A-Theism, the Great Godkiller

[[This story (in two parts) could fit into several categories. It contains mild interracial, May-December, light femdom, anal, lesbian, and heretical action. And like much of fiction there is also death which is in no way portrayed in an erotic fashion and is not intended to be treated as such.]]

*

As Yusef Muhammad awoke one afternoon from uneasy napping dreams he found himself in his study transformed into a monstrous heretic. With a snowstorm compelling all of the Twin Cities metro to stay inside and the first day of Winter (Christmas) Break well in effect, the young professor's body became weary after a semester's conclusion and collapsed as he worked at his desk. Smacking his lips, he plucked his consciousness from the forgotten but disturbing dreams, groggily clutched the desk clock, and pulled it before his face. He sighed and slammed it face down. He had slept for four hours. Sitting in his desk chair, he struggled to convince himself that it was in his best interest to get up. This was true of course but his brain could tell his body the truth until he was blue in the face and it still might not move. What little work the TAs left for him was complete but he had no plans to celebrate a Christian holiday with his secular Muslim family in Oman and Saudi Arabia. And he was fairly certain "secular" was blasphemy in the latter.

He successfully tricked himself to get up and he cautiously stood for a stretch, careful not to pull any muscles strained by his odd sleeping posture. Satisfied nothing broke, he realized he was hungry and turned from his desk towards the house's old kitchen but his peripheral vision noticed a change of environment. Forgetting the snack, he investigated the unsettling feeling of unknown change. As he walked about his study, he tried accounting for every object he passed but also whether Lupe, his maid, had been around. No, surely not, she would have woken him with the sound of her vacuum. And besides, as a gesture to her devout Catholicism, he gave her the week off from cleaning for him. He nearly gave up before he realized the obvious and noticed his free standing black-board covered with white chalk. Though the writing was in his handwriting, he could not recall writing it. The first equation was the "ABC" of logical philosophy—his focus. A + B =C. "A. All men are mortal. B. Socrates is a man. C. Therefore Socrates is mortal," was typically the first example of this formula he gave his intro class.

He nearly started back for the kitchen but when the formality of simply re-remembering the act of writing the equations became an ordeal, his curiosity peaked. Examining the board closely to perhaps jog his memory, he realized they were not many small equations but a single long one. Personal intrigue and professional curiosity enticed him and so he continued to the bottom, realizing it kept going onto the reverse side.

"Sensational," he muttered as he mouthed the logic equation and turned his eyes to the symbolic-key, illustrating what the formula letters stood for like on a geography map. "Remarkable!" he exclaimed at one particularly tricky but well deduced section. "Oh how controversial! How on Earth did this get here?" he asked himself as he read on. After five minutes he reached the end but he was not finished. He read it yet again, this time for a thorough twenty minutes to triple check the correctness of the conclusion. His initial excitement over this mysteriously appearing equation was tempered by repeated examinations but his mind grew more aroused when it was satisfied of its correctness, prompting him to take pictures of the equation with his digital camera just in case it vanished as instantly as it appeared.

He cursed when he saw the clock. His colleague Tina was supposed to arrive soon for coffee but his excitement exaggerated that half hour into eight. He pressed a pen to paper and scribbled a fairly long note of explanation that indented several sheets below. As he exited into the storm with little else but the clothes on his back, he taped the note to his front door and high stepped in the fluffy snow.

Tina's car arrived 25 minutes later. Walking to the door dressed in a metallic gray trench coat as unquestionably feminine as a Hawai'ian shirt is manly, a ribbon weaved cap, and stylish black leather boots to match it all, she nearly rang the home's doorbell before she noticed the note and used that hand instead to remove it. The cold drew mucus from her nose and the snow struck her eye lids and stuck in her fiery hair as she read. Finished, she smiled first with bemusement but as she considered it further, she realized its ring of prophesy. He had gone from his home leaving an absurd note behind him, such as great men have written, and the world has read later when the story of their struggles has become famous. Her gloved hands folded it and neatly placed it within her inside breast pocket just in case her instincts were correct.

