Sun, Moon, & Stars

Chapter 1: The Tower to Heaven

Queen Gem and King Ruby were troubled, for their people were growing restless.

For so long, everyone had been quite happy to do their bidding and act upon their whims; but, they were hearing news that was making them nervous.

For example, a few thousand people had put together a plan to make a break for it, and the royal soldiers had barely managed to capture/kill them before they got away.

They needed unity, bleep damn it! Why were some folks so intent on abandoning their people and setting a bad example that could influence others to do the same?

One of the advisors to the royal couple was named Silk, and she suggested that they needed some new projects (that could get everyone focused on how great and mighty they were instead of getting silly ideas in their heads about traveling afar).

Their other advisor, whose name was Sheet, nodded approvingly, and threw out there that they should make their realm so appealing that the angels in Heaven would become so jealous of them that they’d come flying their way towards Earth; through moon, sun, and stars.

Ruby and Gem declared that they had an even better idea! They could have their people work on a building project to make a structure so big that it would reach up to Heaven!

Then, once they got there; they could take God and the angels captive, put them into a zoo, and let all of the people ooh and aah at them! Yes, that would insure that nobody would ever try to abandon their monarchs ever again!

They ordered Sheet and Silk to get the project started right away! And, the two of them did as they were told.

But, unknown to Ruby and Gem, their two advisors knew that the whole thing was a giant waste of time and that it would only inspire more people to want to pack up and go!

They had been thinking about ideas like art projects, sports, and education!

They also felt like people’s lives could be made less harsh by generating enough wealth so that there could be a universal basic income!

This big tower thing was a laughable waste of time!

And, they were pretty sure that Heaven was far enough away that it’d never get that high.

They immediately decided that those who’d tried to seek greener pastures actually had the right idea after all.

And so, they devised a plan to insure that Gem and Ruby’s idiotic tower to nowhere would fall.

A failure of such epic proportions would get all of the people who’d been forced to slave away on it so fed up that they’d rebel and disperse across the world for sure!

It was too bad that their King and Queen hadn’t listened to them, because it would only be a matter of years before their Realm would burn…

Chapter 2: Cuckoo

As Gem and Ruby sipped champagne, and celebrated the progress of their tower to Heaven, a messenger named Ice rushed into the palace and gave them some news that they did not like.

Three prophets named Dove, Cinnamon, and Darkeyes were speaking out against the glorious project, and many people in the realm were starting to take the religious fanatics’ side!

Ice informed his King and Queen that the three prophets were saying that the monarchs were incapable of even capturing a mighty leviathan to parade around in their zoo;

and that, if they couldn’t even contain and box up a leviathan (which God created), then how could they ever hope to do such a thing to God? They'd joke to their listeners that the very notion was cuckoo!

Queen Gem and King Ruby were outraged, at first; but quickly figured out that (rather than putting the prophets to death, which had been their first idea), if they simply had some of their mighty warriors bring in a leviathan, then they’d turn those pesky prophets into the laughingstock of the realm!

And, so, they quickly assembled thousands of their finest and bravest warriors; and tasked them with capturing one or more of the living leviathans, so that they could show them off and prove that the “prophets of God” were wrong; which would cause the infuriating words of Dove, Cinnamon, and Darkeyes to become successfully quelled.

Ha! Problem solved! And, so, the warriors all dashed off around the world to find and round up some leviathans for their King and Queen!

Unfortunately for them, capturing a leviathan was easier said than done; and, also, stoking the wrath of such fearsome beings was not just risky to the warriors, but could also unleash a threat that could put an end to the realm of humanity…

When the leviathan elders received the news that a bunch of piddly humans were trying to capture them, they roared with laughter for a while, and then began to debate about how to show those little peanuts who was boss.

There were many many ideas on the table, and they went back and forth about which ones to employ quite a lot.

One thing was for sure though, no matter which course of action the leviathan elders might choose;

when mere humans go up against a bunch of mighty leviathans, anyone with even a semifunctional brain should know which side was going to lose…

Chapter 3: Message in the Sky

As Gem and Ruby ecstatically observed the creation of their marvelous tower, (which was now twice as high as any other previous building projects) they suddenly looked up because a strange sound seemed to be booming out above them.

