Rehk'Set watched his viewscreen with glee as the sandstorm blew over Mos Isis and everything around it. His personal mage, Skaraab, had called upon the spirit of the lion goddess Sekhmet to conduct this powerful phenomenon, and had kept it in motion for the next twenty minutes. This would have to force out any resistance, and would compel them to finally bow to him. Or so the pharaoh hoped.
As time went on, and the storm cleared, nothing happened. Even with checking the various cameras inside the city, apart from leftover sand in the streets and buildings, everything seemed normal. This was not what he wanted to see.
Now more than ever, he was counting on Ilais, and felt confident that nothing could break through his troops or the barrier. He had had his scientists bring this device here and left it under his own personal protection in case of an actual break-in.
One way or another, the people would eventually surrender.
When Ben and Max entered the launch bay, several gleaming hovercrafts were parked on a marked path on the floor in a line, waiting for their turn to move onto a turntable leading to a launch ramp somewhere above. First in line was the most impressive vehicle the Tennysons had ever seen. It was constructed of a metal that resembled gold, but painted in striped patterns of blue and red that made it resemble a wheel-less dragster crossed with an Egyptian chariot. Gun barrels and large headlights peeked from the tapering recessed sides, reaching from the front of the cockpit to the thin, pointed bow, which was capped with a snake-shaped battering ram. The cockpit was protected by a bulletproof, reflective, one-way glass canopy. Two long, thin thruster turbines were tucked under a large spoiler painted with a ceremonial feathered wing pattern. The whole thing screamed Ancient Egypt, the ideal fantasy type seen in movies, especially the type Ben saw in that cartoon.
"A beauty, isn't it?" Raht asked, standing next to the back of the vehicle. "This speeder is Ja'Kaal's flagship; Designed it myself, weapons and all. I call it the Hot-Ra."
"You make vehicles?" Max asked with intrigue.
"Oh, just you wait," Ja'Kaal chuckled, "We do more than that, you'll see soon enough."
Gwen, now back in her old clothes, was being escorted to another ship by Raht, making Max ask, "Where are you going? The temple?"
"Yes, we won't be long," Raht confirmed.
Ben took a long look at his cousin and asked her, "You gonna be okay without us? It'll feel kinda lonely without your help."
Gwen busted a gut hearing this, "Wait, YOU? Lonely without me? Are you serious?! Wow, until now I was beginning to think I don't exist around here!"
"Yeah, well, I've been through a lot on my own today. Really made me think," Ben sighed, "What're you actually going to do over at that temple, anyway?"
"If Mr. green-hat is right, somehow we're going to meet the Egyptian Gods. Seriously!"
"Good luck with that," Ben shrugged.
"Don't get yourself hurt out there, Gwen," Max warned.
"I won't, we'll be fine," the girl assured him. "Besides, now I've got an alien protecting me!" she started giggling.
Raht cleared his throat, asking in his ever-stiff voice, "Gwen, would you please hurry?"
"Yes, I'll be right there, sir," the redhead answered whilst turning in his direction. Turning back one more time, she took a deep breath then finished, "Take care of yourself, Ben. Everyone's counting on you, you know that?" She held his right hand and shook it.
"Yeah, I know," Ben solemnly nodded.
"Well...Bye, then. We'll find you as soon as this is over," she finished with what sounded like a heavy heart as she rejoined Raht at his ship, a slim hovercraft shaped like a ceremonial boat.
Undyyne happened to walk in, leading a group of alien soldiers. Ben noticed that her suit had been fitted with a stylish type of black armor, probably appropriate with an upcoming battle like this.
"Wow, Undyyne, you look good," Ben flattered her.
"Thanks, kid," she smirked, flexing bits of it whilst checking to make sure her belt and pistol were secure. "I'll be flying gunner for the Starglider, over there," she pointed to a black, streamlined hovercraft behind three others. "Guess we'll see if all that training we did pays off, huh?"
"I sure hope so," Ben agreed.
"We are all in this together," Ja'Kaal declared.
