John Gone (28 page)

“I don’t hear anything,” John said.

“You do not have ears for the sand. The wind
is broken; the ground is stepped upon. You must sit quietly now. Do
as I say,” Thutmose ordered.

“You don’t understand,” John said quietly,
standing to his feet. “I know who that is outside. We need to
leave.”

Thutmose grabbed him by the pant leg and
pulled him back to the ground. “Sit,” he said. “One does not run
from one’s home.”

“But,” John protested.

“Have faith,” Thutmose said. The man stood
briefly and sat back down cross-legged on top of the well at the
center of his tent.

“John, go. Now!” Kala yelled from the
watch.

Before John could move, the hut’s flap was
pulled open, revealing a man with a thick strap of cloth around his
mouth and neck. His hair was the color of the sand and parted
diagonally across his scalp due to a large scar where it could no
longer grow. On his body, the man dressed in tattered clothes of
varying sizes, some too small for him, others too large. In his
right hand, the man wielded a large curved knife. His other held a
bulky leather sack that rested over his shoulder and across his
back. This man was not an Advocate. John sat still and watched
him.

The man with the knife yelled something to
Thutmose in a language John didn’t recognize. Thutmose replied
calmly in the same tongue. The scarred man stepped closer to the
priest and waved his knife in front of Thutmose’s eyes as if he had
not yet noticed it. Thutmose remained seated, quietly listening as
the man with the knife continued to yell. Thutmose said something
more, and the scarred man lunged at him. His blade slashed
Thutmose’s abdomen, turning his robe red with blood.

John rose immediately. Thutmose, not moving
from his posture or position, raised his hand at John in a gesture
to stop. John slowly seated himself at the signal, unsure of what
he could do to help anyway.

The man with the knife looked back and forth
between John and the priest, confused by Thutmose’s reaction to his
cut. He fixed his sights back onto the well.

An uncomfortable feeling of helplessness
washed over John. This man who’d given him water, listened to his
lies, and brought him to his home was now injured, maybe dying, and
John had done nothing to stop it. He looked again to the scarred
man. He seemed crazed ... or was that fear?

Arms at his side, Thutmose stood as if his
body wasn’t spilling blood, walked to the side of his hut, and
lifted a small tree branch from one of the many thin shelves on the
wall. John wondered for a moment if he meant to wield it as a
weapon against the knife. Instead, he brought it to the man who’d
cut him and began to speak.

Suddenly, he snapped the branch mid-sentence.
The scarred man shook when it broke, and slowly moved backed toward
the entrance of the hut. Thutmose carefully walked to his well,
filled his canteen, and offered it to the man. The ragged man
nervously accepted it and quickly dashed back into the desert only
a moment after.

Thutmose ambled back toward the well and
collapsed to the ground. John bolted to him and untied the thin
rope from his robes. Beneath them, he could see the extent of the
still-bleeding wound. The cut was long, but not deep. He unwrapped
the cloth from Thutmose’s left arm and dunked it into his well.

“Stop. Please,” Thutmose groaned. “Wring the
water back into the well. Do not waste it on this wound. There is
only so much water.” John didn’t move. “Please! Do not waste
it!”

John brought the cloth back above the well
and wrung it out before laying it carefully on Thutmose’s
wound.

The desert priest rose slowly, and wrapped
the rest of it around his stomach. “Thank you,” he said. “I shall
be fine now.”

“What happened?” John asked, still bewildered
by the events he’d just witnessed.

“Before we were interrupted,” Thutmose
explained, “I was telling you that I did not leave the city by
choice. My beliefs were not welcome there. First they mocked me,
but soon that mockery, as mockery often does when not met with
anger, turned into anger itself. Men threatened my life and
desecrated my home.

“I fled into the desert, never returning,
where I walked the sands for months, barely alive, trying to
survive as an animal might. That is when I found Anuket, and when
Anuket found the well. The Gods had spoken, and I vowed to never
abandon their gift.”

“But who was that man with the knife?” John
asked.

“Just a thief, thirsty and scared,” he
answered. “I have never met him before today. He must have seen
Anuket eating outside and guessed the reason for my hut.

