"Okay," Lucifer said, "Kick back and rest." God was haggard from the intense effort, sitting in a recliner and sipping a cup of coffee. Lucifer reached over, touched the cold coffee with one scarlet fingernail. It bubbled and steamed.

He conjured up a scotch and water for himself. "You did great work, I'll be the first to admit it. Day one you created light and seperated it from the darkness. Getting an entire planet spinning is no small feat." God waved the compliment aside.

"Day two you did the water thing. Condensing the giant fog above the red-hot surface? A stroke of genius. You came up with blue skies and ocean in one move. I never would have thought of that."

"Speaking of water," God rumbled, "I notice you added water to that single malt. I thought about making that a sin at one time."

Lucifer laughed. "You know me. Always unrepentant.


"Now day three - a bit of an engineering screw up. Oh, the look on your face when it dawned on you. Trees, plants, bushes and all; with no place to put them. Sure the kelp worked out okay, but you had to shut down and bring some land up to have a place to put them."


God took another sip of the coffee, flinched at its bitterness, then transformed it into a glass of wine. Red, well aged and room temperature. "Well, I was caught up in the moment you know. I could have made them all like water lilies, but it just wouldn't have been pleasing. I mean can you imagine an ocean Redwood?"

"Oh, I understand perfectly," Lucifer comforted. "I don't have a real problem with that. I mean details are nice, although I think you got carried away on day four. The sky was fine the way it was. Moon and stars to mark the seasons? Creating days? Come on now, all that is going to do is cause you more work down the road creating time zones, pretty colored leaves once a year and power bills."

"I work in mysterious ways and all that."

"Oh," Lucifer smiled. "Mine is not to reason why. You hit it hard on day five. Some of your best work. I would call it Feathers and Fins day if it were me."

God shrugged. "I think we'll stick with Friday. I'd hate to waste the T.G.I.F. campaign I have planned. Besides, my best work was honestly day six. All was leading up to the land animals and man."

Lucifer stood and walked over to warm himself in front of a fireplace roaring with hell-fire.

"That brings us to the crux of the matter doesn't it God? You lost. You failed. The bet we had said you could do it all in five days. You took six. I win." Lucifer did a victory dance, his whipping tail coming dangerously close to the seated archangel who was making notes on a golden tablet.

"You have to look at the quality of the work."

"I am not questioning the quality. It's good. Far better than anything I have ever come up with." Lucifer grimaced. "I tend to overdo the fire and brimstone on everything I put together. Thing is," he snapped his fingers and his drink was refreshed, "it still took you too long. You lost the wager, plain and simple. Now I get to wander around sowing famine and war; social unrest and anger..."

"Double or nothing."

Lucifer stopped, a look of bewilderment on his face. "Excuse me? I won. Why would I risk that when I got what I wanted?"

It was God's turn to shrug. "Hey, if you don't have the cojones for it...."

"No, no, wait second. What are we talking about here?"

"A wager of, uh, shall we say...epic...proportions. Something worthy of our natures."

"Ah, jeeze. You got my attention. What's the epic prize to go with this epic bet?" Lucifer asked.

"Nothing less than Armageddon itself. We bypass that altogether. Hard to guess its outcome at best. No, I win and I get it all; you win and you get the whole thing to do with as you please."

Lucifer clapped his hands in glee. "Fill me in boss man. What's the fine print?"

"Simple really. I have been kicking around the idea of this thing I call the Internet. It would get my word out to almost every man, woman and child in the world. I could tell them what is expected of them, how to live and be happy and assure them of their salvation. An unbeatable one-two punch."

"That is big indeed," Lucifer acknowledged.

"Yes, well, to put it concisely, I make web-sites, you make web-sites and whoever gets the most hits wins the bet."

Lucifer tossed his drink aside and grabbed God's hand, shaking it. "Done deal, dude. It's on big time." He smiled and raised his eyebrows before asking.

"Did I ever mention my new idea?

I call it....Porn."