When Marc woke, he was greeted by an open Google search, books taking up every inch of desk space, and Steven out like a light. It was close to noon, the blinds were open, and light rain pitter-pattered against the roof windows.
He stretched and grumbled a curse at his alter's habit to fall asleep while researching. Nine times out of ten Steven made it to bed, but when he really got into something, he was absolutely gone and turned into a night owl. Marc felt and heard something crack and he rubbed over his cramped neck.
"Steven what the hell…?" he mumbled.
His eyes fell on a printed list with several neon colored post-its on them. Steven's handwriting was crammed on them, detailing they had had a visit from a goddess who had given them a list of items that had been spelled with dark magic to become an Unholy.
Marc's brows shot up, then he turned in the chair and met the endless gaze of the deity leaning against the room divider.
"What the hell!" he repeated, sharper this time. He was about to get a headache.
Khonshu's smirk was clear to see, even without lips.
"Isis?!"
"Yes."
"The goddess?"
"Her avatar."
He glared at him. "Nitpicking," he snarled. "Steven met Isis?!"
"Yes."
"Would you please elaborate?" he almost yelled, exasperated. Khonshu was clearly playing difficult and enjoying himself extremely well. "What the hell happened?"
"Steven was quite capable handling her and that meeting, Marc," was the purred reply. "Very much capable. As he had already proven in the Council Chamber. You weren't needed."
Marc stared angrily at him, then glanced at the notes. Damnit! He got up and scrubbed a hand over his face.
"Trust your alter, Marc Spector."
"I do!" he snapped, rounding on Khonshu. "I know Steven can handle himself!"
And yes, he could. He was Khonshu's avatar, Marc's equal, and he had access to the suit. He could defend himself. But still… His protective instinct was screaming at him that he hadn't been there.
"And trust me to protect what is mine." The moon god was close now, right with him, and Marc closed his eyes, feeling his tension lessen.
"Knee-jerk reaction," he mumbled.
There was a gentle touch, so physical and yet not. "You are my weapon, but sometimes the shield is needed."
He snorted a little laugh. "I'm an idiot?" he translated.
"Sometimes."
He laughed again, shaking his head.
The pitter-patter of rain was a soft background noise. Sometimes the rain strengthened and the noise changed into one of a tiny waterfall rushing down the roof.
"You trust her? You trust the list?" he asked after a long time of staring at the printed files.
Khonshu still hovered right behind him, silent, a heavy, reassuring presence in his soul, something he wouldn't ever have thought to be possible. He unconsciously leaned into that psychic presence, felt the countless twines between them.
"I trust in the authenticity of the listed items," the moon god finally said, voice dark and low. "She has no reason to lie. It is her way of clearing her conscience. I do not trust in the completion of the list. Isis is part of the Ennead after all. Osiris allowed her to feed us this information, to hunt only for the dark things left behind. There is magic everywhere and you encounter magical items before."
"Painfully," he agreed.
"The Unholies are different."
"Yeah, I noticed." Marc scrubbed a hand over his eyes, sighing. There was a big difference between getting blasted by some magical item and having your binding to a god almost destroyed. "Okay," he muttered after another lengthy silence. "Okay. We trust the list."
"We do."
"But not her?"
"No."
Big difference. "But you trust her enough that this isn't some badly construed attempt to get rid of us?"
"The Ennead has already gotten rid of me, Marc. Of us." Khonshu chuckled. "We created waves, yes, but those waves are still rippling through the Overvoid. Osiris will do everything in his power not to be involved in anything we do. Anything at all. That's why he let Isis give us the list. Good will. She would never go behind their back."
"He gives us our orders without making it an order. We get pointed into the general direction and when shit hits the fan, he washes his hands of his involvement."
"Yes."
"And if we succeed?"
Khonshu shrugged, unconcerned. "We succeed."
"Hn. You really need to make better friends."
"We are not friends!"
He grinned at the moon god. Riling him up was fun.
"What about Hathor? She's your friend, right? We might get some more from her?"
