"Bye, Mom. Bye, Dad." Mercy Hassid kissed each of her parents on the cheek as she prepared to leave the house.

"You will be home in time for dinner, won't you?" Annie asked her daughter.

"Of course I will." Stepping outside, Mercy entered a world that was vastly different from the one in which her parents had grown up. Formerly wild animals like lions and bears roamed the streets freely, bothering no one. All former carnivores were now vegetarians.

"Mercy!" Mercy turned to see her friends Judd, Vicki, Lionel, and Ryan walking along. All four were more than ten years older than Mercy, but since everyone aged much more slowly now, they all appeared to be the same age. Judd and Vicki were married, and Vicki was six months pregnant with the couple's first child.

"Hey guys!" Mercy called to them. "How's it going?"

"Great!" Vicki smiled. "I think this baby will be either a football player or a ballerina. It kept me up all night long with its kicking!"

Mercy placed her hand on the other girl's belly, and sure enough, she felt a strong flutter almost right away. "Wow, he or she sure is active!"

"He," said Judd.

"She," argued Vicki.

Mercy laughed. "Maybe it's twins!"

"The midwife doesn't think so," Vicki told her. Gone were the maternity floors, obstetricians, and ultrasounds of the past, to be replaced by the midwives of the Biblical-era Israelites. As miscarriages, stillbirths, and other pregnancy complications no longer happened, they were considered to be sufficient.

"Well, here I am." The group had reached the sprawling campus of COT, which was the combination nursery/Bible school run by Cameron and Chloe Williams. Basic skills such as reading, writing, and math were also taught, but the emphasis was on Biblical history and the application of the scriptures to one's daily life.

Mercy entered the main building of the complex to find one of her co-workers, Cendrillon Jospin, surrounded by a group of elementary school age children. As Cendrillon was very popular with children of that age group, Mercy wasn't surprised at all. Cameron and Chloe's son, Kenny Bruce, was writing the day's lesson on the blackboard while Ekaterina Risto plugged the projector in.

"How's it going, guys?" Mercy asked as she walked up to the group of children.

"Great!" Seven-year-old Timothy grinned, revealing the gap in his upper gum. "Cindy's been telling us about Lilith."

Kenny turned from the blackboard, his eyes growing wide with surprise as Ekaterina's mouth fell open.

"She was Adam's first wife," added six-year-old Annika.

"That isn't part of the curriculum," said Kenny.

"She's mentioned in the book of Sirach," Cendrillon told him. "Jeremiah's son told King Nebuchadnezzar about her."

Kenny sighed. "I've never heard of that, but it isn't part of canon scripture. From now on, please limit your stories to the inspired Word of God."

"All right." Cendrillon looked sad.

"Hey, Mercy!" Mercy felt an eager tug on her finger and looked down into the big brown eyes of five-year-old Hassan. "Can you help me with my alphabet now?"

"Sure!" Class didn't start for another fifteen minutes or so. Mercy took the little boy by the hand and led him back to his desk, where he'd already opened his textbook. He sat in the child-sized chair while Mercy took the adult one. "This is a beit, and this is a gimel." The alphabet taught was that of the universal language of the Millennial Kingdom, which was Hebrew.

Hassan pointed. "What are those funny little marks on top of them?"

"Since there are no vowels, only consonants, they help with pronunciation until you learn to recognize individual words," Mercy explained. "You also read from right to left. In my mother's native language, English, it's just the opposite. You read from left to right."

"Where's your mother from?" asked Hassan.

"Before the rapture, it was called Canada, and during the Tribulation, it was part of the United North American States."

"And what about your father?"

"He was born in what used to be called Tel Aviv. That was before all the cities reverted back to their Biblical names. It's about 73 kilometers from Jerusalem."

Hassan beamed. "Where the Temple and the sacrifices are!"

"Exactly!"

Although the two girls lived in opposite directions from COT, Mercy fell into step beside Cendrillon after the school day had ended. "So what happened to Lilith?" she asked.

"She abandoned Adam because he tried to make her submit to him."

"But what about Eve?"

"There are two different creation accounts in Genesis," Cendrillon explained. "The first says that the male and female were created at the same time, from the dust of the earth. The second is the one we were all taught to believe, that man was created first and woman later on, from his rib. The first story is that of Adam and Lilith. It's also in the Talmud, the oral tradition, but Kenny would have had a cow if I'd brought that up."

"But don't you like Kenny?'

"Sure, he's a nice guy. Just a little rigid sometimes."

"How did you know about Adam and Lilith?"

Cendrillon glanced around to make sure no one else was within earshot, then leaned toward Mercy and lowered her voice. "My cousins in France deal in contraband literature."

Mercy gasped. "But that's so dangerous! If they get caught, they'll be brought before the judges!"

"What have the judges ever done to anyone? The worst that would happen is they'd be shut down, but then they'd just find a way to come back a few months later. Hey, why don't you come over one evening? There's lots of stuff I could show you, if you want to see it."