The doors opened with a loud creak, noise bouncing all around the insides of the building. Diego crossed its threshold timidly, unsure of what to expect, and was immediately welcomed with open arms by the figure of Christ on the other end. He walked towards it with heavy steps, and even from the distance, he began to notice the small imperfections that adorned the wooden effigy, hinting that however made it didn't know of Jesus before the order. Despite the care that had been put on it, his beard was longer, face round and more youthful, and so thin it looked like he was starving. Yet, instead of a suffering look, the artisan had made him look up in hope and with a warm smile.
He kept walking in between the cheap uneven benches, looking at the inside of the church. Truth be told, it was a messy space, where they tried to get the most out of every little corner available even if they had to make concessions to make everything work. However, amongst everything else, the thing that took the prize had to be what he guessed was the holy water font, a bucket on top of a stool.
Yet, the lack of free space wasn't just because of the size of the building, but to make room for all the other decorations and necessities of other religions, each with their own tiny little kingdom inside. To the side, Diego quickly recognized the usual interior of a mosque, separated from everything else with some fake walls. Next to it there was some furniture for people to leave their shoes out, and some richly decorated rugs poked from the entryway, waiting for the next hour of prayer.
"Four of a kind!", someone shouted further down the row of benches, "I've got a feeling I'm taking the pot home with me".
"You shouldn't boast so quickly, my friend", another man spoke amicably. The pair sat on the front row, with one of them wearing a djellaba and calmly inspecting a hand of cards, "Luck has a habit of running away at the worst times, more so if you disrespect it. I'll raise".
"Now I know you're bluffing", the first man laughed with glee. Maybe not the best thing to do when wearing the white collar of a priest under his black jacket, "Every time you come out with that my friend act you want me to lower my guard. Every single time".
"Are you sure about that?"
"Of course I am. Go ahead, show them".
The man in the djellaba looked at him laughing with glee. His face then did a complete 180 and turned into utter disgust before throwing his cards down on the bench, "Bah! I need to come up with new tricks".
Diego got closer, close enough to get a good look at their cards, drawn by hand over sheets of thick paper. The pot lied right there in between the cards, a stack of beans, or something that looked close enough to them.
"What you should do is learn to play better", the priest chuckled as he jumped to claim the beans for himself like they would help him pay rent, "My friend".
In between attempts to control his laughter while filling his pockets with his winnings, he finally noticed the young revenant standing awkwardly next to them. He swiped his cards away with a hint of embarrassment, while his partner immediately straightened up his back.
"Welcome!", the priest held out a burly and calloused hand, "Sorry for keeping you waiting, I didn't notice you. I'm Father Kwaku, head of this humble church".
The man in the djellaba coughed loudly and without discretion, a polite way of reminding his partner to not overextend his authority.
"And this is Hassan, the imam for the Muslims that attend our humble sanctuary", Kwaku quickly corrected, "Who is also a very respected and cherished member of our community".
"Pleasure to meet you", Hassan said with his back as stiff as a stick, trying to instill the image of respect and responsibility that many religious figures strived for. Not that of the man that had just badly lost a can's worth of beans and played with hand-drawn cards.
Diego nodded his head and took the hand, only for his own to get completely enveloped between Kwaku's. The priest had the most bizarre pattern of skin tones he had seen so far. Instead of the random way in which they were usually placed without care, whoever had sewed him up did so under a fit of artistic inspiration. One half of his body was made up entirely of darker shades that clashed with the clearer ones on the other side, both irregularly separated by a barrier in the middle of his body that snaked away down his neck and into his clothes.
"Diego, nice to meet you too", he said, trying to be as inconspicuous as he could while his eyes darted through the priest's skin.
"If you don't mind me asking, how long have you been around here?"
"You mean after… you know?", Diego snapped out, caught unaware by the question. It was still a very sore subject.
"Yes, but only if you feel comfortable".
"It's been… a few months", he felt a sharp pinch behind his eyes. Time had mercilessly kept on moving forwards, taking him further away from his old life with every passing day, with every minute. So much had happened that he'd barely any chance to stop and think about it.
"It's not really a long time, given what's happened".
"Maybe", he sighed with heavy frustration. His shoulders suddenly felt like they were made out of iron, "I don't even have a clue".
