The Pontifex slipped in somewhere behind Moone, but Moone quickly lost where; he found himself completely disoriented after entering the portal. The Dreamtime wasn't very much like what Moone was expecting after having visited the lesser dreaming. The dreaming was a filtered product of creation, ritual and myth echoing off of each other. The Dreamtime itself was the voice that had shouted into that valley into the first place.
Moone was there, and Moone was there, and Moone was there, back back back back back. Every man was his father, creation was still going on, and had already been completed, and was yet to be. Moone tried to clear his head; this was so disorienting.
The aboriginals of Australia don't find it odd to have conflicting mythology about the way something particular happened, from one group telling the story to another. Truth of things reflected itself, and the way a tale was told was true, if the truth was true, variations were also true. How was that?
Geography. Mythology. That's why it needed to be here. The Dreamtime, in Babel, would have been different from how the dreaming was there, all tied to the land. Here in Athens, at the heart of the ancient Athenian city state, it was Greek mythology, all of it, not just ancient but modern; the truth here was whatever people had said, all throughout time, all throughout this land.
Going back yet staying in the mythological present was like sliding along a scale, or, how to explain it? Moone had a difficult time attempting to do so later. Staying in one time, moving through the present, but sliding his mind back and forth through history, what people believed. Mind in Ancient Greece, God was Zeus, mind in Modern Greece, God was God.
Moone was in the present, the true present, in his mind, but could see into the past, and the past, the mythology that formed in front of him, was his own. The events that had led up to Xemf coming out victorious and opening up the portal. But this was all mythology, that's what the dreamtime showed, stories that were told of the origins, stories that might as well have been true as long as the present wound up the same, so Moone wasn't sure if this was the true story of how Xemf opened the portal, but it was the story that Moone made up in his mind, the instant small assumptions, gaps in logic filled in like, like a dream.
Moone had seen the end, Xemf transforming MacBeth, on his knees, into a rainbow vortex (was this the Bifrost or was this the Rainbow Serpent or was it both, and if it was a rainbow was that because it came that way or was it because that's how it was believed it should look) and so played it back, like hitting rewind on a VCR, saw MacBeth standing there, saw Xemf arrive, Larry arrive too late, Xemf turn around and lash out--
and Moone stepped in between them and pushed Larry out of the way, and somehow he knew that Larry was still alive now, back in reality, because Moone had changed the past, not the real past but the myth of the past. The Xemf of the Dreamtime, not being the true Xemf but a mythological version thereof, did nothing further beyond how the time had gone, now that the myth had been changed. [or something- don't they interact with the gods and change the myth later on, the gods don't freeze.]
And that was Xemf's plan, wasn't it, to change the writing of the NOC, not the Non-Official Cover but the actual Necro-nom-icon, the image of the names of the dead overwritten.
Xemf was in the mythological past, the Classical mythological past, but Xemf was also here right now, murder of Larry thwarted; was that how Moone was also his father his father his father, back back back back, everyone in place, compounding, because mythologies change throughout time. But here they could navigate through the when of that belief, naivete becoming knowledge, what was being altered or capable of being altered changing along a timeline of belief. I am my own father, because if a billiard ball traveled back in time, hit itself, that would compound, and there would be an infinite number of billiard balls; if Moone went back in the Dreamtime, took his mental state back to when he was already inside the portal, that would compound, he'd be there with himself. What would happen if one were to step through the Portal's version of the Portal? Would that collapse on itself, like the Pontifex's idea of bringing down the Tower of Babel? Would it be more billiard balls, spawning into the universe?
Or would it just pop one into the Dreamtime that one was already in, nothing effectively happening?One can't change the past; Moone had saved Larry by saving the present, not altering what happened in the past but what had happened in the present. The difference was major: Larry really had died, Moone had just, popped him back to life; back in reality Larry revived at a point, not before the portal had opened like in the myth, but after it, all taking place relative to Moone's own time in the portal.
