. Tied to the stone
dock, the ferry did not list as I moved away from the ship's center of 
gravity. I stepped over the rail and walked to where Moe was waiting. 
By the time I turned to look at the ferry Charon was already preparing 
for his return trip. A hose had been dropped into the river and one of 
his crew was operating a hand pump to refill the boiler's reservoir. I 
walked to the bow hoping to find a readable version of the ferry's name 
only to discover a similar scorching, though the letters on the port 
side read "M*** Of  *h*  M***   *n ser**ce 1898".  I made a mental note 
to consider those letters at some point in the future. 

I turned away from the river and was surprised to see Moe standing by
himself on the plateau between the river and the cliff. 

"Where did they all go?" I asked, amazed that the crowd from the ferry
had disappeared so quickly. 

"Virgil explained that phenomenon to Dante by stating that 'all their
fear is changed into desire'. For all the fear you sensed on the ferry, 
there is an aspect of their personalities that longs for, or desires, 
to see justice done. As a young man I had occasion to witness the 
effects of alcohol and other drugs in places like opium dens on the 
lower classes. Though the addictions produced only misery, the addicted 
would invariably return to the agent of addiction, hating the drink or 
the drug for the hold it had on them and hating themselves for 
returning to the chemical that had such influence over them. The fear 
of what it would do to them was overridden by the desire for the 
sensation it gave. I think it is similar here. The sin which they hated 
for what it did to them they now run to. A dog returning, so to speak." 


I thought about it briefly and had my own Romans 7 ("Why do I do what I
don't want to do?") moment, understanding completely the dilemma Moe 
outlined. 

And had Moe said "lower classes" and "opium dens"? What portion of
history was he from? 

"Why did no one stay here?" 

"This is a no man's land now. There is no longer anyone in this circle."


"Then what became of those with whom Dante spoke? This is the first
circle, isn't it?" 

"The technical term for the people Dante encountered in Limbo would be
squatters. They have long since arrived at their proper place in hell. 
Some described this circle as Sheol, and Charon alluded to the event 
that caused its current state of emptiness. Should you care to discuss 
it, I would warn you not to use a particular proper name. It is not 
well received." 

"By whom?" 

"Rather by what. Hell itself reacts to the name of the One who bent its
framework two thousand years ago." 

"If this was the abode of the righteous dead until that time when
salvation was purchased on the cross," I said and felt the stone 
beneath my feet shudder a bit, "has Sheol changed noticeably? I have a 
hard time imagining Abraham and his family of faith residing for 
hundreds of years in this barren place." 

"There are ruins covered with graffiti written in demon tongues. The
homes were Spartan but I presume perfectly serviceable. And if the 
oldest residents of hell are to be trusted, this area was grassy once." 


"Where are the homes?" 

"By now they are several kilometers from here. I'm told they used to be
visible from this location." 

"The patriarchs lived in mobile homes?" I asked, not expecting Moe might
not understand the term. 

"Mm, no. As hell increases in size artifacts within it change apparent
position." 

"Hell is larger than it used to be?" 

"That is the only reason I can think of for the fact that we can no
longer see the homes of the patriarchs." 

"Have you ever thought to do some exploring?" 

"There are stricter protocols in place these days that discourage such
curiosity." 

"So we follow the crowd?" 

"An activity that contributed to large numbers of souls winding up here,
but yes, let us proceed." 

We entered the pass between the pair of rock faces and I paid particular
attention to what I was hearing. Distant echoes of a rational 
conversation, one voice louder than the other, but louder merely in 
volume, not intensity. The simple sound of people talking. For some 
reason it was comforting, which also made it seem out of place. 

The walls of the pass were plain, and about fifty feet in the color of
the stone began to lighten. It was changing from the gray of granite to 
a marbling of limestone and granite and then to the white of limestone. 
So far I had seen sub-zero water that didn't freeze, banners that moved 
through the sky with no visible means of propulsion, and a paddlewheel 
ferry that moved with the grace of a hydrofoil across the surface of 
the water. Now I was seeing sedimentary and igneous rock blended 
together in a manner that would confound any geologist worth his salt. 
Hell seemed to be a place of anachronisms. 

The walls became less random in shape and more like a structure, flat
and smooth with right angles indicative of architecture rather than 
nature. Soon it felt more like I was walking down a hallway than a 
space between rock masses. 

"What are we walking into, Moe?" 

"This is the palace of Minos." 