"If you'll excuse me", Hassan interrupted, "I have to attend some business, and I don't think I'll be much help here. May peace be upon you".
Father Kwaku then turned to the imam and waved his hand, "And upon you, peace", and then, just as Hassan was leaving through the door, he quickly turned again to Diego, "Can you believe that man? I have to attend some business", his impression sounded just like the man's own voice, and he straightened his back in the exact same way the imam did, "He's a good man, but tries too hard to look important. He's probably going to get some tea".
The priest filled his cheeks and imitated Hassan's round face and mighty expression, fishing out a chuckle out of Diego. In his opinion, humor always had a way to lighten people up and bring the present back to focus. Now he could do his work.
"So, did you come here because of religion, or because you wanted to be with people from home?"
"The second one, I've… never been very religious", it was an odd thing to say in a house with so much worship, and Diego couldn't help but feel out of place, "My family has always been very Catholic, but it never rubbed on me. But turns out there's life after death, and magic, and other places outside Earth, and aliens…sort of. Maybe I should try again or something".
"Would you do it because you want to, or because you feel you should?", Kwaku wondered.
"Is believing in God weirder than anything out there?", Diego let all his weight fell into the closest bench, "It wouldn't be that much of a jump. I just wish it'd come easier for me, all this about believing and faith".
"Everyone relates to faith in their own way", the priest lifted his legs and made himself comfortable on the bench, "I don't think you'll do yourself any favors if you're not sincere and pray only because you think you have to. You'll just end up angry at yourself and God".
"I thought the whole deal with priests was to convert people".
"For some, but I'd rather help people first", he then pointed at the crucified figure, "I have him watching, after all".
"Do you really think he does, even all the way here?"
"I'm no one to be the judge of that, but I like to believe that even in this strange place, he still looks out for us. However, that doesn't mean that we don't have a responsibility to one another. For example, take this woman, Epifania, she's a Catholic too, and is going through a crisis of faith, so me and others here help her as we can, listening to her worries and supporting her, even if she's too prideful to accept it at first".
"I just met her outside, turns out we work at the same place".
"Oh", Father Kwaku's face turned two shades paler. He realized that maybe he should've used another person as an example, or even someone outside of his flock, "Don't tell her I said anything, it's a sensitive topic and she can have a… let's say… strong attitude".
"Yeah, she made that pretty clear", Fani's earlier piercing eyes and absolute disregard for what anyone would think of her quickly came to mind, "Is that why she's so intense?"
"I can't go into details, and it wouldn't be respectful to her, but she deserves some understanding. She doesn't look like it, but she's more than 100 years-old and enjoyed a big family that she loved. Now, can you imagine how does it feel? She spent her whole life following the church, going through hardships, losing her husband, and by the end of it all, ready to see it end. She was ready to see her husband again, and instead wakes up here, forced to go through everything all over again".
"If you look at it like that, yeah, I'd be in a crummy mood too. Can't imagine what it's like".
"And there's other people like that, everyone going on with their own struggles".
"Tell me about it", Diego leaned back on the bench, head looking at the ceiling, "I just stopped feeling like puking every time I go out and find some guy that makes me reevaluate all I learned about biology in school".
"And there's a whole wide world of them outside this city", Kwaku then jumped back up, filled with energy, and tilted his head to Diego, "But there's something I have to show you here first".
Hesitant at first, the younger revenant quickly rationalized that he was already inside of the church, and if the priest had wanted something out of him, he could've just made his move earlier, so there was nothing to lose. He lazily got up and followed him like a sheep back to the entrance and away from the figure of Christ. Father Kwaku then smiled proudly at the cork panel hanging on the wall, with all sorts of papers and ads tacked onto it, and handed one of them to Diego.
"People put here all sort of ads on classes and things they can gift away. How'd you like to go to the local community college to learn some magic?"
The kravist looked at it, showing a drawing of man in working clothes attending classes after his job and a list of courses, from basic ones like elementary math and reading to more advanced ones. Crammed between a sewing course and a youth book club waited the class Introduction to Modern Magical Development.
"You could also try a class on the local language, since the translation spell they put on you is going to start failing one day. Lots of our people have signed up."
"It doesn't sound too bad", Diego examined the ad with genuine curiosity, "Maybe I'll give it a try".