Dan finally worked up the nerve to stop one of the passing angels and ask.
“Excuse me, sir, could you spare a moment?”
“Of course, blessed one, how may I help?”
“Well, we’ve all been patiently shuffling along in this queue, and we were just wondering how long it might be?”
“You all have infinite time to spare. What do you folks know about the Pearly Gates, exactly?”
“Just what everyone knows, I guess. There’s a description of New Jerusalem in Revelations, and some pop culture mythology. Not that much.”
“I’m Geburatiel, associate angel third class, pleasure. Well, Saint Peter is up by the Gate, and he looks souls up in the Book of Judgments to determine their final disposition, into Heaven or elsewhere. Peter has a massive angelic corps employed just to handle the addendum pages, new souls always being born and adding onto the Book at the modern end. Are you with me so far?”
“Think so. That’s pretty big.”
“Friends, you may rejoice when you advance far enough in the queue to see the nearest end of the Book of Judgments. At one soul per page side, the Book is currently just over 1500 miles thick.”
199 words, for this week’s Sunday Photo Fiction prompt:
(The number of deceased homo sapiens is estimated at about 100 billion–with lots of margin for error, obviously. At 500 pages per inch… that’s one BIG book. Dead Tree Editions, tsk tsk so wasteful.)
ParkInkSpot 
A queue that really does take forever! Nice humour.
4.3 births per second. Even if old Pete’s fairly efficient at disposition, he definitely needs the world to end asap.
Just send them all to hell, then. St. Peter is a lazy dude.
Now that would be cheating. Cheating’s for the Other team.
Haha. Can someone skip the line by bribing the angels? Or would that be an immediate expulsion from the books.
Another cheater! Is it even possible to bribe an angel? With what, they certainly don’t need cash.
I know a sneaky way in! What’s it worth?
I Protest (that’s my story, not a comment!)
I imagine you could turn a quick profit, if any of the blessed ones had any coins (besides two pennies each).
Togas lack pockets, tho.
Seems like we queue for everything nowdays.
Amusing story.
Well, Brits certainly love their queues.
Do Scots? ::poke examine::
Technically speaking, Dave, Scots are, unfortunately, still British.
And no.
Haha, great a huge line up in heaven or even to have your soul judged. I would have thought God would be able to work without ‘time’ and ‘lineups’ being issues. Great take!
Well, sure, if he hadn’t made one aged Saint the entire date entry department.
Lol. I suppose so, I think that’s just a myth though 🙂
I think heaven had better go paperless, although then they’d need to have a whole IT department too.
Pretty sure that kind of tech is the Devil’s Work.
I’ve been in lines that felt like that! Clever take.
The Empire Strikes Back, last mega-line I actually sat through. But hey, we had wookies and lightsabers to play with.
Someone needs to hand out some cookies on the Pearly Gate line (or something).
That’s one helluva big book. Great story. Brought smiles.
Florida to Mass…at 50 pages per inch. Yup, but maybe we can pave it and use it for a highway?
Now this was an interesting twist to the Pearly Gates angle, A really fun read.
Seems like lines up are everywhere these days. Great take on prompt.
Nicely paced and written.
“associate angel third class,” Loved that line… nice touch!