Tell Me All Your Thoughts On God.

[Kyle Shane]

He didn't expect the little chapel to be so small.

He wasn't even familiar with most hospitals having chapels, but he, as a rule, avoided hospitals anyway. It can have that effect on you, sitting in an uncompromising waiting room chair when you're nine years old, reading a comic listlessly until a surgeon comes out sadly removing his gloves and telling you your mother didn't make it.

But he'd retreated from Patrick's room because he couldn't bear the silent vigil, the sitting with his knees bunched and his hands clasped as nurses came and adjusted his O2. Couldn't stand it. He wanted to scream. And scream. The bustle of the ward around him, the beep of machines, and the scent of slow death in a sick bay was getting to him, and he sought out a quiet respite down the hall, away from the nurses desk. Away from the vending machines. Away from it all. And so, he'd found the hospital's chapel. And as he stepped into it, expecting this sanctified little hovel to set his feet on fire as soon as he did, the noise dropped away for him.

It was what he needed, this go around, away from the madness and all of the bullshit that he had been going through with hacker groups and self-driving cars. A quieter moment to reflect.

He sat in one of the cramped little pews in this glorified closet, looking around. Gold light filtered through one stained glass circlet above the podium. There was standing room for, maybe, 10 people, if they packed together. As he turned his mind on what to do with his half-brother, and the damage the whole mess had caused, he looked at the little chapel and had to admit to himself that a vessel of the Lord had never felt so empty and lonely to him.

"Maybe it's not what came in already filling the place, but what you bring in here that fills it up, pretty boy," came her voice, laughing, teasing, and flirting. No. His eyes widened. His head whipped around. He sniffed at the air, trying to discern if the psychotropic gas was being pumped into the room, that had given him a guided tour of hell. He could feel her presence entering the room, her lithe little body never progressing very far into womanhood. She was tiny, pale, knobby, all dark hair and heartbreaking smile.

"This can't be real," He moaned, "I know you're not here, Array, and it can't be another illusion of Patrick's... it can't."

She continued to tease, it was how they played. She ruffled his cemented hair and wrapped her free arm around his neck. "Maybe not... but who's to say the gas attack didn't knock some screws loose in that head of yours?"

He had to admit she had a fair point, but he still didn't want to turn and face her. She made him anyway, pulling his chin. "Awww, babe, why droops the mug tho?"

He raised an eyebrow at her saltily, and said, "If you're from in my head, that's something you'd know," and she drifted through a pew in an estimation of a ghost before she sat down next to him like a normal person, nonchalantly as if she were sitting in a booth at Wafflehouse. He continues, "It's this, it's all of this. It sucks. Patrick Shane, my insane half-brother, comes back into my life, at the head of a pseudo-Anonymous hacktivist cult. He blackmails a cast of characters into becoming an army to be cyber criminals from all walks of life. He uses hacking skills to royally fuck up Hiro's company with leaked stock info and emails, leading to thousands of people losing their jobs. And he has you followed and profiled... all of these people hurt."

"And you're here, in this chapel, asking God, why do bad things happen to bad people?" the shade inquired, with a sardonic, yet still sad quirk of her mouth.

"I don't wonder about that anymore," he returned stonily. "I haven't since I was nine. You can only ask a question a hundred times and receive no answer before it becomes your answer, that there isn't anybody on the other end of the line, there never was."

She booped his nose. "Ahso, we come to the secret origin of your stoic agnosticism. Boy snubbed by God, denies God and takes responsibilty for his own self."

He knew that she was trying to make it sound bad, after all what voice in your head didn't try to twist your ideals sometimes. "It's the crux of the whole thing, though. I choose, every time. But there's some times, fuck, I have to question afterwards, am I doing the right thing. And I have only myself to answer to."

"Like with Patrick?"

"Like with Patrick, I rolled the dice on getting involved in that scheme with him. Like with Hiroshi Yukio in my day job. I made the decision to go darker, and in the end I contradicted what I was trying to say, my loftier ideals, in the name of manipulating a situation where he wouldn't get a spot in the Icemann Invitational Tournament just because I wanted to be the one that had it."

She's showing empathy now, at least, holding his knee and giving it a tacit squeeze. "Hey. It's not all bad... I mean, sure, you've got pissed off sumo wrestlers chasing you... But you did roll the dice. And you did it because it was what you thought was best." And so saying, she stands up, holding her hands outstretched in front of her and beckoning him to stand up with her. As she does, the chapel becomes a portal.

