Hello and welcome back! We get to meet Tom Cruise in this chapter, yay! ;)

II. Elerie

"What the hell are you doing here?" she demanded.

There was silence before the colonel said, "what's going on Sergeant?"

"Uh, nothing Sir," stuttered Nick. Then he regained composure. "I assure you there must be some mistake because I have not yet had the pleasure of meeting this woman, Miss..."

She smiled smugly. "Ah I see." She turned to the superior officer. "It seems that your sergeant here is too embarrassed to admit that we were married, once upon a time. Until I divorced him. Well I'm not too embarrassed, Nicolas." She turned on him again. "Disgusted? Yes. Regretful of our time together? Oh certainly. Embarrassed? No. But really just amazed at your ability to mimic all the qualities of genuine human intimacy, if only for, oh-" She paused to shrug. "-Fifteen seconds."

Even he didn't have anything to say to that. Vail snorted with laughter behind his hand and Jenny tried to stifle a laugh. The Colonel just shook his head at Nick.

Elerie smiled at her success. "And you want to know what I regret most? Ever falling for your so-called 'charm'."

Nick stared back at her for a moment before recovering and turning back to the colonel. "Alright, you got me. Sir, I admit, Ms. Morton-"

"That's Taylor to you, Doctor Taylor. Did you really think I was going to keep your name?"

"-Is right, we did spend many years happily married-"

"Oh shut up-"

"-Many long, satisfying years, including very long, satisfying, exhausting nights-"

"Oh spare us," she snapped.

"-And I assure you Sir I have only fond memories and a broken heart. As you can see Sir, Hell hath no fury." He gave her a smug smile.

She glared up at him. Oh, if looks could kill...

SMACK! The sound it made when her hand contacted with his cheek was so loud that Jenny, Vail, and the Colonel all nearly jumped back. Nick himself stumbled back, holding his now red and stinging cheek, jaw agape, again taken aback.

"Well what the hell are you doing here?" he shot back, still holding his cheek.

"Doing my job."

"Colonel," stepped in Jenny, momentarily breaking up their bickering. "We're archaeologists from the Natural History Museum in London, and we have been instructed to conduct a dig for a tomb around here."

"Well you're in luck. These boys here just dropped an explosive on it."

"What?!"

Nick pointed to Vail. "He called in the airstrike." When his friend shot him a death glare, he continued. "Well what a coincidence! We're looking for a tomb too."

"Oh really? Another one you can raid?"

"Excuse me?"

"You're a tomb raider Nick."

"Well, with all due respect, so are you."

"Yes but I was trained and it's my actual job. And I do it so that we can further our understanding of human history and evolution, not so I can steal precious antiquities and sell them on the black market for profit."

Vail was nodding as she spoke. When Nick shot him a glare, he stopped. "Well you know as good as I do that to find treasure, you need a map. We just happen to have found a map-"

"You stole a map."

"What, no. We found a map-"

"You're a thief Nick. Finding is your way of saying stealing."

"Now that is a great overstatement-"

"Well we have our own map." Heaving a sigh she turned away from Nick and to Vail, her face breaking out into a smile. "Chris, how are you?" She hugged him.

"Hey El. Well, I almost died, but I didn't, so I'm feeling pretty good."

"Good." She turned to the other young woman. "This is my partner, Doctor Jenny Halsey," she introduced.

Chris turned to the pretty blonde. "Hi, I'm Corporal Chris Vail-" While he continued to flirt with Jenny, Elerie and Nick continued to bicker.

"Great," muttered Chris.

"Oh my God-" The bickering was finally broken apart by Jenny's gasp. "Elerie come look at this."

Elerie, more than happy to turn her back on Nick, hurried to Jenny's side, peering down into the pit. "It's Egyptian," she cried.

"Yes." Jenny nodded excitedly.

"Oh, is that unusual?" asked Chris.

"We're in the Persian Gulf," Nick reminded him. "Egypt's miles away, so it's unusual."

"Oh you're so smart," sneered Elerie. He just smiled smugly.

"Colonel, this is a significant find. I need your men to secure this village," Jenny said, marching towards one of the supplies bags.

"We're not even supposed to be here," the colonel protested.

"It's our job to make sure anything of value stays out of enemy hands. We have no idea what could be down there. The contents of Tutankhamun's tomb alone were valued at six-hundred-and-fifty million pounds sterling."

At this, Nick and Chris exchanged a glance.

"Don't even think about it," threatened Elerie.

The colonel sighed. "Fine. You've got two hours, then we're moving out." He turned to Nick. "You're getting in the hole with them."

"Him?" cried Elerie, horror-struck.

"Me?" cried Nick. "But Sir, I-"

"Oh no," protested Elerie, stepping forward. "I will not have him ruin this excavation."

"Sergeant Morton you gear up, that's an order."

Elerie cursed under her breath.

"I'll be right here holding the rope Sarge," said Chris.

"Get in the damn hole Vail," ordered the Colonel.

Elerie sighed heavily. Great. Just Great. Fantastic. Brilliant. Wonderful.

It couldn't get worse than this, right? Worse than unexpectedly being reunited with your ex-husband who you hadn't seen in years in the most unlikely of places, and now being forced to work with him on what may be your biggest find yet.

Nope, nothing could be worse. Nothing.

Well, we'll see, especially once you find what's in that tomb ;) Haha! So, thoughts so far? Anybody else a huge fan of archaeology and Ancient Egypt? I hope you enjoyed, thanks so much for reading! :)