Before she left, Ben held out his right fist and asked, "Here, pound this fist with yours," realizing how strange that actually sounded.
But Undyyne got the message, and with this 'brofist', she sounded off, "See you on the ground, Ben!" before hopping into her ship.
Ben found his hand sore from how rigid her armored fingers felt when she did that.
Ja'Kaal opened the canopy of his ship with a scarab-shaped remote, and the tapering sides of the chassis made it easy to board. One by one, the elite Golden Guard, Elastamun, and the Tennysons piled into the craft. Ja'Kaal climbed into the pilot seat at the front row while Marnor manned the gunner's console. Ben and Max sat side-by side behind them, Neferti and Elastamun at the back row behind the Tennysons. Strapping on their seat belts as the canopy locked back into place, this crew was ready to rock and roll. Ja'Kaal started the engine and revved onto the turntable. It rose and turned until meeting with a downward-sloping ramp. He jammed the throttle forward and the ship lurched down like on a roller coaster ride, activating the cloaking device as it gained enough speed to launch into the sky with the upward slope at the bottom, where it opened through the mouth of the sphinx their base was under.
Undyyne heard something hitting against metal as she was boarding her craft, but couldn't tell under the cacophony of movement. One by one, the other ships followed, forming into a precise flight formation no one on the ground could see.
Ja'Kaal saw the other ships on the craft's radar, noting that one of them had flown away from the rest of the fleet, likely Raht's ship, and called in over the radio, "All craft, report in."
Voices buzzed in, confirming that other peoples' ships were airborne and ready.
Below, the land zoomed by faster than the stolen ship did, he felt like this thing packed the horsepower of a fighter jet. Out the left side of the canopy was nothing but more of the desert, with some distant buildings on the horizon, while that Nile-like river threaded parallel to their flight path on the right. Of course, he still guessed that there were ships flying beside and behind this one. The technology behind their cloaking devices was flawless – nary a seam, shadow, or glint showed even the slightest hint that something was there. No wonder they didn't see Elastamun right away when they crash-landed.
"Palace is 10 miles and closing," Marnor reported.
"Still feeling anxious, Ben?" Grandpa Max asked.
"Not as much, I'm feeling pretty good, actually," Ben smiled contentedly, "In fact, I'm starting to get what Gwen was trying to say last mission: Teamwork is the best solution."
"That's very good, son," Max affirmed, patting Ben on the shoulder. "I'm glad you understand it's not all about the one hero, but the hero and his teammates combined."
Elastamun, feeling Neferti's bandages curling around his again, asked her, "Neferti, are you trying to tell me something?"
"What?" the warrior hesitated, having prepared for this but still shy, "Well, I...I think you're cute. I like the design of your head, and that red cloak really goes well with your blue eyes."
"Oh, I see. But...how could you like me? I'm just a scribe who spent fifteen years in solitude." But in his thoughts, he thought her cat-head was artistically beautiful, too.
"I like you for who you are, not your profession. I have never worn the cloak of monarchy, I just wear red because it keeps my...bandages out of danger."
"Well then...I am open for anything you want. It has been so long, I have forgotten what it is like to truly know any other Thep Khufan besides my master. Whatever you have in mind, I will consider it."
"After this mission, you will be the first thing on my mind, I promise you that."
Elastamun remembered a factoid from human history, and mentioned, "Did you know that humans cared more about females in ancient Egypt than most later cultures did? Greeks and Romans could not grasp this concept."
"That is interesting. When I was younger, my mother could not be allowed to operate our chariot."
Max looked toward the east for a long time, watching the hundreds of mummies down there, building things, driven by whips. He could tell that, unlike the people in the city or this ship, those were humans.
Not moving, he sighed, "Those poor people down there, I can't believe that pharaoh would do something like this."
Elastamun agreed, "I know, it was bad enough that the pharaohs of your history used slaves of other races, but this...this is unthinkable," he paused, then recalled another fact, "It actually reminds me of a story from that time, in what humans call 'the holy bible'."
