[Sarah]

Marc picked his way carefully through the ruins. They were ruins like any other he’d ever plundered, guarded, explored, discovered, destroyed, yet nothing in this world was truly familiar to him. His nights were spent out of his control. He knew something else was taking hold even if he put his body to bed at night and awoke in that same bed come morning. Even when he felt rested he knew he was suddenly in a time-share with his own body.

[Sarah]

It was an alien feeling and he found himself in an alien world. Species and beings, he could have never dreamed of roamed freely. Cities had names he’d never heard of and when he talked about the cities he knew people regarded him as mad. Sometimes there were whispers of help, of beings like himself with tales from other worlds, but he made sure to clear out before anyone could do anything to him. Khonshu was a surprisingly happy constant and the only remnant of where he had been before.

[Sarah]

Apparently, he was meant to learn about Khonshu on his own time with his own curiosity, but there was no mention of the Moon here. Evelon. He had learned the name of this place, the world - and Lya Pointa the ruin he was in now.

“This is your temple?” Marc asked. He’d been tasked with finding Khonshu in this new world. After a night and day walk through the desert he’d happened upon fringe settlements, a safe road to a rather large city, and yet another safe road to this temple ruin.

[Sarah]

“No. This was my doorway,” Khonshu replied. He was patient even when Marc was being slow to process information. Neither of them had expected to land here. New York had been their calling, but someone had intercepted that call and had flung them to unfamiliar lands.

“What would you have me do?” Marc asked. For all the patience Khonshu claimed to be allowing him Marc was not so keen to return it. He’d been abducted, possessed, and then tossed into another world. There was no regard for any past life he’d had.

[Sarah]

“There is a statue here,” Khonshu said interrupting Marc’s thoughts. “Find it,” he said as if the ruined cathedral hadn’t been the most grand this place had ever seen – as if the grounds themselves weren’t plagued with dangers.

“Is your body so weak, my son, that you cannot even complete this small task?” Khonshu asked. Khonshu did not raise his voice for his voice did not specifically have a volume, but Marc could physically feel the being’s intention and motivation and emotion behind every word.

[Sarah]

“A statue?” Marc asked, defeated.

“Yes. You will know it when you see it,” Khonshu replied, his annoyance gone as quickly as it had come. The being flip-flopped between utter annoyance and calm indifference so quickly it gave Marc only one more thing he had to keep up with.

Marc at least knew what he was doing when it came to searching for artifacts: scour every inch of the place and then scour it again. Knowing what the statue was when he saw it meant Khonshu would know what the statue looked like and would let him know when he’d come across it.

[Sarah]

He’d done some research when he’d reached the big city. Aldrect. A self-proclaimed holy city that was the first place of substance he’d encountered after the desert. Marc had spent a week there chasing rumors and legends. He’d found a place to bunker down and his alter-ego had gotten him cash to set up his new ventures. It had been a relief to know the fashion was not too different from what he was used to, or at the very least the fashion he was used to was available to him rather easily.

[Sarah]

He’d been able to compile a stash of his own clothes and had awoken one morning to find his other-self had created a stash of their own: An all-white suit, a white mask, and the ridiculous white cloak that had been in the temple in the desert. Utterly ridiculous, but when he’d brought it up with Khonshu the being had been utterly offended. Marc didn’t mind having the voice in his head, but he wasn’t yet sure how he felt about losing control of his own body.

[Sarah]

“Stop pouting,” Khonshu demanded. His Knight would get used to how things were now. They had made a pact and it would be upheld.

“You expect me to find this statue before nightfall,” Marc guessed. The other-him came out as the moon did, and it wouldn’t be long now before the day was done and his time run out.

“I expect you to trust me and do as I say,” Khonshu said. Always the same with him, resisting, Marc would have to come around sooner or later.

[Sarah]

Marc ceded if only to be granted silence. If he were being honest he ceded because it was easier. Marc wasn’t a thinker, and he wasn’t a dreamer. He was a follower and he had found something to follow unlike anything that came before. The human part of him wanted to resist, but his will had been taken away long ago – in another lifetime. He was a weapon, a honed blade to be used as an extension of another’s indomitable will.

[Sarah]

He had found a being with which no other will could surmount. Khonshu offered him freedom in his servitude. “Found it,” Marc said before Khonshu could. The statue was sitting peacefully under one of the few standing doorways that remained.

“Very good, my son. Now we will build my temple and your purpose will be known here as it would have been there,” Konshu congratulated him.

“Where should I build it?” Marc asked. He turned the statue over in his hands. The thing looked just as Khonshu had in his dreams, but the statue was made of a white stone whose inner facets reflected blues and greens.

[Sarah]

“That city we came across before. You already have a place there, and one god was missing a temple among all the others of this world,” Khonshu said. His voice was contemplative for the first time. Not being in New York changed everything considerably. He wasn’t acquainted with this pantheon and he was not aligned with this world’s facets of realities.

“I’m not looking forward to uncovering the dangers of this world,” Marc said, mostly to himself, as he secured the statue in his backpack.

“Nor am I,” Khonshu replied, equally as distantly, before going completely silent.

[Wild Pet Found]