A couple loose ends

[Image: another detail from an ad.]

(Cont.)

And the Midianites brought dancers, and meat, and wine, unto Moses and Satyajit, Bryan’s artificial heir, and to the whole congregation gathered in the camp by the wasteland, out on the edge of the desert plains. (This is the area of the Great Basin shrub-steppe, just outside of Las Vegas.)

And Moses, and Bryan’s robot heir Satyajit, and all the finest looking dancers among the shock-troops, went and greeted the people of Midian with open arms, outside the encampment.

But Moses became frustrated with all the yogis and gurus that had arisen within his workforce, who had appointed themselves as counselors to thousands, and mentors over hundreds, during the time when they were warring, back in their battle-days, just prior to their recent reunion with the Midianites; because these yogis and gurus had failed to partner with one whole village of the womenfolk of Midian, during the last tango in Peor.

So Moses said to them: “Have ye neglected these women? Did ye skip over them? They claim that they have not been danced with at all: Did ye not ask them? Nobody in any of your subdivisions coupled up with them?” Moses shook his head in disbelief, then continued: “Lo, these women warmly greeted our workforce, in accord with the good counsel of Balaam, who blessed our offenses on the battlefield when he legally could have opposed them; and this cleared a way for our Plan of Potential to flourish. Now therefore go and tell those handsome fellows who have accompanied us to come and invite yon damsels to a bonus dance, pronto.”

Thus, then and there, Moses established an extra samba to occur, so that the women from the village who had missed the earlier tango could have a nice time too. And this new dance continued for seven days.

So, any maid for whom the Auspicious Hour’s window had closed, due to her having been left out of the first festivities, was retroactively coupled with; and further Seeds of Promise were thereby preserved.

And the type of raiment that these partygoers wore was goats’ hair, and most of their accessories were made of wood.

§

Now Man the robo-butler came out onto the dance floor and began to compliment the appearance of the partygoers. And the partygoers desired to offer this kindhearted android articles of their clothing, to express their gratitude; howbeit, their jewelry was mostly wooden. Yet it turned out that many of them kept treasures at home of gold, silver, brass, iron, tin, and lead: so they ran back and fetched all these precious metals – they were in the form of chains, bracelets, anklets, and necklaces – and they draped them over Man, the mechanical servant, who took them all upon his person. And there was a furnace nearby, and Man walked into the flames of its fire, and all these offerings in which he was festooned grew molten and oozed evenly over his casing, and they became as clean and pure as his soul. Then he bathed himself in oil, and the metals were a solid layer upon his physique, which sparkled brightly: and he resembled the statue that Bryan had sculpted for the Volcano, which they had mounted on the lid of their ark.

So Man reappeared on the final evening of the Seven Day Samba, and he came out and stood in the center of the tiled floor of the canopied ballroom, and all the dancers looked at him and applauded.

Then, on the eighth day, when the dance was over, all the participants went over near Balaam’s residence, and they dipped themselves in the river and washed their clothes.

And the wild man with the goat eyes spoke to Moses, saying: “Perform another census, but instead of counting the number of people in the workforce, tally up all their belongings. And list each item, specifically, by name. For I am curious to know what type of assets they are holding.”

So Moses did as the volcano of potential instructed. And Satyajit the robo-butler took stock of all the figures from this inventory and entered these items into his database. Now here are the results, which a committee of elders doctored:

In the numeral column, they wrote “threescore and twelve thousand,” and, in the subject column: “booty.”

Also the number “thirty and two thousand,” and the subject they left blank.

Lastly, the number “six hundred thousand and seventy thousand and five thousand” was written next to the subject “prayers.” This might hint at various possibilities, the truth about which one can only guess.