The Mummy

Dear Nadir,

I had a nice trip to Egypt, well until the locus showed up and then the frogs and the fiery hail and the other bad things. But it was still a nice trip. I even got to take part in a very nice archeological expedition. Of course when the boat burned down under me I should have suspected that the trip wouldn't end in quite the way one might hope.

Actually I hadn't planned on going to Egypt at the point in time. Oh eventually I would have gone, but maybe it was better this way. After all it wasn't like I needed to sleep or anything was going on at home at the time. Maybe it was because of that movie Xander and I saw the week before, The Mummy. It was a decent movie, better than the original version, but with ILM doing the FX what else could one expect? I hear they are talking about making a sequel.

I had had every intention of going to the Library to help my uncle with his research that day, but the next thing I knew there I was in the middle of the Nile on a boat. Being used to being Called like that I decided to enjoy the weather, it was raining still in So Cal.

When bandits decided to attack our boat and set it afire, I naturally jumped ship. You should have seen the commotion that a group of American passengers made shooting at the bandits. The shore wasn't that far away and the swim as nice, if a little muddy, though not nearly as bad as some I've taken. And when I got to dry land I found myself in the company of the most unusual people; two Englishmen, well a brother and sister, an American, and a fat slob of a jailer. (Pardon my description, but I can think of no kinder words to describe him.) All headed on an expedition. Naturally I offered my service as an explorer and adventurer and that's how my trip began.

I don't know why I'm telling you this since you will surely think me mad, but I find I need to tell someone. Apparently this little expedition of theirs was heading out in search of the City of the Dead. Since I was rather curious about the topic myself I was pleased that they were willing to allow me to join them. Who knew I was in for the adventure of a lifetime? (As long as it was not my lifetime, as you will soon see why.)

I dislike camels profusely. They are almost enough to make even the most stouthearted seasick. And the getting up and down is sheer terror. Well naturally we were traveling by camel. (There are worse things in life. Remind me not to tell you about them sometime.) The City of the Dead, Hamanaptra as some call it, was rather splendid, situated in the abandoned crater of sleeping volcano as it is. There were some spectacular examples of early Egyptian architecture, an interest of mine (architecture in general that is) inspired by a mutual friend. And when we descended into the city its self, most of it had been buried by drifting sand, we found something very intriguing.

You probably wouldn't understand the complexities behind it, curses not being your interest, but we actually found a victim of the hom-dai. And yes I do mean victim. The poor fellow had been the slave to love, and as you well know I am something of an expert on that.

Apparently he (I know it was a he because I have never in all my life met a woman who was that arrogant. Not even that horrid woman in Persia. No offense meant to you, or your country.) had killed the Pharaoh for his love and then when she was framed, (actually she may have been guilty,) and killed. He tried to bring her back to life. This seemed to have been big mistake, because it was for this reason that he was cursed. I found the situation and excellent opportunity to study the curse and I shall try to apply what I learned to another curse, of which I have written to you before. Unfortunately I feel that to fully understand everything I shall have to learn to read Egyptian hieroglyphs. And as you well know that while I speak languages fairly easily reading is not my strong suit. But I digress.

Remember the Americans I mentioned, the ones that were on the boat? Well they too were searching for the city. They found something called the Book of the Dead. Though from what I have learned from Eve, one of the two British in our party, it could also be called the book of the night. Somehow this book, when read aloud, was able to wake our hom-dai victim.

That's when the locus I mentioned earlier showed up. Who would have thought that something as simple as reading a book would cause such an interesting effect? I suppose that is just another one of the many complexities of curses.

But I have forgotten a very important part of my story. The day before all this occurred, the day we arrived at Hamanaptra, we began our dig. The Americans arrived at the same time we did, resulting in some competition between our two groups. Nothing serious only a small bet of about five hundred dollars, American. As we were digging, we both managed to find the base of the same statue of Anubis. Eve said that it was where the book of Amun Re was hidden. Due to fewer people in our party we lost the statue, but Eve found a room under the one where the statue was and we planned to dig our way up under the Americans and take back our statue. (We had found it first.) While we were digging our Jailor friend disappeared somewhere. Just as we realized this, a large stone sarcophagus fell from the ceiling where we had been digging. It was the most unusual thing I had ever seen, and I have seen some interesting things. There was a lock on the side of the sarcophagus, (who ever heard of wanting to lock a dead person in?) Jonathan, the other of the two Brits in our party, had a box that opened up into a key that fit the lock. I have since won said box from him in a card game, the man does like to gambol. If I ever explain what the box does you will understand why I felt the need to join in a game of cards when, as you know, I rarely if ever gambol. Just as Eve was about to open the outer sarcophagus we heard the missing member of our party screaming. We all ran to investigate the problem. We found him just in time to watch him run pell-mell into a wall. When we examined the body he was quite dead.

That night we learned that the Americans had also lost some of their team members to a digging accident. They had come across a booby trap while opening a hidden compartment at the base of the statue of Anubis. We were just discussing curses when both camps were attacked by men on horseback. They resembled the bandits who attacked the boat I had originally found myself on. After a brief gun fight, where one of the Americans was wounded, O'Connell, the American in our party, out bluffed the attackers with a lit stick of dynamite. The attackers left, their leader giving us an ultimatum that we had to leave the next day. The rest of the night was quiet, I know because I kept watch all night. The next day we opened the outer and inner sarcophagi and found a most unusual sight, a Mummy who was still decomposing, and very wet. Even I know that part of the mummification process is to dry the body so they don't keep decomposing. This same day the Americans found some treasure, the reason most of us were here. They also found a book, but not the book of Amun Re, it was the Book of the Dead, Eve said. It was Eve who read the book aloud, by the way. And that brings me back to where I interrupted myself.

