The office building was square and squat, with a roof covered in air conditioning exhausts, solar panels, and various types of antennas. The somewhat overly ornate details like door frames and window sills contrasted sharply with the simplicity of the 3D printed structure; the place had obviously been erected during the initial automatic-building craze.

The tag outside the front door said Theology & Thaumaturgy Institute. Kurt Williams squared his shoulders, mouthed a brief prayer, and walked into the lion's den.

A short girl with a round face and a luxurious mane of black hair pointed a smartphone at him from the receptionist's desk. Kurt thought she looked unnaturally pale.

"Are you a revenant?" he blurted out before reminding himself that a good first impression would require full alertness.

"No, I just got back from Night City. It was pretty fun. Uh, can you turn NFC on on your terminal?"

"Oh. I don't have one." Kurt touched his temple, to mean he was equipped with a cellphone implant instead. Voice only.

"Okay, you'll have to input some personal data by hand then." The girl handed him the smartphone. Kurt started filling out the form.

"I'm here as-"

"...the new chaplain, yes, we asked for one a week ago."

"You -asked- for a Christian chaplain? I was expecting to-"

Kurt remembered his conversation with the venerable Abdullah Ababneh, about how he had first contacted the TOL front organization that still bore the TTI name. In the centuries since then, they had gone through a lot of trouble in order to appear more legit, of course. Kurt's mentor had to essentially offer the TTI folks a choice between letting him in and setting him up in an office, or having to deal with him preaching right outside their front door.

"Well, yeah. This is the Theology and Thaumaturgy Institute. We want all faiths represented here. The last guy was in breach of contract, so, here you are."

The contract text flowed on the small screen. As soon as the girl - Emily, by her nametag - mentioned breach of contract, a clause was highlighted blue.

"Says here I'm not allowed to disrupt staff or guests' undirected worship activities, and others are likewise not allowed to disrupt mine. Why would I ever do that?"

"That's what the guy before you did. There was a scheduling conflict on using the chapel, and long story short, he barged in and started shouting at a group of Haephestians. The algorithm determined that he was in the wrong for the scheduling conflict, so he got the boot."

"...Oh. That's... Well, I would say that worship is one thing, and idolatry is another, but I can see how that might be seen as rude."

"TTI in its current incarnation exists to promote interfaith dialogue. That can include shouting, heh, it can even include dueling if everybody's cool with it, but in the appropriate time and place."

Interfaith dialogue. That in itself boggled Kurt's mind. In the last century of the Millennium, The Other Light - whatever they called themselves - had gained enough influence to put entire territories under their boot. Osaze, which they called Misrayim, was one of them: much as it had happened in the first millennial century, God had punished brazen unbelief with a territory-wide drought. Nevertheless, they persisted, ripping life-giving water out of the sea and the air with powerful machines. Even so, the desert once again lapped the base of the great pyramids, some of the few structures still left from the ancient world. Instead of forcing the masses to worship their lord Lucifer, TOL had chosen to be devious, and resurrected the idea of the secular state: within less than a decade, various cults dedicated to a number of the false pagan gods had sprung up. Kurt had made a cursory study; most were simply an excuse to indulge in chaos and hedonism. A few, like that of Haephestus (syncretised with Ptah, Vulcan, Aulë, and other mythological smith deities) had even more adherents than the straight-up Luciferianism promoted by The Only Light. All this misplaced faith towards technological idols probably went some way towards explaining why, Kurt'd had to admit to himself, after the punishments of drought and the Ten Plagues redux, Osaze had embraced their land's loss of fertility and refactored itself into an industrial powerhouse. During his trip here, he had to concede that with the exception of Greater Jerusalem, made magnificent by centuries of love offerings, Osaze's prosperity was second to none.

"You do understand, of course, that my job here is to try and make a case for the light of Christ. And this includes trying to convert others, regardless of what they may believe."

"Yep. That's why you're here. So's every other religious lecturer we have, so, if you want some advice, listen to their pitch after they listen to yours. You'll get along well."

"Their pitch?"

Kurt signed the contract with a thumbprint and handed the smartphone back to Emily. "All right, you're all set! Your office is 42B. And yeah, if you try to convert them, people will try to convert you, that's only fair."

"That's... not going to happen."

"In the sense that you won't let them try or in the sense that they won't succeed?"

