Author's Note: This chapter does not do anything to advance the plot and is very introspective. You can skip it if you want.

Disclaimer: I don't own these lyrics, and they are readily available to anyone who walks into a church and picks up a song book, so… I'm not making money on this and I highly doubt that this will take money away from the owners of these lyrics. I put some of the lyrics to "God Has Chosen Me" by Bernadette Farrell, "Anthem" by Tom Conry, and "How Can I Keep From Singing?" by Robert Wadsworth Lowry. This last one, though modified by several other artists, is now in the public domain anyway.

Threads

Joan marched up the steps of Our Lady of Faith Catholic Church. She wore a lovely green dress that Jessica had helped her make. A burgundy sash around her waist covered some of the crooked seams she had made when first learning to use the sewing machine. Thankfully, the rest of the dress was every bit as elegant as the pattern intended it to be.

With limited resources to spend on incidentals like new clothes, the Noelites were careful to avoid purchasing items from the very corporations they sought to overthrow. Besides, the heavy cloth they were using would last longer anyway.

As Joan passed the walk-in confessions sign, music drifted to her ears. She pushed open the heavy wooden door and immediately saw a small choir standing beside the altar with sheets of music.

…new sight to those searching for light
God has chosen me, chosen me

And to tell the world that God's kingdom is near,
to remove oppression and breakdown fear,
yes, God's time is near, God's time is near,
God's time is near, God's time is near.

Joan quickly blessed herself with holy water and sat down in a pew. She wasn't sure whether Father John was busy with someone or not, so she decided to sit and enjoy the music for a while. However, the choir members kept glancing in her direction and smiling as if they were hoping she would join them.

God has chosen me, God has chosen me
to set alight a new fire.
God has chosen me, God has chosen me
to bring to birth a new kingdom on earth
God has chosen me, chosen me.

There were only three women and one man who were not very good singers, but at least they put their hearts into the song. Their accompanist was better, holding the group together.

God is calling me, God is calling me
in all whose cry is unheard.
God is calling me, God is calling me
to raise up the voice with no power or choice
God is calling me, calling me.

When the song was over, a wizened lady with a bob of curly white hair asked, "Can we help you with anything, dear?"

"Yes. I'm here for reconciliation. Is he…?"

Father John poked his head out of the booth. "Busy? No, come right in."

Joan smiled and gave a courteous not to the choir director before slipping into the darkness on her side of the booth. Once situated, she whispered. "How did you hear me? Are the walls really that thin?"

"Unfortunately, yes. Start confessing something really boring and mundane until they start singing again," he whispered back.

"Forgive me father for I have sinned," Joan began, going through the routine. "I was visiting my sister this week and I didn't help her with the dishes when the meal was through. I had time to help her, but I wanted to watch my favorite TV show instead. I should have…" It was a lie – Joan didn't even have a sister – but she could confess that part later.

We are called, we are chosen.
We are Christ for one another.
We are promised to tomorrow,
while we are for him today.

"Oh thank goodness. Are they here every Thursday or something?"

We are harvest, we are hunger.
We are question, we are creed.

"Yes. They are a devoted little bunch."

Then how are we to stand at all,
this world of bended knee?
In nothing more than barren shadows.
No one else but he could save us.

"I can tell. I'm tempted to join them. I'm not much of a singer, but sometimes-"

Who was justice for the poor.
Who was rage against the night.
Who was hope for peaceful people.
Who was light.

"-Please don't."

Then shall we not stand empty
at the altar of our dreams:
When he promised us ourselves.
Who mark time against tomorrow.

"Why not?"

"Just the whole thing, the idea of you there while I'm trying to… to…"

Who are rage against the night.
Who are hope for peaceful people.
Who are light.

"May our Lord Jesus Christ…" Father John hastily shoved a key through the broken slot in the screen while reciting the words from memory, "….I absolve you from your sins in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen. Go say ten Hail Marys and sin no more."

Joan took the key and tucked it into an ugly pocket under her sash. "Thank you, Father."

Joan slipped out of the confessional to find the whole choir smiling eagerly at her. She nodded politely and left the scene as quickly as she could without breaking into a run. She knew that if she gave them another glance, she would not be able to resist the lure of the music. At her own, smaller church near Rakitan Industries, there was only a single cantor and nobody else had expressed interest in forming a full choir. Joan made a mental note to herself to sing with Penguin's team more often to get the urge to sing worked out of her system.