Could Moone save Unwin, Lovecraft, Gef, everyone, this way? But no, he could only change the mythology of what happened here, in Athens, in the Acropolis. Mythology tied to geography, worship maybe. And the geography was off, to save those who had died anywhere but here.
There was no way to change where they were at, was there? Where the Dreamtime had been accessed, change where Xemf had opened the portal, but, no, again that wouldn't work, Xemf had opened the portal here, and getting it to change its mind on that would require being not-here, being before being here. It would only work if it already had worked, and... not even the Dreamtime would be able to change that.
Moone had spent so much time thinking about this, and no time at all. If it had taken time, would he have been able to change the way the Dreamtime worked by reverting to his primitive understanding of it, the initial assumption and shock of first going through the portal? But it hadn't been his assumption anyway, he'd been proven wrong, and if that were possible the other thing wouldn't be.
Or had it taken time? There was no reference here. The Xemf that had been thwarted just stood there frozen, the past being changed, its following actions not occurring and no future going on from that point, at least here in the Dreamtime. That was just a shadow Xemf, the real Xemf somewhere in the Dreamtime, even now changing the past, not changing the past but how the past had gone. [or maybe not, there should be a bigger fight scene somehow.]
Moone had been able to defeat the shadow Xemf because the shadow Xemf took place in a section of Dreamtime outside of Dreamtime, a myth Moone had created of Xemf's existence in the real world. Powers amplified, able to change form, here in the source of those powers, there was no telling what Xemf would be able to accomplish. What force would be able to stand against Xemf, the real Xemf?
Moone considered turning back, but without even needing to mull it over, changed his mind as he realized the answer.
So Moone brought his mind back, slid his mind's scale of time back to the ancient days, which took him before then, to when that version of reality was being created.
...
Mythological Greece. The Court of the Gods. [or wherever- why are we in the Parthenon and not at like Mt Olympus?]
Xemf was there already, of course. But where was the Pontifex, shouldn't he have gotten here already as well? Moone glanced around furtively, but gave up, realizing that if the Pontifex wanted to reveal himself he'd reveal himself, and turned his attention back to Xemf.
Xemf stood conversing with the Pantheon in all their glory, in Ancient Greek which might as well have been modern English now that Moone was back in the Dreamtime, having once spoken the Primordial Language in the dreaming. Pleading with them, about a book that it had...
The Pantheon here was not as we think of them in the modern world, but as envisioned by the Ancient Greeks. Not known just through their myths, which this was. But as actual household gods, arbiters of fate, the generous ones who bestow rain during dry times as blessings for righteousness, the just ones who send plague and famine to warn their followers against hubris.
There was a gorgeous feast set out, not just of ambrosia and honey but of roasted meats and fine stewed figs, olives and dates.
[bring up Pontifex again.] He'd slipped away, gotten to the ancient myths before Moone... Moone suddenly realized what myth he was in.
In the Dreamtime, everyone is their own father. And the Pontifex was a descendent of Lycaon, King of Arcadia. In Greek myth, the first werewolf. [foreshadow more clearly: Pontifex is a werewolf.] Pontifex had been here, the whole time.
The myth went that Lycaon served the flesh of his own son Nyctimus to the gods to test their omniscience, and was punished for it. The Pontifex had taken the place of Nyctimus here. If he hadn't been able to sacrifice himself to get to Dreamtime, the Pontifex sure would be able to sacrifice himself inside of Dreamtime.
And when the gods found out...
What force would be able to stand against Xemf, if not for gods themselves.
[the gods find out.] And they looked very displeased. Their punishment would have been to turn Lycaon into a common beast, for attempting to cause the consumption of human flesh, but Moone had to make this more dangerous, at least for Xemf.
What had the myth been like before? Changing something this far back into mythology wouldn't, once again, change the past- but it would change the present as though the past had been changed; the difference between the two didn't seem much, but was profound.
The myth would be different, people's attitudes toward the myth would be different, but their actions surrounding the myth would be the same-- did that allow free will, because decisions were already made and to erase them would be to deny will, or did having the decisions remain the same itself erase the concept of free will?
