Author's note: This chapter's going to reveal another twist.
I do not own Kingdom Hearts or the Mummy. Kingdom Hearts belongs to both Square Enix and Disney, while the Mummy belongs to Universal Studios.
Chapter 3: The Curse.
The next morning everyone returned to the sites underneath the City of the Dead to continue their search for what they were looking for. Axel on the other hand went outside of the entrance and glanced around. Too bad for him that everywhere he looked was nothing but sand, hills and more sand. No matter how much he tried to summon a corridor around the corner of a hill(he was pretty certain those guys in the robes were close by), he was met with the same result as yesterday and it was really getting on his nerves.
"When I find that spiky-black haired kid, he's gonna get it." Axel growled softly to himself. It was all that kid's fault that he was stuck in this world until it's crisis is averted. Axel had no idea what the boy was talking about and he certainly didn't want to stick around to find out.
The darkness around this area and Ardeth's warning yesterday didn't help either. Sighing, he leaned back and groaned, "Man, I'm thirsty. No wonder desert people value water more than anything else. Even just one drop of rain is probably hard to come by these days."
Which also made him wonder how those guys in the black robes could fight and survive with maybe as little water as they get. Maybe they were adapted to it.
Just then he felt a pressence to his right and Axel jumped back before the sword that belonged to Ardeth Bay could stab him or slice his head off. The redhead restrainted himself from summoning his Chakrams and just stood there, both men holding serious looks on their faces. Neither of them knew what the other was thinking, but both kept vigilant.
In the end, it was Axel who spoke first and said, nonctunately, "Lemme guess. You think I'm with those guys that made camp in those old ruins, right?"
"I do not recall seeing you last night, but you cannot be a Medjai because your coat is different." Ardeth replied, "But you cannot stay here either. You must leave or die."
"Relax, I wasn't even plannin' on staying anyway." Axel shrugged dismissively. "Just needed a direction to a nearest town or village so I can get a proper room service."
Ardeth did not lower his sword, though he did ask, "Then why are you here?"
"The truth? I have no idea." Axel admitted, though he was reluctanted in revealing about what really happened. "Though you'd like to blame a kid with unusual yellow eyes for that one and a stupid looking outfit. I have no idea how he managed, but he's the one that brought me here. Didn't know a place a like this even existed and considering how creepy it is, I don't even wanna know what's here."
"It's best that you do not know." Ardeth replied as he took a cautioned step closer. "And it's best that the other outsiders never know either. If they do find it, then they will unleash the next apocylpse."
Axel cringed at the last word in the opposite man's sentence, before sighing in annoyance and grumbled, "I was afraid someone would mention something like that." which also made sense to the very dangerous darkness he sensed. Sure he wasn't a good guy and he knew that certainly-trained assassions were trained to kill and killing was always a bad thing-but that didn't mean he wasn't careful either. The question was, why did that kid send him to a place like this anyway?
What was the boy's intention?
"What do you know of it?" Ardeth questioned.
"I don't know it. It's...more like a bad gut feeling." Axel answered. It was more than that, but he wasn't about to reveal that detail about the power of light and darkness.
Ardeth didn't say anything, though he did lower his sword and approached closer to Axel who edged back a little cautionly. To the latter's surprise, the man in the robe pulled out a flisk with water and a napkin bag of food in a container, giving them to the redhead who gave him a questioning look on the sudden generosity.
"These will last you for three days until you reach the closest village. Take little by little in order to survive. Stay away from here." Ardeth answered the unasked question, before turning and walked away.
Axel blinked before gazing at the water and food he was given, and felt very uncomfortable and he wasn't supposed to feel anything. On the other hand, he called out, "Uh, thanks." before Ardeth was out of sight.
Still, if those people were concerned about this place, then the attack last night was not random at all. Axel then realised that not even Riku or King Mickey had any idea on what they were about to face.
He just hoped that they wouldn't regret it later.
Back with Riku and his group...
Riku and Mickey both didn't have a good nights sleep after awakening from their nightmares last night. In fact, they didn't get back to sleep at all and instead were on high alert on everything around them, and both could've sworn they felt a pressence of darkness just jolt on the ground above them where the rival diggers were at, though they couldn't be certain.
