Summary: Post night at the museum; begins before the second movie. Unluckily assigned to write a research paper on the public's level of interest in Egyptology, Kiya must visit the Museum of Natural History every day for two weeks and stay by Ahkmenrah's coffin. It is a boring task, but when she takes to talking to the still Pharaoh, life begins to get just a little more interesting. And interesting isn't even the half of it.

Hey! Third chapter is heeere!

Disclaimer: all the characters in the movie and its universe belong to...well, the people who made the movie! The only characters I own are Kiya, her friends, and her family.

R&R, please, and I hope you enjoy reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it!


Chapter 3

"Kiya! How went the weekend visit? More productive, I hope!" Professor Goedet taught Kiya's last Monday class, Cultural History of Ancient Egypt (which was different from her Friday class with him). Once everyone in the class had gone, with the exception of Kiya, Horem, and Annie, he approached them and asked this.

"Well, the professor is always right...in this case, that is," Kiya replied, "There were tour groups who visited the gallery this weekend. Did you know our grandfather found King Ahkmenrah's tomb?"

"Of course," Professor Goedet laughed, "You learned that in your first year here...and you should have known that even before it! Zahi Ganzouri Sr. is best known for his discovery of the boy King. But where did you learn this? Rather..." there was a mischievous glint that sparkled in his eye as he asked, "from whom did you learn it?"

Kiya stared well and hard at the sparkle in her professor's eye, and was able to decipher it after a twelfth of a minute. With an irritated expression on her face, she turned to Annie, who looked down in shame. "Anneliese Lennon..."

"I thought you might tell Professor Goedet...and don't you think, Kiya, that you should tell us? It is, well, you know, a big step for you!"

"And I have to tell you all everything that happens to me, do I?" Kiya flared.

Annie was easily subdued. "I..."

"Hey, Kiya, chill." But Horem was not. Sternly, he stepped in, shielding his girlfriend from their best friend's sudden hostility. "I think we'd have a right to know when you finally got yourself a boyfriend."

"Oh, really? I thought I had a right to know some things, too. But apparently, you didn't think so!"

Horem scoffed, raising his voice as his eyebrows furrowed. "Kiya, what in the world are you talking about this time?"

"I'm talking about mother!" Kiya shouted, on her toes with fury. She shoved an index finger into her brother's chest. "You didn't tell me mother was in Salamis! I had to learn from Baba Zahi... You knew! Don't lie to me and say you didn't, because you did!"

"You never asked!"

"Do I have to ask about my mother!"

"Have you ever thought that she'd tell you if maybe, oh, I don't know, you actually called her to ask once in a while!"

"You think I never tried? She never answers when it's me! Oh, I'm sorry, Miss Ganzouri, but your mother's in a meeting! So sorry, Miss Ganzouri, but your mother's giving a speech at the moment! My deepest apologies, Miss Ganzouri, but your mother has blocked all calls from you since you disgraced yourself by dragging your brother down to New York to study instead of entering the best university in the world, Cambridge!"

"Oh, you've got to be making those up!"

"I'll have none of these quibbles in my classroom!" Professor Goedet finally intervened, stepping in between the two. Motioning for the students and faculty outside watching the scene to leave, he continued, "I'm aware you two have deep-seated issues to sort out, but please, do it somewhere private!"

Kiya groaned at the sight of Horem's face once more. "I don't have time for this nonsense! I apologise for causing a scene, Professor, and Annie, I'm sorry to have raised my voice at you. But goodbye. I'll see you tomorrow." And she stalked out of the classroom, students and members of the faculty watching her as she did.

"That Kiya..." Horem sighed, watching her walk away. Glaring at the watching passersby, he shouted, "What are you all looking at? Get going!"

"Horem, it's all right. You're both just worried about your mom. That's what you told me, remember?" said Annie, squeezing his shoulder. "It's just the same shock you had when you found out your mother went to Salamis..."

"I didn't tell her because I knew she would react far worse than I did," Horem reasoned, to Annie and to the Professor, who raised his eyebrow questioningly. "Mum didn't want her to know, either. Only Baba Zahi ever thinks she's mature enough to know the truth...when obviously, she isn't...that's why she can't ever get a boyfriend!"

"Horem," the Professor shook his head. "There is nothing wrong with Kiya's lack of interest in romance. There was nothing wrong with her visits to the library in the first place. Yes, she may have been antisocial, which is why I agreed to this scheme of yours to get her to go to the museum instead, but you've done all you can. If she finds no one there, so be it. And if she says she has, don't any of you pressure her into telling you. Kiya will only block you out and might even lose the friend she said she has made in the museum. So if romance isn't her primary concern as yours is, Horem, don't make it your problem."

