Ramuna was at a loss for where she woke up. She expected to be in a prison cell with her own military guarding her. Awaiting execution or whatever it may have been Seth Phisler had planned for her.
Seth Phisler…
The man she thought she was going to marry after they finished their project. The project that happened to be a nuclear weapon that wiped a whole civilization. Now what? Was the New World in fear of her? Fear that she would destroy them too? A form of rage she never felt in her life started to grow inside her but it was quickly diminished when she looked at her surroundings.
Ramuna was in an open room as big as a soccer field laying on a stone slab that was smack in the middle of the large room. As she sat up her back ached, luckily she was not restrained. Grateful that her legs regained their strength she stood up off the slab and looked more around. There was in fact a ceiling to the dark cool room that only gave a hint of a bluish glow for light. The strangest thing was that the stone she had been laying on was the same color as the ceiling and walls around her. A pitch-black obsidian like stone that was almost eerie and haunting. It was so dark it almost was like it was trying to consume the glowing blue light coming from the ceiling. How strange.
She looked around for an exit but could find none. If there was no exit how did she get in here? Her next move was to find where the bluish glow that lit up the room was coming from but that was impossible to find as well. Ramuna soon realized that the light above was not even attached to the ceiling but hovering close to the ceiling like a form of gas cloud. It took her a long time to observe all the walls that imprisoned her.
As she walked amongst the walls she noticed symbols shimmering and shifting. Almost as if she was watching words being typed out onto the walls by a powerful mainframe computer. Was this place being run by some form of technology she had never even come across before? As she observed the wall in front of her still inputting its intricate designs she soon realized what was being engraved onto the walls. It was what the people of Atann would have called Hieroglyphics. The symbols were glowing the same bluish hue as the light floating on the ceiling. The blue illumination of the symbols started to light up the large room a little more to Ramuna's relief.
As she was fixated on the wall in front of her it was hard to ignore the loud bang that came from the center of the room. Ramuna spun around to look over at the center, a scream tried to escape her lips but she fought hard not to show any fear to this thing that was standing by the slab. What the hell was that thing?
Standing at the end of the stone slab was a being that resembled a man. He was not wearing a shirt and only wore a white kilt with a gold plate and no shoes. With how toned his chest was it was clear that this was not a man who spent his days with leisure activity. His body was almost chiseled like a statue. Nothing of importance stood out about him except his head. There was no head of a man but instead some dog-like creature with pointy ears like a doberman stared at her and bright golden eyes that actually were brighter than the blue glow of the room to Ramuna's surprise. She could sense the anger seeping off him even from across the large room.
Ramuna.
The thing spoke but not out loud. Ramuna could hear it in her head almost like a telepathic conversation. That was impossible! Wasn't it? Maybe she was losing her mind. Yes! That had to be it! How else could she explain the room before her and the man who had a dog's head. Especially after being drugged by her own fiance.
Ah yes…
This all had to be something her mind was making up now that her life was ultimately going to come to and end. Why else would Seth Phisler have drugged her? The New World did not need to imprison her to create more weapons; she had already been open and willing to do anything her government had asked of her. The only reason they could be detaining her is because they were scared of her own talents and now of all times her mind was making up some intricate insane scenario just to cope with her hopeless reality when she woke up.
The dog-man was laughing at her. This time it was not in her mind but right in front of her. The sound he made didn't even sound animalistic. It really sounded like a man laughing uncontrollably. Its mouth was slightly open, its lips were curled back and she can see sharp canines as a dog's mouth should have. Regardless it still made her feel uneasy about the thing standing in the middle of the room.
"What a good story to tell yourself, Ramuna. Unfortunately, for you your mind lacks way too much knowledge to come up with a place as grand as the one before you now." His voice not only spoke within her mind but out loud as well.
Ramuna lacked knowledge? Her of all people? Lacked… Knowledge?
"You think blasting a damn continent is what makes you the top of everything?" Now it was walking towards her rather quickly with disgust in its tone.
The fear Ramuna had tried to hide from the dog-man creature finally came out as she actually heard his steps as he stalked towards her as if it was the loudest thing in her existence now. She could hear and feel the rage with each movement he made.
Ramuna started to run. She had no idea where she could go, there was no exit as far as she knew but if this truly wasn't all made up in her head but also was not her current situation since nothing like this existed in the New World then maybe perhaps wherever she was she had more stamina than what she expected of her body.
To her luck and surprise the wall she was running towards started to weave more than hieroglyphics onto its wall but the frame of a doorway that slowly started to open, the outline being a glowing blue hue as well. Ramuna had no idea what would be beyond that door but anything would be better than being alone in a dark area with a half-human, half-dog creature pissed off at her.
Ramuna ran full force into the doorway and was blinded by a bright white light that disappeared as quickly as it blinded her. Once her eyes were able to regain focus a new fear started to unravel before her. She was most definitely far from home.
Was she even on her own home planet?
Ramuna found herself on a moon-like world. She was surrounded by stretches of barren, silvery gray landscapes, the sand underneath giving a slight lunar glow almost as if she was standing on the moon. Was she standing on the moon? She continued to walk forward and observe her surroundings. There were deep craters all around her almost like the area she was in was used to meteorite impacts but the one thing that made her heart sink was the series of colossal pyramids that rose up into the sky that was shrouded into perpetual darkness. They were as tall as the mushroom cloud she created that wiped out Atann.
The dog-like man came through the doorway and stood beside her a lot more calm than he was when they were inside what now Ramuna realized to be another extremely large pyramid.
"Welcome to Kemet, Ramuna. Or as you once called it. Atann."