He could have simply made all the crabs disappear by a miracle—gods can do that—but the Council on Ethics for Deities didn’t approve of direct intervention. That sort of thing tended to make people superstitious. So Shelmo created a bacterium—nobody knows where they come from, anyhow—which attacked the microcircuits, not only of the steel crabs, but also of the copper scorpions and mechanical vampire bats. By clever genetic manipulation, Shelmo was able to cause the bacteria to destroy only what it was supposed to destroy and then destroy itself.
When the job was done, Shelmo cut short Dan’s hosannas and praisegivings. “I don’t mind doing it once,” he said. “After all, I was a human once myself. But now I’d really like a little peace and quiet so I can get on with my one-pointed concentration.”
Dan made his way down the mountain back to the lands of men, and Shelmo settled down to some good, solid meditating.
Years came and went. But to Shelmo it seemed like no time at all before Dan was in his cave once again.
“Back so soon?” Shelmo asked. “What’s the matter? Didn’t I get all the crabs?”
“Oh, yes, Lord,” Dan said.
“Then what’s the matter?”
“Well, we did manage to live in peace for quite some time. But then there were troubles again.”
“Troubles? You fought each other?”
“No, we managed to avoid that. But we had a serious accident. There were many huge concrete lakes, where obsolete radioactive and chemical weapons were stored. Informed opinion said that they would be all right. But then something within those lakes began to change, to mutate, to become alive and malevolent.”
“So you created living things,” Shelmo said. “Accidentally, but still, you did. It takes a god to handle that sort of thing properly. I suppose it went badly?”
Dan nodded. “The living, semi-liquid substance in the lakes oozed out, feeding on everything it encountered, spreading over the countryside. It sent out spores and infected people in all countries. It is slowly covering the world, and we have no way of stopping it. Unless you help us, O Lord, we are doomed.”
Shelmo said, “You humans keep on making silly mistakes. Don’t you learn from what’s already happened?”
“I think we’ve learned our lesson this time,” Dan said. “At last there is a world-wide consciousness about these matters. If we are not destroyed by our past mistakes, if you can help us, I think we can go ahead now and build a better world.”
Shelmo inspected the situation through his omniscience. The chemical creature really was an ugly sight—orange and black blotches against the blue and green of the Earth.
There were many ways for a god to handle this situation. Shelmo caused the chemical creature to be sensitive to a lack of nobelium, an unstable radioactive isotope of the actinide series. Then, by a miracle, Shelmo extracted all the nobelium from the Earth. (He was not without a sense of humor. And he planned to replace it later.)
The chemical creature died. Dan said, “Thank you, Lord.” It was difficult to find an adequate means of thanking a being who had just saved his race from destruction for the second time.
Dan returned to his people. Shelmo settled down again to his meditation.
It felt as though he had barely begun, when, lo and behold, Dan was standing in front of him again.
“Weren’t you just here?” said Shelmo.
“That was fifty years ago,” Dan said.
“But that’s hardly any time at all!”
“Yes, Lord,” Dan said. “And I do beg forgiveness for this intrusion. I come, not for myself, but for the people—your people, Lord, they are helpless and suffering.”
“What happened this time? Did another of your inventions get out of hand?”
Dan shook his head. “This time it’s the Paratids. I know you don’t bother to keep up on local politics, so permit me to fill you in. The Paratids are one of the major political parties in my country. They stand for liberty, equality, and a fair deal for everyone irrespective of race, gender, or religion. Or so we thought. When they came to power, however, we found that they had deceived us and were, in fact, unprincipled, authoritarian, fanatical, cynical—”
“I get the idea,” Shelmo said. “But why did you let such people come to power?”
“They deceived us with their propaganda. Perhaps they believed their own lies. I don’t know whether they are guilty of cynicism or fanaticism, or a mixture of the two. But I do know that they have canceled all future elections and declared themselves to be the perpetual guardians of the coming Utopia. Although they make up less than a third of the population, they have instituted a reign of terror.”
“Why don’t you fight back?” Shelmo asked.
“Because they have all the weapons. Their soldiers march up and down our streets. Terrible stories are told about their secret torture chambers. They’ve taken thousands of prisoners. All culture is banned except approved treatments on patriotic themes. We are helpless in their hands. Only you, O Lord, can save us.”
Shelmo mused for a while. “I suppose there is a precedent for a god meddling in political affairs?”
“Oh, yes, Lord, there are many accounts of it in the ancient annals of our major religions.”
“Do these annals tell us anything about a God’s procedure in these cases?”
“He struck down the unrighteous.”
“And how was it determined which were the righteous?”
Dan thought for a while. “Sometimes a prophet of the people would take the complaint direct to God, as I am doing.”
“That doesn’t strike me as equitable,” Shelmo said. “Not without hearing arguments for the other side.”
“You could discover the truth of the matter through your omniscience.”
“No,” Shelmo said. “Omniscience is only good for facts, not for matters of opinion.”
“Then you could do whatever you think is best,” Dan said.
“All right,” Shelmo said. “But remember, you asked me.”
“What better thing could I ask for than the judgment of the Lord?”
“Just so you remember,” Shelmo said. His body stiffened. His eyes narrowed with inner concentration. Unseen energies hummed in the air, causing Dan’s hair to stand on end. Suddenly, the cave was bathed in a lurid red light which slowly faded as though controlled by the devil’s rheostat. And then the cave returned to normal.
“Finished,” Shelmo said.
Dan heard a cry arise from the Earth, a cry of sorrow and rage, a cry of anger and grief so strong that it could reach Shelmo’s cave when prayers hadn’t been able to.
“What did you do?” Dan asked.
“A straightforward solution. I vanished the Paratids.”
“Vanished them? What does that mean?”
“You might call it killing,” Shelmo said. “I call it vanishing. It comes to much the same thing in that they are no longer around to cause you difficulties. Your problems are solved.”
It took Dan a moment to take it in. With growing horror he realized that Shelmo had disposed of almost a third of the planet’s population.
“You shouldn’t have killed them,” he said. “Most of them were not bad men. They were just mindless followers.”
“They followed the wrong leader this time,” Shelmo said.
“Some members of my own family were Paratids.”
“My condolences. But now, at least, your enemies are gone. There should be no obstacles now to your building an equitable society. But if there is, feel free to call on me again. Be sure to tell that to the people.”
“I will proclaim it to the nations,” Dan said.
“That’s the idea. Tell them that I’m available to them now. My judgments are swift. I will be glad to help those who can’t help themselves. In my own way, of course.”
Dan bowed deeply and departed. Shelmo made himself a glass of tea, the first he had permitted himself in centuries. He hummed a few bars of a song he had known when he was a human. Then he used his omniscience to peek into the future of the Earth. He scanned 150 years ahead. He noted that the humans still hadn’t reached utopia. But they were doing all right. Or at least no worse than was to be expected.