Strangely Jared doesn't feel overly worried about being in the lap of a giant jackal man.
"Anubis...so I'm guessing you don't have an army of evil mummies?"
Hard to tell, on a non human face, but Jared is pretty sure he sees a wry grin.
"No. You people have become...so afraid of death. It wasn't always that way. You've all inherited the Greek neuroses, I think."
Jared blinks, a little confused.
"So...this...is what happens when you die? You get a hug from the Egyptian God of the Underworld?"
Anubis throws his head back, parting his jackal jaws. Instead of a howl, a rich, rolling laugh flows out. Oddly, Jared finds it...comforting. Normal. Less surreal than...everything else going on.
"No, no, this is a special occasion. Different psychopomps, what you might call grim reapers, come for different people. But we don't need to get into the particulars now. Suffice it to say that your soul, such as it is, is going through an...unusual series of events."
Jared felt a shiver.
"Such as it is...?"
Anubis nodded, and slowly picked Jared up, just as if he was a small child, and placed him, standing, on the sands.
"It's better than it sounds. I'll let Djheut - Thoth, in your time - explain."
Jared nods, and stands....and realizes for the first time that he's buck naked. He tries to cover himself.
"Eeep!"
"Heh, calm down. Your soul is reconstructing its image from memory - if you had a particular outfit that you thought of as quintessentially part of you, you would be wearing it. As is, you're soul is just putting together what it knows to be you, which is your body. We are gods, Jared, we're not going to laugh at your nakedness."
Anubis stands, easily nine feet tall. He tilts his head in a canine fashion.
"...well. Neither Thoth or I will. I make no promises about anyone else, we tend to be as variable as mortals in terms of personality...."
At that, Thoth began slowly walking over. Jared heard the sand moving, and turned to see the bird-man approach.
"If you like," he said in that cold-but-not-cruel tone, "I can conjure you something simple to wear."
"Um. Yes please."
The bird man waves a hand, and a white garment materializes on Jared's spiritual body. It looks shapeless, but clean, like a medical smock without a gap in the back.
"Uh...thank you."
The bird face nods.
"It is no trouble. We have much to do to balance the scales that Wepwawet's amulet has set askew."
Jared, feeling entirely out of his depth, just sort of nodded along.
"...Ah. I sense you are a bit confused."
A rumble from Anubis, and a comforting hand - paw? - rests on Jared's shoulder.
"Try to keep it simple, Thrice-Great. He is only a boy."
The bird face tilts, then nods.
"Very well. Let us begin at the beginning."
A wave of a hand, and the amulet hangs suspended in the air. But, as Jared looks, he sees it is see through. A hologram?
"Long ago, the various gods of humankind went to war with each other, because of...well, you don't need to know that. Several reasons, same as any war. Wepwawet was a war god, and..."
The bird-man looked at the jackal. Another rumble, more like a sigh.
"Wepwawet is my younger brother. That does not make him less of a monster."
Jared looks back and forth between the two gods of old Khem.
"Um," he says, "Where do I come in?"
"Shortly, in the story, although about five thousand years, give or take a century, if you mean chronologically. As I was saying...?"
Jared gulps, and nods, feeling dwarfed both by these giants and by the scope of time. The ibis nods in turn.
"Wepwawet joined the faction that felt humankind should be subjects of the gods. Property, serfs, slaves, what have you. Anubis and I...we were of the faction that saw your people as our children."
The magician god cleared his throat.
"Suffice it to say Wepwawet and his faction lost the war. The peace was...somewhat inconsistent. Some of the Old Gods are still out and about. Wepwawet, however, fell early. He crossed paths in a conflict with Enki, who was a mighty force on our side. He lost. Enki imprisoned him in the amulet."
The hologram of the amulet changed, suddenly, into the dog tags. The bird face was considerably harder to read even than the jackal, but Jared thought it looked amused.
"You know your story up to this point, so I will elide that."
"Thanks, I...don't want to talk about what just happened."
The bird head nods, gravely.
"Yes. It was quite traumatic. When this is over, I will send you to a certain therapist who is a devotee of mine. He will help you."
Jared was startled. He expected a lot of things from an ancient god, but offers for therapy weren't one of them.
"Wepwawet has, in addition to being cruel, gone quite mad. But that allowed your brother to exploit the enchantment AND Wepwawet's own power, which is to open ways where there are none. Your brother has a talent for Magic, and I and certain colleagues of mine will be watching over him henceforth. But suffice it to say, he is still an amateur. He didn't quite manage what he wanted, which was to get his brother and his dog."
Jared was more confused than ever.
"I don't understand. Then who was Shaggy?"
"You."
Jared stared, blankly. Anubis squeezed his shoulder.
"Your brother split your soul in half. Both boy and dog thought they were Jared. Both were right."