Horem sighed. "Okay, I give. I'll back off. But..."

"I will not always be there to mediate, my boy," said the Professor, "and neither will Miss Lennon. Settle your disputes, and be wise about it. No matter if it is only by three and a half minutes; you are still her older brother. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm late for a faculty meeting."

Kiya walked into the Egyptian gallery of the Museum of Natural History with much stomping, and had Ahkmenrah's jackal guards been alive, they would have watched her in partial amusement and partial curiosity instead of their usual hostility as she passed the archway to reach their king's coffin.

"Did it ever happen to you, Ahkmenrah?" she said as soon as she found her spot, "Did any of your siblings infuriate you as much as Horem does me? He didn't tell me our mother went to Salamis! Tell me why I shouldn't be angry! And then he tries to turn the tables on me by accusing me of never attempting to call mother, which I have, more times than I can count!"

Panting again, she leaned her head against the wall and closed her eyes. Too angry to fall asleep this time, she resorted to breathing deeply, and did so until she was calm. Or less angry.

"All right, I'll tell you what happened between me and my mother. My mother...earned her Master of Arts degree in Cambridge University, and when my twin brother and I, Horem, were of age, she wanted us to study there, too. It was only natural that she did. But my grandparents were here in New York, and at the time, Baba Zahi was ill...I thought he would leave us any time then and I decided to apply for New York University, my school now, despite the fact that my brother and I had already passed Cambridge. My brother applied as well because it was one of my father's last wishes that he and I study together, at least until we finished our undergraduate courses. My mother was angry, of course, but I didn't care. Baba Zahi got better later on and is now in perfect condition, but I can't leave the school now that I've begun to work towards being a graduate student...and quite frankly, I like Annie, and Professor Goedet, and the campus, even though I don't really have friends there. I don't care. And that's what annoys my mother so greatly...we only speak during Christmas and birthdays now. And even her gifts have been sent through my grandparents or brother, and...there it is.

But back to Horem. And I'll try not to get too angry this time...why does he always have to comment about my love life? Or my lack of one? Last year he even asked me if I liked girls. He just can't seem to understand that I have no interest in boys. Annie obviously does, and I don't mean to offend her. She just likes Horem for some reason, and I won't take it against her...but not every girl is like Annie. I'm not even going to fall in love with a man who doesn't approach me first, and even if that happens, if I have to correct him about every little thing concerning Ancient Egypt, I know it isn't going to work out! Last year and a half, before he asked me if I liked girls, he sent me on this terrible string of dates with a few of our batch mates in school. I am loathe to admit it, but even Horem knew more than they did!"

Kiya sighed. "I know it's selfish of me. I'm willing to accept-well, no, I've already accepted that I'm never going to get married because I'm so picky. But I don't care! Because I love Egyptology. I want to learn more about your world, Ahkmenrah, what you really did and how life really was for you...and I'd rather study Egyptology alone forever than spend my life with someone who can't understand my-"

"Hello?" called a man's voice.

Kiya froze in her spot and covered her mouth as she heard his footsteps approaching the archway. Into the second half of the gallery came a fair-skinned young man in a suit, perhaps four or five years above her, whose hair was light brown and whose eyes were a pretty shade of green, like Annie's, but darker and more inviting, and he looked at Kiya with the most curious expression on his face.

"Am I...interrupting something?"

"Oh!" Kiya scrambled to get up from her relaxed and already unladylike position and dusted herself off once she did. Pointing to the door and hurriedly walking toward it, she laughed nervously. "Excuse me."

The young man smiled kindly at her as she turned to leave. "You don't have to leave. I'm just here to see the...Pharaoh, as you no doubt are. Weren't you?"

Kiya faced the handsome young man again and nodded quietly.

"If I may ask, what is your business here?" he asked her, obviously willing to carry on the conversation. "I was sent here by a colleague from Cairo...which I don't mind, as I love anything Ancient Egypt-.

"I was sent here as a prank by my brother, I believe...but Cairo?" this sparked Kiya's curiosity. Someone else-a male-who loved Egypt? The only other person whom she knew loved Egypt besides herself was her pen pal from England, Ramy, but that was a girl. "Are you an Egyptologist?"

He laughed and began to approach her. She had half a mind to run away, but she held her ground, and was a little glad to find that he was only going to offer his hand. "Keith Kashani," he said, "a mere Egyptology graduate. Sorry to disappoint."

"You haven't," said Kiya, shaking his hand. "I'm only an undergraduate. But I do hope to study Egyptology as a graduate like you in the future..."

"That's very impressive, uh..."

"Kiya," she replied, hoping not to start another conversation about her famous heritage, "just Kiya."

