Previous Challenge Entry (Level 1 – Beginner)
Topic: PUZZLE (11/24/16)
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TITLE: Where am I, Who am I and What Shall I Be | Previous Challenge Entry
By Art Westefeld
12/01/16 -
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Helena McCray was lined up in a queue staring down at what she determined was a revolting male body. A native, if one could call her that, of the Terran colony of Sappho, she was born male but transitioned to female before she hit puberty
To distract herself from looking at her semi-translucent naked male body she looked up and down the queue at the other beings from across the galaxy and tried to recognise them. There was a female Klag in front of her with its fierce cat like features, two beings down she saw a member of the race of Deamonia with its beak replacing a mouth and green skin and antennae. Several beings forward Helena saw one of those bipedal Cetaceans with its black and white skin, and fins on its back and the strange thing is that all of the others in the line were as exposed as she was.
Helena looked towards the front of the line to see a human man dressed in a white robe and sandals going over a large book, a real paper book. She had only used electronic readers as long as she remembered. The line moved faster than she had been aware of, in what seemed a very short time she was standing in front of the white robed man who spoke to her, “Welcome my son, I am Simon Peter, do you have any questions before you enter to meet with the Father?”
His tone seemed condescending to her and she responded angrily, “Listen, old man,I ain't nobody’s son! I am a woman!”
Peter smiled down at her and said to her, “Here in the afterlife we receive perfect bodies and you have been turned back to what you were intended to be by the Father.”
Helena shook her immaterial fist at Peter and shouted, “Your Father made a big mistake! I have always felt like a female even when I was trapped in the body of a boy in school. So have Him turn me back to how I was before I ended up here.”
“Can’t do that, I’m sorry to say. He may return you to your sinful form if he casts you from His kingdom to the place of eternal torment…”
Helena cut him off in mid-explanation, “Having this form, which I never wanted, is torment. So kindly send me home and give me my real body back.”
“Herman, that is not as easy as you think. Very few people get to go back to their mortal bodies.”
Helena was too angry to process the implications of what Peter had just told her. She responded like any proud citizen of Sappho and screamed, “Herman was my slave name before I was fixed! I am Helena McCray! Herman was left on an operating table on Earth! For a guy who acts like he knows everything how come you don’t know that?”
Taking what seemed like a deep breath, though she hadn’t noticed a need to breathe since she came to this white place with its gem-like gates, she spoke calmly to Peter, “Wait… You said mortal bodies. Does that mean I’m dead?” Even as she asked the question she recognized the absurdity of it. After all she wasn't one of those religious nuts like her parents. She was aware that when you died you ended. No spirit worlds of Heaven and Hell. No punishment for sin like her parents tried to warn her before she transitioned from her boy body to being the girl she had always felt she should be.
Peter smiled at her and just nodded his head. “You claimed to accept the Lord when you were Herman McCray. Admittedly you were rather young,” He referred to his book, “I see you were only eight years old.”
“So now that I am older I am allowed to change my mind, right”
“No actually anyone who is given into the Saviour’s hand can’t be removed.”
“Does that mean,” Helena wondered aloud as she processed what Peter said, “That I’m going to be stuck this way forever?”
“Yes,my child, and I must say you seem calmer. Ready to see the LORD so he can decide whether you stay or join Satan’s rebellious angels?”
Helena slumped her shoulders and said, “Yes” resigned to leaving her female body behind like an unfinished jigsaw puzzle.
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Some of your creativeness made it harder for me grasp your whole story but I think your title may tell more than what is on the surface.
Interesting thoughts in this piece.
In Heaven, we don't have to worry--there is no male or female.
Keep writing and challenging.
I wonder, though, if the sci-fi characters detracted from your message, and your thoughts on a current hot-button issue. If you'd just made it human beings, and focused on this one particular recently-deceased human being at the gates of heaven, you might have made your point more effectively. The sci-fi elements here are a distraction, I think, whereas using human beings would have made your story more topical, current, and thought-provoking.
I was confused by the descriptions of the different characters. I am new at this but someones comment about having them all be humans would helped me to understand where she was.
I have a "brother-in-law that goes as a woman. It is awkward for me to call him a she, so I try to call him by his name.
very creative.