Khonshu refused to be baited. The silence stretched and the empty sockets reflected timeless darkness, giving nothing away.
"She might," he finally said as Marc sat out the silence like a pro. He knew the entity by now and the gentle back and forth along the connection told him told him Khonshu was a little annoyed.
"Hathor risked a lot helping us the first time, going behind Osiris' back," the moon god finally said slowly.
"So she won't do it again?"
A shrug.
Marc sighed. "I hate politics."
"Indeed."
"So the Ennead is helping by not really giving us much, I get it. And we can't expect more help to come. I guess I'm starting to understand how this works. And where your antipathy comes from." He shot the moon god a look, brows raised. "Not that you were any better when we first started out. You were just as unhelpfully helpful. With a heaping serving of attitude, temper and pushiness. Sprinkled with some blackmail and threats."
Khonshu's mirth was clear to feel.
Marc got up and stretched. He needed a long hot shower and then have a long talk with Steven about falling asleep at the desk. "You don't think Osiris set her up to bring us the list?"
That got him an actually amused laugh. "No. He would never do me any favors or even appear to be doing me any favors."
"Yeah. My bad. Should have thought of that." He checked the time, then the messages on his cell phone.
Nothing from Layla, which meant she wouldn't be around tonight. A shiver of anticipation flickered through him.
"Yeah, yeah," he laughed softly. "Addict."
"I am vengeance, Marc Spector. There is always an innocent life to avenge."
And it would do him some good to get some exercise. After a hot shower.
A short time later he left a text message for Layla that he would be on a business trip, then raised his eyebrows at Khonshu, who was by no projecting restlessness and eagerness in one.
"Where to?"
Steven woke two days later, wearing a slightly too large 'I Love Berlin' t-shirt. There was a note from Layla on the message board.
'MK went to Berlin and all he got us was this lousy t-shirt'.
He fell back onto the mattress, laughing so hard, his sides started to hurt.
Marc Spector had gone into his service for Khonshu not knowing what to expect. He had followed orders, had been sent all over the world to hunt for the criminal element. He had been an assassin, clear and simple. A weapon to be pointed at a target and then let loose.
He was still a weapon, was still the Moon Knight, but matters had changed profoundly. Yes, he was still going after those who had hurt the vulnerable, he still killed if necessary, but it wasn't like before. He wasn't like before.
And now there was also a new job. Long-term, probably an insane game plan, but one that was as important as punishing criminals.
Khonshu felt like it was his personal mission to find Unholy items. He wasn't the pushing, driving force of before. He didn't run his Knight ragged, demanded the impossible and left him panting for air, aching all over, teetering at the edge of an endless abyss, but he was single-minded when it came to the dark magic.
Marc knew it was personal for him. It was also personal for both Marc and Steven, who had both been under attack by the sinister spells that had tried to destroy something precious and holy. The scar was the eternal reminder and something neither of them could overlook.
That the confrontation with the dark magic had given Marc access to the root core of the bond was a bonus, but he could have done without the threat of an injured or permanently destroyed bond to get to that point.
Khonshu had advised him to only attempt it when he was perfectly safe because his body would be unresponsive, close to unconscious for the time he spent there. Maybe only a fraction of a second in real time, a second at most, but it might be a second that meant the difference between failure and victory.
But he was getting better.
Layla was completely on board with looking for cursed objects. She had a lot of connections, she knew the right people, and those people knew more people. She hadn't specifically hunted for relics containing dark spells before, mainly because she hadn't known they a) existed and b) how to find them, but now that she did, she was absolutely invested.
Isis' list wasn't all too long, but there were descriptions and sometimes a sketch. It helped a little, though Steven had still spent long, long days searching and researching. He had handed his finds over to Layla, who had in turn done her own thing. They had found a few leads as to where a particular item might be, but it was tedious work.
Better than nothing, Marc argued. There's also no deadline.