"All right, just Kiya," he said with a grin, but Kiya found that his wasn't annoying like her fool of a brother's. "would you like to have dinner with me sometime?"

Kiya stared at him, wondering if it was a dream. Someone she could go out on a 'date' with, and who wasn't set up with her by her brother! Hmm. Yes. She would show him...

Smiling, Kiya opened her mouth to answer. "I would be delighted to."

"Great," Keith seemed happy. "How can I contact you, then?"

"You can find me here after classes, actually," said Kiya, unwilling, for some reason she couldn't understand herself, to give him her cellphone number. "I'll be here for the next two weeks. Is that all right?"

"Oh, yes," Keith laughed, "There's nothing better than to see you in your natural habitat. It makes you all the more real."

Kiya's body began to ache before she could reply. And all of a sudden, her head throbbed, her fingers and feet shook, her stomach felt like it was about to burst, and her heart felt like someone had driven a spear right through it. But worse than all this pain was the empty feeling that had enveloped her, this sense that something was missing...and it tortured her not to know what it was, and at the same time know that the chance of ever filling it was close to nothing. And again, all of a sudden, it was gone.

She only realized that the pain had caused her to lose her balance when she felt Keith's hand on her back, and his free hand cupping her cheek. "Kiya!" he called. "Can you hear me? Kiya!"

"I'm all right," Kiya breathed, pushing herself away from him, "I'm sorry to have worried you. What...what happened?"

"I don't know. We were talking about dinner, and then you started to squirm until you fell...do you want to go to the hospital? Does this happen to you often?"

"No, no. I'm fine now, thank you. And I still have books to read...it was a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Kashani."

Keith came close to her, and before she could react, kissed her cheek. "The pleasure was all mine, Miss Ganzouri."

Shocked for the second time that day, Kiya simply nodded, then left as quickly as she could without looking like a fool. As she exited the museum, she noticed a familiar head full of curly hair.

"Aww, come on, dad, can I please come tonight? He said he remembered that he had something to tell me..." It was Nick, Mr. Daley's son. Kiya didn't want to bother them and so decided not to greet them, but deliberately walked slowly as she passed them to hear their conversation.

"Nicky," said Larry with a skeptic expression, "he's been there for how many years? Of course he has something to tell you."

"But dad, you know he's not crazy like Atilla! It's gotta be something important!"

Seeing the pitiful look on his son's face, Larry sighed. "Fine. But don't bring food this time. You know how Jed and Octavius can get really..."

Kiya was too far away now to hear the continued conversation, but she had heard enough. How odd! Why would Nick want to join his father in manning the museum? It was an even more boring task than staying there during the day! And who were they talking about? She wasn't aware of Mr. Daley having partners in his work... Then again, she knew only little about him, so she could be wrong. But who in this day and age would name their child Octavius?

Managing to shrug it off as a Daley family quirk, Kiya took the transit back to her residence hall and did a bit of homework, as well as note that Egyptologists still visited the gallery, though Professor Goedet had told her that there was no need to do so. She also pondered on the sudden episode she had in front of Keith, and on that note thought of his credibility. He couldn't have been sent by Horem. She'd never seen him around campus before and he was from Cairo, assuring her of that.

With thoughts of Horem's schemes on her mind, Kiya fell asleep.

"May I see him tonight, father?" asked the girl, and though she couldn't see his face, she could feel her heart thump in fear of his reply.

"No."

"Just this once?"

"No. Are you deaf, child?"

"No, father, but if I am to serve him, then I would like to..."

Her father grabbed her by the chin, but even then she could not see his face. "Your foolish brother did not understand this, but I know you are the intelligent one, so I will tell you. Beloved daughter, if you obey me and all goes well, you will never have to serve a human soul again. Is that not what you desire?"

"Of course, father," said the girl, like the drone she was raised to become, and left her father's office. She stealthily wove through a channel of busybodies who greeted her as she passed, however, and found herself in a small compartment with a tiny cot and servant clothes just her size. She knew the clothes belonged to a sick servant girl who was permitted to return to her family for the time being. The girl reminded herself to change into it after dinnertime, and she seemed to forget all that occurred to her until she did.

Keeping her head bowed at all times, she took a jug of wine in place of his old servant and excitedly approached his grand room. Her fingers tingled as she came closer to his resting figure, until she had the honour of pouring him a drink. Still, she could not look at his face for fear of being shunned, and was content with being his presence.

Until he spoke to her. "I have never seen you before. Is Awan ill?"

The girl froze and ceased pouring wine into his cup. "He is tired...sire," she answered, shaking, and finally gazed into his eyes.