"Minos...the judge of the underworld in classical Greek literature. In
Inferno he assigned the souls to their particular circle of hell, 
right?" I asked as I again noticed the discussion I had heard earlier. 
It sounded closer and the lesser voice was different now; definitely 
female. 

"Yes, that is his function." 

We crossed several intersections, the passages moving at right angles
off the main corridor. One such passage was comparatively short and a 
bluish-yellow light was visible at the end. With a little persuasion I 
was able to convince Moe we should take the brief detour. 

The light was coming through a narrow opening in the wall, a slot
through which defenders of a castle might have fired their longbows 
five hundred years ago. The view through the opening turned out to be 
striking but somewhat depressing as well. I felt like I was at one of 
those overlook pull-offs along the east rim of the Grand Canyon a few 
minutes after sundown. On the far wall of the "canyon" I saw flickers 
of light a long way down and realized that the wall was being 
illuminated by blue flames. 

"Do you see anything that surprises you?" Moe asked. 

"No, fire was expected as was the smell of the smoke rising from below."


"Consider that an overview. It is time we move on to specifics," he said
and headed back toward the main corridor. "You are going to be a 
surprise to Minos and he may spend some time in discussion with you. 
Don't be bothered by this because he, of all the persons you are likely 
to encounter, is most deserving of your trust." 

We walked for a long time past stone furniture, undistinguished artwork
and nondescript rooms containing statuary reminiscent of minor cubist 
sculptors. The corridor finally opened into a large room. Directly 
across from the doorway we had just passed through was a large seat 
(throne?) occupied by a titanic being. Minos was enormous  but he had 
the proportions of a normal human being, not someone with pituitary 
issues that exaggerated limb or trunk size to an awkward degree.  For 
the moment Moe and I went unnoticed as Minos was engaged in discussion 
with a woman whom I thought I had seen next to the guy who had jumped 
ship partway across the Acheron. 

The discussion was thoughtful and surprisingly honest. Perhaps even
friendly. The woman revealed details of her life to Minos such as I 
would never consider discussing with a stranger let alone a being 
straight out of an Albrecht Dürer woodcut of the Apocalypse. All the 
while I was conscious of movement behind Minos' throne and as he sat 
there pondering the discussion the two had just shared the movements 
became shorter and quicker. 

Minos stood, folded his arms and from behind him a prehensile tail
wrapped twice about his midsection. He spoke the name of the woman, 
nodded, and she jumped as though she had been hit with a jolt of 
electric current. As she shook off the sensation a stunned expression 
crossed her face. She touched her own midsection and as she did I 
noticed that two rings of red had seeped their way to the surface of 
the robe she was wearing. She looked at Minos and he gestured toward a 
doorway to his left. Without a word she followed his direction. 

Immediately Minos looked at us and frowned. "I have seen you before.
Your destiny is already established. Why are you here again?" 

"This is not my doing. I was summoned from my proper place to the
vestibule. Since your judgment is both true and just, my being here 
must have been willed where what is willed is what must be," Moe said 
in his own defense. 

"A variation on a theme, but I'll buy it for the moment. What of you?"
Minos asked me. "I can generally get a sense of the core disposition of 
a soul but I get no such read from you. How have you accomplished 
this?" 

In keeping with Moe's earlier caveat about the use of names, I took a
moment to choose my words. 

"It's really nothing I have done. It's something that was done both to
and for me. You are trying to deal with two separate natures, an old 
and new, and you are most likely only able to read the older of the 
two. The newer nature has been sublimating the old for a few decades 
now so I'm not surprised you are having a difficult time of it." 

"The sin on your soul reads more like a distant and indistinct echo than
something that is part of who you are. It's almost as though there is 
nothing to judge." 

"Perhaps because that judgment took place two thousand years ago on a
hill near Jerusalem. It's referred to as justification, being declared 
guilt free and righteous based on the fact that payment for my sin was 
made by Another," I said, adding the justification explanation to the 
mix because Minos seemed unsure how to react to me. 

"I have detailed knowledge of all jurisprudence based on the Law as
delineated through human reason and its proper application. I have 
simply never encountered a redeemed soul before," Minos said. His tone 
was that of a child who had done his best with an unfamiliar task. I 
think I hurt his feelings. 

"When you say 'the Law', are you referring to God's Law?" 

"Of course. What other Law can there be?" 

"Understood. You mentioned human reason so I was thinking of a law with
human rationalization attached, which would give that law every 
loophole imaginable." 

