Leareth doesn't, which is bizarre - maybe he's just forgotten, but it's the kind of procedural memory that should stick better. It's not impossible that some third group other than the Tayledras worships the Star-Eyed and uses one of the star symbols. He's fairly sure that he would recognize any symbol affiliated with Astera, though. His top theory, now that he's managed to eke out a few more thoughts, is now that they're on Velgarth's other continent, somehow. That doesn't make a huge amount of sense, it's an order of magnitude too far to Gate even when he's not dying, but it's less confusing than somewhere like this existing without his knowledge on the continent where he's spent centuries operating. 

He's not sure if he thinks the woman's affect obviously means opposition to the gods, as opposed to her feeling it was important to communicate that the House of Healing isn't affiliated with a specific temple? Karal could probably get a better sense with Empathy, though. 

Karal did not know there was a second continent!  (...Also he only knows what a continent is because Leareth's thoughts carry that information.)  That does seem like the sort of place that might be this strange and alien - and have different gods as well, he supposes.  Does Leareth have a guess about whether they hate him too?

Empathy, yes, all right.  How does the young woman feel about these gods?

The woman's feelings are mostly that this is really awkward! She's still not sure she interpreted the question right and it would be so embarrassing to give that whole elaborate answer if he actually wanted to know something about the courthouse! 

There's not particularly a sense of hostility in her emotional reaction to what she drew? Mostly the sense is that she thinks of the whole topic as a sensitive and fraught one- and a private one, there's definitely a sense of feeling-exposed in a way she doesn't expect to encounter usually and that's throwing her off-balance - and a feeling that she's worried about his reaction and whether he's going to be uncomfortable with her. 

Oh no!  He's... not exactly sorry about asking her apparently private questions, this is important, but he's sorry that she feels awkward about it, and definitely doesn't want her to be worried.  He gives a serious nod and... how can he make this right...

He nods, then draws another figure and points to himself, and on it both a sun and a scribbled out circle - not even referring to Leareth, he himself is... really not sure about anything, right now.

There, now they have both shared private and somewhat vulnerable information, is that better?  She can't think he'd be uncomfortable with her given this, surely, but he adds a small friendly-calm-apologetic-appreciative Empathy push just in case.

So, this place has some sort of complicated god situation where... multiple gods are worshipped but people dislike each other based on this and try to keep it secret?  It seems like a difficult thing to keep secret to Karal, when the temples obviously aren't, but perhaps he's missing something.

Marian supposes this is marginally less awkward than her patient demanding a Muslim nurse, which probably isn't even a request they could accommodate on this shift. She’s…not sure why it was worth it to him to put what must have been quite a lot of effort into conveying this question, given that it’s not clear how he’s planning to act on the answer? 

He did seem - surprised about it, or confused, or something. She’s not sure what to make of it, or of his own drawing - that he deconverted from a religion that uses the sunburst symbol, maybe? But that’s still not an answer to why he brought it up at all…

She tries to smile reassuringly at him anyway, even though at this point she has no idea what she’s reassuring him about.

(To Empathy, her affect is - not upset or stressed, but definitely bemused.)

Yes, there are confusing things going on with him and he cannot (and possibly shouldn't) explain them.  He gives her an apologetic smile, nods, and switches to a topic he hopes will make more sense.  (Although this is so much drawing, his hand is starting to cramp, he's not used to holding a pen for very long and he's weak and uncoordinated on top of that...)

He takes the earlier sheet with his drawing of a town, and adds the Sun-In-Glory to the temple building.  Draws the borders of Karse on the empty half, as best he can remember them, and some reasonable guesses at the borders of the surrounding countries.  Labels a few in small Rethwellani letters (rather crookedly given how much effort all this is, but it's not as if she can read them anyway, it's just important that it looks like writing).  Draws a dot in Karse, circles the town, points to the town and the dot and himself.  Then points to her drawing of this town, to the building around them, and a few blank areas outside the drawn map.  Questioning gesture?

