The ghost of Rod Serling appeared in a corner narrating:
"You are about to witness games within the game of the universe being played by God almighty himself. Two men of might and power, strength and wisdom
pitting themselves against each other to outwit one another in a realm of strategy and mind, magic and uncertainty. A realm known as-The Twilight Zone"
said Rod, taking a puff from a cigarette. He then vanished into thin air.
Go Fish for God:
The room was dim. A strange kind of twilight fell over it—not from any discernible source of sunlight, but from a lingering hush that cloaked everything in the mystery of half-seen dreams. The air was thick with the musty smell of forgotten corners, worn leather, and the faintest hint of lemon disinfectant.
One bearded man with blue eyes in his thirties sat in a tattered chair as if it were a throne.
He appeared somewhat rugged, like he had been through quite a lot-a tough man not a weak man, yet he illuminated vibes of wisdom, love, and kindness. He sipped from a flimsy paper cup filled with low-grade pathetic iced tea as if it were the vintage wine of the gods. His robe, off-white and frayed at the cuffs, bore a patch above the chest embroidered with a golden fish. He exhaled slowly, eyes distant, shimmering with the burden of millennia. We'll call him Jesus.
A voice sliced through the stillness like lightning over a still sea.
The voice of a man in his mid forties with gray hair and dark brown eyes with a smart-aleck disposition.
He spoke in an exaggeratedly deep melodramatic voice. We'll call him the Antichrist.
"How's it going fellah? Been thinkin' about the crypto market. I think it's how I'm gonna bring about my one world digital army. Gonna
put a cute little animal on the coins-been thinkin' about a possum what do you think? Hello? Mark of the Beast? Think about how damn rich I'm
gonna be when no one can even buy or sell without my help! I'm like the ultimate financial guru!" said the Antichrist.
"Sit down, funny man" commanded Jesus.
The antichrist continued speaking.
"Funny? Says the man who IS his own father? I don't wanna even go there. Anyway, I know we only just met yesterday, and I know the magazines aren't getting any less out of print. But if you're really Jesus? You've got explaining to do, pal" snarled the newcomer, slamming a weathered Bible down on the warped wooden desk. His hair looked like it had lost a war with gravity, and his eyes blazed with the holy rage of misunderstood geniuses and fallen stars. "Explain this: Genesis. The Garden. The Tree. The Snake. All of it."
The seated man, unbothered, looked up with the kind of serenity that infuriates the righteous and humbles the wrathful. "If it ain't the devil himself" he said, smiling warmly as he spoke with a slight Southern drawl.
"I'm not the devil," the man hissed. "Ain't no El Diablo, no. Diablo was a warning. Diablo II is coming soon. I am the correction."
"Ah," said the man in the robe. "You've taken up carpentry. But instead of planks and nails, you're usurping the natural order of things"
The Antichrist jabbed a finger at the Genesis story. "You call that freedom? One misstep and we're cursed? An apple and now the whole damn world's paying the price? For what exactly? Some dude and his girlfriend got a little bored and hungry and now we all have to die huh? That's just fantastic, I'm supposed to be SO happy about this"
"Hey, what's your favorite chocolate bar? Mine's Three Musketeers" said Jesus.
"STOP IT! Read from the Bible it's your own word for God's sake" shouted the Antichrist angrily.
Jesus folded his hands, looking not at the book, but through it.
"Long ago," he began, voice low and grave, "there was a resonance. Not a command, not a law, contrary to what most religious minds think. A resonance-the word if you will. The word of God illuminated every living thing. Each being was a strong individual co-creator, not a slave, for how can a creator be a slave? We are meant to create, and there was no effort in faith. It was like breath. It simply was. Not the absence of free-will but freewill voluntarily directed in a different fashion from the very core of our beings. Space-time was fluid, not rigid as we know it now. Thought forms would flow like rivers, creating new glorious beings of pure light and energy. Is a cord plugged into an outlet a matter of free will or uncertainty? No, it simply receives the flow of power-of electricity, a current flows through it. That current comes from God the Father himself, and it sets us free from limitation. But see-Judas's chariots? They want you to think freedom is slavery and vice versa. There's some people born to want to serve you and some more born and suited to serve me, but I can save them all just the same, bro, despite all of Judas's chariots"
The Antichrist's lip curled. "I think you mean Judas Iscariot not Judas's chariots. And all that stuff sounds like mindless devotion to a tyrant to me."