By the gods, he was beautiful.

But Kiya could only see a bright light.

Kiya opened her eyes and groaned. Sunlight. Morning had come too quickly. Who was he? Who was her father? And she, pretending to be a servant? Rubbing her eyes in irritation at the day that had so rudely interrupted her dream, Kiya kicked her blankets off and headed for the bathroom, her irritation increasing as she remembered that she would have to see Horem today.

School was slow (but enjoyable, to Kiya) as usual, and all throughout the day she spoke only with Annie. Horem, who was prideful only as his sister, turned his head away from Kiya as well, and their friend was left to try and not look too awkward in between the two silently quarreling siblings.

Professor Goedet held no Tuesday classes, and Kiya had decided to give up on the begging-to-be-released-from-the-museum venture and simply bid Annie goodbye as she started towards the Museum. After all, nothing harmful had come from her visits, despite the initial boredom. So far, she had made two friends, despite their being adults with whom she barely had any history, but who had kindly invited her out with them (which was much more than her school friends had ever done); she had spoken, though unknowingly, before a fairly large group of people, and met a credible, Egypt-adoring man who might just have reached her standards. Admittedly now, Kiya looked forward to visiting the museum, and the Pharaoh, though quiet, might have been a good man and was now quite the listener to her everyday ramblings. Had he not liked her tirades, his ghost or spirit would have scared her off by then. Nothing of the sort had happened yet, so Kiya laughingly figured he was fine with listening to her.

Entering the Egyptian gallery, she looked around to make sure there were no people, and despite her excitement towards seeing Keith again, found that she was not disappointed by his absence. There would always be another day. Shrugging it off, greeting Ahkmenrah's jackal bodyguards and passing the archway, Kiya didn't sit down on her spot as she usually did. Wary now of anyone entering and catching her speaking to the dead again, she leaned against the pillar beside the Pharaoh's coffin and stood where she could see the entrance to the gallery.

Turning to the Pharaoh, she grinned. "It's you and me again, Ahkmenrah. I've calmed down about Horem; we're just avoiding each other now and it's probably for the best, otherwise we'd jump at each other's throats the moment we sensed each other's presence. In view of that, nothing's going on with me today. I met this guy yesterday, Keith Kashani, if you heard us speaking. He's an Egyptologist! As I hope to be in the near future. I don't know why he was sent to visit you...but he did, at the very least, and that has to mean something. Other than that, I've not been doing anything. I think it's Rebecca's day off today, since she wasn't there when I walked into the lobby, and Mr. Daley might not come till closing time, so I've decided to spend time with you.

Not that you'd be second choice to any of them! It's just that if they invite me out to eat again, I can't really say no because I do get hungry...and it's so funny to watch them joke instead of argue over the little things. They really are friends. Did you have such a friend in your existence?"

"Hey, Kiya!"

Kiya mentally berated herself for lowering her guard again. This was why she preferred not to talk so much around everyone else; once she had started, it was hard to stop until something caught her surprise.

Looking toward the entrance, she found that perhaps it was a pleasant surprise. Approaching her was Nick, Mr. Daley's son, the boy she once babysat on a dare given by Horem.

"Nick," she smiled, giving him a small wave of her hand to say hello. "I haven't seen you in years. You've certainly grown!"

"Yeah, three years," Nick nodded. "But what're you doing here, Kiya?"

"Oh, nothing," she lied. If his father hadn't told him about what she was doing there, he probably didn't even know that his father knew her. "My grandfather found Ahkmenrah's tomb and everything inside it on just his first expedition, so I decided to come visit."

"Cool. Are you here every day?"

Think fast! thought Kiya, and think she did. "No, of course not," she shook her head. "Maybe every other day or so..."

"Oh," said Nick, and he almost sounded disappointed. "Did I just hear you talking to him?"

"U-uh," Kiya looked to Ahkmenrah for help, only to remember that he was...well, dead. "It doesn't mean anything! Ahkmenrah is just a very...good...listener."

Nick looked at her oddly, wondering what she meant. When she gave no explanation to her words, he shrugged. "I know someone who's really, really good at listening. And he's smart, too."

"Do you?" Kiya nodded. "This person must make a good friend."

"Do you want to meet him?"

"I..." Kiya drawled, "don't mind, I suppose. What is his name?"

"I can't tell you yet."

Kiya frowned. "And why not?"

"Because...because. Do you want to meet him?"

Kiya narrowed her eyes at the boy. He had certainly grown secretive over the years. If this were Horem she would have brushed him off long ago, but Nick was a more reasonable child and she supposed she could put up with him. That and now that he had taken hold of her attention, there was really no going back. "I suppose. When?"

