A young man sporting a red hoodie, baggy pants, and headphones steps onto a train with several passengers. A man begins to preach the gospel, to the annoyance of the passengers, who just want to ride in silence. Soon enough, another man begins to argue with the street prophet exchanging lyrical blows in a debate to prove the other wrong. Using scripture as a weapon to cut down their foe. The street prophet only knows a few verses from revelations and the other man’s understanding of religions quickly start to dismantle the street prophet. Ultimately, the passenger proves the street prophet wrong and embarrasses him in the process, making street prophet leave at the next stop, to the cheers of all the passengers. As everyone thought the rest of the ride would be in peace and quiet, another man makes a point against what the victorious passenger. Their argument pursues. One man uses science to explain life, while the other uses religions like Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Tao, and others to explain life. Surprisingly, all the passengers are paying close attention and are beginning to choose a side and cheer their chosen knight to victory. Except the young man who appears to still be listening to his head phones bobbing his head to the beat. Minutes pass by as the men verbal joust until each is exhausted.

Finished but not wanting to let the crowd down from their metaphysical high, the men turned to the youth and gesture, “wisdom is lost in the youth.” Nodding their heads disapprovingly.

The men begin to take their seats and the train passengers started to settle back down the young man calls out to the men, “Ok boomers, what would you know anyway.” Surprised and amused the men turn to see the young man has risen from his seat and begins a free style rap dismantling each man’s every thought. The flow consists of mythology from flood stories of ancient Mesopotamian’s Gilgamesh, to the Sermon of the Seven Suns from Buddhism, to Noah and The Book of Revelations, finishing with the Prose Eda and Ragnörak. All while discrediting scientific theories like “Darwin’s Evolution of Man” to the “Big Bang Theory.” The young man weaves a narrative of ancient myth after myth revealing both science and religions misguided attempts to explain the universe. The crowd is now astounded and the two men team up to try and gain their footing back. The first man argues that it is faith that is the bedrock of all religion and thus life only needs to be understood through faith. While the second man says more of life is revealed everyday as scientists decode the secrets of life.

The young man asks, “Why do we die?”

The religious man replies, “While it may have started with Zoroastrianism and their belief in paradise, the goal is the same in most religions, so that we can move on to the next plain. Some call it heaven or New Jerusalem, Muslims call it Jannah, Buddhist say Nirvana, Hindi’s Moksha, Judaism Olam Haba, but in the end it’s a new type of existence.”

“That’s right,” adds the other man, not wanting to be left out. “It’s like Einstein’s theory of relativity states, “Matter can’t be created or destroyed.”

Both men seemed very pleased with their answers and the other train riders seemed to nod their head in approval.

Laughing the young man says to the first man, “Awe the old carrot and the stick routine, I see you are still a slave to the matrix.”

The young man reaches into his backpack and pulls a revolver from its black abyss. While out stretching the bag towards the two men.

“This is a stick up put all your money, phones and jewelry in the bag or we are going to put Einstein’s theories to the test!”

At first everyone is confused but then the sound of the young man cocking the hammer and firing off a warning shot brought them back to reality and they quickly begin shoving their valuables into the bag. As the last passenger shoved their wallet into the backpack, the train approaches the next stop.

The young man grabs the bag, “I’d like to thank everyone for their valuable contributions to life, may you find peace in Heaven, Nirvana, or wherever the fuck else you’d like to go and I certainly couldn’t have created this wealth on my own, so again I appreciate our little science experiment.”

The doors of the train begin to open and the young man steps out but turns back to say, “I’d like to leave everyone a parting gift of wisdom. Understating is an art and not everyone is an artist.”

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