[Moone sics the gods on Xemf, maybe it transforms into a wolf but would that make Xemf Lycaon?? I think Pontifex is also Lycaon. Lycaon is here, guess the myth wasn't that altered after all. There's a huge epic climax-worthy battle, Moone realizing that his own boon and bane are enhanced in the dreamtime as well far above what the Pontifex could grant, and twists his boon around his bane again, becoming basically invincible against gods. Xemf is defeated; Moone makes out with the NOC list.]
[Moone goes to exit the dreamtime, maybe there's a suspense-type time constraint?]
Moone brought himself back to the moment the portal was created, MacBeth's flesh exploding into unimaginably brilliant colors like a prism made of fire. Maybe to get out of the Dreamtime, one just had to... go through the portal the opposite way? That would make sense.
Moone did so, and nothing happened. Guess that answers the question of what would happen entering the portal inside of itself, Moone thought, and his thought came as a voice and as one thousand rushing waters. What else...
Moone brought himself back, not through the timeline in relationship to understanding the myth, but through the myth itself.
Moone breathed out. Here was Xemf with MacBeth in front of him, MacBeth on his knees, seconds before Xemf turned him into the portal. Moone replicated Xemf's stance, placing his hand on MacBeth's forehead. And ripped MacBeth out, the portal never being created and the Dreamtime collapsing.
MacBeth and Moone fell to the earth and rolled a short rocky distance down the steps and the hill. It was as long as it had been since the portal was created now for Moone, the same idea behind the passage of time in Moone's and Pontifex's return from Babel; in reality the portal had been open for a few moments, but now sometime after it had closed Moone had collapsed it, and both MacBeth and Moone popped out of nowhere.
Moone rolled over, sore, and looked at the groaning form of MacBeth. The Pontifex had gotten a chance to sacrifice himself, like he'd always wanted, but MacBeth was still alive from closing the portal, from having been the portal, but then closing, and living. Moone looked at MacBeth, breathing softly there, with sadness.
The Pontifex hadn't needed to die. The Pontifex shouldn't have died. The world lost something, Moone couldn't help but shake the feeling, lost something grand, some irretrievable part of itself that should never have been given up, when the Pontifex died.
But to sacrifice himself had been the Pontifex's choice. Even if he hadn't needed to die to create a portal, it did accomplish a purpose in changing the myth. Time would tell what that would mean, though.
Time would tell what that would mean.
...
A few hours later, Moone and the five members of Unwin's old team were on the Mothman's private jet and headed back for the States. Moone sat in the same seat he'd used coming up to Athens in the first place. It had only been that morning, it was hard to believe, and he'd been in Babel only a few hours before that. The seat was the same, same crisp polished leather; Moone himself was a lot more, wrinkled, now. Like a shirt that had been wadded up and pressed wrong.
Moone stared emptily at the glass that he'd been drinking from that morning, the ice cubes all melted now, a small pool of water staring blankly back at him. He considered his next move, the NOC list held in both hands.
Xemf was dead, but the rest of its conspiracy still out there somewhere; Moone needed some way to shine cleansing sunlight on the conspiracy, dissolve it. The last scattered remains of the Pontifex's old organization were presumably out there somewhere as well, but without such a key player, they were bound to dissolve like the Soviet Union before them.
Moone considered whom he was going up against, an ancient and [profound] organization, powerful enough to rip his boon apart from his bane, powerful enough to control the weather. There was a distinct possibility that if they'd had agents in the Tetragrammaton, they'd have agents in non-supernatural organizations too, probably at every level of government and not just in the United States'.
Moone shook his head, his hands in his hair, and puffed out a breath from between his cheeks. If they truly were that powerful, he couldn't afford not to blow the whistle on this. Come what may. Even if they did have the power to potentially tear people's auras apart gaess from gaess, well, Moone did have a couple of plans to work around that...
As far as the [method] of exposing the conspiracy, Moone did have a medium for [exposure.] A medium who happened to have been embedded in the conspiracy at a high level, and who also happened to be a literal medium.