"The goal of a human's ability to reason, the function of the intellect,
is to discern and apprehend truth, in particular truth about God. It is 
precisely that capacity for rationalization that works against what 
Aristotle referred to as the 'good' of intellect, the quest for truth. 
The intellect continues to function here, but it has no desire for 
truth which can no longer profit the soul. I will admit, however, as in 
the case of your friend here, there are exceptions to that maxim. He 
seems to maintain an academic curiosity toward his Maker." 

"May I ask what you did with the woman who preceded us?" 

"She shared her heart with me by responding to my questions. From the
answers given I was able to determine which sin most defined her life 
and sent her to the appropriate circle. There is neither malice in the 
process nor rush to judgment, as we had been speaking for quite a while 
before you entered the courtroom." 

"She was on the ferry when we crossed. How did you get through that mass
of people so quickly?" 

"You will discover that time does not flow here as it does on Earth. In
fact it doesn't flow at all. It is always 'now'. That means I can 
accomplish a lot of work in an arbitrarily short amount of  'time'." 

"Alright. Now the two circles of red on her robe. They corresponded to
the number of times your tail was wrapped around yourself, meaning that 
she was sent to the second circle. At first I thought reptile when I 
saw your tail. But the appearance of blood...would I be more correct if 
I presumed cephalopod?" 

"You are correct, it is more tentacle than tail. And as a tentacle, the
suction pads have a serrated edge to them. I wrap it around myself the 
correct number of times and the person receiving judgment also receives 
the cuts from the suction pads. It is that simple." 

"It makes an interesting kind of sense. How long until she will reach
her destination?" 

"As soon as she passed through the doorway she arrived at the second
circle. And before you ask, had she been predisposed to pandering, 
gluttony, or had committed suicide, she would have passed through the 
doorway to the proper circle. There is an incredible economy of space 
in hell." 

"We thank you for your time. May we pass to the same circle she did?"
Moe asked. 

"I sense that you are taking this task seriously, or at the very least
are using it as an opportunity to alleviate the monotony. Know that 
when you have finished with Jerome here, you will return to your proper 
place." 

"I understand." 

"Be on your way. I have work to do. Charon has made another successful
crossing," Minos said and we heard the shuffling sound of many feet 
coming from the corridor behind us. 

"Jerome?" 

" 'Jerry' is an accepted foreshortening of the name. In the 1960s no kid
named Jerome wanted to actually be called Jerome by friends, teachers, 
classmates or parents for that matter." 

"I see. Are you wearing a belt?" 

"Yes." 

"Would you mind loosening it just a bit? I may require your services as
an anchor." 

"What... That's right, wind." 

"Correct, but you have weight which should make you stable in a way the
residents of this circle can never be nor would even choose to be." 

I stood before the doorway trying to sense what lay on the other side.
Like the entrance to hell, this doorway was both open and gave no hint 
of what was beyond the opening. I half expected to see dust devils 
skittering about on the other side of the door, catch the edge of a 
gust coming through the door or be pulled toward the door by a strong 
wind blowing across the opening in accordance with the Bernoulli 
principle. That's the effect that allows an airfoil to create the lift 
necessary for an airplane to fly and pulls passengers out of airplanes 
when someone opens the emergency exit at 20,000 feet in disaster movies 
from the 1970s. 

Moe stepped through the opening and with a skeletal hand grabbed my
forearm to urge me along. The expected maelstrom seemed somewhat 
lackluster. The "black wind" Dante described seemed to me more like a 
stiff spring zephyr. Excellent conditions for kite flying but not 
particularly hellish. Then I looked up. If the wind made it feel like 
spring, the sky made it look like fall, only instead of leaves, the sky 
was filled with people. 

After recovering from my initial surprise, I watched the activity above
us with the curiosity of a three year old. The people, joined together 
in pairs, moved randomly, a combination of sudden shifts in the wind's 
speed and direction. And Newtonian physics at its purest was 
demonstrated when individuals collided. The reaction of the impact 
could have been demonstrated equally well on a billiard table. Impact 
resulted in both people acquiring a new trajectory and if one or the 
other was rotating, the new course was colored by that rotation, as 
when someone places English on the cue ball causing the target to move 
in a manner that somewhat defies the geometry of the table. Something 
about the way the people were moving seemed familiar. Maybe I would 
recall why before we left this circle. 

For the first time since we met, Moe looked somewhat uncertain, perhaps
even a little frightened. Was he standing up straighter than he had 
been? He seemed taller. I looked down and noticed that his feet were 
three inches off the ground. 

