Part I: The First Days

“Look, I can’t be eating dry sausage and potatoes every day. I need variety!” Brother Kevin’s complaint echoed through the stone refectory, his frustration evident in every syllable.

Brother Mortimer, ever the voice of patience, responded with the measured tone of a man who had weathered far worse.

“Patience, Brother Kevin. If variety is what the Lord had planned for you, he wouldn’t have sent you up to our mountain top begging for redemption. This is not uncommon. We’ve been through worse spells in the 500 years this convent has lasted.”

Brother Malachi’s weathered face brightened with the gleam of memory. “Aye! When I was a wee monk, only a few years more experience than you Brother Kevin, this monastery was plagued with the worst snowstorm this mountain had ever seen. Seventy-two days! No contact. Nobody came up the hill, nobody could go down. We missed Christmas that year because none of us could keep track of the days.”

Brother Thomas nodded impatiently in agreement, holding up a haggard leather book as if it contained all the proof they needed.

“Aye, Brother Thomas is right,” Brother Mortimer continued. “The monks during the Great War survived nearly twice that. And still they produced one of the greatest brews this monastery has ever brewed.”

“The Devil’s brew,” Brother Malachi added with a knowing look. “I think we still have a cask in the cellar.”

Brother Mortimer straightened his robes with an air of finality. “For the time being, we practice patience. We continue with our daily tasks. In due time, the power will be restored and we’ll be set right.”

“Aye!” Brother Malachi agreed.

“Aye,” Brother Kevin conceded, though with considerably less enthusiasm.

Brother Thomas, having committed to a vow of silence, scribbled on his notepad before flipping it over to reveal a single word: “Aye.”

Part II: The Christmas Debate

Time had become slippery in the monastery, days bleeding into one another like watercolors in the rain.

“What is it you’re doing, you crazy old fool?” Brother Kevin demanded as he entered the kitchen to find Brother Malachi surrounded by a feast’s worth of ingredients.

“It’s Christmas. And I’ll be damned if we don’t celebrate the day of the Lord’s birth properly,” Brother Malachi declared, wielding a ladle like a scepter.

“Properly? You cooked up half the food. And I won’t tell you again, it’s not Christmas. That’s not for another four weeks.”

Brother Thomas scribbled furiously on his notepad before holding it up: “Says your stupid calendar.”

“It’s not stupid. It’s called Astrology. Not something I’d expect a senile old abbot and a mute to understand,” Brother Kevin shot back.

“Senile or not, I know in my bones when it’s Christmas. And today is Christmas, therefore we are having a feast.”

Brother Mortimer entered the kitchen at that moment, looking troubled. “Brother Thomas, I don’t see how these calculations can be accurate.”

“Hah! You see?” Brother Kevin exclaimed triumphantly.

Brother Thomas held up his notepad: “In what way?”

“Well, you see, you’ve projected the second coming of Jesus around the 2nd week of November. Had your estimation been correct, wouldn’t we have been raptured by now?”

Brother Malachi turned to Brother Thomas. “Could you be wrong?”

The response came swiftly, emphatically: “Absolutely not.” Brother Thomas underlined the word “not” several times before tearing the sheet from his book with a flourish.

“Well, something must be wrong,” Brother Kevin insisted.

The four abbots fell into contemplative silence, each wrestling with the mathematics of salvation.

“Could it be that we’ve been following the teachings of God too flippantly?” Brother Mortimer suggested cautiously.

“Hmph. Absolutely not. I’ve been devoted to this monastery for nearly a century. I will have none of this blasphemy,” Brother Malachi retorted.

“But… isn’t what you just said kind of blasphemous in itself? I mean, you’re almost saying God was wrong by not rapturing you.” Brother Kevin replied.

“How dare you! I should’ve pushed you back down this mountain when you came scratching at our door. Half naked. Bottle of ale sealed to your lips.”

“Brothers! Brothers! Cease this bickering,” Brother Mortimer intervened. “We shant expunge our valuable energy arguing amongst ourselves. Yes, the power has been disconnected longer than expected but we are still nowhere close to the brothers of 1856 when a family of bears barricaded them inside these walls for nearly six months.”

“Aye. Brother Mortimer is correct,” Brother Kevin admitted.

“Aye. That he is,” Brother Malachi agreed.

Brother Thomas flipped his book over to reveal a poorly dimensioned circle with two dots at the top and an upside-down “U” toward the bottom.

“Thomas, is that—is that a sad face?” Brother Mortimer asked, peering at the crude drawing.

Brother Thomas nodded solemnly.

“Well, perhaps use this time of isolation to hone your artistic skills because I thought that was a deformed monkey’s backside.”

Brother Mortimer finally surveyed the chaos of the kitchen, taking in the discarded carrot shavings, onion skins, and fully roasted chicken. “What is all this?”

“It is Christmas. And I’ll be damned if a little possibility of being marooned here means not celebrating properly,” Brother Malachi insisted.

Brother Mortimer sighed deeply. “Brother, Christmas was last week.”

Part III: The Barrel Problem

Nearly two years had passed since the power failed, and the monastery had transformed into a labyrinth of fermentation.

Brother Mortimer and Brother Malachi stood at the entrance to what had once been a storeroom but was now an architectural marvel of stacked barrels. Only a small square of floor remained visible, and the overflow had begun consuming the hallway leading to the cellar like some sort of alcoholic flood.

“This is getting out of hand. We need to shut down production,” Brother Mortimer declared.

“Absolutely not! This monastery has been producing ale since it was established. I’ll be damned if we let a little isolation and claustrophobia disrupt this.”

“We’re beyond a ‘little isolation.’ It’s been nearly two years. We have to begin thinking that this is the new normal.”

