Joyce and Walky!

“Thousands of years, I’ve reigned, from the very beginning…”

I didn’t want to say “millions” or “billions” because that automatically makes Joyce wrong, and this arc is called “FAITH and Science,” so we can’t just kick that out from under her here.  So, um, let’s consider potential other “beginning”s for The Cheese other than the dawn of the universe, I guess.

Also, I put a red herring here as to The Cheese’s identity.

In retrospect, I think the red herring identity would have been better.  It’s more obvious, but now I believe sometimes you have to sacrifice that a little for some more solid emotional resonance.  Then, I was more invested in it being a surprise.  This requires solutions to be more left-field and footnote-y, but gaddangit you get your surprise!  Hopefully!