"In spite of the fact that lust was not the predominant sin in my life,
I had my moments of self-indulgent sin shared with another. And a 
lifetime of effort directed toward extinguishing that desire simply 
finds me agreeing with the old axiom that trying to extinguish any 
desire by denying its complimentary act is like trying to quench a fire 
with gasoline. That is the nature of this and the next few circles, the 
sins of incontinence." 

For a moment the only thing that came to mind were television ads for
adult diapers, but then another definition clicked into place, a 
failure to restrain an appetite. These would have been the sins of the 
leopard, sins without malice per se, but sins which reflect those urges 
or bodily desires that echo the most basic impulses of human existence 
that, when separated from their divine source, are the most easily 
debased of all the gifts God gives to mankind. 

Though I had heard nothing to cause the reaction, I turned around
because something behind me felt wrong. Peering at us from the far side 
of an outcropping of rock was the woman who had recently arrived here 
from Minos' court. 

"Hello... Magdalena?" 

"Lena is fine." 

"I'm Jerry," I said and extended a hand. 

"Hi. I don't mean to seem unfriendly but I don't dare let go," she said,
her eyes widening at the prospect of letting go of her rock to shake my 
hand. 

"How came you to this place?" Moe asked. 

"Fog had dropped visibility to practically zero. I'm not sure where I
was in the chain reaction, but there were horns blaring, hazard lights 
flashing, my car slipped under a jackknifed semi and I was here. Not 
here here, but no longer west of Terra Haute. Then there was that ferry 
ride, the monster in the palace and now here holding a rock." 

"No, I mean what caused you to be in this circle of hell. What did you
discuss with Minos?" 

"The monster," I added when it appeared the name only confused her. 

"He asked a lot of personal questions. Boyfriends, lovers, spouse,
affairs concurrent with the marriage, lovers following the marriage." 

"His questions are only as probing as is necessary to determine what he
must. I'm sorry if you were made to feel uncomfortable," Moe said, 
looked at me and nodded in her direction. 

"That's very kind of you. You know, I never really thought of myself as
a bad person. Certainly not the type deserving of hell. I just don't 
get it. I honestly loved each of the people I was ever with. How can 
love be so wrong?" 

Her intonation was well practiced, developed to convince others (and
herself?) of her point of view. The way she reacted to Moe's baiting, 
showing concern for her discomfort at having her life scrutinized, 
revealed much. She immediately turned on the charm, responding to his 
manufactured affection with affection of her own. 

"I do not mean to heap grief upon you, but do you not see the
contradiction in your question?" Moe asked. "You use love, the very 
commodity you have abused in your life, as the excuse for its misuse. A 
lover's tenderness and the passion ignited by that tenderness served to 
give you a rationalization for consent to sin, a first step in the 
direction of this circle of hell. And the history you mentioned makes 
me think that you were comfortable revisiting this sin, that your 
infatuation with love outweighed any commitment to loving one person. 
You were satisfied with the afterglow of an adolescent love rather than 
committing to the covenant that mature, adult love demands." 

"That's how you see it," Lena said, peevishness having replaced
affection. 

"If there is one thing you can trust here, it is Minos' judgment. He is
both just and true in his rulings. I have never met a soul who, upon 
getting to know their unique situation, did not belong precisely where 
Minos had sent them. He has a God-given insight into the nature of a 
person's heart." 

"Would any God worthy of worship come up with a place like this for the
unbelieving? All I did was follow my heart. Can I be blamed for acting 
on those 'God-given' impulses?" 

"You are only held accountable for your choices, the choice to indulge
your passions, the choice to believe that you knew better than God what 
was best, the choice to not believe that God had something infinitely 
better in mind for you should you yield to His leading." 

"Strong words coming from someone else in hell." 

"I claim no special status. My unique curse here is to hope where there
is none. I want others to know and understand the truth about their 
situation, to know that God is just in creating hell." 

"True, truth? What is truth?" she asked and suddenly seemed confused by
her own words. "That wasn't what I meant to say. That came from 
somewhere else." 

"Such instances will be annoying for a time. Eventually you will come to
either embrace or hate these intrusions." 

"Then what was it? Where did it come from?" 

"The eighteenth chapter of John's gospel, Pilate's cynical reply to the
statement that the Accused had come to bear witness to the truth," I 
offered. 

"And it came to mind because it was appropriate for it to have done so,"
Moe added. "Think of it as a white elephant of the mind. It can do you 
no practical good now, but you may access scripture should you choose 
to do so." 

