The New Prophetic (flash fiction, 178 words)

The prophet was well-dressed and charismatic, as a modern prophet must be. Gone were the days of men like Moses and Elijah, who raved at foliage and still wore the clothes they were buried in, soiled from the gritty resurrection. In an age of electricity and screens of glass, wherein all the information accrued by, and aspirations of, man are stored, nobody listened to the poor and the insane, the men who came down from the rocks and the plywood temples, being turned inside out by a message utterly unique and selfless. They turned instead to the prophet, well-dressed and charismatic, who rose in a time of deep divisions, promising to cohere the philosophical narrative that had for so long tortured his subjects. One day, he walked on stage to the cheering crowd, reached his podium, recited his prophetic speech - recited over and over again in the years before - to the religious ecstasies of a crowd ripping itself apart in its passion, and smiled. Only after he smiled did anyone realise that their prophet was actually the Devil.