Chapter 4: Joe

I was siting at Michael's council seat on Mount Olympus.

I sighed. Mike once again had decided to shirk his duties. He must know that as a Controller he actually has to go to these things. I sighed again, of course it fell to me once again as Mike's second in command to go. I was Joe, the magic administrator of Mike's domain. It's not like the Gods were particularly interesting. In fact, they were rather tiring. You would have assumed that after millions of years they would have exhausted political intrigue between them... but, you would be wrong. The worlds basically govern themselves without the God's particular guidance. All they do is sit around and bicker as to who should be in charge of Mount Olympus.

The council room was shaped like a pyramid. The three major religions', Greek, Egyptian and Norse delegates lined each side. The walls were made of three single sheets of glass. Every few million years or so the religions rotate in dominance. This time it was the Egyptian Gods that were in charge. I had my own seat in the corner to the left of them. The master Amun-Ra and his pesedjet were seated to my right looking out over the plains. It was considered an honor. The other three sides looked off into the void or at Mount Olympus itself. Though there were many dieties in each religion, they were only allowed nine members to sit in the council at a time. The Egyptian pesedjet consisted therefore of Amun-Ra, Atum, Geb, Isis, Nut, Nephthys, Set, Shu, and Tefnut. Osiris long ago gave up his seat to be guardian of entrance and of the dead.

When we went our separate ways after Ra dismissed us I decided it was time to tell go yell at Mike for the millionth time. I arrived at his Arch-Temple just as the sky began to change to the traditional artificial night of the Mountain. His temple was set at the back of the mountain in the pass between a set of higher cliffs which, together with the cliffs, serve as a boundary between the Gods on the mountain and the void behind. Behind the cliffs was a desert which flowed off into the horizon to meet the blackness of the void. Mike seemed determined to guard both sides of the temple, the void side and the God side. He said that you never knew where your enemies would come from. Even with that said, we haven't had war since he gained Controller status. The temple itself is a spell-bound, tan stone fortress. It has never been entered by force before.

It's also worth mentioning that we have a number of others who worked with us and quite a few guards. Every time Mike went out into the world and found someone he liked he'd mark them to come work for us later.

I entered Mike's chambers expecting to have an argument. I knew he'd be unhappy about it, but seriously I don't want to have to go to these meetings for him. He wasn't there.

I went downstairs. He wasn't there.

This was just great. I couldn't find him to go to the council meeting and now he just isn't here.

I tried the dining hall. He was nowhere to be found. I did however find the chef.

"Hey, you know where Mike went?"

"Hey Joe,... Mike? Hmmn he came down this morning looking rather distracted. We talked for a bit."

"Did he tell you where he was going? When he'd be back?"

"If I remember correctly he said he had business to attend to across the void."


Now that was perhaps the most ridiculous thing I've heard in a long time. Across the void? There is nothing across the void. Why would Mike enter the void? He does realize we're bound to him. If anything happens to him... that would be bad.



Wait.

Does this mean that he left me to do all of his work back here? Really?

And seriously, where did he go?