Nick's tone of voice took an excited one as he asked, "You promise not to tell?"

"I solemnly swear it."

Nick grinned. "Tonight! When you stay with me and my dad here after closing time."

Kiya's eyebrows shot up. "When I stay with you tonight? After hours? Must I remind you that we both have classes tomorrow?"

"It's just ONE night, Kiya!" said Nick, and rather convincingly, too. "Come on, it's really important that you go!"

Kiya's eyebrows furrowed. In the beginning it had been about meeting his friend, but now it was about her staying with him and his father during the man's graveyard shift? Did those two deal in things she didn't want to know about? Why would Mr. Daley make his son stay after hours? Was Nick only pretending not to know about her reasons for being here? Suspiciously, she stared at Nick, only to have him stare back at her pleadingly. She sighed. Nothing the child could come up with would be so sinister as to endanger any lives...

And despite her better judgment, Kiya agreed. "All right, but how?"

"Great! All you have to do is stay in one of the second floor restroom before closing time, because they never check there."

"I have to HIDE in the restroom?" Kiya asked, bewildered. "What a prepost-"

"I'll come to get you when everyone's gone," Nick interrupted, "Then you can meet him."

Kiya bit her lip, thinking of all the horrible things that could happen (her mother had given them quite the innocence-stripping lecture as children whenever they arrived at a new country), but remembered that Nick was still only a child, and during the days she spent with him, a good child, and nodded. "Fine. I'll be waiting."

Half an hour after closing time, Kiya stood in one of the second floor restroom's cubicles, quite sure she was dying of boredom. Just a few moments more and her previous prediction would finally come true: the vultures in the ornithology display would fetch her remains soon. Would her rotting flesh, posthumously, reek of boredom as she suspected herself to now? Ha ha, posthumous. What a funny word that was. And another funny word was...caution. She could see the wet floor sign from the narrow gap between the cubicle door and the wall, and in big red bolded letters she saw it: CAUTION. Yes, that was indeed one of the funnier words in the English language. The more she stared at it, the more it seemed to morph into this ugly word, and she began to wonder how it could be an actual word in the dictionary... It was so deformed and it didn't look like a very sane word at all!

Kiya felt herself slowly going insane, too, and if all you had to stare at was that one word, you would see it transmogrifying into this hideous word yourself.

"Aaargh!" she cried, tugging at her short hair, and decided she could take hiding in the restroom of a museum just to meet a man who was, in all likelihood, not even worth his merit no longer. She kicked the cubicle door open like Indiana Jones (the leading man of a series of movies she watched secretly as a child, as one of her tutors vehemently disagreed with the concept of an archaeological escapade being such an exciting adventure; it was her dull geometry tutor) escaping to find his lady love-at least, for the duration of the movie-and let a wild battle cry escape her lips as she finally escaped the prison called the bathroom cubicle. Kicking the wet floor sign aside too, she rushed to the door and-

Kiya sighed, her sanity slowly catching up with her, and set the wet floor sign right and wiped the cubicle door with a small piece of tissue paper of any possible shoeprints. Calmly, she walked out of the bathroom but reveled in her new freedom, twirling around and around in her spot and giggling, and in all honesty still looked quite like one of unsound mind.

"If they move too quick, oh-whey-oh, they're falling down like a domino...Ehhh-ohhh-wheyyy-ohh, eh-oh-whey-ohhh oh oh..." she sang, forgetting it was Horem who lodged the song in her mind, and shook her posterior along with shaking her arms, something she had never done in public before.

So it was only natural that it seemed to offend a group of men who had spotted her from behind, and rushed forward to attack her.

At the sound of grown men screaming like banshees, Kiya turned, and began to scream herself. Who were those men advancing towards her? Why were they wearing such outrageous clothing? She had neither the time nor the right state of mind to answer those questions, and instead paired running as fast as she could with her screaming.

"Makashulaaaaaaaaaaa!" the leader of the furry-hatted bearded men seemed to shriek, and at once his companions hounded after her more quickly.

Kiya yelped and turned a sharp corner. "Help!" she yelled to anyone who could hear, "There are crazy men running after me! Help! Aaaaahhhhhhhh!"

She cried out as the men reached her and grabbed her by the head, the arms, the legs, and lifted her on her back like a sacrifice to their unnamed gods. When she heard theIr leader mention what sounded like Larry Daley in between the gibberish he spouted, Kiya's eyes widened. Of course! Larry! And Nick, too, who was the reason she was being hoisted in the air by a group of mentally unstable men!