“He told me that he would kill me if I did
not give him my home and this well that it protects. I told him I
would not leave, and that this well was a gift from Anuket. He
raged, and as you saw, sliced my belly with his knife.”

“What did you do with the branch? Was that
some sort of curse?” John asked.

“Curse? No. A lesson,” Thutmose said. “I
asked if he was a strong man. He nodded yes and bared his knife. It
was then that I broke the branch in front of him. I offered it to
him and asked him to repair it. He did not understand, so I
explained to him that any man can destroy, but only the strongest
among us can heal and fix that which a weak man breaks. I then
asked him to heal my wound. He knew he could not do so either.”

“So, why did you give him the water?” John
asked.

“Because that is why he came and why he
carries that knife. I wanted him to understand that he could have
had the water, had he asked, and that he could still have it, even
after wronging me. I also did not want him to die. The man looked
close to death, and being weighed in such condition would not bode
well for his immortal being. All weapons weigh heavier than the
feather on the final scales that balance us.” Thutmose rose and
rubbed his stomach where the knife had cut him. “Thank you for the
bandage.”

“Don’t thank me; it’s your bandage,” John
replied.

“Yes, but you applied it. Thank you,” he said
again.

“It’s a miracle you’re alive. Any deeper, and
that knife could have killed you.”

“There are no miracles, John,” Thutmose said,
sitting back on his mat.

“How can you not believe in miracles? You’re
a priest.”

“The many Gods have shaped the world. The
miracle, if there must be one, is the system that they have
created. Ra is the sun that shines on Geb’s grass. Geb’s grass is
fed upon by Bastet’s cat. Bastet’s cat is eaten by Amun’s jackal.
Amun’s jackal passes the cat into Hapi’s Nile, which feeds Geb’s
grass. It is a simple way to explain a complex system. One should
not look at the world and see a thousand miracles. Again, there is
but one miracle, and that is the Gods themselves who have created a
world where creatures, plants, rocks, and air can grow and develop
to work together and for each other.”

“You mean like evolution,” John said.

“Yes, though I fear your definition may hold
too narrow an understanding,” Thutmose replied.

“Science doesn’t bother you?”

“Why should it?” Thutmose asked. “Science
enlightens people to the ways of the Gods. Priests study tirelessly
for those truths in texts, so why should they not also study what
they see before their own eyes? Is that not more so the gift of the
Gods? Is that not worthy of our understanding? I am not well-versed
in the sciences, but I hardly damn their practice.”

“Then let me show you something,” John said,
pulling Mouse from his bag.

“Hello,” it said, waving its arm.

“
Ammit!
” Thutmose exclaimed, stumbling
backward from the robot. “What is this?”

“A robot,” Mouse said, walking toward him
across the woven mat.

“I do not know this word,” Thutmose said.

“It’s like a telephone that can walk around.
My friend is on the other end of it. It’s just a machine,” John
explained.

Thutmose crawled toward it and held out his
finger. Mouse latched onto it lightly and shook it up and down.

“Oh my,” Thutmose said, laughing. “This is
truly amazing. Truly amazing! I thought I had heard a voice before
that man came into my hut. It must have been you.”

“That was me, actually,” Kala said, appearing
on the watch’s face.

Thutmose’s eyes widened at the blue hologram.
“This is a man’s soul,” he said, staring at Kala.

“I hope it’s not mine,” John said.

“Very funny,” Kala replied.

“This is the same idea as the robot,” John
explained, “but made of light instead of metal.”

“This I will never understand,” Thutmose
whispered, leaning close to Kala.

“Boo!” Kala yelled, raising his arms like a
Halloween ghost. Thutmose stumbled back quickly.

“John, if you do not mind the question, why
are you here?” Thutmose asked.

“It might be difficult for you to
understand.”

“Perhaps,” Thutmose said, “but speak truth,
and I will know it.”

John did his best to explain. “This watch on
my wrist won’t come off.”

“Stuck?” Thutmose asked.

“Yes, and permanently as long as I don’t have
the right tool,” he answered. Thutmose nodded.

“Every day, there is a time that it takes my
body somewhere in the world, different each time. I can’t control
it. That’s how I ended up here without a water bottle.”