The chapel is becoming a garden. Literally, the epitome of the Garden of Eden is growing around them, the most lush, beautiful oasis forms from the portal. As he cranes his head up in wonderment, she smiles back at him. "If you're making the determinations which alignment you want to play the game in, you can always use this skill to make your own reality. Let there be light." She arches her eyebrows wickedly, beckoning him to come, see the plants growing.

Array, daintily, not a care in the world, stops to smell hibiscus and it's here that he's seeing the girl that he knew from their apartment. She's even humming a little. And now, in this too perfect place, he's finding that he is the one that feels out of synch, out of touch. It's as if, in the one unimpeachably, painstakingly created fantasy his mind could conjure, he is the one thing with a flaw. That says a lot about him.

But he has to say something. He has to break the mood, spoil the aura, lessen the moment. He has to. It itches at the back of his throat, wanting to say something, to qualify it. And he can't let this go, because without voicing it, it won't feel real. "I want to... but ignoring my problems and running from them has led me down even worse paths. It's led me to feeling broken. If I just decide to retreat into a garden in my mind, I'd be... using just another coping mechanism, instead of dealing."

"But isn't that what you want? Never with the weekly grind. Never with the feeling of chasing the emptiness." She primly sits on her knees, patting a knoll of grass with a wreath of bushes around them. He smells sweet honeysuckle on the wafting breeze. "All you have to do is give that up." And it's so tempting for him, because isn't that the dream? When you won't have to fight for something every week, when you can just be at peace? But it continues to feel and manifest more uncomfortably with him. As his brow furrows, and he thinks this over, swirling dark clouds begin to form overhead. And Array becomes impatient, demanding, "Sit with me a while."

He sighs, and does so. They sit, her folded against his side, him absently looking up at the sky.

"You know, I never thought to ask you when we were together, what are your thoughts on God?"

"I believe..." she hedged for a minute, trying to think of how the real Array would have worded it perhaps, and he appreciated the part of his brain for giving him this lie. "I believe in making Heaven on earth as long as you're able. Life's so short, and then..." she rips out strands of grass, and then flips her hand open, letting them float away on the wind. "Gone."

"I can't stay, though, and you know that." He waves an arm at the gathering clouds on the horizon. "I've already tainted the potential of what this could have been..."

Array looks so profoundly sad, hugging her arms around her knees. She stays there as he stands up. "You're always so afraid. That your self determination leads to self destruction. That everything beautiful you decide to have for a little while becomes corrupted."

He looks back down at her, pushing a wisp of hair out of her eyes. "I know... it's why you had to go."

Array looks down, gritting her teeth. "You and the goddamn five nightmares."

"Number four is not my favorite," he says, absently. But then she reaches her hand back out, like a little child, asking him to stay. "Sit with me just a little while longer?"

He does, sitting Indian style next to her. "You're not a monster, you know," the piece of her in his mind says, "For thinking of all the things you've ruined... and for the fear, of everything you could. For having your demons."

"The worst part of being your own theology, kid," he said grimly, "Sometimes you're the devil as much as you're God."

Her fingers brushed his lips, and as he woke, eyes snapping open as he shot straight up in the pew, he felt/heard her voice in his head, saying, "Sometimes it's okay to try being human."

He ruminated on the strange, fading vision as he stood and walked back. The ward was empty now, lights were out down the hall, and he was alone except for a few nurses passing by. He had a lot to think about. He thought about Gardens, and sweet kisses, and the smell of honeysuckle, and the heartbreak of not staying. He thought of stormy, raging skies roiling in, halting the peace of tranquility.

He thought about his brother, laying there on a respirator, as he entered the hospital room, pulling the curtain around.

And, mostly, he thought of the continuous roll of the dice that came with all of his thoughts on God, on destiny. And he felt it roll again, in his mind.

He felt the pillow in his hand, lowering it towards Patrick as the dice tumbled to a stop.

I have been here since November of last year. Week after week, I've put down every challenge to step up to me. I claimed the Underground Championship in my third match here, and since then I've set out to prove myself each and every week despite the front office's lack of faith in me, and the higher ups criticizing me because they don't know what they have. And then you have men like Hiroshi Yukio, who just plain get under my skin, telling me I "CAN'T" do this, I CAN'T beat them, I can't put them down. So I've added more challenges to myself. Knowing as I do that if I win the semi finals match, I'll go on to a triple threat match at the pay-per-view with the Icemann Tournament trophy and title shot on the line, a triple threat match that very well could have Hiroshi Yukio in it. That's if Hiroshi doesn't do what I think he may and challenge me to a match for my belt, which will mean I'd be double booked and still with the challenge of chopping down a 500 pound wad of Play-Doh in the middle of that ring.

That's not enough for me. I needed more.

