Chapter 29
Now the creditors amassed all their armies at Dublin Port, while the wayfarers of the caravan were dancing with the Sea People around a fountain in the Valley of Exploding Earth.
And the captains of the creditors’ forces began to march their stormtroopers forward by hundreds and by thousands. But David and his disciples passed on in the rereward with Belial. Then said the moguls among the creditors: “What are these wayfarers doing here – don’t they belong to the Volcano’s caravansary?” And Belial attempted to appease the moguls, saying: “This is David, whom Saul the president of the caravan denounced as a traitor and hired us to assassinate. But we spared him, because he came asking our overlords for employment. He and his gang have been with me for more than a year now, and I have found no fault with him throughout all that time.”
But the moguls of the Creditor Class were annoyed at David’s presence, and they said to Belial: “Send this fellow back to your base, and let him do office work, or whatever you had him laboring on before. We don’t want him coming along with us into battle, lest he turn against us, in the midst of the fighting, and become our adversary: for he will likely try to please his masters in the caravan by delivering up to them our severed heads. Lo, is not this the same fellow about whom they sang: ‘Saul governs thousands; David conquers millions?’ And did he not slay two hundred robotic stormtroopers and pay their foreskins to the president in exchange for his bride?”
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So Belial returned to David, and said to him: “Surely, as Yahweh lives, you have been upright with me, and I would love to let you fight alongside my troops, but the other moguls have a problem with your social credit rating, and I cannot afford to displease them. Therefore, go back in peace.”
And David said to Belial: “But what have I done wrong, in all the time that you have known me, that should bar me from fighting the enemies of our creditor overlords?”
And Belial answered and said unto David: “I know, I know: but this is not up to me. In my sight, you are as handsome as an angel of God; notwithstanding the other moguls distrust you. One can’t cross the moguls. Therefore, rise up early in the morning with your disciples, and depart.”
So David and his disciples rose up early to depart in the morning, and they returned to the Churches of Ziklag, while the mercenary armies of the creditors readied themselves above the Valley of Exploding Earth.
Chapter 30
So, after being away for three days, David and his disciples were traveling back to those areas where their creditor overlords had allotted them to live, and behold, as they approached, they found that all seven of the Churches of Ziklag had been invaded in their absence: the residents had been slaughtered, and every place had been burnt up with fire. But all the women had been saved alive and taken captive, along with the children.
Seeing this, David and those disciples who were with him lifted up their voice and wept, until they had no more power to weep.
All three of David’s wives had been taken hostage: Applebee from the Valley of Exploding Earth; Abigail from the buffer zone of Chaos, the wife of Good Christian; and Saul’s daughter Melanie, Phalti’s wife.
Now David was not only devastated by the horror, but he was in personal danger, for his disciples had become so maddened about this that they spoke of stoning David, as payback for having lost their sons and daughters.
But David sought strength in the volcano of potential, and he said to Man his robo-butler: “I pray you, bring me your ephod.” And Man brought his ephod over to David; who then consulted the liquid-filled die agitator of the android’s Urim, along with the Urim from David’s own ephod. He enquired of the Volcano, saying: “Shall I hunt down those mercenaries who did this, and overtake them, and recover all our captives?” And, after an initial reply of “Concentrate and ask again,” the Urim from David’s ephod displayed the answer: “It is certain.” And this was corroborated by the robo-butler’s Urim, which answered: “As I see it, yes.”
So David arose, he and his six hundred sixty-six disciples, and went to pursue the creditors’ mercenaries. None of them knew which direction to go, since they had seen neither the invasion nor which way the attackers fled: so David simply followed his whim and charged forth, heading north by northwest.
After a while, they came to the brook Besor, whose waters were sweet. So they stopped to sip. Then they continued on their way.
Soon they met an Egyptian in the field. The young lad was so famished, he could barely speak. David offered him bread and water, and the youth did eat and drink. Then David gave him some cakes of figs, with two clusters of rum-soaked raisins; and when the lad had finished, his spirit revived within him. He explained that he had eaten nothing, nor drunk any water, for three days and nights.
Then David asked the youth: “What happened? Who are you? And where are you from?”
And the youth answered, and said: “I am one of twelve sons born to a local herdsman: we were watching our father’s flock, once upon a time, when my brothers, being jealous of my stature, tossed me into a pit and then sold me to some traveling merchants. I ended up as a slave in Egypt. My master was a mogul among the creditors: he joined the mercenary troops that have amassed hereabouts, and brought me along to serve as his armorbearer. We made an invasion of the places south of here, also up the coast of the caravan: we slew the Cherethites, and smashed a lot of the manmade Sea People; then we burned all the Churches of Ziklag with fire. However, three days ago, I fell sick, so my master abandoned me.”
Now the eyes of David widened when he learned that this army was the one that he was pursuing. And he said to the lad: “Can you help me locate your former company?”
And the youth answered: “Swear to me by Aton that you will neither kill me, nor deliver me into the hands of my master, and I will lead you to their encampment.”
So the youth guided them to the camp. Now, behold, the troops were spread abroad upon all the earth, eating and drinking, and praising God, because of all the great spoil that they had pillaged from the cities they had raided.
Then David smote them from the twilight of that day until the evening of the next. And there escaped not a single soul alive, except four hundred brigands who fled away on camels.
And David recovered all that had been pillaged: so there was nothing lacking that had been carried off – neither spoil, nor his disciples’ sons and daughters. And David rescued his three wives.
Also David took all the flocks and the herds that the brigands had stolen from other places, beyond the livestock that had been taken from his own company, and he said: “This is David’s spoil.”
And, on their way back home, they came again to the brook Besor. So they stopped for another sip. Then they continued on their way.
Now, once they were safely home, some of David’s disciples complained about those disciples who had been too scared to fight (they were, in fact, the reason that four hundred of the brigands had been able to escape), and they said: “Those who refused to join in the battle should not be allowed to share any of the spoil. It is enough that we recovered their family members who had been taken captive – let them keep their wives and children, but we who did the killing should get all the livestock.”
David answered, however: “Ye shall not do so, my brethren. Remember: it is the Volcano who does all the work; so nobody can claim that he is owed any more than another. Those who were too fearful to fight, who thus remained trembling and hiding behind boulders and bushes, are just as deserving of reward as we manslaughterers. Who knows but that the volcano of potential might favor their inaction: for perhaps it pleases him more when we abstain from vengeance; and he might enjoy hearing the tall tales that these cowards will someday tell: their outlook might prove refreshingly divergent from ours. (How dull, if we all were to strike the same stance.) As with gods and spouses, so with perspectives: The more the merrier. Besides, not everyone can be a warrior poet. Am I right, Archilochos?”
And Archilochos, who, at that moment, was entwined with a sea nymph, raised his grail to David, while stroking her hair.
So, from that day forward, David made it a statute among his disciples: that no one should ever care about who deserves what.
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