Once out in the fresh air again, Joan found it easier to breathe. While the choir seemed to be a close-knit, welcoming community, somehow she did not think they would appreciate her affairs with their priest. Around the side of the building she went until she came to a simple green door to which the key in her pocket belonged. After surveying her surroundings to see that nobody was watching, she swiftly unlocked the door and stepped inside.

The apartment was very neat and clean with a faint smell of incense. Through the thin walls, Joan could hear the tune that the choir was singing. She could make out the melody, but not the words. However, she knew the song well enough for her brain to fill in the words.

While though the tempest loudly roars,
I hear the truth, it liveth.
And though the darkness 'round me close,
Songs in the night it giveth.

Joan saw John's notebook on the coffee table beside a stack of Christian magazines. Since she already knew that the magazines were incredibly boring, she decided to take a peek into the notebook. The concept of looking into his notebook bothered her a little, but if he kept it out in the open in the middle of the room, could it really be so private?

No storm can shake my inmost calm,
While to that rock I'm clinging.
Since love is lord of Heaven and Earth
How can I keep from singing?

At last, Joan flipped open the notebook and was relieved to find that it contained sermon notes. It wasn't private at all. This was the stuff he was going to say in front of… how many people could the church fit? Two thousand, maybe? How many people actually showed up to mass? Judging from the size of the choir, the congregation may have dwindled as well.

When tyrants tremble in their fear
And hear their death knells ringing,
When friends rejoice both far and near
How can I keep from singing?

Joan relaxed and started reading John's notes. They were also dry and boring. Judging by the scheduled readings and the songs the choir was practicing, the theme of the upcoming Sunday was social justice. John's notes addressed the symptoms of the problem, but not the root causes. He mentioned giving spare change to hungry people, but never questioned why so many people were hungry in the first place.

In prison cell and dungeon vile
Our thoughts to them are winging,
When friends by shame are undefiled
How can I keep from singing?

Then again, the reason was the government and as Joan knew all too well, questioning the government could get one killed. She and her friends had nearly fallen victim to a satellite weapon from Stellar Defense. As Joan read, she grew more and more depressed until she finally put down the notebook and stared into space.

Joan's mind wandered to the time shortly before and after the corporations had taken control of the planet. Everyone had been either shocked or outraged. The outraged had taken to the streets, and she was among the outraged. It was only by sheer luck of being young and agile that she and her friends had escaped to safety. Her chubby friend Adam would have died if Tam had not been fit enough for both of them.

What about Tímo? Was he among the shocked of the outraged? He had a good excuse for staying indoors at the time of the protests, so Joan had never asked explicitly, but she sometimes wondered. Had her love for him blinded her to his true nature? No, even if he was among the people who were too paralyzed to stand up for justice, she still loved him. Even if he…

"Joan?" Father John asked.

Joan forced herself to snap back into reality. She had been so preoccupied with her thoughts that she had not noticed the door opening. Here stood one of the few people in the world who cared about her, one of the few people who even know she existed outside of Rakitan Industries. "Hey," she replied softly.

John knelt in front of her, took her hands in his, and looked up into her gold-specked blue eyes with his chocolate brown ones. "What's going on?"

"Do you ever think that maybe… things could be different?"

"All the time."

"But you can never…"

John remained silent while Joan's eyes welled up with tears. He stood up and then sat on the arm of the brown rayon chair, pulling her head to his chest and stroking her curly auburn hair.

"I mean, none of us can do anything. Even what I am doing, it's not working. They think I'm a terrorist," Joan spat out, rushing her words.

"What matters is that you are doing all you can do." John eyed his sermon notebook, still open on the coffee table. "Sometimes, I wish I could do what you do. Your friend Penguin puts things so bluntly on television. If I did that, I would be shot on sight. Working with a live audience does not leave much wiggle room."

"But you don't wiggle at all."

"Do you think I could do better?" John wiggled his body a bit to emphasize his willingness to try.

Joan laughed, and the mood brightened. "Yeah, actually. Throw in some subtle things here and there. Let people draw their own conclusions."

"That sounds dangerous. What if someone on the wrong side figures out what I am trying to say?"

"Leave it open to interpretation both ways, but just make sure you give people something to think about. I could even help you brainstorm."

