When you worked in a profession whose tools included guns and bombs, death was always on the menu; only a… — Steve Perry

“How interesting,” Kay said. “The human capacity for denial sometimes seems to be quite large.”

“Ain’t that the truth.”

Gunny squatted to look at the dead creature. “Looks like a rat snake,” she said. “It’s harmless, not poisonous.”

Gramps said, “I don’t care. I don’t like snakes. I don’t like poisonous snakes; I don’t like nonpoisonous snakes; I don’t like sticks on the ground that look like snakes.”

“Ah think maybe somebody had a traumatic event with snakes along the way. What, you had a run-in with the serpent that bedeviled Eve back in the Garden?”

Singh raised an eyebrow.

“A Jewish/Christian story,” Jo said. “The reason mankind lost direct contact with God and was banished from Paradise. A snake talked the first woman into trying fruit from the Tree of Knowledge, after God had warned them not to eat it.”

“Sah, I understand this god is supposedly much more powerful than our gods. I wonder, if he created all things and was all-knowing and omnipotent, why would he put such a tree there? Would he not know in advance that Eve would succumb to the temptation?”

“The tale doesn’t bear too close an inspection,” Gramps said. “Believers view these stories as allegories, metaphors, rather than as literal happenings.”

Gunny jumped in quickly to amend Gramps’s response: “Some of ’em,” she said. “Some of ’em are literalists, and crazy as space-station roaches when the hatch opens to blow them into vac. They think the Earth is six thousand years old and that every word of the Bible is absolutely true. You can have a field day pointing out inconsistencies in those stories, doesn’t bother them, just bounces right off their self-righteous armor.”

He had thought about it. Mostly, after the fantasies, he had let it go. It was done, history. No point in bumping into the furniture while looking back over your shoulder.