But Jesus was always one step ahead of him.
"The ultimate state of mind… is mindlessness. For when you go outside the mind, you reach its core—the closed doors of an open mind. No one needs knowledge, they need proper resonance with the fabric of spacetime-what I call the Harmonious Individual Resonance" said Jesus, as the Antichrist munched on a chicken leg.
"Go on then, pal" said the Antichrist.
"Harmonic keys, mathematical signatures that resonate with fields of intelligence beyond Earth and yet of it. When you engage with the word of God by listening—you in turn are also broadcasting his word-my word. Walkie-talkie frequencies for example-specially them ones in the lower MHz or upper kHz bands—interact more naturally with Earth's electromagnetic field. These waves propagate differently, blending with natural resonances that heavenly consciousness can more easily detect." explained Jesus as he laughed, and the sound curled in the room like an old wizard in a Tolkien novel.
The Antichrist rolled his eyes. "You sound high as a shroom bucket, buddy."
"No, just lifted. Ascension my friend. Intent is the key. If you encode the word of God properly, even a digital transmission can serve as a beacon, though it is less direct than analog methods of contacting the almighty Lord."
"K140 this is the Antichrist speaking is God on the line? He is? Ten roger!" said the Antichrist, picking up a walkie talkie and chuckling.
A low whistle echoed from outside—the hollow eeri cry of a distant train. A strange stillness followed the sound as if a resonance had been born from the Holy Void itself, and Jesus reached for a dusty deck of cards sitting nearby.
"Now see you was focusing on the peanut shell and not the peanut, that's what most people do-you gotta go within. Still, you got a signal. Shall we begin with Go Fish?" he offered.
The Antichrist sat down across from him. "Fine. Let's see what divine intervention looks like in a children's game."
As they dealt cards, Jesus explained: "This game is pure. No bluffing. No deceit. Just asking, seeking, and receiving—or drawing from the waters of the unknown."
The rules were simple. Each held seven cards. One asked the other for a match. If it existed, it was handed over. If not, one must "go fish"—draw from the pile.
Jesus asked first. "Do you have any threes?"
The Antichrist glanced down and grudgingly handed one over.
"You see," Jesus continued, "Go Fish mirrors the original condition of Eden. Trust. Simplicity. The vulnerability of the inquisitive spirit that seeks within not without. But modern man sees this as weakness."
The Antichrist scoffed, "Yeah, well, in the real world you bluff or die."
Jesus smiled. "That's why the fruit was eaten. Not because they were hungry, but because they doubted the abundance and prosperity they already had."
The train outside howled again, louder.
"Let's move on," the Antichrist said, rubbing his temple. "Something that matters. Poker."
They shuffled in silence as a storm ravaged the seemingly wild untamed lands outside. The clack of the cards echoed like sacred bones being cast.
Jesus dealt the first hand. Five-card draw. No wilds. No mercy.
The Antichrist leaned forward, eyes narrowing like a general on the eve of war.
Poker, Jesus explained, was the game of this world. A game of masks, probability, deception. Bluffing. Betting. It wasn't asking—it was wagering. Not Eden, but Babel. Not innocence, but the marketplace.
"Your bet," Jesus said calmly.
Antichrist raised an eyebrow. "I'll open with three."
Jesus matched. The draw began.
Antichrist discarded two, drew two. Jesus discarded one. Silence.
They revealed.
Antichrist had a pair of queens.
Jesus had nothing but a high card king.
A grin bloomed on the Antichrist's face. "Even you can't pray your way into a full house."
Jesus merely nodded strangely like a crazy old wizard. "How do you know what I'm really doing here?"
Next hand: Antichrist bluffed a flush. Jesus folded.
Next: Jesus bet big with a three of a kind.
Antichrist folded immediately.
"Why'd you back out?" Jesus asked.
"I saw your eyes."
Jesus chuckled again. "Poker takes us through the looking glass and tells us what to find there. It reveals what the face hides."
Hand after hand, Antichrist won. Confidence rising. Strategy flawless.
On the final hand, Antichrist went all in with a straight.
Jesus called with two pair.
And lost again.
"You don't care about winning, do you?" the Antichrist asked, suspicion blooming.
"Winning is a matter of perspective unique to each individual" Jesus said. "But what truly matters is only truth. And resonance."