Imagine my surprise when we discovered that the Mummy we had found had woken up. He certainly was not that terrible to look upon, well not nearly as bad as some of the things I spent my summer break fighting, but one does not generally find such things as walking corpses in the living world. As least not anywhere except perhaps where Uncle Rupert lives. I was even more surprised when he started attacking the members of the American party. That was, until some of the bandits, the same ones who had burned our ship and attacked our camp the night before, explained that he was only fulfilling the curse. I for one feel a little sorry for the chap; after all he did not ask to have it done to him.

So back we went up the Nile, Americans too, fleeing for their lives. I had offered to stay at Hamanaptra, I certainly didn't fear the fellow, but my companions would hear nothing of it, and natural as any predator, the Mummy followed us. It was most fascinating, the way he killed his prey. He used the desert sands to mummify them then used their juices to rejuvenate himself. The American in our party, O'Connell, seems to have an affinity for guns. I use the present tense because he still lives and still has this affinity. Eve is a librarian and has a sense of duty that rivals mine at times. Her brother Jonathan has an affinity for drink and gambling, as I believe I mentioned before. The Jailer never made it out of the City of the Dead, alive. In all, not the worst group one could wish for when tackling the task of stopping the Mummy from destroying the world, or ruling it, as I believe that to have been his real intention, he can't be killed by the way. The Americans, as I said earlier have a definite affinity for guns and for running. A deadly combination as they soon found out.

Well it was back down the Nile to Cairo for us, to the dubious safety of the local British fort. I say dubious because it was here that we discovered that the Mummy was capable of turning himself into the desert sands and entering any room he wished, locked or no. Actually he used this same technique to drain the bodies of the Americans and rejuvenate himself. Though he could only do this to a few people (ones who had opened a cursed chest, in this case the Americans. The chest being the one the Book of the Dead was in.). But until this regeneration processes was completed he didn't care much for cats. Apparently cats guard the underworld. Wouldn't our architecture loving friend have found that interesting, though I'm sure you don't.

In Cairo the Mummy killed all of the Americans with the exception of O'Connell (Who had developed a tendre for Eve). Not a bad looking Mummy if I do say so myself, especially once he was regenerated, though very arrogant. Once he was fully regenerated the Mummy set about bringing back his love. According to what Eve later told me, he needed a human sacrifice to do this. I don't know if gender played a role but for some reason he chose Eve. This naturally required that he take her and bring her back to the City of the Dead, where his love was buried. As I'm sure you will understand I felt compelled to stop him from killing Eve, as did her brother and O'Connell.

Since this required the locating of a book (the book of Amun Ra), we too had to go back to Hamanaptra. Because of the time constraints placed on us O'Connell enlisted the help of an old Great War pilot with a death wish and a Med-jai named Bay (Med-jai are the descendants of Pharaoh's body guards). It turned out to be a good thing he had a death wish too, the pilot not Bay, because the Mummy fellow created a very impressive wall of sand emblazoned with his face which swallowed the bi-plane we happened to be flying in. In the crash our pilot died. Sand does not do wonders for machinery. Luckily for us we had arrived at the City of the Dead when the plane crashed.

It took us some time to locate the book of Amun Ra partly because it was buried in the labyrinth that had once been the city and partly due to the resurrection of a large number of the Mummy's priests, which were surprisingly difficult to kill, possibly because they were already dead. Once we did find the book we had to find Eve and fight off another batch of priests while trying to retrieve the key needed to open the book, from the Mummy who had taken it from Jonathan. This was complicated when Jonathan tried to help using his rudimentary knowledge of Hieratic by reading an inscription on the cover of the book. This woke a number of Pharaoh's mummified guards who fought on the wrong side (against us) until Jonathan was able to finish the incantation. Of course by this time there were only four of these mummies left, thanks to O'Connell's fighting skills. Jonathan then ordered them to destroy the Mummy's love, which naturally infuriated the Mummy who tried to kill Jonathan.

Ever resourceful, Jonathan used the opportunity to get the key. Naturally he was not our first choice for finding an incantation to stop the Mummy. Fortunately by this time Evelyn was freed and able to do that while O'Connell kept the Mummy occupied, mostly at the result of being thrown across the room. The end result of all of this was that the Mummy impaled himself on a sword O'Connell was holding and was sucked down into a pool of black gooey stuff, one of several surrounding the chamber. All of this after his immortal spirit had been sent back to the underworld.

Now I'm not certain if this was a result of the Mummy's death or not (it wouldn't have been the first time such a thing has happened), but the city started to sink further into the sand and we had quite a time getting out before it was swallowed. Obviously we did succeed since I'm writing this and you should receive it in the post in a few days time. Outside we found ready transportation in the form of a herd of camels that had been grazing in the area. Have I ever told you how much I dislike camels? We also found Bay who we had assumed to be dead, since he had taken on a number of the dead priests with nothing but an empty shot gun.

Despite being alive I found myself in the middle of a somewhat depressed party due to the fact that Jonathan had dropped the book of Amun Ra into a pool of the black gooey stuff on our way out and they were unable to lay hands on any of the treasure we happened upon. That is until they discovered that someone, most likely the Mummy's weaselly henchman, had packed the saddlebags of one of the camels with gold treasure.

And that pretty much finishes my trip. I went back to my Uncle, he didn't believe my story, and back to work at my books. I don't know how much of this you will believe, but you have shared an adventure or two with me, I hope you won't think it all false. It certainly isn't what you would normally see on a tour of Egypt. I still can't help thinking that it isn't over. 'Death is only the beginning' Imhotep said as he died.

Well any way, give my love to Daurius.

Love,

Sac.