"Museums first," Layla told him as she perused the latest list with Steven's extensive notes. "I can't say I've ever seen these anywhere in any of my books or the places I visited. Some are very distinct. Also, not every foul piece of magic stands out, as Khonshu said. We have to go through the collections, then the privately owned stuff. And the not so legally owned things."
"Sounds like we'll be travelling for a while." Steven stacked some books. "And who knows what items are still undiscovered in some tomb or temple."
Layla smiled. "Look at it as a road trip."
"There goes my job," Steven sighed.
You have a new one, Marc told him with a soft smile. You're my walking, talking encyclopedia of all things Egyptian. You're also going to visit a lot of museums, maybe even sites that no tourist has ever seen.
Steven perked up a little. "Legally visit or 'drop through the ceiling and break down the doors' visit?"
Marc laughed. We'll see.
Three days later, their flight took them to Cairo. So much time had passed since the last time Marc had been here and he hadn't been in the best of places then. Actually, he had drunk himself into a stupor that first night. At least that's what he thought he remembered. He had been trying to escape the nightmares and the pressure on his mind, dealing with Steven becoming so active, with the sudden switches, with Harrow and, yes, with Khonshu. Especially with Khonshu, who had been riding him to find the scarab, then to retrieve it and, when that had failed, to find Ammit's tomb first. Or kill Harrow first.
So much had changed since then.
For the better. Only for the better, he mused.
He felt whole; healthy. The constant pressure against his mind was gone. There was a balance he had never thought he could achieve. He was complete and very much at ease with who and what he was.
Marc had always felt like he had been shattered into a million pieces. All his life. Not anymore.
He wanted this. He wanted to be the Moon Knight. It wasn't a burden. It was his calling.
And he was free.
A free man.
Marc nearly laughed at that, the memory of Harrow's words dancing through his mind. They didn't hurt anymore. They weren't nightmares even throughout his waking hours.
In a way, Harrow had done him a big service; a great favor.
There was a brief surge and he glanced at Khonshu, who was staring back with muted fury. Harrow was a sore spot, especially since he had been an avatar for the moon.
"It's the past," he murmured. "Just the past. I know you got the memory of an elephant, but let it go."
There was another surge, but softer this time.
Somehow the whole ordeal with Harrow and Ammit had freed something in Marc. It was a sensation like a knot had been split, like suddenly being free of an oppressive weight that had sat on his very soul. Like his whole skin had burst open and emotions he had held in check for all his life were unleashed.
"And he really did us a favor, y'know," he continued softly. "Without all of that, I'd have done just about everything to get rid of you."
The moon god chuckled, low and dark. "You would never be able to do that, Marc."
Months ago that might have sounded like a threat. Now it was a promise.
Despite everything, despite the loss and the pain, Marc Spector had grown whole again, had found a solid balance between the two souls inside him, and his relationship with Khonshu was close to symbiotic.
Yes, he would always make the same second choice again. Just like Steven had told Isis: they had wanted this.
"You look relaxed. Both of you," Layla remarked as she walked onto the roof terrace to where he was sitting on the cushions scattered on the tiles. She carried tea in small glasses, as well as a kettle.
Yes, a lot of good had come out of this, he thought with a soft smile directed at her. He had been ready to divorce his wife, the woman he still loved so much, because he wanted to protect her. Now, in retrospective, he knew it had been a ludicrous idea. Distancing himself from Layla wouldn't have stopped Khonshu.
Not that the conniving bastard had ever wanted her to begin with. But as much as he would claim he hated him, Marc knew it was a lie. He didn't. He hadn't for a long time.
There was a slight curl of possessiveness winding through his body and he almost laughed. Khonshu was slinking around like a cat, rubbing against him with a purr, marking his avatar. He let the warm feeling sink into him, almost heard the purr of approval.
"Deep thoughts?" Layla asked playfully.
"Hm," he grunted.
She leaned over and gave him a quick kiss. "Don't hurt yourself."
"Funny."
She kissed him again. "Talked to a friend. We get in for free tomorrow."