It’s pretty clear what he’s trying to communicate, and it might be a more successful communication if Marian…sucked less…at geography… Maybe she could track it down on Google Earth but that sounds time-consuming and she’s not incredibly hopeful.

Also she can tell he’s tiring himself out - it’s actually really impressive he had the stamina to draw this many things - and she should probably encourage him to rest soon. (And either make a bigger effort to find someone to help turn him, or just do it herself and tank the lower back injury risk.) 

It's pretty reasonable of him to want to know where they are, though she's...confused...how he ended up in a Reno Walmart with a stab wound while not knowing he's in Reno. She's starting to feel like there must be a weirder and more complicated story here. 

She is absolutely not going to try to draw the United States borders. She'll pull up Google Maps on her phone and show him that way?

Leareth is missing a lot of memories and context but he’s still fairly sure he’s never seen an artifact like that before.

(He can’t sense any magic from it, which is a little confusing, but he’s groggy and not in control of the body and can’t poke at his mage-sight on purpose, so probably it’s just not working properly.)

What is that??

Why does this kind young woman whose really very normal-feeling emotions he's been sensing have an incredibly complicated mage-artifact sitting in her pocket?

...And even more confusingly, why is she not acting like that's what she has??  She very obviously isn't - she pulled it out and did some intricate and unbelievable things to it and did not at any point look like she thought this was at all out of the ordinary or like she expected him to think so.  Is magic so common in this place?? 

Karal's shock is very obvious.  He's definitely making no gestures in the direction of touching this thing, but he isn't taking his eyes off it.  He wishes he could figure out mage-sight right this second, but he almost certainly shouldn't be piling more new factors onto an already unbelievable situation...

It takes him a moment to realize the thing he's looking at is - of course, that's what he asked for - a map.  He... really doesn't know what to do with the information that they use mage-artifacts instead of maps here.

It’s a map that can zoom in and out to different scales, even! Marian starts at the dot for her current location, points out the hospital on the map and gestures at the room around them, and then uses her fingers to zoom out until she can point at the city and say “Reno”, and then zoom zoom zoom out to the state (“Nevada”) and finally the country with both coasts visible (“America”).

That…is not the other continent Leareth is aware of, the shape is wrong. Is there a third major continent that he’s somehow missed the existence of for two thousand years?? One that has zero outside trade but internally has impossibly advanced mage-artifacts…???

Marian can pick up on the patient’s surprise and awe. Has he never seen a touch screen smartphone before? Wow. 

He absolutely hasn't!

He's never seen "America" before either, although at this point it's probably hard for her to tell what specifically he's having that wide-eyed reaction to.

But she does such a good job with her clear map demonstration that, when she pauses, he manages to copy her repeated zoom gesture in a request to show him more of the map instead of stopping at the still-unfamiliar continent outline. 

…Sure, okay, she can do that. She’s not sure why he wants that - has he never seen a map of the world before, what is this dude’s deal - it’s not like he’s illiterate, she saw him writing in whatever that language is…

Fully zooming out doesn’t work great on a phone, she has to pan back and forth to view all the continents, but: here’s Europe, here’s Asia, here’s Africa, here’s Australia…

…Leareth is so incredibly confused.

... Is Leareth very sure they're not dead?

He said he's been dead before, so surely he would know, but Karal is back to feeling like that's the best explanation for how they ended up in a different world entirely.

... No, if this was what happened to the dead then all these people would know it, and wouldn't act so surprised about everything.

Well.  Karal is also incredibly confused - and too confused, or maybe just too tired, to think of any more questions.  Maybe things will make more sense after they've slept?

Leareth is pretty sure this is not what being dead is like, and that "being dead" is probably not the best explanation for apparently ending up in another world. (He's not certain of that, thinking is so hard and he feels so agonizingly disoriented, it feels entirely possible that he’s somehow catastrophically failing at reading maps.)

