Oooh, crap, were the first two words that popped up in my head upon
regaining consciousness. Well, I thought I did. But . . . I could hear
something, like . . . crackling fire? Oh, crap! Had I, like, knocked over a
candle, and the whole school was up in flames, and I was already dead, but
now a ghost? If so, maybe now I could be with Jesse? But, no. I couldn't
smell smoke, or anything. Can ghosts even smell? I decided to like, open my
eyes, to eliminate other possible situations.
OH.
MY.
GOD.
'Ahhhhhhhh!' I screamed. And screamed, and screamed, and SCREAMED. Let me tell you, it's no picnic finding yourself in a leopard skin draped, pleated linen dress, with this huge headdress on my . . . brace yourself . . . BLACK hair!!!
AHHHHH!
I looked around frantically, and saw that everything was in black and white. I was in a dark, enclosed room, with limestone bricks imprisoning me. I felt like I was suffocating me. Along the walls were flaming torches. But the thing that most caught my eyes were the piles and PILES of gold! Little sarcophaguses, columns of coins, golden sphinx figurines! I realized where I was about then.
I was in a tomb.
An EGYPTIAN TOMB, by the way?
Sweet Mother of the Lord freaking Jesus!
What, was I supposed to by, like, some dead Egyptian pharaoh? They knew I was alive, right?!
Of course they did. Otherwise, I would be mummified.
How reassuring.
I bolted to the door of the tomb. Wait, what door? That wasn't a door! It was just wall! Where's the door? I could by claustrophobic, for all they know. Oh, I'm going to die in an Ancient Egyptian world of black and white. Goodbye, cruel-
Wait! A vent. Well, it looked like a vent, leading upwards. I decided to climb it, you never know, I might be able to get out of this gay place.
Let me tell you, it's no pushover climbing upwards. In a kalasiris! Well, I think that's what they were called, these robe thingamabobs. Oh, I was in deep shit, and God, did I know it. After about half an hour of continuous climbing- I kid you not! Half an hour! I can't even RUN the school runathon for that long!- I kind of fell out of the vent, (which still lead upwards,) into another chamber. This one, on the other hand, had people in it.
I'm serious.
All around me were these freaky people wearing freaky, Egyptian clothes, with bald heads, headdresses, feathers, head bands over the hair of the guys who still had some, braids to the side, loin cloths, more kalasiris', and gee, intense looking Egyptian eyes. A bit slanted, and glaring. I backed away slightly.
'Pharaoh,' said one. Another thing occurred to me, you know?
I COULD UNDERSTAND EGYPTIAN!!!
Hold it right there!
That dude just called me PHARAOH!
'Holy *fuck,' I said feverishly, and under the circumstances, you can totally understand, right? RIGHT?!?!
They all stared at me some more. 'I thought you were sleeping?' asked one. I just shook my head. They thought I was permanently sleeping, more like it.
I suddenly realized what an odd scene I'd walked in on. There were four people lying in these stone tables, looking quiet still. Their faces were pasty white. I mean, even though I was seeing black and white, I could so tell that their skin tone was abnormally white. Like CeeCee.
'Who are they?' I asked. But then I knew. These four people were scribes, going by the names of Naeemah, Jafari, Khufu and Amun.
Oh God.
Why me?
'These are our scribes, Naeemah, Jafari, Khufu and Amun,' a dude echoed my thoughts, wearing but a little cloth thing, and a braid down the side of his head, whereas the rest of his head was bald and shiny. This was way overwhelming. Was I drunk? Or high? Did Paul slip me some disco biscuits while I was out?
'Oh, why aren't they moving?' I asked blankly.
'Well, Pharaoh,' said a woman uncomfortably, 'They're dead.'
Dead.
'Oh, right,' I said, nodding. 'Uh, why are they here?'
'Well, their families have paid for a shifter to come for them,' explained the woman. My ears hell perked up then.
'Shifter?' I asked.
Everybody frowned. I guess it would be real weird if the chic who's supposed to order you around was acting all daft, or as if she'd had an attack of amnesia.
I wish.