"I-I know Larry Daley!" she cried, "he's a friend of mine, the night watchman here, and when he finds out about this, which I'm sure he will, as he should be making his rounds right about now, well...he won't he happy! So set me down now, please, and we can say this never happened and I can go home and believe it was just some insane nightmare and that I just fell asleep while talking to Ahkmenrah over at his gallery, and what in the world is that!"

Kiya gasped as she saw, upside down, because that was the only way she could see anything with the position the men held her in at the moment, a terra cotta soldier and a Ming Dynasty guardian lion walking around and staring at the group of mentally unstable men curiously.

"Sir! Yes, you, sir! And the men that I'm sure are in the lion head and butt! Please, help me! I-" Kiya groaned as the man shrugged his shoulders and walked away with the lion guardian. Was there a costume party tonight she hadn't heard about? Yes, perhaps there was, and Nick was going to introduce her to an avid...history fan who dressed up in historical costumes? It would explain the blasting PA system, but... Ugh. Dumbest idea yet. But there was no other explanation for this insanity, and- were those Neanderthals? And those could not have been Inuits that just greeted the leader of her assailants... Unless she was dreaming, as she had earlier theorized. Then again, she'd heard Nick and Mr. Daley talking about staying here after closing hours, so was this what they meant? They were having a costume party? The men below her still discussed things in their gibberish language, and she wondered if they weren't just taking her on some sort of tour around the museum. She didn't look that foreign, did she? On another note, her back was beginning to ache.

"Set me dooown, please," Kiya whined, tired of screaming and wondering where in the world Larry was at this time. Would she ever see her family again? Would she ever set foot in Egypt again? Or was she fated to die here? She decided to let fate take its own course. It was impossible to escape from these men. "Nick told me to come here..."

Kiya saw many other, she believed, people in museum display costumes as the men carried her down to the lobby, where it was actually packed with costumed people and where party music was blaring even more loudly through the PA system. What were her assailants pretending to be, she wondered? They were wearing fur, so they were obviously pretending to have lived in a cold region, but they weren't Eskimos. Judging by their spears-

"Atilla! What are you doing!"

Of course! Atilla the Hun! That was what Nick meant! They were pretending to be Huns! And they were quite skilled at it, too, thought Kiya when the Huns lowered her and held her simply by the limbs. As she opened her mouth to tell them just how much more uncomfortable the new position was, a large stack of bones stomped past them, chasing after a remote controlled car. A...a tyrannosaurus-rex? Then, a loud, wild trumpeting invaded her senses. Was that a wooly mammoth! Kiya shook her head, as if trying to rid her ears of the sound, and closed her eyes. She would have to write her plausible everyone-is-in-a-museum-costume theory off now...not that she could ever have explained the llamas walking around leisurely, or the zebras hanging around by the foot of the stairs... Keeping her eyes squeezed shut, Kiya chanted to herself that it was all just a dream, and that in a few more minutes she would awake in the Egyptian gallery, safe, sound, and certainly not being carried around by Atilla the Hun's men.

But she could still hear the Huns speaking gibberish, and the more she did, the tighter she squeezed her eyelids shut. "Just a dream, Kiya. It's just a dream. We have had less sane dreams, after all. Naturally, this is just our latest nightmare. All a nightmare. It's all just a nightmare..."

"Kiya?"

She knew that voice.

Still carried by the Huns, she dared to open her eyes. He was upside down in her line of vision, but it was him. "Mr. Daley?"

Larry glared at the Huns, who didn't seem to take the hint, before looking back at her. "Kiya! Oh, man, what are you doing here?"

"Nick told me to stay!" she groaned, tired of her position. Waking up now would be...well, a dream! "He told me he would fetch me from the second floor restroom and that he was going to introduce me to someone but he didn't so I left the restroom and then these mentally unstable men attacked me!" she said all in one breath.

Atilla gave her a hurt look and said something to Larry, which the man could still, though vaguely, understand. Larry sighed. "Atilla, I thought you and I already had a talk about this? No limb-tearing."

"Wh-what? No! I mean, yes! Yes to no tearing of any such limbs apart! I rather like my arms and legs where they are, thank you! Mr. Daley, will you please-"

"Larry, is something the matter?" asked a soft voice, and it was the only calm voice throughout the museum. Turning her aching neck to see who had spoken, she gasped. It was a bronze-skinned young man only a few years her senior, who donned seemingly genuinely gilded ancient Egyptian garb she had only seen in books, and he wore a golden Pschent whose wearer, it was well-known, was the one, the only, the famed boy King...

God, he was beautiful.

"Ahkmenrah?" his name escaped her lips.

The boy king looked down to her, his eyes wide, and swiftly returned his gaze to Larry. "Larry, this girl is innocent."

But why did he have an English accent?