Marc grinned. "I like your friend."
"She's married."
"So am I." He winked.
Layla chuckled and joined him on the cushions.
Turning his face to the sky, Marc closed his eyes and enjoyed the warmth as the sun set slowly. It was warm, but bearable, and there was a slight breeze. Tomorrow would be the time to scout around the museums they had on their list. He would leave that to Steven, who was already excited about it.
"Time to play," Khonshu whispered darkly, eagerly. "Finally!"
He cracked an eye open, looking at the deity sitting on the roof across from them, leaning against the chimney. One knee was bent, the arm with the moon staff resting lazily on it, the other leg hung over the ledge. In a way they each reflected how at ease they currently were.
He had never been this relaxed throughout any of his prior missions or jobs. Neither had Khonshu been this laid back. There had been this feverish edge to him, driven, always driven.
The balance that had been between them for months now was amazing.
"You're up for that?" Marc murmured as he glanced at Steven.
Oh, very! I've heard they are featuring a temporary exhibit on the Qantir-Piramesse site! There is a physical exhibition and a virtual tour!
Marc gave him a fond smile. "We have a job to do, Steven."
It'll take at least two to three days to scout around the whole place and that's not counting all the special exhibits. You can do your Mission Impossible stuff and break in, hanging from the ceiling or crawl through vents to get to the storage areas. I think the basement's several times as large as the British Museum's. This will be fun!
"You and my definition of fun differ greatly, my friend."
Khonshu rumbled, amusement flooding him, and the hollow sockets regarded his Knight.
Layla watched him with that indulgent look of someone who knew she was listening to only one side of a fun argument, but who also knew the other party and had a good idea what was going on.
"You wanna play personal tour guide?" Marc shot a grin at the moon god watching them.
Layla snickered into her tea glass.
Those eyeless sockets filled with more than emptiness. There was almost the glint of a thin moon.
"I did offer," Khonshu replied smoothly.
"Hm, you did. And it's only a first casing. Check stuff out. We have time. No deadline."
Khonshu's magic flared a little. He was eager to hunt, to maybe find some criminals while they were looking around, but he accepted his avatar's lead. Yes, so much had changed. For the better and for all of them.
This was their life now. His life. Marc had a life, which also included his wife. He was forever entangled and bonded with the Egyptian god of the moon. With a timeless, immortal entity who called his avatar his soul-bound. And he had his very stable and perfectly balanced counterweight; his alter.
Steven had always been his safety, his shield, before he had even known it. But now it they were equals, equally strong, equally serving as anchors of the soul bond.
It sounded… okay.
Really okay.
Perfect, actually.
Marvelous, Steven whispered softly, fondly.
Yes, absolutely perfect.
Khonshu watched his avatar, his host, as Marc enjoyed the pleasant evening with his wife. Night was falling, the moon peeking out, and the moon god let its energy suffuse him. And his Knight in turn.
Marc was an easy presence within the soul bond, reflecting everything Khonshu himself felt. There was no tension, no anger, no exhaustion, no sharp, sour spikes of emotions. Steven was just as relaxed, keeping very much below the surface to give Marc and Layla some privacy.
He had made an instinctive choice back in his temple.
It had been the right one.
He had made another instinctive one the second time when he had offered more than just the power of the moon to a potential Knight. When he had offered it to two souls instead of one.
And Khonshu had offered everything.
What he had gotten in return had far surpassed his wildest hopes. The acceptance had paved the way for a development he couldn't have foreseen. The strength of the two balanced souls was unrivaled and while the moon god didn't believe in luck, he knew he had been lucky.
Marc suddenly met his gaze. White burned in their depth, a clear indicator that his Knight very close to Khonshu's mind, feeling more than Khonshu would have thought possible. Marc was itching to go out into the night, find some criminal elements, too.
The next few days would be Steven's.
The nights were theirs.
Time had no meaning for him. The future was an abstract concept.
And Khonshu was very much looking forward to what it held for him and his soul-bound.