It didn't help that tiredness was making them less focused.
"Ooh! I've dreamt about this since I was a little girl." Evy said excitedly as Rick and Jonathan had opened up the coffin and had pulled out another coffin that had the same keyhole and had it standing up to make things easier for them to see who it was.
But the darkness Riku was sensing was much more powerful than he ever felt, and he to mentally tell the thoughts of Ansem(he hoped it wasn't the real thing) to shut up. Though what Evy just said made him and Mickey nervous.
"You dream about dead guys?" Rick asked with a slight disbelief look, resulting a spooked out look from Mickey, an exasperated roll of eyes from Riku along with a groan, a chuckle from Jonathan and a glare from Evy.
"These sacred spells have been curved off. This man must've been condemed not only in this life, but the next." Evy decided to ignore the comment and instead gazed at the curvings on the coffin itself.
Riku grimiced and said, "Tough break."
"I'm starting to think that he really did something terrible to go through this sort of being buried." Mickey thought, shuddering.
"Yeah, well, I'm all tears." Jonathan said sarcastically as he pulled out his key and began unlocking the coffin. "Now lets see who's inside, shall we?" as he and Rick then grunted as they both pulled hard at the coffin door. The next thing that happened, a mummy jumps out and causing everyone to scream in terror and fright, and Mickey nearly fell onto the ground. before they stopped as the mummy just stood there.
"Ooh! I wish they wouldn't jump out like that!" Mickey grumbled while placing a hand to his chest, his heart still pounding rather too quickly.
Riku stared at the mummy in disbelief, as did the others since this wasn't a normal mummy that neither of them had seen before. It was still...red, gooey, slimy and disgustingly fresh. "Is he supposed to look like that?" He asked.
"No, I've never seen a mummy like this before." Evy replied, in disbelief herself.
Mickey blinked in disbelief as well as he said, "Gosh, me neither. Mummies are usually wrapped up and dusty. This fella's more gross..and still...still..."
"Juicy." Riku, Rick and Jonathan muttered in unision, both in disbelief as well.
"Yup." Mickey agreed with a nod since he couldn't come up with a better explaination on how to discribe the skeletion of the dead person before them.
"He must be more than 3,000 years old, and, well, it looks as though he's still...decomposing." Evy agreed.
"Guys." Riku suddenly spoke up as he noticed something else unusual and had bend down to look at strange scratches from the other side of the lid. The others, hearing him, gathered around. "Do these look like...finger nails to you?" he asked.
"Finger nails?" Mickey blinked, shocked.
Evy trailed her fingers onto the markings, and said while whipping around to gaze at the skeletion and said, "Oh my god, you're right. This man was buried alive." before turning back and noticed something else. "And he left a message."
She translated as she read, "Death...Is only the beginning." All five of them turned back to the dead man again, all wondering what he had done to deserve such horrible fate. Though Riku and Mickey both had a feeling that they shouldn't find out.
If only Riku sensed that the rivals were being watched by someone that would possibly be the cause of this world's demise into darkness.
As soon as the black-haired boy rounded the corner to search for something, the next thing he encountered were the diggers running past him, and then few minutes later, Beni came running while passing him and screaming, "Beware of the curse! Beware!" before disappearing.
Smirking he said to himself, "Curse or not, he's just gonna end up like everyone else." before the boy continued and didn't even jolt when he heard the sound of unusual burst, and when he found the chamber of the legs of Anubis, he instead hid at the corner as he listened.
"It does exist; The Book of the Dead." Allen was saying.
"A book?" Daniels asked, sounding disappointed. "Who cares about a book? Where the treasure?"
"This, gentlemen, this is treasure."
'Bingo.' The boy thought, while silently disappearing into the darkness to wait for the moment to strike.
Phase one was a success. Now it was time for Phase two.
Later that night at camp, Riku, Mickey, Rick, Jonathan and their rivals were seated around the campfire, still wary on last night's sudden attack episode. On the other hand, Riku and Mickey both suddenly felt that there was a reason for Ardeth's warning to leave this place, but they couldn't figure out how or why though.