"Moe, are you saying that the residents of hell have the Bible committed
to memory?" 

"No, I'm saying that we may refer to scripture and that it is sometimes
forced upon us." 

"But how do you acquire the words?" 

"Unsure. When it is needed it is there in my conscious mind." 

"Ah, cloud storage," Lena mused. 

"An apt description," I said. 

Moe looked at us, wondered, and must have decided that it was
unimportant because he didn't pursue a definition. 

"Lena, how are the wounds Minos inflicted?" I asked. I had noticed that
the robe clung to her skin where the red rings had formed earlier which 
indicated that clotting had resulted, but a childhood experience with a 
stinging jellyfish at a North Carolina beach made me think Lena might 
be dealing with more than just scabs. 

"The wounds sting like hell, if you'll pardon the expression. I'm
guessing some venom was involved," Lena said and shrugged. 

"Warm water works best if you can find it here somewhere." 

"It's kind of you to care," she said with an unsuccessful attempt at
charm. In my eyes she had used up whatever reserves of allure she 
possessed when she was speaking with Moe. She looked up at the sky as 
the winds died down, weighed her options, tossed her hair back and 
opened her robe, asking us how things looked. In opening the robe she 
ripped off the recently clotted blood and as the wind picked up the 
fresh blood streamed around her midsection looking very much like two 
rings of red. The wounds looked vicious, as though someone had 
repeatedly taken a razor-sharp melon baller to her stomach. There was a 
sudden gust, her robe filled like a parachute and she was ten feet off 
the ground in a second. 

"Carried away by her passions in death as in life. You saw the sardonic
grin on her face as she opened the robe. She was trying to shock you 
for having the gall to lecture her about her life choices," I said and 
watched with surprise as two individuals came into contact twenty feet 
above us and tripled their speed away from each other as they collided. 
Based on what I had observed of souls being blown about this circle, 
that was an improper reaction. Why? 

"Here and in the next couple of circles you will observe desires that
have been based upon perceived need or want.  There is no real 
calculation involved. As we move deeper into hell, desires will 
increasingly be tied to the use of the intellect, so that as we proceed 
you will notice that more thought is required by the sinner to indulge 
in the sin. In other words, the more intentional the choice, the more 
severe the consequences." 

Intentionality. There shouldn't have been any based upon... 

"...the kinetic theory of gases," I mistakenly said out loud as I
watched people moving about the sky above us. 

"The what?" 

"I've been trying to make sense of the randomness of their motion," I
said, nodding in the direction of the sky. "The kinetic theory of gases 
makes the most sense except for a couple of instances that defy that 
theory. Like gas molecules, the people are traveling in straight-line 
motion and obeying Newton's Laws. Likewise, collisions between gas 
molecules or people are perfectly elastic. That is, no energy is gained 
or lost during the collision. Also, there are no attractive or 
repulsive forces between individual molecules or individual couplings. 
However, I have recently observed instances of repulsion where, upon 
collision, the individuals are sent seemingly to opposite ends of the 
world." 

"That's easy. In life they were actually in love with each other." 

"I suppose that should have been expected." 

"Why is that?" 

"I have been taught, and as I grew up observed, that man seems designed
for relationship.  Rapport and connection with other humans seems to be 
something that God not only expects but encourages in His creation. It 
therefore stands to reason that relationship as God intended it will 
not exist in hell." 

"And you presume this because...?" 

"Because relationship demands sacrifice on the part of each member.
Believers are more apt to understand this because they have already 
received that kind of love from their Savior and have been given the 
ability to live out this kind of love through the indwelling presence 
of the Holy Spirit. Without that kind of reinforcement, I doubt a 
relationship can last. And in hell there is no such underpinning, so 
relationships here are illusory at best." 

"That doesn't explain the shift in your attitude toward Lena. When you
first met you seemed sympathetic, even cordial. Then, just before the 
winds took her, your look was almost one of contempt. Where did that 
come from?" Moe asked as we began walking inward toward the division 
between the second and third circles. 

“Weariness, I think.” 

“What is the source of your exhaustion?” 

“Probably an accumulation of emotional fatigue from having to deal with
an unending train of social ‘causes'. People were not designed for 
unrelieved tension, be it of a personal, work, or cultural nature. Was 
the world you knew ever ripped from one end to the other by a shift 
within the culture that challenged a longstanding status quo?” 

Moe looked at the ground, then at me, smiled and said, “You might say
so.”


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