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It'll Never Happen Again

"What? Another mass extinction? How many of my families are gone this time?"

"Um, about a quarter, Lord. I'm really sorry?"

"Sorry, are you, Ken? And what caused it this time?"

The Archangel Ken squirmed noticeably. "I'm afraid ... the air contract expired," he blurted.

"What? Again? I thought you said that wasn't going to happen again."

"Lord, I know, I said that," cringed Ken. "I'm so-o-o-o sorry."

"Remember the first one, back in - what are they going to call it? - the Ordovician?" God scratched his chin. "That was just after we signed the air contract. Lost about a quarter of the families then, too."

"Um, yes, that's true, Lord. All kinds of bookkeeping screw-ups in those days. That was when we decided to automate the process."

"Ah, yes," mused God. "And you said that would ensure that it wouldn't happen again."

"Yes, Lord. Sorry, Lord," said Ken. "There was a bug in the software."

"And that led to the Devonian Extinction, didn't it? Don't you ever test your software?"

"That was when we started testing," said Ken. "After that one, yes. Sorry."

"So, then, it was never supposed to happen again, right?"

"Um, yes, Lord. I'm awfully sorry."

"But, in fact, we then got the Permian-Triassic Extinction, didn't we?"

"Afraid so, Lord. I'm sorry. Incredibly sorry. "

"So, should I believe you? Can you remember why we signed this blighted contract in the first place?"

The Archangel Ken wrinkled his brow. "Efficiency and cost-effectiveness, I think, Lord. Um, yes, I'm sure that was it. The Atmosphere1 people are the premier experts in planetary gas systems."

"Hmm. And whose idea was it to contract with Atmosphere1?"

"Not mine!" replied Ken quickly. "Can't remember who it was, but he must have fallen eons ago."

"Anyway," God continued, "after that last extinction, which wiped out more than half the life on earth, you improved our processes so that ..."

"It would never happen again," finished Ken miserably. "I know. But this time, it wasn't our fault, Lord."

God cocked a divine eyebrow. "Yes?"

"The, uh, air download software ... stopped working properly," winced Ken. "That's what the systems people told me. I'm really very sorry. But we've got it whipped, this time. We're modifying the software to send us warnings as the expiration date approaches, so ..."

"It will never happen again?"

"Right, Lord," said Ken unhappily. "I can't tell you how mind-bogglingly sorry I am about this."

"Well, ok," said God. "Maybe it's just as well, because listen to this. You know those big reptiles I've been experimenting with? Well, I'm going to turn them loose in a big way. They're going to be my special pets, and I wouldn't want anything bad to happen to them."