'Shifters accompany the souls of the dead to the next world,' said the woman patiently. Then, there was an echoing of stone on stone.
'Oh, he's here,' said the woman.
You bet he was. This guy was dead ringer for an older- much older- version of Paul. Geez, if Paul was going to look like this when he was older, he'd better start praying. Or, maybe it was just all the black.
'Here,' he said. In Egyptian, of course, but of course, I could understand. 'Now, where are the ones to be shifted?'
'Well, obviously, there,' I said. He looked at me sharply, with dark, black eyes, rather than Paul's icy ones. I mean, what kind of question is that? There are four freaking dead people lying in front of him!
'Pharaoh,' he said, bowing briefly. 'It is my honour to serve you, my Pharaoh. I hope I will-'
'Just get it over with!' I said. Geez, you'd think I was about to have a needle, and the nurse was explaining exactly what she was going to do, like, "First, I'm going to push it into your skin, and it's going to be excruciating. Then you're going to feel the awful liquid swimming all over your arm, like I just injected poison into you . . ." You get the idea. Shudder.
'I must ask you all to leave,' he said, with an identical smirk to Paul's. Everyone tramped out except me.
'I'm not going anywhere,' I said defiantly. 'I wish to oversee this process, and you will not disobey your pharaoh,' I said severely, and he kind of looked at me in surprise.
'But-'
Then, suddenly, there was a kind of internal feeling. I shouldn't be screwing around here. I had to do as everyone else was doing, or I might have stopped what had to be.
'On second thought, I'd better go,' I said hastily. Why am I such a loser? Why? Sigh.
He turned from me, and, quiet as a mouse, I slipped back into the vent, to listen. Paul's wannabe closed the door, and turned to the four corpses. I peaked out from the vent, my knuckles were shining white.
He said this weird incantation, and all, and then, collapsed. Something occurred to me. It was my guess he had gone to purgatory. If so, the ghosts would have most likely been in this room. Why couldn't I see them? Wasn't I a mediator anymore?
Weird.
And another: Didn't CeeCee's Aunt Pru say that Dr. Oliver Slaski thought that this shifter dude was related to him? That would mean that Paul was also related to him, seeing that Paul's last name Slater, was changed from Slaski by his father. So, I was seeing some ancient ancestor of Paul Slater here now. One Paul was enough!
That was when I heard the voices. In my head, not coming from the black and white room before the vent I was hiding in.
"Aaah, the last four I'll need."
"What do you mean? Aren't you the shifter?" Naeemah's voice.
"Yes. But I'm so much more than that. I plan to be pharaoh by killing the current one."
Ah! He's going to kill me! No, wait, I was starting to work this out. I was in Tutankhamun's time, history was just altering around me. So basically, I was playing the Tutankhamun dude. Hey! No wonder why he died so young! This bad ass killed him! I'm so smart!
"What are you doing? Where are we?" Jafari's voice.
"This is the Shadowland. You have no need to fear. All you have to do is walk through that door."
"Why should we?" Amun.
"You will go to your next life."
"How can we trust you. You just told us that you were going to murder our pharaoh!" Khufu, sounding angry.
Silence.
"Fools! You don't understand! You were going to be the last four lost souls to help me gain the kingdom above! Go through that door, or you will suffer!"
"Never!" That was the Egyptian four, all together.
"You will pay!"
Then, the most horrible shrieking roared in my mind. I was screaming too. It was so painful! Oh, God! But no, that wasn't all!
"No, you are the fool!" Go Naeemah! "For this, you will pay. May Bastet, our sacred God of cats, punish this evil fiend! Make him suffer for all eternity! Make him live, until our true shifter destroys him!" screamed Naeemah, amid the roaring of the Egyptian four, as Paul's ancestor tortured them all. Oh, God, this was terrible! The screaming was killing me! And he was laughing. I felt like I my head was going to detonate.
"Who are you?" roared . . . I think it was Jafari, this time.
"Ramsis, my name is," he said.
Geez, what a stupid name . . .
