All froze upon seeing the Addressee. His head was bandaged, not from Sniper’s bullet but from Science, whose tests had cut His flesh deep, seeking the miracle’s residue. His suit of antique black had always been a mourning suit, His protest against His Peer’s creation Death, but it felt different now that concrete tragedies made so many wear black with Him. He Who Visits from Another Universe can never be said to change expression, nor is there much alteration to the bearing of the flesh that He inhabits so distantly, as a puppeteer inhabits his marionette. Yet somehow the flush of spring and sun awakened an energy in the limbs of His youthful earthly body—Jehovah’s Peer, Who governs Nature, bade her grant His Guest the full flower of the human form, however little He might use it.

“I hesitate to enter Another’s sanctum,” He said as He crossed the Conclave’s threshold, “but I am relevant.”

For three breaths, no one could do more than stare.

“Yes,” one sensayer found strength to answer. “Yes, you are relevant. Thank you for making the time to come.”

“What is more important?” No one could face His pure black stare and think the question was rhetorical.

“Nothing,” they agreed.

Julia smiled. “I asked Jehovah to come, in case some of you had questions. It should make certain decisions easier.”

The others nodded stunned thanks, and raised no protest as Julia took her seat as Conclave Head. Her smile was all victory as she fingered the new pin she wore upon her breast, Quarriman’s bull’s-eye O.S. sigil. Only a day had passed since Quarriman created it, but the sign was already common on the streets, and even two here in the Conclave wore it. But it felt different on Julia, pinned beside the temporary clip-on chest monitor which oversaw her new heart. Had you forgotten Sniper’s second shot? After it fled the Forum, with Dominic still clinging rabid to the car, the living doll stopped at the jail in Antwerp and fired a second bullet through the window and clear through Julia’s heart. She had a new heart now, fully artificial, thumping coldly on within her cold chest. I have seen many strange species of courage in my years, but one of the strangest was this, to pin above her still-raw wound the bull’s-eye invitation: shoot me again, my love, if your cause demands it.

“I will answer anything you ask,” Jehovah offered, “excepting matters on which one of My Earthly offices requires silence.”

Several of the sensayers blinked as they reviewed the imperial gray armband which held the insignia of His many offices. The crisis and its power vacuums had promoted Him: no longer merely a European Parliamentary Counsel but a European Council Counsel; no longer a Humanist Bailiff but Deputy to the Humanist Attorney General; no longer a Clerk of the Cousins’ Chief Counsel’s Office but an Advising Member of the Board. It takes a rare mind in such days to forget Jehovah’s part in earthly politics; here sat many who can.