*

Arthur Zimmermann was not a happy man. Even though he was the chair of the University of Minnesota's department of philosophy, he had the most dilapidated and drafty office the renovated building had to offer. New seats, floors, piping, and those new-fangled several ply windows that one could never open were installed in every room but 307. Perhaps socially he might claim this was because, as someone with a logical philosophy Ph.D., he was picked on by the Continental philosophy Ph.D.s. Because of their stuffy air of superiority, they wallowed in their own genius. In reality however 307 was untouched because he called in a few favors. Though they needed to examine the pipes underneath and the wiring in the walls, which meant tiles replacing laminated cement and dry wall patches, everything else was original; this included the windows.

As the left half his butt sat in his window's niche and his right leg supported his corpulent frame, the bald department chair grunted when he opened the window facing the ten foot bronze statue of a solitary Civil War soldier, loosing the cold December air inside. Billy Yank, his ears perked as his neck turned Southeast to Richmond, carried the colossal and august ideal of Union upon his hardened shoulders as well as what snow the storm bore down. Arthur glanced to his office door and honed his ears for his secretary's soft footfalls. Nothing. Relieved but still half listening for the slightest sign of her, he placed the Lucky Strike into his mouth and lighted it. The first drag was unhurried, merely sighing past his lips and out the window. The following ones however were swiftly inhaled and he was careful to keep as much smoke out of his office as possible.

With only half smoked, Art heard the swift sound of pounding shoe steps. Though clearly not his secretaries delicate ones, it was probably someone she would have to show inside. He frantically tried to suck the lingering smoke before dropping out of the niche and sprinting to his coffee mug to snuff out the cherry.

"Blast—some smoke came with me," he quietly cursed, spilling some ashes onto his desk. His secretary's soft knock sounded on the door and like a child nearly caught masturbating, he desperately tried to hide the contraband and clean up the mess he'd left. "Just a minute," he requested, careful to hide his hurry as he dropped the butt into his coffee. His secretary ignored him and stepped inside, careful not to open the door more than she had to.

Dressed as usual in her flowery full skirt and blouse adorned with countless little flowers, Arthur's personal secretary and confidant Fanya Kaplan stood with her back against the door, her nylon covered legs spread several feet apart. Though her smile and behavior was very matronly, this 25 year old belonged at the arm of an equally young and talented doctor. A throwback to a bygone era, the woman's protective and supportive demeanor yet challenging conversation would make her the perfect wife and companion of one lucky stiff some day; she sniffed the air, drawing a weak frown from Arthur, and shook her head reprovingly. Until she found that lucky stiff, or Arthur did the impossible and found someone better qualified, he had to suffer her attentions.

Perhaps naively unaware that men melted at her seductively long legs and toned ass, she stepped lightly in her simple gray running shoes, the single deviance from an otherwise flawlessly classic professional behavior and attire. The first time Arthur saw her bruised aching feet, she had worn heels but a few hours; insisting they were fine even as she sorely massaged them, she reluctantly accepted Dr. Zimmermann's ultimatum that she switch to anything more comfortable—even bare feet. He hadn't heard their clacking ever since. It was only later he realized this silence made it harder to sneak a smoke but the disadvantage was acceptable so long as Fanya walked without pain.

She offered her palm when they came face to face. Looking suitably ashamed, he placed the coffee-wetted butt in her hand. She impatiently twitched her long fingers towards herself, demanding more. Reluctantly he placed the pack of cigarettes in her hand like a child spitting out his gum in class. She glanced inside the pack, spotted the lighter, then rewarded and punished him with a pleased but disappointed smile that met her cheekbones.

"Art, you know you shouldn't be using these," she chastised. "The doctor says you have to watch your health and dieting isn't enough."

"Well the way you've been feeding me I'd be surprised all those fruits and vegetables won't do me in. My old eating habits were balanced AND tasted better."

"Balanced how?" she asked without believing he could satisfy her.

"Strongbow comes from apples and you can't make a decent pizza without tomatoes." Neither laughed though Fanya rolled her eyes.

"I cook you dinner so you live longer, sir," she whimpered slightly as her small hands adjusted his tie and collar and brushed away any lint from his shoulders. "I want you to die at a hundred and with your shoes on." Satisfied, she touched his cheek but looked warmly into his brown eyes. "Your body is a temple sir, God wants you to treat it well."

