The raven flew away and John was left to reflect on the ease with which he had sold out the goose and all of the work that he had been doing for most of his life. When presented with the chance to acquire the answers he had desperately wanted for so long his mind became clouded by greed and he could do nothing but submit to the raven, and he knew that there would be many more times when their interactions would end in exactly the same manner. The raven was a remarkable creature, being in its presence he could feel its power' like the raven had made his office its territory and ensnared him within it without any chance of escape. He thought about his wife's words regarding the egg and after his conversation with the raven he was beginning to have similar thoughts. The raven had the same deep darkness about it as the egg, and its powers of persuasion made it impossible to refuse. Increasingly troubled by what he had become a part of, John put the egg away in the drawer of his desk and got back to his work. He opened his laptop and looked at some reports that had been e-mailed to him from researchers out in the field. One of the researchers had sent him an e-mail containing pictures that she'd taken from inside a pyramid in China that contained within it two-storey high statues of the goose. He read the e-mails disinterestedly and wasn't nearly as excited about the pictures of the statues as he would have been just a day ago. The egg, sitting in his desk drawer, was calling out to him. Even with it being just an arm's length away, he was experiencing separation anxiety. His wife's words came to mind again, specifically when she'd said that nothing good would come of them keeping the egg. The Raven had lied to him during their conversation, he was sure of that. It wasn't because it wasn't an egotist like the goose that the raven's name or likeness didn't appear anywhere; John suspected, having met the raven and come into contact with the egg, was that those that had been in the same position that he was in had come to the conclusion that the raven and the black egg were so dangerous that nobody should know about them. John was facing a severe dilemma. Despite all that he had put into finding it, his chances of ever meeting the goose were slim to none, making the opportunity that the raven had offered him the only opportunity of its kind that he might receive. He wondered, also, why the raven had made contact with him and not the goose. He had given his life to the goose, and the goose must have been aware of his dedication, the raven was, and yet the goose had made no contact with him like the raven had, had done nothing to recognize his unwavering devotion to educating the world about the unparalleled divinity of the goose. Why had the goose not made any effort to reach out to him? Why had the goose chosen someone else as its pilgrim when for decades he had been a lone voice, suffering ridicule from all corners, advocating for the elevation of the goose to its rightful place? Was it not the slightest bit grateful for all that he had done? All that he had sacrificed? John became angry. He was angry at the goose for the way that it had ignored him, for forcing him into a position where he had no choice but to accept the raven's dubious offer. John decided that he would respond to the goose's indifference to him by allying himself with the raven and wouldn't look back. He made up his mind to go to New York and meet with David Huntsman, and once he had the volume of the egg decreased and he was no longer feeling separation anxiety. He took the egg out of his desk drawer and down to the vault, being careful to make sure that John White, the church archivist, didn't see it. He stored the egg in a special safe for which he had the only key and returned to his office to take a closer look at those pictures of the goose statues.