Chapter 5, Rumors of friends

Michael was fairly certain he was dreaming, the only problem was that he didn't know when he had fallen asleep, nor how to wake up. He remembered spending the day with Jacob and John. It had been the usual birthday they celebrated with Jacob. They were practically his family at this point, so every year, Michael and John bought some food, ice-cream and a cake, and headed to the small beach they had found years ago. Nobody except for them ever went there, so it was almost like their own private place. Over the years they had even built a small shack there.

The beach hadn't always been as empty as it was now, since every now and then, they found some shaped rocks, or old statues. Maybe there was a small stone age village there at one point. Last year they even had the idea to buy snorkels, and have a competition to find the coolest stuff. John had won, he found an ancient obsidian knife blade.

They had decided to have a rematch this year, and so, after having eaten some ice-cream, they had gone snorkeling to find lost treasure. It didn't take long for a small four inch wide cube to catch Michael's eye. He had almost dismissed it immediately, but then he noticed the mud covered carvings on it. Michael picked it up, and quickly cleaned it under water before placing it on his towel.

The cube was rather beautiful. All six sides were covered with geometric shapes, Celtic knots and some odd runes that, with a closer look, were all made of even smaller shapes. Every single carved shape was like a fractal. Michael fetched his phone from the shack, so that he could take a picture, and called for his friends.

Through the screen of his phone the cube was glowing a deep violet. Michael saw his friends coming out of the water, so he picked up the cube in one hand, and went to show it to them. It didn't go as he had expected.

As Michael lifted up the cube, it started to glow. And with a sudden flash of light, Michael wasn't on the beach. He was a couple hundred feet above some sort of city, slowly floating down with the now glowing cube held in front of him in one hand, and his phone in his right.

The city Michael was above, was the most astonishing thing he had ever seen. It's architecture resembled that of ancient Roman cities. It had colorful murals everywhere, wide and clean cobbled streets and low buildings no more than three stories tall. Even the layout was beautifully designed, and we'll planned.

Only when he was lower, did he notice that the people in the city were pointing at him, some even were kneeling. That, and they weren't human.

Jacob was lost. Not literally lost, but he didn't know what to do. He wasn't too worried about the well being of his friends, as he was fairly certain that they could survive in the wild, and find a place to stay. He also knew that so far, for whatever reason, none of the food he had eaten was harmful, and most had at least some nutrients. They wouldn't starve to death.

However, it did change his priorities quite a bit. Jacob had thought he could live with Alerd, and learn enough magic to make something that could get him home. It might even be as simple as just forming real enough wormhole essence for him to pass through. It would take a while, potentially even years, but he had already come to terms with it in the last week.

But now, with the knowledge that his friends might be there with him, Jacob wasn't so sure. He would have to make sure if his friends even were there, and if they were, he'd have to find them. What had been a clear way forward, was now scrambled. Jacob didn't even know where to start.

"So, yer saying that ye have friends who might be here." Alerd asked after Jacob explained his most recent realization.

"Yeah."

"And ye don't know what to do because?"

"Because I'm not... I don't know. Where would I even start? You didn't see or hear them when you found me, so either they're not here, or they're not close. There's nothing saying they couldn't be on the other side of the planet."

"So ye want to find year friends, but ye don't know how ye would find them, without potentially wasting time."

"... Maybe. I might spend who knows how long only to find out they're not here, and that'd mean I'd get back home that much later."

"I can see why that might be a problem. But who says it has to be ye who finds yer friends."

"Do you mean that you'd help me find them, or do you have something else in mind. No offense, but two people searching the world instead of one, won't make that much of a difference."

"Heh, of course not... I mean I am going to help ye, but why not make it easier for yer friends to find ye."

"How? Spread posters around? Might work if they're in one of the nearby towns, so it could be a good start. But what if they're too far away?"

"That's one way, but not what I was thinking. Ye forget that yet the odd one out here. Heiran already told me how her friends at school have asked about ye. People get curious when they see something new, and ye are something new. Ye have weird hair, flaps on the side of yet head, soft scale-less skin, and ye even feel more real than most sages. People are going to talk, and spread word about ye around no matter what ye do. Do something big, and even make people are going to hear about ye.

The same goes for yer friends. I'm sure they're smart enough to find a town or a city, and rumors of them will start spreading around the world. All ye have to do, is maybe help out some of the village folks, or do something big in a city."

Jacob was silent for a moment. Alerd might be on to something, but Jacob wasn't entirely sure, "Do you really think it'd be that simple to get word of me around the whole world?"

"Of course, just yesterday I even heard some people in the village talking about some god of knowledge called Hemen, having descended from the sky in the capital."

Jacob was stunned. He had never called himself a human, so of course Alerd hadn't made the connection. It couldn't be just a coincidence. "Would it be at all possible that he called himself a human?"

"Sure, rumors change as they travel along. Why, is one of year friends name Human?"

It could be Michael. John was more asocial, and liked spending his time watching TV and playing videogames. But Michael, he had always been the popular one. He could become friends with practically anyone he met, and he had a good bit of knowledge that could potentially be used to portray a god of knowledge. Still, even for him, it was a bit much, and stupid. The rumors might be exaggerating though. The so called 'god of knowledge' could very well be Michael.

"No, but it is the name of our species." Jacob finally said.