Moone looked over at MacBeth, still alive but now asleep and handcuffed to his seat across the aisle from him. [Thing established earlier, some kind of key able to allow Moone to hijack MacBeth's psychic powers, to leak MacBeth's secrets.] The host to receive the secrets would be David Icke, an English football star who'd been arbitrarily chosen to be a Son of the Godhead, a recipient of arcane knowledge, a line set up just for such occasions. Such recipients were generally celebrities, as their built-in fanbase allowed the blown whistle to be heard loudest; the Son of the Godhead before Icke had been a fairly established pulp fiction author, and before that had been... Moone wasn't sure, but he'd always guessed Elvis; there always seemed to be a lot of conspiracies built around that man.
Moone readied the key and paused. As great as Moone's own sacrifice was in all of this, Icke's would be greater. Such a [data dump] would be bigger than anything he'd received before, and would go on to shape much of the rest of his life. Though most did consider being chosen to be Son of the Godhead a great honor, and it was true. The man did seem to be genuinely having a blast wearing turquoise everywhere, and living in a menage-a-trois.
Some guys have all the luck, thought Moone. And turned the key.
EPILOGUE
Following Moone's leak of MacBeth's secrets to the public, Moone was exonerated and back at the agency, and didn't have to work out his issues alone. He did have many of those, to work out.
Working out assembling a new team. Working out the loss of each member of his old one. Working out the idea of a public who would now know of the truth. Working out the fact that he was the one responsible for this increase in public knowledge, the dark corners he and his kind used to hiding in being lightened a bit, suddenly and irretrievably. The rise of technology was contributing to this already, and there was no way of telling how those would interact.
For now, Moone mulled the basics; the public would know the truth and could choose to either accept it or ignore it. The same of any truth; these were universals, though Moone firmly believed that no truth could ever be truly known. But that shouldn't stop people from hunting it down.
Moone still thought about the Pontifex every day. Thought about the myth of Nyctimus, the meaning of it, sacrificing a son and testing out whether the gods were truly omniscient. There was something vitally inexorably profound in that, and Moone knew it related to his current position-- but, as hard as he thought about it, he could only scratch the surface of its significance.
[he's talking to someone about the myth of Nyctimus, discussing the symbolism.]
"The cannibalism thing, specifically, is what gets me. [somethinsomethin] and killing his son off forever."
"Um. Nyctimus was brought back to life, dude."
"Nyctimus--"
"Was brought back to life. Yeah. Resurrected by the gods after his father was punished, and went on to become King of Arcadia himself. Everyone knows this. If you're going to discuss symbolism--"
"Revived, revived by the gods," Moone corrected, hurriedly interrupting and turning to put on his coat. "Thanks, mate. Gotta rush."
[person] was left at a loss what to say; they shrugged and returned to their work.
Everyone was supposed to know that part of the myth, except Moone hadn't. Sudden fluctuations in mythology, that was a sign of... well.
Moone drove home, cruising on the [illegal] side of the speed limit. The house was just as dark and quiet tonight as that night [number] years ago when Smith had recruited him for the first time; it sometimes felt like only a few weeks ago, but sometimes felt a lot longer than it really was. Tonight, it felt ancient; like mythology.
Moone busted out his brand-new laptop, an IBM ThinkPad 700, and logged into the internet. The ThinkPad 700 was an impressive machine, boasting 120 megabytes of hard drive, and a 50 megahertz CPU, which meant it ran at a blazing 50 million cycles per second, so logging onto the dial-up only took him [humorously long time.] Moone didn't know what he was going to do with all his free time, with speeds like this.
He logged into Usenet, and ran a search for any news about werewolves. There was a new newsgroup under the .alt hierarchy dedicated entirely to the topic, which hadn't been there a few days ago; another excellent sign. The Pontifex could have been still out there somewhere, and if he was, the date that that newsgroup appeared would have been the date that mythology had changed. Moone sucked in a breath. Clicked into it.
And got on the hunt.
Just finished. Woot!
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