14.
Jonathan dared to challenge Satan that anyone could attest to being Satan by merely quoting Genesis, but he very quickly remembered Alex. No mortal man had the power or trickery to do that. He decided against the challenge and preferred to let Satan continue. He took another sip of water.
‘Do you know the story of Noah?’
‘Of course!’ Jonathan replied indignantly.
‘The world was a mess, all thanks to me; evil dwelled in every household except the household of Noah. I was king of the world and mankind was my servant.’ Satan raised his hideous arms in a triumphant gesture.
‘I used all of my wits to try and infiltrate Noah’s family and to make them turn from God. Nothing worked. He was such a faithful servant.’
‘Sorry,’ Jonathan interrupted ‘Don’t mean to interrupt; I just want to check the camera, stretch my legs a bit.’ He said as he stood up and looked at Satan and hoped he was not going to zap him for being so bold.
‘Do your thing.’
Jonathan quickly stretched his legs as he took long strides to the camera. He checked it over in a hurry and strode back to his chair sitting in it all at the same time.
‘You comfortable?’ Satan asked sarcastically.
Jonathan neither nodded nor moved.
‘Good. I knew God wanted to destroy the people of the earth because they were so corrupt and evil; they were so rife with filth, no matter what I did to get Noah to break his faith in God he only grew stronger. You know God does have a sense of humour.’ Satan smirked.
‘He told Noah to build this Ark. Good grief it was a huge boat – by the by, do you know since the Ark, all the boats and ships get built on this basis. When God told Noah to build this Ark I was confused, I had never heard of such a thing, no-one or any angel had ever heard of such a thing. We did not even know what a boat was. It was a monstrous proportioned odd looking house. He was mocked by every person every day. People threw things at him as they mocked him. I was adamant that Noah was going to cave and come over to my side.’
Satan shook his head ‘I tell you that was the biggest thing that had ever existed and besides the idea of it floating we had no idea what is going to do. God told Noah that he was going to bring rain down onto the earth and destroy everything in it. Rain! What was rain? There had never been such a thing before.’ Satan sounded almost exasperated.
‘Noah took hundred and twenty years to build that ugly monstrosity. Would you be mocked for a hundred and twenty years, day in and day out? I admired his tenacity. Do you know the Ark was built by an amateur and the Titanic by professionals?’ Satan laughed at his joke terrifying Jonathan’s ears.
‘Then one day this water dropped down from the sky. It was an odd thing; no one understood what was happening. At first, people laughed at this wonder, but when it started to fall in torrents, people scurried for the shelter of their homes. But therein lay a problem you see. Houses were not built to be sheltered from rain since it had never rained before and it was not long when the roofs of the houses began to cave in, and the level of the water rose from the ground. People panicked and ran about trying to salvage their possessions and to find shelter. Noah by now had all the required animals and his family in the Ark just as God had instructed him. Who was laughing now hey? Not me!’
Satan shook his head in disgust. ‘Still no one ever believed the water would rise as high as the boat was. But the rain kept pouring down and down and down, I felt sorry for these people. Every corner of the earth was wet and drenched. The level of water rose and rose, people drowned by the second and everyone tried to get into the Ark and begged, screamed or cried out to Noah to save them. It was awful.’ Satan hung his head in shame.
‘Then the ropes holding the Ark snapped and it began to sail. Then and only then did I understand God’s plan. It was an incredible sight, this huge ship sailing afloat that water, what magnificence and ingenuity. I acknowledged defeat, and I was highly annoyed. I knew, I believed, that if God had not done that my second attempt to destroy God’s throne would have succeeded.’
Jonathan coughed and cleared his throat. ‘So where is the Ark now?
‘God told Noah to hide it once they hit dry land and they were all safely on the ground.’
Jonathan sighed disappointedly. His sudden hopes of bringing breaking news and the discovery of one of the most sought after missing links vapourised.
Satan merely smirked at Jonathan.