Atilla the Hun said something to the Pharaoh with a distrustful frown, to which he replied, "Because I recognize the way she said my name, Atilla...oh, I mean..." he said something to Atilla using the same gibberish the bearded man spoke with, which seemed to make the Hun even more confused.

"Look, Atilla," Larry sighed again, "the point is, she isn't a bad guy and you aren't allowed to tear her limbs apart...no, not even just a little! Not this time. Now set her down. Ahkmenrah, please."

The Pharaoh nodded and, Kiya guessed, translated Larry's words for Atilla. The Hun whimpered sadly and walked away after ordering his men to finally release Kiya. When she was finally free (again), she dusted herself off and watched Atilla go dejectedly. It was such a pitiful sight to behold that she even considered allowing him to rip her apart! ...wait, no, not really. She shuddered and turned back to Larry.

"As I was saying, Mr. Daley, your son Nick said he had someone to introduce me to today, and told me to stay after closing time, but he didn't show up and...oh, what does it matter? Seeing as I'm in a dream, anyway, I don't think much needs explaining."

"Uh, yeah." Larry bit his lip an shook his head. "See, this isn't actually a dream, Kiya."

"I would expect you I say that, dream-Mr. Daley," said Kiya. She understood that she was dreaming. Now all there was to do was wake up, but in the meantime, she could explain her situation to them if they really wanted her to. "But it's all right. I'll play along, and with you too, Ahkmenrah, because I doubt any Pharaoh could have looked as handsome as you do, and soon the real Mr. Daley will find me asleep in the Egyptian gallery, an I'll wake up and know, still, that this is and was all a dream."

The two men gave her astonished looks, though one was of utter bewilderment and one was a shy sort of surprise.

"You think I'm...part of a dream?"

"You find me...handsome?"

"And am I not speaking the truth?" Kiya shrugged. "It is impossible for any of this to be real. A walking T-Rex? Wooly Mammoths walking around as if they're taking a stroll around Central Park? I don't think so. Also, studies say that past Pharaohs, though admirable in depiction, could never have been as pleasing to the eye."

Ahkmenrah blushed and smiled, unbeknownst to himself, and it went unnoticed by everyone else, too, because Larry immediately tried to explain how none of it was a dream, an idea Kiya rebuffed again and again. Before Larry could explode, the Pharaoh put his hand on his friend's shoulder and pulled him aside.

"Larry, perhaps I could speak with her," he said to the night watchman, whom he held in great esteem. "I know she is a lover of all things Egypt. This common ground may help me in persuading her to believe you."

Larry rubbed his right temple in exhausted surrender. "Okay, Ahkmenrah. The faster we can get her to believe us and convince her to keep this whole thing a secret, the better. And don't let her leave the museum."

The Pharaoh nodded, and, approaching Kiya, smiled. "Good evening. I am Ahkmenrah, Fourth King of the Fourth King, and..." he seemed to put a lot of thought into what he was about to say. "Former ruler of the land of my fathers. May we speak in private?"

"Kiya Ganzouri, your Highness," said Kiya, playing along with her dream as she said she would, and curtsied. "And of course."

Nobody paid much attention to Ahkmenrah leading the strange, normally-dressed girl to the open diorama exhibit. Kiya looked curiously at the enclosed Mayan diorama, wondering if those really were arrows she saw trying to penetrate the glass, but ignored them and took the seat Ahkmenrah offered her on the benches at the center of the circular exhibit.

Kiya wondered what she would say to the handsome man before her. It was all a dream, anyway, and it wouldn't matter in the morning, but she supposed she would feel guilty to the real Ahkmenrah in the real museum where she was sleeping at the moment if she treated the dream-Pharaoh terribly. Meaning she had to keep her sarcasm in check. "What did you want to talk about, your Majesty?" she asked.

Ahkmenrah, sitting beside her, leaned in and stared at her curiously. "Have we met?"

The girl's face scrunched up as she tried to conceal her amusement. What a stupid question! Still, she remembered to be polite to the dream-Pharaoh. "Yes, actually. We met outside this exhibit...in the museum lobby, just a few minutes ago, do you remember?"

It was Ahkmenrah's turn to laugh, and he let a small chuckle escape his lips. "No, I meant that I feel as if I've seen you before. Before all this."

"I must be blunt and say that I certainly don't, your Majesty," said Kiya, becoming nervous with the realization that she was alone in a room with the former king of her homeland. It didn't matter if it was a dream; it had still never happened before, and this caused her some distress.

"I must have been imagining it, then," laughed Ahkmenrah, before he took her hands in his own. "Now, Kiya, I want to thank you."

Kiya was growing considerably red by this time, though she could not retract her hands from him. "For what, your Highness?"