"Say, O'Connell." said Handerson as he and Burns joined Daniels on their side of the campfire, while shaking his bird-shaped headed canobic jar, "What do you think these babies'll fetch back home?"
"We heard you boys found yourselves a nice, gooey mummy." Burns added as he sat down with his monkey-headed jar, which annoyed the others as he added, "Congratulations."
"You know, if you dry that fella out, you might be able to sell him for firewood." Daniels added, laughing.
While Rick mocked their laughter, while Riku and Mickey both shuddered at the thought. The idea of drying up that mummy and selling the bones for firewood was just too disgusting for words.
"Look what I found!" Evy called up as she sat between Rick and Riku. "Scarab Skeletions."
"Scarab?" Mickey asked, a bit curious.
"Flesh eaters." Evy answered, "I found them inside our friend's coffin, and they can stay alive for years, feasting on the flesh of a corspe. Unfortunately for our friend, he was still alive when they started eating him." as she showed off the dried up skeletions of the said insects in her hands.
Riku was certain he was feeling rather sick in the stomach, and Mickey certainly looked rather green, the latter regretting in asking what the Scarabs actually were, and really, who would blame him? Well, he did ask, so, too late to not know now.
"So, somebody threw these in with our guy and they slowly ate him alive?" Rick asked, in slight disbelief.
"Very slowly." Evy confirmed.
"Well, he wasn't a popular fellow where they planted him." Jonathan thought as he looked pale himself.
Rick then said while trying to lighten the mood, "Well, he probably got a little too frisky with the Pharaoh's daugther." everyone but Riku laughed and Mickey laughed more nervously than in humor.
"Well, according to my readings, our friend suffered the Hom Dai." Evy explained, "The worst of all ancient Egyptain curses...one reserved for only the most evil blashemers. In my research, I've never heard of this curse actually being preformed."
"Is it really that bad?" Riku asked, not liking where this was going.
"Yes, they've never used it because they feared it so." Evy continued, "It's written that, if the victum of the Hom Dai should ever arise, he would bring with him the ten plagues of Egypt."
Mickey ended up clinging onto Riku while quivering in fear at the terrible ghost story until he realised how silly this looked. Muttering an apology to his friend while letting go, the king then asked while awkwardly clearing his throat, "What happens after that?"
"No one knows, but they say that it will spread darkness onto the entire world." Evy concluded.
Riku and Mickey both looked alarmed as they glanced at each other in great worry. If the legend was true, then this was a definate danger to this world. If the dead mummy they, Rick, Evy and Jonathan found would really send this world into darkness, then they were risking in sending in Heartless that could find the Keyhole to this world and devour it.
"Then I guess it's best to leave that guy where he is and not wake him up." Riku decided. "If this place is cursed, then this is a bad sign to find him."
"You know, I think those fellas from last night know about this too and maybe that's why they wanted us to go away because they didn't want any to find the fella we found right now." Mickey said in full agreement.
"Yeah, that Egyptologist guy mentioned on a chest that we found about something similiar where we found a boring old black book, and these babies." Handerson pointed out.
"The Book of the Dead?" Evy asked, surprised. "I thought the Book of Amun Ra was supposed to be there."
"Sounds like the book's not normal either." Riku thought with a concerned frown.
"Yeah, are you sure anyone should be playing with that thing?" Rick added, worriedly.
Evy shook her head, "Oh, come on. It's just a book. No harm ever came from reading a book, right?"
"Um, what happened to the phrase, "you can't judge a book by it's cover"?" Mickey pointed out. "Nobody said about every book being normal on the inside."
"He has a point." Jonathan agreed quickly in agreement.
Too bad the group were unaware that, later that night when most of them went to sleep, the boy in the red and black outfit snuck up to take the book from a sleeping Allen's arms before finding slowly approaching the campsite where the others were sleeping.
However, just as the boy took the key from the sleeping Jonathan's bag, instantly Riku sensed darkness, Rick was quickly awake, Mickey suddenly felt a familiar pressence though he thought it was impossible, and Evy, who had a bit of trouble sleeping awas wide awake, and all four of them jolted up right and saw the new intruder.