The Antichrist slammed his fists down. "There's poverty, uncertainty, the possibility of nuclear wars. How do we bring the people together?"
Jesus leaned forward, eyes shining like ancient suns. "I do. I'm not here to interrupt your plan at all. It's all part of the plan bro, I'm here to help it proceed, so I can intervene when the right moment arrives, should need be my people shalt be taken to a new Earth with a new Heaven. You represent the part of me that tried to bring kindness to the world… and failed. I have no ill will towards you whatsoever, I hate the sins, not the sinners"
The Antichrist looked stricken. "Then why don't you care what happens to this world?"
Jesus sighed, his voice like soft thunder. "I care what happens to the people. And those who believe in me will be saved in the end times. But people misinterpreted me. I simply noticed that whosever believeth in me shall not perish, but have eternal life. I simply noticed these things, hell I didn't set the rules"
The Antichrist fell silent, very confused.
Then he rose to his feet. "You're God-but you didn't set the rules. Still don't get it yet, and I don't think the author of our story does either. Chess. Now. I want to see the God behind the curtain not the little wizard of Oz in front of it."
Jesus looked up and shook his head gently. "My Father plays checkers, not chess. He is not strategy, but simplicity which is the ultimate strategy."
Just then the same eeri train sound could be heard.
"You see, son? You're learning to weave signals across dimensions, just as I do. No matter the game the rules stay the same" explained Jesus.
They stared at each other for a long time. Then sat.
They played. Jesus barely won by one move.
That's when melodious harp music could be heard out of nowhere.
The shadow of a beautiful young woman could be seen by passersby outside the room, making some suspicious of who was in there but when they checked? No one.
Minutes later...
"Final game," said the Antichrist, drained. "Candy Land."
And so they played.
It was absurd. Laughable. But Jesus's eyes lit up with childlike joy. He soared through the game like a comet through bubblegum skies. Gumdrop Pass, Lollipop Woods, Rainbow Trail.
He arrived at King Kandy's Castle before the Antichrist had reached the Peppermint Forest.
"How," whispered the Antichrist. "How do you win at this?"
Jesus leaned in close. "It is a certain childlike wonder that unlocks the power of God, but it must be directed deep within-an alternate universe of divine bliss"
The Antichrist leaned back in stunned silence.
They replayed every game.
Jesus won every single one.
Every card.
Every move.
He had let himself lose earlier. That truth now throbbed in the Antichrist's mind.
"You knew," he whispered. "You knew all along."
Jesus nodded.
The Antichrist's lips quivered. "Why?"
"To teach. To show. To love and serve mankind."
Jesus paused. A tear slid down his cheek.
"I tried too Mr. Antichrist sir. I tried to bring peace. I understand why you want peace. To stop sacrifice. The bastards nailed me to the cross for it, got the wounds to prove it." Jesus revealed his bloody hands.
The Antichrist swallowed, his voice cracking. "Sweet Mother Mary… the world is so tough, that I can tell you."
Jesus stood and took his hand. "I love this world. Don't want dominion over it like you do-but I love everyone and everything in it-including you my son. Thy kingdom will come, Mr. Antichrist"
The Antichrist responded prompetly, "Yet it is THY will that shalt ultimately be done"
Click.
The fluorescent lights buzzed into full brightness.
Two orderlies entered with trays of lukewarm food.
"Dinner time, nutballs-excuse me dinnertime gentlemen" one called.
The spell shattered.
The robes were just bathrobes. The golden fish just a patch. The divine games… hallucinations? Possessions? Dreams?
The two men blinked under the bright lights.
"James," the taller orderly said, handing a tray, "meatloaf again. And for you, Martin. Don't throw it at people this time, treat others how you would want to be treated."
They nodded quietly, but Martin chuckled wickedly, whispering to James "I do treat others how I want to be treated, it's just that I'm a masochist returning the favor"
"Shut your mouth you smartass blasphemous punk" James said jokingly.
As the door shut, Martin leaned in again. "Candy Land again tomorrow?"
James grinned. "Absolutely. For no matter how many times the games and battles change-no matter for which side we fought, the message remains the same-you gotta understand the simple before you can comprehend the complexities of the complex, you gotta be allowed to be a child before you can be an adult, it's the alpha and the omega-no end without a beginning"
The End