A golden bull framed dead-center in an ancient stone gate as the last light comes through — the geometry of a Mithraic doorway, built so the setting sun would land on the god exactly here, exactly now. For three centuries Roman soldiers worshipped the bull-slayer in windowless rooms like this one, and Christianity won by a nose. In another timeline the West spent two thousand years kneeling to the bull, and we would not be so surprised by what is coming.
"Christianity won by a nose" is a wild way to summarize late antiquity and yet
the mithraea being underground and the herd's chamber being at the crown is not lost on me