To ensure that Hiroshi got the message that I am not intimidated I crossed a hell of a line and attacked him from behind during his match with Alexandra Tamora. This, also contradicted a message I sent before his match, where I said, I was willing to look at options for going hardcore to show him that I meant business. But I took a gamble of my lifetime and I went rogue. I fucked Hiroshi Yukio over as a DM determines exactly how the adventure is going to play out with a flick of my Powergloved wrist. I put Hiroshi out of the Icemann Tournament. But in doing so, I opened myself up to retaliation, and a much bigger challenge now, because he'll find himself justified in coming in and squashing me and throwing me to a gang of vultures. So why did I do it? It's the same reason that I gave when saying that I would fight Hiroshi with whatever means neccessary to take him down. I crave the thrill of a challenge, and I crave setting limits on myself and transcending them in ways nobody else does. Not Hiroshi, and not my opponent, this week, in the semi-finals, Gabriel, the Artist Formerly Known as Rick Majors.

Not one of them has what I have, this unshakeable, unfuckwithable, mountain destroying confidence. The knowledge that on a long enough timeline, there is nothing I won't achieve here.

And to me, that's not even the saddest part.

The saddest part is what a depressing mirror this is like looking into. When I see Rick Majors. 45 years old. 6'1, 219 pounds. Same finisher even, it's almost like he's biting me in the most incredibly painful way. I look at the newly christened Gabriel and I'm seeing what I could have been, if I put my faith in anything else. If I completely weakened my own premise. And I all I can see there is a wasted, dried up man who can't believe in himself. Who doesn't have the skill or the competence to turn his own life around, so he had to turn to thumping his bible. Oh, this born again Christian act is rote, but it won't play to the far pulpits friends and neighbors. Cuz see, when who I could have been meets me as I am in that ring, it's going to be more than just a clash of ideology. What my road to the ultimate victory in TIIT will come down to is mostly just a matter of faith.

So it's time and with no more perfect dance partner that I lay out truly who and what I believe in.

From the time I was just a little kid who's mother was ripped away before he could even have a handful of years with her, and was told by simpering relatives that she was in the hands of "higher powers" I have grown self-sufficient, beholden to no masters in the sky. I don't put my stock in callings from the Lord, and that is where I get my strength. I believe in triumph of the human spirit over adversity through continuous levelling up. I believe in forging my own destiny. I believe in being your own master, second to none. Everything I ever got in this world came through my own hard work of self-improvement and it is to that extent that I'm a testament of a truly self-made individual. Believe in yourself. Push yourself to the next level. Never settle for less than the gold standard. Be the protagonist... or the villain of your own game. That's the lesson I imparted to Hiroshi Yukio last week and it is a tough lesson I'm going to teach to Gabriel now.

Put your faith in your own angels, or put your faith in monsters that populate your own mental Garden of good or evil.

But, being a follower. A lackey. A lickspittle. A servant of another God or Master besides yourself is ultimately the most hollow lie.

And that's all Seromin-ism is. It's a cheat. It's hollow and without sustenance because it's not backed up with any kind of personal fulfillment.

From the very conception of becoming just one of Seromine's flock, Gabriel undermined any special worth or belief he had in himself. He negated any meaning to his own career and threw it out the window.

Maybe, (probably,) I'm either a nihilist or a complete dick to believe in nothing but me out there, but at least I'm taking responsibilty and taking charge in what I do.

Everything I do, whether it's Lawful Good or Chaotic Neutral is because I rolled my own dice and determined how I was going to play it. I didn't pray to the father above, and I didn't act like the mouthpiece, nay the goddamn puppet of another Man's will.

Everything Gabe says now is not HIS will. He's being the gopher of an idiot twisting Scripture to his own ends, literally making this up as he goes. He doesn't allow himself to see because that makes his world more compromised. It's simpler to be a puppet. It's far easier to buy propaganda and swallow it down. Seromine's got him hook line and sinker and now all he is, is a hinged jaw ventriloquist dummy with Seromine's hand up his ass.

A parrot with clipped wings shitting in his papered cage and spouting all the phrases Seromine has trained him to say.

I think you see my point.

Gabriel has bought so totally in to what Seromine's selling, that he'll be right there to co-sign any single time Seromine barks a dictum or threatens somebody with a cryptic Biblical riddle. "Praise Be To Seromine!"

In his previous life as Rick Majors, Gabriel failed his way into getting here. He failed in his professional life, and was looked at as someone who couldn't do it anymore. By his own admission, he was faltering and he was in freefall before he hooked up with Seromine, who opened his eyes to the possibilities. But what Seromine really did, was hook himself the most impossibly naive and gullible fall boy. Look at how Seromine wasn't about to retain his title against Kelli Starr, until Rick crossed the river and joined the flock. That's buying in, but it's also saving a cheap demogogue with feet of clay. Only Rick didn't see that. He heard the message and he began mouthing the words, 'cause they made sense to him.