Father John rested his chin atop Joan's head. "Now there's a thought. You write me some notes, and I'll decide which things I can risk saying."

Joan beamed, and her heart raced with excitement. "Can I come watch?"

John froze. "Didn't you say you had your own church to go to?"

"Yeah, but the priest there isn't hot like you."

John recoiled from her and started fidgeting with some trinkets on a shelf. "It's not like I could stop you from going to mass here, but I… I would really rather you didn't. It would be… distracting. I've never had anyone quite as… special as you in the congregation before."

"I see. Well, maybe I'll just surprise you someday. You won't even know I'm there until the mass is over."

"That works. Come to think of it, you don't even have to show up in person. There's a podcast for the disabled and the ill. Just watch that and I won't have to worry about people finding out about us."

Joan pouted. "All right, but doesn't it thrill you at all?"

John crossed his arms and looked at her with a flat expression. "No. It just scares me. I'm happy being a priest, and I don't want to lose what I have here. I'm taking a huge risk with you, but since I know that you also have something to lose I thought you would understand. I mean, what if the government found out that you are a Noelite?"

Joan's face softened, the edge of her excitement gone. "I wasn't talking about actually revealing you. The thrill lies in the unknowns and the what ifs. What if someone actually understands and accepts us? Noel has actually found a few supporters, you included, by revealing itself to individuals. Obviously we can't just blow our cover in front of the whole world because society as a whole would crush us, but some people just get it."

"What happens when you accidentally reveal yourself to the wrong person?"

"Usually we have pretty good instincts about that sort of thing, and when we don't we have a little memory eraser thingy."

John turned back towards her and raised an eyebrow. "You're kidding! Can you use it on multiple people at once like the flashy thingy in Men in Black?"

"It's not quite that good. It can only be used on one person at a time, and we have to sedate him first. Even then it is iffy. We're pretty sure that the subject will lose the hour before the treatment, but he might forget the whole day or just part of it."

"Did you say treatment?"

"Yes. It is actually an electroconvulsive therapy treatment we give them. It is supposed to treat severe depression. The memory loss is just a side effect of the therapy, but that's actually our main purpose for doing it. It could be better, but it does what we need it to do."

John sat down on Joan's lap and took her face in his hands to see if she was serious. "So when you first confessed to me, did you have one of these treatments handy just in case I turned out to be on the wrong side?"

A light tingling sensation ticked Joan's skin, making it very difficult to concentrate on the conversation. "Actually, no. I was… in a very strange place at the time. Looking back, I probably should have been prepared just in case, but I guess I felt that… God was watching over me."

"Of course He was watching over you." John nipped Joan's earlobe softly, and then whispered, "He's always watching you no matter what."

Joan squirmed under the sensation of John's hands caressing her neck, and draped her own around his body. "In that case, let's put on a show for Him."

Father John pressed his lips to Joan's, imbuing them with the fire of the Holy Spirit. Joan kissed him back with equal fervor, rolling her hips to the lingering choir songs stuck in her head. John's features melted away and he became a vision of pure light, almost blinding even though her eyes were closed.

Suddenly, Joan wasn't with her favorite priest anymore. She tumbled through space until she figured out that she was not falling toward anything in particular, but merely present in a place with no walls, ground or sky. She had a feeling that she had been here before, but only in dreams. Then she recognized another presence. It was not by his electric blue eyes not by his cool, devious smile that she recognized him, but by the mere existence of something beside her that ebbed Timothy Saunders with every fiber of its being.

It communicated with her-not in English or any other language known to man, but in sense and emotion. It told her that something was wrong, but not what that something was. It missed her, yet expressed indifference about seeing her again. The day would come, but not until the end of her time on Earth. It bid her farewell, but only for now. All of this happened in an instant.

Joan's eyes snapped open, and she gasped for breath as if she had not tasted the air in several years.

"What happened? Did I bite you too hard?" John asked.

"No, it's…" Joan shook her head, "I think my ex-boyfriend is dead."

John laid a hand on Joan's forehead. "Are you feeling all right? Have you been drinking holy water again?"

Joan shook her head. "No. I really don't know how to explain it, but I just have this feeling that he's… gone somehow."

"You say that like you're not sure if it is a good thing or a bad thing."

"I'm not sure at all, really. I don't know what to make of it."

