What Lies Beyond Faith?

Chapter 1

While legion upon legion of His angels fell, the Throne of God sat silent. The ranks of Seraphim were the first to fall closely followed by the Cherubim and the Virtues. The last to go were the Archangels who clawed and struggled to hold onto their grace as their bodies hurtled into the Earths atmosphere.

Of course they were long dead before they hit the ground. Thousands upon hundreds of thousands of charred bodies lined the streets. Their white feathers falling in an unholy imitation of purest snow.

What was humanity's first response to see the Heavenly Host laying dead before their feet? Everybody filmed the grisly scenes with their phones of course. The T.V. channels were permanently regurgitating the images while the world held its breath for answers.

The Pope was to give a speech at noon in The Vatican City the following day but of course that never happened. There in the harsh noonday sun was where the first crack in the world appeared. In one brief moment whole churches, streets and eventually Rome itself fell into gaping chasms that opened from beneath the earth.

Without warning huge cracks appeared all over the world. Giant gaping maws that led into fiery depths that belched brimstone stench across the broken globe. Slowly the cracks stopped and the world came to rest. After the rumbling after-shocks subsided was when the madness increased again.

The world looked on in horror as the most demonic abominations that their collective fears could imagine crawled their way out on claw, stump and tentacle. Floods of demons were coming up through the cracks in the ground!

As one the human race saw Hell and despaired. People tore at their hair and clothes in madness and started to attack one another. Before things got too out of hand the demonic army took one step forward and fell flat on its collective face.

On closer inspection they too were just as dead as the angels. Torrents of dark red blood spilled out of every demons orifice. All over the planet red demon blood mixed with charred angel remains.

The clean up efforts were a massive undertaking but we did it. As a single entity humanity banded together and cleaned the mess of biblical proportions. Then we repaired all the countries and infrastructures that were damaged.

As one the world joined together to put hundreds of our greatest scientific minds to work. We needed to know what had happened and why. With that many brilliant people we discovered new renewable energy sources and we started curing illnesses that had long plagued us.

Of course some of the more fanatical and devout among us tried to renew fear and devotion to varying religions but its hard to do that when the world saw religion die.

Eventually we found the science of inter-dimensional resonance harmonics. We attuned teams of people to specific frequencies that allowed them to see and touch things we couldn't register. The teams were made of scientists, explorers and military and they led the first expedition to Hell.

As expected it was empty. A large barren red desert where nothing moved. Even giant lakes of fire had died and become craters of ash. The whole realm was classified desolate and with no usable resources or discernible life we officially left Hell. With several thousand super computers cataloging every dimension we eventually discovered the frequency that Heaven existed on and we sent more expeditions up there.

Of course the whole thing was televised. Every major cable network and radio station was talking about humanity's return to Heaven. Finally we hoped to find the answers we needed as a species.

When we arrived nothing would prepare us for what we found.

The U.N. initiated a new globally funded branch named C.R.E.A.T.E. The Celestial Research Exploration And Testing Expedition was made up of delegates from all nations. Scientists from all fields and highly trained military made up the bulk of C.R.E.A.T.E.

We were finally ready. All of humanity looked on as we entered the inter-dimensional breach that lay just outside of Earths atmosphere.

Our initial forays were reconnaissance in nature. In those early days we mostly marveled at the glowing white light that permeated all. A light that seemed to come from every direction at once. The teams reported feelings of warmth and elation once through the breach and inside the light.

The architecture was grand, epic beyond comprehension really. Depending on your location there could be an eclectic mix of renaissance stylings or more modern buildings of glass and metal. Thrown in for good effect were Corinthian columns and detailed friezes, sprawling art covered walls and white stone buildings that shot up beyond sight.

Even with drone telemetry we couldn't reach the top of some buildings. It was as though all types of architecture from all times were present at their peak of opulence and design. It was quite a sight to behold.

The only similarity each structure had was that they were all locked to us with no way of getting in. We tried blowing the doors open, cutting with plasma torches and eventually driving large vehicles into the buildings. Nothing worked.

After a few expeditions that went further and further in we realized that the mapping of Heaven may take more time than we anticipated. The issue being that there were no resources there that we could use and that no matter how far we traveled the place just kept going ever on and on.

With no natural resources we were limited by the food and water we could take in ourselves. Soon we had set up several forward bases that were being steadily restocked. Earth stood united in its exploration of Heaven and the answers it may contain.

Meanwhile back on our own humble planet our research gradually allowed us to achieve even more. First we successfully colonized Mars then we led manned missions to other planets in our solar system . War had been abolished and in every endeavor we were united as one.

Over the last two hundred or so years the varying C.R.E.A.T.E. teams noticed that Heavens terrain had been steadily heading upwards. With the height came an increase in the intensity of the ever present light. It was in the three hundredth year of the C.R.E.A.T.E. missions to Heaven that we found an impassable gate.

The gate seemed to vibrate with the power of the light. In fact it seemed to barely contain another, stronger light as it bulged outwards like a Dam about to burst.It took us twelve years to finally unlock the gate. It was completely invulnerable to any aggressive actions and we tried everything short of nuclear weapons. There was something about nuking Heaven that was too distasteful for most people.

In the end it was as simple as a child pushing on the gate lightly. Scientifically they said it was the child's genetics and the complicated way she touched the gate before pushing it. That she managed to touch the correct places to decipher the lock. To all those watching they saw a little girl laughing at the warmth from the light spilling out of the gate. She only walked up and touched it once gently before it opened.

Beyond the gate lay a large cobble stoned area. Its size could not be ascertained because If you tried to look up from the polished cobbles the light would burn your eyes. Actual burns were recorded on everyone's eyes with seventeen of the participants going blind. On top of all this, every electronic device shorted out as soon as they were touched by the light.

Only the children present could look inside the gate without harm. After much deliberation the small 7yo girl who opened the gate and two even younger boys (6yo twins) were sent in to look around. What they found would answer the oldest questions and change humanity forever...