They saw that there was a message in the sky that was composed out of the flames of many leviathans.

It said that, if humanity didn't back off from their mission to capture a leviathan, then King Ruby and Queen Gem's realm would be sorry.

As the leviathans spread their mighty wings and soared away, Gem and Ruby quickly developed a counter-message and ordered that it be spread through their realm very quickly.

It said that surely the leviathans were bluffing and that they were only sending such messages in order to try to scare humanity away from claiming their rightful prize.

Some people bought their retort, and some did not; and the prophets Dove, Cinnamon, and Darkeyes immediately began siding with the leviathans and declaring that the words of the King and Queen were lies.

The monarchs quickly sent out every last worrier that they had at their disposal, commanding them to join their comrades in the mission to find and capture a leviathan. With the weight of all of humanity's military forces on the job,

they were confident that they'd soon expose the foolishness and buffoonery of both the leviathans and the prophets of God…

Chapter 4: Through the Fire and Flames

The mighty warriors of Gem and Ruby were so numerous and so dedicated that some of them eventually did manage to capture a toddler leviathan who had strayed from her parents’ abode.

They brought her back to Ruby and Gem, and the monarchs promptly put her on display in their awe-inspiring zoo, saying, “And now humanity has proven false the words that the prophets and leviathans lyingly spoke!”

This immediately prompted hundreds of thousands of leviathans to fly over to the realm of humanity,

and they blew powerful flames at literally everybody!

As they flew away (after having retrieved their little formerly captured leviathan), they grinned in satisfaction, and the prophets Dove, Cinnamon, and Darkeyes (who were seated atop three of them) grinned too.

The realm of humans had been bested, just as they’d warnned, and any futile hopes that the completion of that ridiculous tower to Heaven would ever happen were irreversibly and utterly doomed.

Humanity would not die off, for the leviathans knew that God had forbidden nearly (or fully) wiping them out again after the world had been flooded and only a few people had survived because they’d been on an ark.

No, they hadn’t shot the sort of fire at humanity that would burn their bodies to a crisp and stop the beating of their hearts.

Humanity would wake up from the slumber that they were all in in only a few hours.

But; they would wake to find that their Queen and King’s pride, tyranny, and foolishness had ended with them losing virtually all of their power…

Chapter 5: Angels

When Queen Gem and King Ruby woke up, they discovered that they both couldn’t understand what the other was saying.

They were not alone in this, for everyone else in their realm was also unable to comprehend the sounds that were coming from the mouths of anybody.

Silk and Sheet quickly realized that the supposed Tower to Heaven wouldn’t even be built high enough for it to begin collapsing in on itself.

They’d intentionally sabotaged the building procedures (so that such a destructive thing would eventually happen), but there was no way that it would ever be built high enough for that now that the flames of the leviathans had made it so that the only person’s words that any individual could understand was what they said themself.

People were quick to abandon building the tower, and began to travel to the far away places that their tyrannical monarchs had decreed were forbidden lands. Pretty soon, the only two who still cared at all about the tower were King Ruby and Queen Gem.

The two of them managed to figure out a few words that both of them could both say and understand, and decided that (if nobody else would build the tower) they’d do it themselves! After many many many many years of building, they eventually did managed to get it high enough to where they had reached Heaven.

By this time, they could speak to each other very fluidly with the language that they’d developed. God (who’d prevented the tower from collapsing in on itself from getting so high) greeted them,

and asked how they planned on gathering up everyone in Heaven and bringing them back to Earth so that they could display them in their zoo and have everyone ooh and aah at them.

They responded that they were the Queen and King, and that God and the angels must do their bidding!

God chuckled, and a chorus of angels began to merrily sing.

Ruby and Gem liked the song so much that they began to sing along with the choir of angels,

🎵“Glory to God in the highest, and on Earth peace, good will toward all people!”🎵

As they sang, they realized that (rather than trying to capture God and the angels) they should’ve been focused on making life as good as possible for the people in their realm.

They hoped that humans on Earth were currently in more capable hands than they’d been in when Queen Gem and King Ruby had been at the helm…