"Who are you!?" Riku demanded.
Mickey had a bit of trouble in why the boy in the red and blue outfit was familiar, but when he did, his eyes widened in horror as he gasped, "It can't be!"
The boy laughed, and said, "Oh so you recongise me? Took you long enough." before he leaped up and posted himself onto a stone piller while easily opening the Book of the Dead with the key and then tossed the key to the ground to the group's feet.
"Who's this kid?" Rick asked, dumbfounded.
"Vanitas!" Mickey exclaimed, "I thought you disappeared!" pointing accusingly at the boy now identified as Vanitas.
"I did disappear, but well, I'm not really here right now, but I will be soon...sooner than you think." Vanitas laughed.
Riku, not recongising the name Vanitas, glanced at Mickey, asking, "Do you know him?"
Mickey shifted uncomfortably and replied, "He caused a lotta problems with another evil man eleven years ago. It's a long story."
"Give that book back! It doesn't belong to you." Evy demanded.
"What're gonna do, lady? Lecture me?" Vanitas mocked, before looking into the book, and grinned as he, surprisingly, began to read in Ancident Egyptain, much to the group's shock. Since when did Vanitas speak Ancient Egyptain?
Riku then felt a painful scent and jolt of darkness and he shut his eyes tight, but then suddenly a vision blocked his view. He saw the mummy underground, and could still hear Vanitas' chanting...seconds later the said skeletion jerked instantly to life, and roared, unleashing the most horrifying and imhuman scream ever heard before he returned to reality and Vanitas finished chanting.
"Riku! Are you alright?" Mickey asked worriedly as he noticed the pained look on his friend's face.
Before Riku could answer, suddenly he and everyone else heard an alarmed and horrified scream from a now awakened Allen, "NO! YOU MUST NOT READ FROM THE BOOK!"
"Heh, too late." Vanitas smirked, before closing the book which slid shut and then carelessly tossed it to the floor, the others too shocked to register on what just happened, and were even more shocked when he teleported out into darkness as he waved, "See ya, if you all survive what's yet to come."
"He can...use darkness...!" Riku whispered in disbelief.
Then they all heard something that quickly woke everyone else in camp up, and it was a good thing they did too. At first, Riku and Mickey both thought the darkness was quickly spreading to devour the world. The second worst thing that came instead was a black wall was coming towards them and it turned out to be locusts.
"Run!" Rick yelled, quickly leading Riku, Mickey, Evy and Jonathan towards safety down one tunnel, everyone else all heading into the other tunnel in great fears. Unfortunately, a couple of Heartless appeared and began to devour hearts from the diggers, turning them into darkness.
Allen was on his own, covered in Locusts but surprisingly still alive, as he held the book to his chest, asking in guilty whisper, "What have we done?" and even the Heartless didn't seem to be paying attention to him.
Axel didn't know what was going on. One minute he was wandering stuck in the desert with the supplies he had, then next thing he knew, a bunch of locusts appeared and he had to fight off Heartless that appeared until he had no choice but to at least try and teleport away, though not to where he hoped he would go.
Instead, he was forced to teleport back into the tunnels of the City of the Dead and panted in relief for a bit of a rest, though the sent of powerful and evil darkness filled the tunnels were much stronger now than ever.
"Okay, can someone please explain to me where those locusts even come from?" Axel asked to no one in paticular.
He then noticed a door up ahead, and furrowed his eyes. But before he could even consider in going in, Axel sensed more darkness behind him and whipped around just in time to see not Heartless, but strange blue jittery things with red eyes.
"For crying out loud." Axel grunted as he summoned his Chakrams, and slashed at two with ease when the blue things leaped to attack him. He then skillfully whacked and slashed at more of the strange monsters that were attempting to attack him, though he was forced to leap out of the way and make a break for it towards the door.
He had no idea what was going on, but Axel was about to find out very soon.
A/N: If you can figure out the twist I was talking about, this was the twist I was mentioning. I'm trying to make it different from both my Sailor Moon version and the original version.