She switched to an office appropriate but still cheerful smile. "Dr.Yusef's in a state and nearly ran straight through your door without so much as talking with me first, so it must be urgent." She proclaimed as she turned around. Her ass cheeks of steel bobbed with each step, attracting his magnet eyes. Damned if she did not treat him like a (not his own) mother. His wife left him for (amongst a host of things) his "daily sacrilege"and Fanya, who took it all lying down, was the closest he had to one since.

In a different world they would have married long ago and lived pleasantly; this was assuming of course in this magical world he was not twice her age. When she cracked the door, a breathless Yusef nearly burst through, spilling snow from his shoulders as he went. Unfazed, she continued and discreetly closed it behind her.

"What's up? Sticking around despite the gentile holiday? That Fanya decided to stay just because I was here..." he trailed off with a tone and gesture implying he was done with the perfunctory small talk. A man of few words, he only used it as a courtesy to others but Yusef was snow capped, wet, pink cheeked and visibly exhausted. Clearly he had something of great import to say.

"I woke up an hour ago Art, and you won't believe this, but there was a formula on my board in my handwriting but I didn't write it!" he said as he glanced at his surroundings, almost deciding if there was enough room to pace excitedly. Intrigued, Arthur nodded for him to continue. He knew Yusef as a competent professor, not one prone to excitement over the superfluous, so he listened on. "This," Yusef said as he reached into his pocket for his camera, "will blow your mind!" Arthur glowered suspiciously at the contraption but after Yusef showed him how to zoom and follow the equation on the screen, his face became more expressionless the further he went along. The formula was like a set up for a long joke. One kept himself eager and ready in anticipation for the punch-line but was repeatedly roped around every time and amazed at every turn how it still continued. When he arrived to the end ten careful minutes later, he laughed.

"This is wonderful!" he roared excitedly, shaking the floor with his furious hopping.

"Well, it's certainly ground breaking but I don't know if it's 'wonderful'..." Yusef replied confusedly.

"No don't you see! This'll put all those religious nut jobs in line! They can't beat this!" he chortled victoriously at Yusef's discovery.

"But that's not my intention at all!" he tried to tell the overjoyed and overweight Jew while he skipped and leapt like a five year old. Feeling Art's vibrations, Fanya opened the door and queried Arthur, expecting his joy to be nothing more than childishness. Having arrived just at that moment, Tina emerged from behind Fanya and stepped inside just as confused as the secretary but expecting a real answer from Yusef.

"What's up?" Fanya asked like she failed to understand an inside joke. Art confidently handed Tina the camera.

"Our boy Yusef has just ended a debate as old as mankind itself," he said proudly, wrapping his arm around his taller colleague's shoulder. He awkwardly smiled back and looked to Tina whose eyes lay solely on the camera's LCD screen. Fanya, kept entirely out of what she continued to think was a joke, rested her hand on her hip and cocked it to one side.

"So what's so funny?" she asked playfully. Swinging his knees and arms, Arthur strutted to her and plucked the cigarette pack from the small breast pocket she placed them in for safekeeping just in case she left her desk and he dug in her drawers. He was a brilliant sweet man but a weak one. Nevertheless she wished she could have him as a husband of whom she could take care. She did not resist the cigarette's removal but frowned in disappointment as she reproached him. "Sir, that's not good for you and your body..."

"...is no longer a temple!" Arthur finished for her as he bowed his head down and shielded the lighter's flame to light the smoke.

"Whatever do you mean?" she humored.

"Yusef's logic formula has argued that you've been following the teachings and praying to something that never existed!" he started with pursed lips that held the cigarette in place. "With the way society is now the only legs your people had to stand on was doubt and possibility. 'Maybe there's a God and maybe there isn't but I believe in him', right? That doubt's been the only thing keeping religion as popular as it is! That," he removed his cigarette and pointed it at the camera Tina continued poring over, "removes all doubt that all the supernatural—from organized religion right down to Ouija boards—is bunk! Budkes!"

Visibly hurt by this statement and her employer's unabashed joy in saying it, Fanya's eyes began to water and she shook her head. "No, it can't be true. You can't prove or disprove that. No one will believe you!" she looked at Yusef but spoke to Arthur.

