Angie had expected monsters. But the puppeteers were just people. Tired, hollow-eyed people in gray tunics, holding up cardboard cutouts of celebrities, politicians, disasters, miracles. One of them was crying silently as she raised a cutout of a weeping mother. Another was laughing as he thrust forward a cutout of a grinning CEO.
Angie shielded her eyes, weeping. Her entire life—her status as an oracle, her understanding of good and bad omens, her twenty years of dedication—had been spent analyzing the blockage of this light. She had been worshipping the obstruction, not the source. deeper angie faith allegory of the cave 20
Here the puppeteers sleep. They are not evil. They are former escapees who grew tired of the ascent. Angie had expected monsters