"Call me Ahkmenrah," he said. Another reason why she was dreaming-would any Pharaoh have an English accent to match a perfect face? She thought not! "It is how you address me when you talk to me in the day, and...I like it when you do. I wanted to thank you for just that-for speaking with me. I hear you, though you believe otherwise, and I appreciate you sharing with me everyday what you have never shared with anyone, especially despite my condition...during the day. I asked Nick about you...he informed me that when he was still in your care, you were formal in your speech and always, somehow, aloof. It takes great courage to release such thoughts from your mind, and great trust in whoever is listening." he squeezed her hands, and without any malicious intent Kiya thought her dream-Pharaoh had. "I promise you, Kiya, your trust in me is not ill-placed, and I would never ridicule you for taking a more informal approach when speaking. In fact, I find it oddly endearing."

Kiya's mouth was left open when he finally allowed her to speak, but nothing came out. His words were so real, but dreams could pretend to be very real, too, couldn't they? He found her informal speaking endearing...he was drawing that from her subconscious. Of course. Perhaps secretly, so secretly that she herself didn't know it until this dream revealed it to her, she wished for a man who wouldn't laugh at hearing her speak informally, like her friends, and even more-for that man to find her endearing, as he so eloquently worded. "You know, Ahkmenrah," she began, her throat dry, "You make a wonderful dream. Now all that's left is for you tell me that you studied in Cambridge, my would-have-been school, and that that is why you can speak English."

"I did go to Cambridge University. I was on display in the Egyptology department...and I'm not a dream," he insisted, remembering why Larry agreed to leave them alone together. "I'm real. I'm as real as you are, Kiya. But I can only come to life at night, because that is all my tablet allows..."

"Displayed in Cambridge! How miraculously coincidental. And oh, yes, your tablet," Kiya nodded, failing to realize that she'd let her sarcasm run wild a long time ago. "I figured that would come into play some time in this dream."

"Do you mock me, Kiya?" he asked, without anger or pride, but with pure innocence, as if he couldn't understand why she doubted his existence before her now, and already Kiya felt the guilt she was trying to avoid. "I don't understand it myself. As a child, my mother told me that someday, years after my death, I could be brought back to life with the tablet's power. I can manipulate it to some extent, but I, as well as the rest of the museum creatures you might have seen earlier-such as Atilla and his men, Rexy, the animals, Miss Sacagawea, Teddy, and Columbus-are only animated, or reanimated, in my case, at night. But I am real, we all are, and this is anything but a dream."

Kiya looked up to him, her resolve in believing that moment was a dream lost, like the screams of the hostile little Mayan figurines. "How do you know?"

Finally, Ahkmenrah released her hands. But just as Kiya gave a relief-filled exhale, the Pharaoh took her chin in between his thumb and his index finger and gently pulled her towards him.

Still confused, she looked up to the boy.

And in a dreamlike trance, certain yet unsure of what he wanted to do, the boy kissed her.


And Ahkmenrah finally appears in the story, as promised! I always fulfill my promises. Mmhmm. *nods sagely*

Don't worry, girls, neither of the children are in love at the moment (unless you want them to be crazily in love at first sight, which is certainly not the case here). And by at the moment, I mean yet. It's a simple misunderstanding, as most awkward situations are. And by children, I mean Ahkmenrah and Kiya. Obviously. Unless you want me to mean Rebecca and Larry, which would be odd...or Jed and Octavius? Ack! Haha, I'd love to see a Kahmunrah fic in the future. Although Kahmunrah will be in this story many chapters later, when we delve into the second movie! But that'll be done later on. Okay, I've said too much. o.o I'm off!

If anything needs to be explained, just state it in a review or pm me and I'll gladly answer it!

Yellowfruit: Voila, an update! Heehee. Thanks for dropping by! :)

Elven Heart993: Haha, thanks! I've been wanting to do a NatM fic with Ahkmenrah forever but I could never think of a plot before, and being the stupid sort of preteen in those years all I thought about was all romance and no plot! Well, the plot here circles romance, obviously, but there's a difference, I promise. And WHOA, I was thinking the exact same thing (about the years being kind to Ahkmenrah)! In fact, your very words were going to be uttered by Kiya in the next chapter until you reviewed! XD

Many thanks, too, to the awesome people who put the story on their alert lists! Feel free to drop by any tiiiime. (Or make your presence known through anything other than an alert.)

Please review, and stay tuned to the next chapter! I'm leaving the country in a few days, which is why I made this chapter at the very, very least, I know, seven hundred words longer than the last one. And Ahkmenrah was in it, so...yeah. Heheh! See you all soon!