"You evil, horrible man!" yelled Naeemah desperately. And again, they were being tortured! I couldn't stand it! That was when my fingers went like jelly. I slipped down the vent.
'AHHHHHHHH!'
Ka-ploomph.
Well, thank God the screaming had stopped.
'Suze! Wake up!'
Huh?!
OH.
MY.
GOD.
'Ahhhhhhhh!' I screamed. And screamed, and screamed, and SCREAMED. Let me tell you, it's no picnic finding yourself in a leopard skin draped, pleated linen dress, with this huge headdress on my . . . brace yourself . . . BLACK hair!!!
AHHHHH!
I looked around frantically, and saw that everything was in black and white. I was in a dark, enclosed room, with limestone bricks imprisoning me. I felt like I was suffocating me. Along the walls were flaming torches. But the thing that most caught my eyes were the piles and PILES of gold! Little sarcophaguses, columns of coins, golden sphinx figurines! I realized where I was about then.
I was in a tomb.
An EGYPTIAN TOMB, by the way?
Sweet Mother of the Lord freaking Jesus!
What, was I supposed to by, like, some dead Egyptian pharaoh? They knew I was alive, right?!
Of course they did. Otherwise, I would be mummified.
How reassuring.
I bolted to the door of the tomb. Wait, what door? That wasn't a door! It was just wall! Where's the door? I could by claustrophobic, for all they know. Oh, I'm going to die in an Ancient Egyptian world of black and white. Goodbye, cruel-
Wait! A vent. Well, it looked like a vent, leading upwards. I decided to climb it, you never know, I might be able to get out of this gay place.
Let me tell you, it's no pushover climbing upwards. In a kalasiris! Well, I think that's what they were called, these robe thingamabobs. Oh, I was in deep shit, and God, did I know it. After about half an hour of continuous climbing- I kid you not! Half an hour! I can't even RUN the school runathon for that long!- I kind of fell out of the vent, (which still lead upwards,) into another chamber. This one, on the other hand, had people in it.
I'm serious.
All around me were these freaky people wearing freaky, Egyptian clothes, with bald heads, headdresses, feathers, head bands over the hair of the guys who still had some, braids to the side, loin cloths, more kalasiris', and gee, intense looking Egyptian eyes. A bit slanted, and glaring. I backed away slightly.
'Pharaoh,' said one. Another thing occurred to me, you know?
I COULD UNDERSTAND EGYPTIAN!!!
Hold it right there!
That dude just called me PHARAOH!
'Holy *fuck,' I said feverishly, and under the circumstances, you can totally understand, right? RIGHT?!?!
They all stared at me some more. 'I thought you were sleeping?' asked one. I just shook my head. They thought I was permanently sleeping, more like it.
I suddenly realized what an odd scene I'd walked in on. There were four people lying in these stone tables, looking quiet still. Their faces were pasty white. I mean, even though I was seeing black and white, I could so tell that their skin tone was abnormally white. Like CeeCee.
'Who are they?' I asked. But then I knew. These four people were scribes, going by the names of Naeemah, Jafari, Khufu and Amun.
Oh God.
Why me?
'These are our scribes, Naeemah, Jafari, Khufu and Amun,' a dude echoed my thoughts, wearing but a little cloth thing, and a braid down the side of his head, whereas the rest of his head was bald and shiny. This was way overwhelming. Was I drunk? Or high? Did Paul slip me some disco biscuits while I was out?
'Oh, why aren't they moving?' I asked blankly.
'Well, Pharaoh,' said a woman uncomfortably, 'They're dead.'
Dead.
'Oh, right,' I said, nodding. 'Uh, why are they here?'
'Well, their families have paid for a shifter to come for them,' explained the woman. My ears hell perked up then.
'Shifter?' I asked.
Everybody frowned. I guess it would be real weird if the chic who's supposed to order you around was acting all daft, or as if she'd had an attack of amnesia.
I wish.
'Shifters accompany the souls of the dead to the next world,' said the woman patiently. Then, there was an echoing of stone on stone.
'Oh, he's here,' said the woman.