“How do you move? Do you fly?”

“No, I just disappear. Then I appear again
somewhere else.”

“Truly, this is a God’s work.”

“There is no magic deity at work here,” Kala
interjected. “It’s just science, albeit complicated science for the
likes of a hyper-religious rustic.”

“As I have said before,” Thutmose said,
moving his finger through Kala’s visage, “I do not believe those
two ideas are separate.”

“There are two men chasing me,” John said.
“They’re trying to kill me. Usually they would have shown up by
now. Maybe they couldn’t track me through the desert.”

“Unlikely,” Kala said. “Don’t ask me how to
track someone in the sand, but if it’s possible, they know how to
do it. And that’s not even accounting for the fact that this hut is
probably the only structure for miles. It makes for an astoundingly
obvious hideout.”

“So, everyday this happens at the same time?”
Thutmose asked. “A cycle of appearing and disappearing between
different places in the world?”

“Yes,” John said. “I told you it would be
difficult to understand.”

“I understand perfectly,” Thutmose said. “You
are on a journey of
maat
.”

“
Maat
?”

“Yes. It is difficult to explain in English,
or any language made of spoken words. It is reality. It is truth.
It is the stability upon which we are able to exist.”

“Enough of this ridiculous waste of time,”
Kala interrupted. “We need to move on. Who knows where the
Advocates are.”

“You’re right, who knows?” John replied.
“They may be right outside waiting for me. We’re staying.”

“Maat is balanced by time and cycles,”
Thutmose continued. “Your clock also operates like this. You pass
from one place to another and back as Ra passes over Geb and back
through Duat, only to pass over Geb again the next cycle.”

“I’m sorry,” John said. “I have no idea what
you’re talking about.”

Thutmose smiled. “Ra is God of the sun. He
rises and he falls. There was a time when this was not so, and Ra
stood across the sky always.

“There was a magical creature, Apophis, the
serpent of chaos, who became angry with Ra the Almighty and sought
to destroy him. Because he could not hide from the sun’s light, he
fled to Duat for his plotting, a place deep beneath the Earth where
the spirits of those who died must always travel. Ra had become
Pharaoh, let himself be contained by a mortal body, and Apophis
knew that, as all men, Ra could not avoid traveling through Duat
once his mortal body had perished.

“Eventually, the day came when Ra the Pharaoh
was out of time. He could do nothing to stop the aging of his
mortal form. His spirit descended into Duat, where Apophis lay
waiting, expecting a weak, worried spirit, easily snared and
destroyed. But Ra was not weak; he was accompanied by two
companions whom Apophis had not expected. The companions were
strong and wise. Apophis attacked the group, but, aided by his
companions, Ra triumphed. He ascended back into the sky, lighting
it with his glory until the time came again to descend to Duat,
where Apophis lay waiting still, magically healed from old wounds.
It is the cycle that happens each day and night, and the triumph of
Ra is the light that surrounds us.”

Thutmose leaned in toward John and placed a
hand on his arm. “John, I believe what you are doing is important.
Do not let these agents of discord find you. Have faith that you do
the Gods’ work. They will watch over you and provide for you, as we
watch over and provide for them. They will protect you as you
descend and ascend.” Thutmose stood slowly and collected the two
pieces of broken branch from his shelf. He brought them back to
John and placed them in his hands.

“Never rely on violence, John,” he said. “But
also, do not run.” John opened his bag and put the pieces
inside.

“Running is all he can do,” Kala argued. “The
men chasing him have guns.”

“Losing yourself is a fate worse than death,”
Thutmose answered.

“And yet if one dies,” Kala retorted, “one
has no chance to find one’s self again if lost.”

“Guys,” Mouse interjected, “this argument is
pointless. We can’t run. We can’t go anywhere. Look.”

Thutmose turned and looked at John’s body. It
lay unconscious on the ground.

“Does he travel now?” Thutmose asked.

“No, not yet. But this happens sometimes
before he does,” Mouse explained. “Kala, we can’t leave, even if he
does wake up. The cold will kill him and, if he passes out again in
the sand, he’ll drown in it. We have to stay.”