“I refuse. The first brothers of this monastery lived in isolation for five years before entertaining a visitor.”

“The first brothers resorted to cannibalism!”

“A minor detail.”

Brother Kevin emerged from the cellar at that moment, arms laden with clay jugs, freshly brewed ale sloshing over their rims. “We need to stop production! I’m almost out of containers to hold the next brew.”

“We were just debating that. Where is Brother Thomas? We should call this to a vote.”

As if summoned by the question, Brother Thomas emerged from a minuscule gap between a herd of barrels in the corner of the storeroom. He struggled to propel one leg over the row of barrels blocking his exit and promptly tripped, falling to the dusty stone floor as his back leg attempted to follow.

“Ah, Brother Thomas. What were you doing back there?” Brother Mortimer asked.

Brother Thomas returned to his feet, swaying back and forth as he pulled at the tangled creases of his robes. He bent to retrieve his notebook, and his head crashed into the side of a keg as he once again lost balance.

“Brother Thomas, are you alright?” Brother Kevin asked with growing concern.

Brother Thomas expelled a guttural squealing noise in an attempt to convey his wellness to the abbots. His inability to communicate stemmed not only from his vow of silence but also from the fact that he’d consumed roughly two full jugs of the vintage ale currently overtaking the storeroom.

“Brother Thomas, you look quite ill. You’re pale as a ghost and it seems you’ve vomited on your cowl a bit,” Brother Malachi observed.

“Aye, brother. You do appear ill. I pray it’s not a flare-up of your gout again,” Brother Mortimer added.

Brother Thomas waved the notion off with an uncoordinated movement of his arm.

Brother Kevin eyed him suspiciously.

“Well, we were just discussing what to do about the monastery’s storage issue. As we all can see, without the ability to ship out what we produce, we are being overrun with casks,” Brother Mortimer explained.

“You know my vote,” Brother Malachi protested. “I’ll have no part in being the first brothers to cease production.”

“Aye. I agree with Brother Malachi. And perhaps I have a solution to avoid a stop in production.” Brother Kevin indicated the jugs and barrels in the corner where Brother Thomas had been lurking. “I’ve been monitoring the casks on that end and I believe them to be compromised. I’ve found several termite colonies that have chewed through the barrels and in one case, I found a rat floating in one.”

“Ah, it is an unfortunate waste but emptying those barrels will afford us a few more months to continue production. Besides, we certainly can’t let anyone ingest that now.”

With that statement, Brother Thomas curled over and vomited profusely onto the floor before collapsing into the puddle of his own creation.

Part IV: The Pyre

Brother Mortimer, Brother Thomas, and Brother Kevin stood around the wooden pyre in the open clearing adjacent to the monastery. They watched, dejected, as flames and smoke billowed into the night sky. At the center of this pyre lay Brother Malachi, finally succumbing to old age, malnutrition, and the prolonged senility that had caused him severe memory loss.

“We cannot continue down this path,” Brother Thomas declared, his voice cutting through the silence.

“Thomas! You speak,” Brother Mortimer gasped.

“Aye. I do. I have lost faith in our religion and feel no shame in breaking the shallow vows I’ve made in honor of it.”

“Blasphemy!” Brother Kevin cried.

“Aye, it is. But look where our belief has gotten us. Isolated, hungry, dead.”

“God is testing us. For what reason, we do not know, but we cannot abandon Him after so much time,” Brother Mortimer insisted.

“What if He’s not even out there? What then? We’ll be left on this mountain, suffering, for nothing more than our own cynical beliefs. I refuse!”

“You are talking out of fear and sadness. Think of your words,” Brother Kevin urged.

“I have, Brother Kevin. I’ve been thinking deeply of words as I was locked in my silence. And I’ve come to a conclusion. Just now. Watching the embers of our Brother fade into nothing.”

“And your conclusion is?”

“That we have been dedicated to a false God.” Thomas paused. “I have been visited by another spirit. A spirit called Xenu.”

“Xenu?”

“Aye. He says that we have been abandoned on this mountain by what he calls SPs, Suppressive Peoples. The entire world is littered with them. And they have abandoned us because they are evil. Xenu explained that we must embrace our thetans.”

Brother Thomas wandered inside, leaving the other two in a mix of suspense and confusion, before returning with a contraption seemingly made of tin cans, assorted wire, and a kitchen timer.

“What do you have there?” Brother Mortimer asked.

“This is an E-meter. Xenu explained how to make one. It will assist in determining our thetan levels.”

“And what does Xenu call this new religion?”

“It is called Scientology.”

“Scientology!” Brother Kevin and Brother Mortimer exclaimed in unison.

At that precise moment, a helicopter soared overhead and settled down adjacent to them. A balding, middle-aged man stumbled out, his jacket emblazoned with “Belgium Electric Company” on the lapel.

“Brothers, we are so sorry. We had no idea you had lost power up here. We just assumed you all died,” the man explained.

“Well, one of us has,” Brother Kevin replied grimly.

“We were running a diagnostic and realized that the connection to your monastery had been severed. We’ve fixed it and have come here as soon as we could.”

Suddenly the lights of the monastery clicked on. A long-abandoned speaker began blasting Chappell Roan’s “Pink Pony Club” into the mountain air.

“Alas! Our trials are over!” Brother Mortimer exclaimed with joy.

“Praise the Lord!” Brother Kevin echoed.

The two thanked the man profusely and began walking back into the monastery. Brother Thomas remained frozen in place alongside the pyre, his homemade E-meter dangling in his hands, a monument to desperation and isolation.

As they reached the entrance, Brother Mortimer turned to Brother Kevin. “What the hell was all that Xenu, Scientology crap about?”

The question hung in the air, unanswered, as they stepped into the light.