But what doesn't make sense no matter which way you try to turn it logically is how it's helped make him better. If anything it's shown me that he's weaker than he ever was before he hooked up with Seromine because now he needs the flock of followers at his back like a crutch. He needs Seromine in his corner pontificating and giving him sermons to boost his self esteem. And when the time came last week, he needed an added stipulation that allowed a gaggle of idiots in robes running interference to secure a trip to the semi-finals.

And therein lies the divide. If we take him at his word that Gabriel is a totally new entity divorced from his previous life as Rick Majors; well then all I see is a man who is incapable of winning a goddamn match without getting a bunch of choir boys and bag ladies to stop him from being beaten fairly. But if we look at the career of Rick Majors and see the threat that he is supposed to pose because of his record, then before he joined Seromine he was so in the toilet that only joining a cult made sense to him as a lateral career move.

Myself, I honestly don't care what he's done, or who he was in a previous life. The new Gabriel I see presented here is the world's biggest chump.

Let's assume for a second he's so delusional that he thinks any of this is going to save him from getting a terrible ass-kicking from me. Any of the run-ins, any of the cheap "community theater version of The Ten Commandments" parlor tricks that define the faithful, any of his Godly hogwash. Suppose he prays and his Lord delivers a miracle that will net him a victory into the finals of TIIT. Would Gabriel truly be so blind as to think that his Savior Seromine would suffer even the slightest possibility of just one of his stooges upstaging him and winning a title shot, thereby making the leader of the entire sect look worse than him? It's not happenin', captain. Seromine would never actually LET someone lesser than him, go into a position where they could put themselves higher than him, God's Will or not. He just wants Gabriel in that position so that if the time came he would have someone who would willingly hand the title shot over to him.

But should his whipping boy lose... and he will, because second guessing victory never even registers as a possibility to me... then Seromine can just spin it to Gabriel as God having another plan for him.

Or opening a window after I slam the door full force into his face.

Or there only being one set of footprints in the sand because Jesus carried his unconscious body out of the ring after Kyle Shane put his lights out in the center of the ring.

I mean... there's gotta be some sorta bon mot written for this in Psalms.

That's the other painful truth is that when you're part of a cult that places your fate in the hands of an Almighty, when things don't go your way, it's because the Father had a different plan in mind. But if you take responsibility for your own future and fight as hard for it as you can, you don't let anything stop you or hold you back from getting what you want, God's fucking plan be damned. I am determined to make the Icemann Invitional Tournament mine, and nothing is going to divert me, no divine plan is going to bar me or different path is set in front of me. It's mine, and I will take it.

And I know, that my self-determination is going to horrify the Jesus freaks, leave them aghast. How DARE you say that! Gabriel and the man holding his leash are going to call ME a sinner, because every single time I hook up with a Church Goin' Boy, he has to tell me that worshipping other graven images or calling myself a God of Game is blasphemy, because those that can quote verbatim from a fucking book are nothing if not predictable. But see... I don't demand people bow their heads and worship me for doing what I do; However, people seeing me at work does inspire awe. And, week after week, when I do what I am capable of I instill belief in me that I can accomplish any sort of miracle, because I have the confidence and the skill to do by myself what men like his Lord Seromine can't make him do on his best day. Those people bow for me because the example I set inspires people. People believe in what I say and respond to my confidence and empowerment.

I have ultimate faith in the fact that I am the best in the damn world. I believe, in ME. Gabriel can't say that and can't have Seromine say it for him, he can't make people see him for what he's not.

I have defined myself in my run as the PCW Underground Champion in a way nobody can. Put any one person or any group of challenges in my way and I'll rise to the occasion.

I don't need to look elsewhere for answers, that is the penultimate truth to my existence.

But when I look at Gabriel, I see a version of me that is lost in the Garden. A version of me that hugs tight to false prophets and ascribes every cent of his worth to how he looks in the eyes of his Lord. I look at Gabriel... and the only emotion I could begin to conjure is an abstract sense of pity.

I look down at this little lost lamb who could only find a sense of worth in sheep bleating out to a God for assistance to make his life mean something again.

I'll look across that ring, and see someone that I could have been, if I was weaker, if I didn't push myself so hard.

And he'll look up, from the lights, and see... me.

The only God who matters here.

And in that ring, I'm damn sure the one he's going to be praying to.

Now, "Praise Be" to that shit.