"You didn't get your Ph.D. learning how to argue." He took a savoring drag and looked to the floor as if in deep thought. "You've never seen Pluto, right?" he turned his eyes up to her.

"Well yes I have, in pictures..."

"Tisk, tisk, tisk. But you've never seen it, have you? Not in the sky? Not with a telescope?" He returned the cigarette to his lips and inhaled.

"Well, no. Of course not. It's too far away."

"Exactly," he snapped his fingers and pointed. "But a bunch of expert types say it's there and show you pictures, say how many moons it has, what it's made of, how cold it gets, and you take their word for it because you can't begin to understand how they figured all that stuff out."

"I suppose...but...but"

"When they all got together and decided there were eight planets and it was demoted to 'dwarf', you went and accepted it even though Pluto had been called a planet your whole life?"

She gave no answer but both knew what it was. The impact sunk deeper into her psyche, beginning the slow and painful demolition of her Christian assumptions of God that underpinned her entire life. As her head lowered, her hands muffled her cries, and tears streaked down her cheeks, Yusef wondered if this was how Albert Einstein or J. Robert Oppenheimer felt when they realized their pursuit of science was far deadlier than they anticipated.

"Oh my God, this is brilliant!" Tina shouted, mouth gaping over the camera's screen.

* *

Ellen hated history class. She especially hated the first history class second semester and she seriously contemplated skipping the whole day in favor of her bed, her principles of punctuality and attendance be damned. The lecture hall was emptier than expected so she freely draped her legs over the chair in front of her, her beaten brown sneakers bobbing to the beat and rhythm of a song solely within her mind. Since she was wearing thick black long johns, she could sit in such a posture and wear her short skirt without fear of wandering eyes trying to catch of a look at her underwear just in case she bothered to wear any that day.

At her side and nearly passing out from the weariness of their partying the previous night was Mary Beth, her eyelids weighing heavily on her head as it slowly tilted closer to rest on Ellen's tingling shoulder; it achingly anticipated feeling her weight. For as long since Ellen had befriended her red-headed southern companion, she had loved her. Every night and day they spent together was better than the last and, even in the platonic co-habitative lifestyle they developed as room mates complete with cooking and cleaning together, she had lost none of her charm or appeal. Usually animated and filled with spirit, Ellen's weary angel gave up her battle against sleep and finally succumbed to it, putting the full weight of her head on Ellen's shoulder. She smiled. The professor's lecture became but an echo and Mary Beth's blissfully soft breathing carried them both to a dream world.

That was of course until a boy behind them noisily popped a gum bubble in his boredom.

Jarred awake, Mary Beth jerked her head away and wordlessly apologized in embarrassment and coughed awkwardly. Ellen smiled politely to show it was no big deal but it was quite the opposite. She wanted it to stay there and she quietly steeped her mind in slow burning anger for the inconsiderate prick who woke her sleeping beauty. Fear of revealing her love for Mary Beth kept her in her seat instead of face to face with him. Her love made her impotent and she hated that restraint.

Fortunately, the irritating popping continued and gave Ellen the chance for retaliation. Looking around, Ellen saw a few neighbors jerk with each pop, a few even looking back to investigate. The pink gum, probably three sticks worth, blocked the entire lower half of his face. When finally popped, the strained rubbery mess dangled below his chin before dragging back inside with loud stuttering slurps and starting all over again. If his annoying act was malicious, he deserved anything that came to him. How could he not see the annoyed shutters and subtle coughing urging him to cease? No, it was inconsiderate ignorance of social behavior.

This certainly did not warrant a punch to the face, her usual reply for the maliciously annoying, even though he took Mary Beth's weight off her body, so she devised a more polite but clear as day scheme. She removed five sticks of gum from her purse and after chewing them for ten seconds, stretched and readied them for blowing. Still in her seat, she twisted her torso back and looked straight at the boy behind her. Sensing her eyes, he looked uncomfortably at her but still noisily chomped on his gum. He was greeted with a steadily expanding green bubble noisily stretching with her hot breath. Passing her still staring eyes and nearing her brow, it popped loudly leaving its flimsy remnant streaked from her nose bridge and curled round her chin halfway along her jaw. She slurped it just as noisily back inside and blew one more time before she turned around, a triumphant grin upon her face. The boy did not do it again.