“It’s so strange”, Shakti mused. “They are completely convinced that you killed that demon, without provocation and out of the blue. They even have two witnesses. They are completely convinced of what they saw, and in an emotional turmoil over it”.

Shiva sipped coffee and thought about it. “Their perception is unreliable because it is completely clouded by expectations, preconceptions, prejudice and other impure emotions. They don’t distinguish between what they actually saw, and their interpretation thereof. Eyes are an unreliable witness when the heart is impure, as they say”.

“What they actually saw, and I know because I tapped in, is that the demon approached you, the two of you sat down and talked, the demon started changing colour from black to white, and then brightened up significantly, started phasing out, and then disappeared completely, with you following suit. Even if someone didn’t know what exactly happened, the correct conclusion would be to state one’s ignorance: we don’t know what happened, and that’s that. The correct next step after that would be to either ask someone who is likely to know for an explanation, or try to figure it out in some other way, but it feels like they start with a narrative, and they just shoehorn everything they see into it. As I said, it’s strange”, she concluded.

“I know. One could say that the obvious way out of their misapprehension would be for someone to tell them what actually happened, but you know what they would do. If I said it, they would respond that it’s a lie and I’m an untrustworthy murderer. If you said it, they would say you’re covering up for your murderous husband and you should be ashamed of yourself. If Azazel said it, they wouldn’t recognise him since he’s a crystal of vajra now, which they couldn’t even see with their astral eyes without him taking a lower form as we do, and then they would say it’s an obvious deception by the Gods, who are obviously worried about consequences of their actions if they are trying to cover them up so much. You just can’t win with those people”, he smiled.

“No, because all their problems are intrinsic; however, Azazel is an example that shows that miracles can happen. And, also, that on your worst day you are still the best person in the whole world”, the Goddess smiled at her husband, who grinned back and blew a flurry of rose petals at her instead of an answer.

“I did get how Azazel came to change his mind, though”, Shiva continued. “He talked to Sanat Kumar, and saw how deeply deluded, insane and warped that one was, and thought “How am I any different?”, and that worried him and made him think about what could actually be done about it that would be constructive, rather than continue mixing questionable perception, ignorance, paranoia and resentment, until he became as unhinged in his insanity as Sanat Kumar, or those other demons that periodically challenge Gods to a fight and have their careers come to a quick end. He didn’t like those prospects, and so he explored the alternatives, and he’s now an angelic being. But his ability to distance himself from his situation and look at it clearly was already a sign of significant progress, of detachment which is the root cause of all forms of liberation. People think detachment is to not care about things, but no, detachment is to look at yourself and think, ‘what the hell am I doing?’”, he continued, tapping his finger absentmindedly on the empty coffee cup, which his wife understood as a call for a refill.

“Which brings me to something else”, she said. “Do we know what the hell we’re doing?”

“I surely hope so. We wanted to funnel all the demons and idiots from the astral nursery into the honeypot of doom. Mission accomplished – there’s now an active demon revolt and they are jumping into it head first as we speak; Sanat Kumar seems to have rendered his hellhole. From what I can see, his primary parameters were to limit powers of individual beings, so that he won’t feel like an imp anymore. He set it up so that he inhibits everybody’s memories so that his sandbox looks like the One True Universe. He’s also making the presence of God as dim as possible while still having a workable Universe and not a pit of darkness. He’s also having all sorts of safeguards intended for evading any responsibility for the outcomes, which is of course alarming. Also, both Time and Eternity are in turmoil and actively reconfiguring, and I see that the outcomes are good, but much between now and then is in a blur. One of the reasons seems to be that the Jewel itself can recursively edit time until he gets what he wants, the way you can, and Sanat Kumar is issuing new commands that increase the likelihood of a good outcome for him. But he sees that the eventual outcome is his failure and death, and that everything he did increases the glory of God, which makes him panic, as he now suspects that he fell for a trap, which in fact he did, but it’s too late now and he’s totally and irredeemably fucked”, Shiva grinned with dark satisfaction.

“Your special sauce is yummy”, Shakti nodded.

“Careful, my love; I can almost see the yellow feathers between your teeth”, Shiva’s grin widened.

She pretended to check, smiled, and blew a flock of canaries at him, as he laughingly swatted them away.

“The Jewel can edit time, but only before any souls actually incarnate there. At that point, it anchors into reality, so there’s a limit to what he can do. After that point, he needs to use pressure and influence, trying to coerce events, but that’s unreliable and he gets increasingly desperate even before the point where we step in to finish it”, she corrected. “Which brings us to my least favourite part of this whole ordeal”, her face darkened.

“I’m with you there, but think about the outcome”, he prodded.

“You mean, we get to have a vacation?”, her face rose hopefully.