Time After Time, Part One

Time After Time, Part One tells two stories in parallel, one from most ancient Egypt (Kemet) told by Ishaq, an escaped servant of Tehuti-the revered demigod, the other story from modern times told through the eyes of Isaac, a grad school dropout entranced by alternative views of the ancient world-who gets an opportunity to explore it firsthand.

In the ancient story, Ishaq escapes from his demigod master, Tehuti. He flees up the Nile to the capital of the land of Kemet. There he becomes one of many builders of the great pyramid. Years later, Tehuti visits the great city and suspects him. Ishaq is smitten with the master's youngest wife, Zahra. A natural disaster twists their fates together, as the three of them, along with a male servant, take refuge in the nearly completed pyramid. There Ishaq's survival depends upon his value as a guide through the passges of the mighty structure. In secret, Zahra asks Ishaq for help to escape her abuser, before her demigod master kills him.

In the modern story, two old friends-Hannah and her ex from college, Isaac, get together at a coffee shop in Cornell, NY. to discuss astronomical physics. Hannah is a graduate student and researcher at the Carl Sagan Institute of the Cornell Center for Astrophysics and Planetary Science. Isaac, her former classmate who majored in Classics at Cornell-a courseload covering everything from lost languages to archaeology believes that either the moon has begun to drift away from earth more rapidly than before, or time . . . never mind, that other explanation is impossible. Yet a more "primitive" test used by ancient astronomers seems to bear out this hypothesis. When Isaac verfies the change during a soloar eclipse, he catches the attention of a wealthy and beautiful Egyptian woman who seems overly interested in alternative theories about ancient Egypt.