…anyway it doesn’t seem like there are any decisions to be made right now, they're almost certainly not in acute danger and Leareth is deeply badly placed to evaluate and mitigate any longer-term danger, and the exhaustion is starting to feel intense enough that Leareth wouldn't be surprised if sleep happens at some point regardless of whether they're planning on it. 

Marian is now burning with curiosity about this guy's deal, but also he looks so tired and she wants to leave him be to rest but doesn't want to leave him flat on his back for another two hours. 

She tries to mime "helping him roll over" - honestly, he can probably contribute enough that she's not putting her back at risk? - and then points at him, pillows her head on her hand and closes her eyes? 

If Leareth might be catastrophically failing at reading maps then they definitely should just sleep and try to think about all this again when they're rested.  But this place scribbling out all the gods should be a good sign about not being in acute danger, yes?  So they can probably afford to take some time.  ... Not that they necessarily have much choice about it.  The young woman miming sleep makes him feel so tired.

And she... needs him to not be on his back first?  ...Yes, that does sound really nice.  He didn't realize it was allowed, since most other comfortable things aren't, so he'd just been ignoring that entire category of problem.

The idea of having a young woman help him roll over in bed fills him with vague mortification.  Can he just do it himself?  Maybe he's enough of an invalid that he genuinely can't, but he's definitely at least going to try.  He does feel very weak, and it becomes immediately obvious that he shouldn't be using his core muscles for much, but his legs and arms more or less work, the side of the bed has something he can hold on to and pull, and he is very willing to ignore any pain that doesn't feel like it's doing him real damage.  (His intuition for what counts as real damage might use a higher bar than Marian would like.)

...Ah, he's that type of guy. (Also some other more complicated type of guy, she really doesn't know what's going on here, but "youngish previously-healthy man who has his pride and absolutely does not want help with anything basic" is absolutely an archetype of patient she's seen a lot of in the trauma ICU.)

It's fine??? She's not totally un-stressed about it, but she'll settle for helping him only by managing the various tubes and by tucking a row of pillows behind his back so he has something to lean against. 

He is absolutely that type of guy, yes. 

He gives her an apologetic look about the extra stress (and about wanting so much confusing information earlier), smiles tiredly, maybe touches her hand if she puts it close enough for that to be a reasonable gesture, and is out like a light the moment he stops trying to stay awake.

Awww. Marian will definitely squeeze his hand reassuringly and smile back, and then feel quietly pleased with herself when he's clearly asleep less than thirty seconds later and even looks mostly comfortable. 

...She's really quite confused about what happened just now?? "Guy who stabbed himself in the aisle at Walmart before it was technically open" was already bizarre enough, and that was before they identified all the injuries that look neither self-inflicted nor possible to pick up in a Walmart aisle. And that was before he woke up, proved not to speak English, cared a weird amount about communicating something related to his religious background, is from a country she definitely doesn't recognize on a map (not that this is saying enormously much), and also acted like he had never seen a smartphone before and was having his mind utterly blown by Google Maps. 

She's at least a lot less worried now that he's actively suicidal, unless he's doing a very good job of hiding it, but that just means his serious injuries are even more inexplicable. He didn't show any sign of a head injury, so it seems implausible he has complete amnesia over how he ended up in Nevada (it would be implausible even with a head injury, unlike in fiction it's pretty rare for someone to have retrograde amnesia and no other problems.) 

How much are the many questions she has actually a priority? She needs to think more about how she would draw the question "what happened to you?" and isn't 100% sure he wants to answer, and she kind of wants to give him a break from drawing complicated things, he was managing it remarkably well but it pretty clearly wore him out. 

...If he's confused about that many things, he plausibly doesn't really understand what they're doing treatment-wise, which must be stressful and scary. It's maybe a higher priority for Marian to convey to him, like, what all the tubes in him are for? 

Also, obviously the highest priority here is making sure he stays stable. How's he looking?