The Supermarket

“Welcome to the Life Supermarket. Please enjoy our great deals today in the frozen hearts section. Now only $19.99!”

The loudspeaker continued to blare its ads to the shoppers. But, really, this supermarket was only open for one customer and one customer only: Him.

As the Creator of all human beings, animals, plants, and other life-forms, He needed a way to organize the parts of life. And, lo and behold, He decided to create a supermarket.

Why? He didn’t know Himself. He just always liked the little markets that His humans had made. Always so petite-like, humble, hearty, and a little slow, but that didn’t matter. He created, for His supermarket, a pretty good employee (He really only needed one since he was the only shopper), but He decided to put it in the image of an elephant. He… just didn’t feel comfortable with a human, but He didn’t mind an elephant. He enjoyed how massive and grand those creatures were, how they smiled no matter what, and how their noses grabbed anything. Ah, how He loved it when He created those creatures! So very fun and fresh, different from all those beginning mammals He made. At that time, He had Creator’s block – it was awful! Most of His creatures ended up as hairy as that green, yucky moss he accidentally created when he dropped green food dye into the ocean. It spawned almost instantly, staining the ocean with its green tendrils of icky doom.

But the elephant! – even more hairless than the human being. Its beautiful, wrinkly body, the feet that can barely support itself: ah, such immaculate discombobulation!

The Creator went down the nose aisle, looking for a curled one that was long and fat. The texture He wanted… He though it should be, oh, maybe dry, but the underside should be smooth, not cracked like the top. Ooo! And it should be flexible, like a snake’s body.

He quickly found what he was looking for (right next to the anteater’s nose), and He dumped it in His shopping cart. He looked down at all the parts, finally satisfied with this conglomeration of groceries.

He had been trying to create a new creature for some time now to replace the humans that destroyed the world a few millennia ago. He had no idea that his once-beloved humans could become so brutal and… godlike, but it didn’t matter now. He just recently finished creating a new world, complete with animals and flora. All it needed was an intelligent life-form, one that would not make the same mistakes as its predecessors. He made sure of that by selecting the most juicy-of-juiciest brains available in the frozen parts section.

He went to the counter and, one by one, laid each item carefully down on the conveyor belt. The elephant behind the counter tallied it all up and said, “That’ll be $50, please.”