You bet he was. This guy was dead ringer for an older- much older- version of Paul. Geez, if Paul was going to look like this when he was older, he'd better start praying. Or, maybe it was just all the black.
'Here,' he said. In Egyptian, of course, but of course, I could understand. 'Now, where are the ones to be shifted?'
'Well, obviously, there,' I said. He looked at me sharply, with dark, black eyes, rather than Paul's icy ones. I mean, what kind of question is that? There are four freaking dead people lying in front of him!
'Pharaoh,' he said, bowing briefly. 'It is my honour to serve you, my Pharaoh. I hope I will-'
'Just get it over with!' I said. Geez, you'd think I was about to have a needle, and the nurse was explaining exactly what she was going to do, like, "First, I'm going to push it into your skin, and it's going to be excruciating. Then you're going to feel the awful liquid swimming all over your arm, like I just injected poison into you . . ." You get the idea. Shudder.
'I must ask you all to leave,' he said, with an identical smirk to Paul's. Everyone tramped out except me.
'I'm not going anywhere,' I said defiantly. 'I wish to oversee this process, and you will not disobey your pharaoh,' I said severely, and he kind of looked at me in surprise.
'But-'
Then, suddenly, there was a kind of internal feeling. I shouldn't be screwing around here. I had to do as everyone else was doing, or I might have stopped what had to be.
'On second thought, I'd better go,' I said hastily. Why am I such a loser? Why? Sigh.
He turned from me, and, quiet as a mouse, I slipped back into the vent, to listen. Paul's wannabe closed the door, and turned to the four corpses. I peaked out from the vent, my knuckles were shining white.
He said this weird incantation, and all, and then, collapsed. Something occurred to me. It was my guess he had gone to purgatory. If so, the ghosts would have most likely been in this room. Why couldn't I see them? Wasn't I a mediator anymore?
Weird.
And another: Didn't CeeCee's Aunt Pru say that Dr. Oliver Slaski thought that this shifter dude was related to him? That would mean that Paul was also related to him, seeing that Paul's last name Slater, was changed from Slaski by his father. So, I was seeing some ancient ancestor of Paul Slater here now. One Paul was enough!
That was when I heard the voices. In my head, not coming from the black and white room before the vent I was hiding in.
"Aaah, the last four I'll need."
"What do you mean? Aren't you the shifter?" Naeemah's voice.
"Yes. But I'm so much more than that. I plan to be pharaoh by killing the current one."
Ah! He's going to kill me! No, wait, I was starting to work this out. I was in Tutankhamun's time, history was just altering around me. So basically, I was playing the Tutankhamun dude. Hey! No wonder why he died so young! This bad ass killed him! I'm so smart!
"What are you doing? Where are we?" Jafari's voice.
"This is the Shadowland. You have no need to fear. All you have to do is walk through that door."
"Why should we?" Amun.
"You will go to your next life."
"How can we trust you. You just told us that you were going to murder our pharaoh!" Khufu, sounding angry.
Silence.
"Fools! You don't understand! You were going to be the last four lost souls to help me gain the kingdom above! Go through that door, or you will suffer!"
"Never!" That was the Egyptian four, all together.
"You will pay!"
Then, the most horrible shrieking roared in my mind. I was screaming too. It was so painful! Oh, God! But no, that wasn't all!
"No, you are the fool!" Go Naeemah! "For this, you will pay. May Bastet, our sacred God of cats, punish this evil fiend! Make him suffer for all eternity! Make him live, until our true shifter destroys him!" screamed Naeemah, amid the roaring of the Egyptian four, as Paul's ancestor tortured them all. Oh, God, this was terrible! The screaming was killing me! And he was laughing. I felt like I my head was going to detonate.
"Who are you?" roared . . . I think it was Jafari, this time.
"Ramsis, my name is," he said.
Geez, what a stupid name . . .
"You evil, horrible man!" yelled Naeemah desperately. And again, they were being tortured! I couldn't stand it! That was when my fingers went like jelly. I slipped down the vent.
'AHHHHHHHH!'
Ka-ploomph.
Well, thank God the screaming had stopped.
'Suze! Wake up!'
Huh?!