Father John sighed, sensing that the mood was lost, and rose. "I'll make us some tea." In just a few short paces, he was at the kitchenette filling the kettle.

"I'm sorry. Let's forget I even brought it up," Joan said.

John put the kettle on the electric stove and cranked up the heat. "No, get it off your mind. It isn't fair to either of us for you to be preoccupied."

Joan bit her lower lip. She knew she was always preoccupied with something, but this was a little different. The thoughts she had were never quite this strong or ethereal. This one bordered on visionary. She sometimes had similar thoughts before falling asleep, but not usually in the middle of the day. Joan took a deep breath. "OK. This is going to sound crazy, but do you think that two souls can connect through some sort of spiritual plane?"

"The Church teaches that such transactions must be done through Christ, but I suppose anything is possible."

"All right, well sometimes I feel like I'm bonded to Tímo even though he's not near. I feel that with other people too sometimes, but it is not as strong because I know I'll see them again. With Tímo, it's all I have left of him. Am I making any sense?"

Father John laid out two teacups and prepared a pot to receive hot water. "More or less. I think I have heard similar stories, but people always dress it up somehow or hide it behind a veil. Usually they claim it is Jesus talking to them. Maybe Jesus is talking to you as well, but He doesn't always come in the form we expect."

"Ah. So now I can run home and tell everyone that Jesus speaks to me, huh?"

Father John smiled softly. "If you want to make a fool of yourself, sure. I believe some politicians of yesteryear tried that, and it did not go over too well." Father John prepared the tea and brought it to the table on a tray where it proceeded to steep.

Joan's face brightened as he sat down on the couch, and she moved to sit beside him. "I think I remember that. It was some American and his words were 'Jesus speaks through me.'"

"Ah yes! That's what it was. You know, come to think of it things could have been a lot worse than they turned out. We could have had a Protestant nutcase like him take over the planet. At least with the corporations, we're still moderately free to practice our own religions."

Joan grew more serious. "Rumor has it that Bakura has a secret cult of Zorc or something that he wanted to turn into the official world religion. However, the other CEOs nixed it. That's just speculation Tulip found on the internet, though. He says that the CEOs have a lot of secrets and there is no way to sort out fact from fiction. That's the only reason people are allowed to toss around wild accusations of the oligarchy; nobody actually believes them."

Father John poured some tea for himself and Joan. "But people believe you. That's why the oligarchy is on an anti-terrorist campaign against Noel."

Joan took a sip of her tea and sighed. "Yeah. Maybe it would be better if we pretended to be religious nutcases. Then we would not have people after our heads. They would just ignore us and Penguin could go out in public without getting shot."

"Ah, but then you would not be doing any good either. Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven."

"Mmm…" Joan let the tea swirl around in her mouth, savoring its warmth and familiar flavor. "That still doesn't solve our problems, but it adds perspective. Do you really think we are doing any good, though? Getting feedback on what we do is nearly impossible because people won't actually express support for us publicly. It's too dangerous."

"I agree. I've run into a few people who seem to support what you are doing, but if Noel is mentioned directly, they just shut down and get really quiet. I'm fairly certain that there are people on your side who would support you in any way they could if they knew the government wasn't going to come after them."

Joan thought for a moment. "You know, you're right. Perhaps we should network better. We have a few family members who know about us and want to help more, but don't know how. We could keep them on a list of some sort with their talents and stuff and contact them as we need them."

"In that case, put me on the list! I'll give you emotional support and stress release when you need it."

"Just me, or the other Noelites as well?" Joan finished her tea.

"I was thinking just you. I don't really know the others."

Joan moved closer to him and pressed her body against his. "What about my best friend? She got to our shared boyfriends first and since I got to you first, I think that maybe I should return the favor by introducing you."

Father John blinked. "I'm not averse to the idea, but you are really all I can handle at the moment. This scares me, and the thought of being caught with two women is even more terrifying."

"You would not be caught with the two of us. Even if you were, we could both stand up for you and protect you."

John slipped an arm around her waist and said, "That's good to know. Maybe one of these days we'll all get together, but right now I would just like to be with you."

"That works." Joan closed her eyes and snuggled up to Father John. The day slipped away from them slowly as they lay there in each other's warmth. Eventually, they had to leave and return to their duties, but life no longer seemed like such a daunting thing.