That was a good question, Kurt mused. Analyzing the situation, he figured that if heathen priests were preaching their false message at him one-on-one in conversation, they wouldn't be doing it to undecideds.

"They won't succeed."

"That's actually part of what we're studying. TTI's broader mission is trying to figure out the supernatural. And of all faiths in Misrayim, only Yahwism - Christianity, if you like - has a zero percent deconversion rate."

Kurt smiled. "Maybe it's because our God is real, and His Son is in the Temple every day, and you can see Him plain as day."

"Maybe. But, for a counterexample, I am a worshiper of the Omnissiah. The Machine God is real, too, we witness Its power every time we turn on a light switch or water comes out of the tap."

"Men did that. With their God-given brains."

"Actually, on the water taps around here specifically, men and women did that - specifically against Yahweh's wishes. I believe that God is not a starting point, but an end point, a goal for us all to reach. Actually, if you want more details, 43B is assigned to our sysadmin, and she's an ordained Techpriest. Just post your available hours on the door and, well, knock on hers I guess."

"Well, you're... half right, I will give you that. God, the real God, is the Alpha and Omega, not just one or the other."

Emily smiled. "Oh, don't tell me you believe in all those conspiracy theories, the Omega are just a cryptocurrency network, they don't - Oh, you mean the Bible verse. I'm sorry!"

"Is she a revenant? My, uh, neighbor I guess."

"Yeah. She got zapped during the Battlebots Revolt. Sad story, really. It left her a bit... uhm, excessively flirty. If it makes you uncomfortable, tell her and she'll back down, and if she doesn't, tell us at front desk. I haven't heard actual complaints, but, just in case. Oh, by the way, ask before using the R word."

Again, Kurt analyzed the situation. Revenants, people whose soul had gone to Hell after they died of unbelief at age 100 but whose brains and bodies were kept alive artificially, had been adjudicated by the Temple Tribunal to be equal to those who had willingly taken the Mark of the Beast during the Tribulation: irredeemably lost souls. It is permitted to man once to die, and then the judgement. It used to be that revenants were very visible, slack pale skin, aqueous eyes, and obvious mechanical life-support equipment, but in the decades following, technology had gotten to the point where it was impossible to tell a revenant from a living human, save for seeing them naked. Then again, others had almost completely artificial bodies. The Only Light used "MEC troopers" as enforcers and for heavy construction work. Kurt shuddered.

"I thought revenants had no feelings."

"Metabolically extended citizens have no sense of touch, pain, or pleasure. So they can't feel stuff. But they definitely do have feelings. Sam definitely does, anyway."

"You're romantically involved with a r- metabolically extended citizen?"

"Yeah, ze's pretty great. Well, ze's trying, you know? It's... a bit of a struggle sometimes, but I'm sure that if I show enough affection Sam's going to relearn how to return it eventually. For now... well, ze got the full package, just for me." Emily smiled and blushed. Kurt didn't flinch, Emily noted.

Kurt quickly figured out that Emily was likely trying to get a reaction from him, and just returned the smile, finding that he meant it. "You know, I don't really understand this, even we say 'till death do you part', but I can respect that you care about your significant other. Thank you for the warm welcome. Say, do you mind if we talk more in the future?"

"We better, it's part of your job description after all!"

Kurt left and glanced backwards, catching Emily in a sigh, then made his way up the elevator. Somebody had hung a paper bag full of cookies on his door, with "Welcome Mr. Williams!" written on it in uncertain calligraphy. He knew, having asked his Glorified ancestors, that Chloe and Cameron's taste for cookies had somehow turned into a giant joke in TOL circles; as far as he was concerned, the joke was on them - he actually liked the pastries, and it would not do to reject a welcoming gift. Besides, maybe it wasn't even a joke - it'd have gone stale after centuries, one hopes; maybe there were other Christians in this workspace. He walked in, took a moment to admire the impressive laptop computer, and noted, with some relief, that the TTI folks still used office phones like normal people.

Author's note: The chronicle of The Omega Legacy and of the last 100 years of the Millennium can be found by Googling "Left Beyond Quest" and clicking on the Archive link that should show up in first position. It is an interesting piece of fiction written cooperatively over the course of about a year. You can also use the redirect URL at
http：／／www．f3．to／omega／