Mother Patricia stormed out of the temple, the braying, mocking laughter of the High Priests following her down the steps. Down the street, where she roughly shouldered and weaved her way through the mass of people grateful to finally be leaving work for the day. She was tossed and turned this way or that, a short, dumpy pinball bouncing off people at random. A salmon swimming against a raging stream. Desperately trying to get their cruel words out of her head. Out of her ringing ears. Trying to get away. Trying to get back to somewhere where she could feel... not like this. Feel at home. Safe.
Because her church, the church of Samar, the god of kindness and love, would, could, never be that for her. Never again. Not after seeing where the donations of the faithful actually went. How the high clergy comported themselves, behind closed doors. Not after her prayers to do something about it – and she'd prayed, for so long, so hard – had gone unanswered. Her god didn't seem to care what was being done in His name. Maybe never cared. Or even existed. Maybe the Voice she'd heard all those years ago, when she'd heard the calling... hadn't actually been there, and she'd been deluding herself for decades.
Maybe... there even were no gods at all. Not in this modern day and age.
She was unmoored, adrift on a storm-wracked sea of emotions. Tears flowed freely, turning the world around her into a fractal kaleidoscope of nothing more than glittering colours and shadows. Unseeing, her foot went out from under her as it landed on a carelessly discarded bottle, which went skittering and clattering down tiles, echoing in a vast cavernous space. Trying to regain her balance, she ran into someone, and her mad dash away was halted, finally, by a brief, steadying arm. "I... I'm sorry, I wasn't watching where I was going." she apologised, blinking away her tears, trying to focus.
The young woman she'd bumped into was pretty, in that nondescript way so many other girls her age were in this city. A college student, maybe. A red scarf was wrapped around her head, its long tails draped across her shoulders and chest. The only pop of colour in the dim greyness of the otherwise deserted subway platform they were standing on.
The tall stranger pulled her earbuds out, a lock of auburn hair escaping to curl against her forehead. Tinny voices at the edge of hearing as she wrapped the cord around her fingers, juggling a thick book so she was only holding it with her other hand, and smiled. "That's okay. No harm done." she reassured her softly, before asking "Do you need help? Are you lost?" with such genuine concern in her voice.
Was she lost.
Mother Patricia – Mother no more, just Patricia Nawal now, she supposed – barked, a broken laugh that turned into a sob halfway. Was she ever. Both spiritually and... she looked around. She had no idea where she was. How she'd gotten here. How to get back to... whatever her life would be now. Something else, necessarily. "Yes." she choked.
Kind, sympathetic brown eyes gazed at her, and it felt like they were looking through her, dissecting her very being. Her soul. The stranger touched Patricia's shoulder. "It's going to be okay. You're going to be okay." she reassured her, and Patricia believed her. Something was urgently tugging at her senses, and she squinted. Blinked.
Once.
Twice.
Lines bloomed behind the girl, growing out of her, twisting and turning as they took shape. Crossed each other. Blossomed. Gained a riot of distinct colours, until all she could see was the warm stranger, and... something that looked suspiciously like a subway map, if such a thing could exist for an entire world. An entire universe. It hurt to look at for too long.
Mouth suddenly dry, Patricia licked her lips. "W... Who are you?" she croaked.
The young woman smiled, a softness that made a welcome heat bloom within Patricia. A heat that drove out the cold dread that had taken hold of her. Suffused every nerve. Every cell of her body. "I am the Wayfinder. I help those who are lost." She started to put her earbuds back in, pressing the book into Patricia's unresisting hands. "Here, you'll need this."
"Wait, what do y–" Patricia cried, but the young woman was gone.
The world rushed back in. An overwhelming cacophony of noises. Colours. Smells, as the subway platform she was standing on was suddenly packed more tightly than a sardine tin, the evening scramble of people getting off a train. Grumbling. Irritated. But also joking with each other. Laughing. Breathing again. Relieved another day was over.
People, people, people, of all kinds. All walks of life. Just normal people.
Had it been real? Patricia's eyes fell on the sign overhead, above the departing crowd, and she stared at it. This was her stop, on the other end of the city from where she'd been. She looked down at her hands. No thick book, just a ratty old subway map – one of the millions, if not billions, available from every transit authority counter. Except this one was well-loved, and she had no idea where it'd come from.
She became aware of soft crying, somewhere close by. Patricia craned her neck, tried to zero in on the source. Difficult, when she was so much shorter than everyone else. Until the crowd thinned, and she found herself looking at a young boy, sitting against the wall, dejection in every line of his gangling, growing body.
Crouching in front of him, Patricia smiled softly. "Do you need help? Are you lost?" She gently touched his shoulder. "Don't worry. It's going to be okay. You're going to be okay. I'll help you."
Oh.
