Scene: The Papal Library, night.
Candlelight flickers across gilded shelves of forgotten chronicles. Pope Pius XIII sits beneath a great celestial map, his eyes half in this world, half in eternity. Father Basashar listens intently, notebook trembling in his hands.
Pope Pius XIII:
You see, Father Basashar, history is not a straight line โ it is a loop. God allows the same spirit of empire to rise and fall, like the tide that tests the shore. Every thousand years, man tries again to become God… and every time, time itself stops him. That is my time cop theory of history.
Father Basashar:
A time cop, Your Holiness?
Pope Pius XIII:
Yes. Divine providence โ the ultimate enforcer of the cosmic law. Every empire that sought to rule the world has faced the same verdict: โYou have gone too far.โ
Let me recount the offenders.
(He rises, pacing slowly, his voice echoing against marble walls.)
Pope Pius XIII:
First came Egypt, the mother of empire. She mastered the Nile and wrote the book of kingship. But her mistake was pride in eternity โ building tombs instead of futures. The sands swallowed her.
Then Babylon, under Nebuchadnezzar. They built a tower to heaven, thinking they could breach the divine firewall. The time cop struck them down with confusion of tongues.
Next, Persia. Cyrus almost unified the known world under tolerance and law. A near-perfect empire โ until hubris drove Xerxes into the Greek sea, where freedom struck back.
Then Alexander โ the Greek comet. He dreamed of a world under one tongue, one coin, one law. He succeededโฆ almost. But he died young, poisoned by his own ambition, his empire dividing like Babel all over again.
Then came Rome, ah, the iron hand of civilization. The greatest attempt yet. They built roads, law, and order. But Rome crucified God Himself โ and time intervened again. Out of their ashes, the Church rose as the anti-empire.
(He turns to the crucifix, crosses himself, then continues.)
Pope Pius XIII:
After Rome, came Islam, under the Caliphs. They nearly united the world through faith and sword. But they fractured โ Sunnis and Shias โ a civil war of spirit. The time cop smiled.
Then the Mongols โ Genghis Khan, the scourge of the world. He conquered faster than any man alive. But his sons could not conquer themselves. They drank, divided, and time erased their maps.
Next, the British Empire โ the merchant crusaders. They conquered with ships and silver, not swords. โThe sun never set,โ they said. But the time cop brought two world wars โ and the sun finally set.
And now, we live in the era of the American Empire โ digital, invisible, broadcast by satellites and credit cards. Their mistake? They think theyโve escaped time. They believe the clock stopped with them. But the same law applies: the greater the reach, the greater the fall.
(He leans forward, voice low, conspiratorial.)
Pope Pius XIII:
Every empire leaves behind the seed of its own destruction. That seed is always the same: forgetting God.
Father Basashar:
Soโฆ the time cop isnโt a man. Itโs judgment itself.
Pope Pius XIII:
Exactly, Father. Judgment disguised as coincidence, fate, or failure. Empires think theyโre building eternity โ but eternity already has an Owner. And He enforces His copyright.
(A silence falls. The Pope stares out the window at the stars.)
Pope Pius XIII:
Mark my words, Father Basashar. The next empire will be born of code โ artificial minds, digital kings. But when man tries to write Genesis 2.0… the time cop will come again.
Father Basashar:
Holy Fatherโฆ if divine judgment is the โtime cop,โ then perhaps the twentieth century gave us its clearest case. Hitler โ he came agonizingly close to conquering the world. Had he succeeded in building an atomic bomb missile โ one V-2 fitted with that dreadful weapon โ the Earth would have burned. But his own prejudice, his madness, was his undoing.
He drove out the Jewish scientists who could have built it for him. The men of the atom fled to America โ Oppenheimer, Fermi, Szilard. If not for his hatred, the Reich would have held the fire of the sun.
Pope Pius XIII:
(Nods gravely.)
Yes, Father. The ultimate irony of evil โ it defeats itself. Lucifer always imagines he can perfect rebellion, but his pride makes him blind. Hitler worshiped race, not reason. He wanted to be the hammer of God, but became His proof instead. The time cop needed no miracle โ just manโs own hate to destroy him.
(He pauses, looking at a globe on the table, gently spinning it.)
The Father of Lies whispered to Hitler: โYou are chosen. You will build the thousand-year kingdom.โ But the kingdom lasted twelve years. A parody of eternity.
Father Basashar:
And yet, Holy Father, the Americans โ the victors โ used that same bomb. Twice. On innocents. Did the time cop allow that?
Pope Pius XIII:
Yes. Because history, Father, is not about winners and losers โ itโs about lessons unlearned. The bomb was the serpentโs tongue reborn, speaking from the split atom. Man had eaten from the tree of knowledge again, but without wisdom.
The world ended once already โ in Hiroshima. Everything since has been after the end.
(He turns back to Basashar, his face lit by the candleโs trembling flame.)
And that is why I say: every empire dies the moment it thinks itโs eternal. Hitlerโs sin was race. Americaโs sin is pride. Both are the same root โ the will to be God.
Father Basashar:
Then what of the Church, Your Holiness? Has she not claimed eternity too?
Pope Pius XIII:
(A small smile crosses his face โ sad, knowing.)
Ah, Father Basasharโฆ that is the greatest paradox of all. The Church is eternal โ but only because it dies every day. We are the one empire that rules by surrender, not conquest. The blood of martyrs, not armies. When we forget that, the time cop will come for us, too.
(He snuffs the candle out, leaving only the starlight through stained glass.)
Remember this, Father:
Every empire believes it can stop time. But in the endโฆ it is always time that stops them.