"Yeah? Which one?" Max asked with intent, Ben not really listening.
"The one where the human Moh-ses called upon his god Yahweh, to force his brother pharaoh to release the slaves that belonged to his race. It took diseases, starvation, pestilence, fires, even the deaths of children to make him do so."
Neferti shivered in her seat, unnerved at that description.
Then the scribe pondered, "Therefore, I just now asked myself: If it took that much power to defeat a human pharaoh, what chance do we have to do the same to ours?"
Ben looked down at his watch again, knowing what was at stake. Then he took a shot in the dark and suggested, "Maybe we need your gods to get us out of this, also."
Ja'Kaal heard this, and reminded him, "Even with what limited information we have, we all know that the gods do not intervene unless Ma'at itself is in danger."
"I don't know," Elastamun "The pharaoh is drunk with his own power. I would say he is a threat to Ma'at. Rather ironic considering what his role is meant to be."
"Maybe so, but we will have to keep the tide in our favor in the meantime," the commander finished.
"I hope Gwen's all right," Ben speculated.
Raht had discreetly flown Gwen in a southeastern vector from the city.
"Where are we going? I thought the temple was back there," Gwen pointed out the window.
"That temple is not the one we need. I know of one of the most sacred religious sites on this planet, and that is this site, in the river itself. Look," he stretched one finger towards the windshield and Gwen immediately noticed.
She could see an obelisk marking the island like a flagpole. It rose so high it almost reminded her of a radio tower. Quite fitting if that was the case, considering she remembered some fiction novels speaking of ghosts communicating through radio waves, or structures like this being used as a link to the heavens. The temple itself seemed to be embedded in its base, almost as if one could go in and climb to the top, even though this had no windows, unlike the Washington Monument. Around the island, to her surprise, strange papyrus-like plants seemed to flourish. The whole area looked like an oasis in this Tattooine-esque planet.
"I can see why," Gwen just said.
Slowly, Raht decreased the ship's speed and dipped ever so gently, like how a passenger jet would land, until finally it came to a stop right at the western shore of the island.
Hitting the canopy switch and setting the craft to a low power level to keep it hovering just above the water, but not enough to drive off in, Raht jumped out of the hovercraft, quickly followed by the girl.
"The pharaoh may have the largest of the temples, but it is not the most sacred," he explained, "This was here before him, before Rho'tep. Before my entire generation existed. I think it is one of the few holy places that survived even the Ectonurites."
"Whoa," was all she could say.
As they climbed ancient stone steps, Gwen could see what he meant by how old this place was. Where Mos Isis was filled with dark, futuristic industry and architecture that still retained the old aesthetics, this place looked as if it had been taken from Earth when Egypt was new and dropped here. The entire structure was made of mud blocks and limestone, splattered brown in places by sandstorms and bleached at the base by shifting tides. Only the obelisk remained untouched, but that sent the girl's mind reeling. If something this old could still shine like new, just how powerful was this particular temple? She knew there was only one way to find out.
The inside of the building was quiet and still. She almost sensed that no one had come here for years.
Curious, she stepped close to the hatted mummy and asked him, "You said the religion isn't always practiced. How come?"
"That, I am afraid to say, we do not know. Though I sense our so-called pharaoh may have something to do with it."
"Who is he, anyway? You didn't talk about him much."
"I cannot speak his name in the presence of Ra, but we do know this: His duty to the gods has gone to his head, which is likely why he enslaved your people. He wants power over everything, frighteningly like Zs'Skayr, actually."
Gwen shuddered, then she asked, "So what do we do now?"
"Follow me."
Although none of the torches or incense bowls were lit, the near-noon sun lit the temple end to end. Small sphinxes flanked the pathway they'd been walking, massive cylindrical columns holding up the massive ceiling, all of them carved and painted with hieroglyphs and murals of the gods and pharaohs of centuries past interacting with each other.
Statues of various gods stood out between the columns. Isis, Thoth, Sekhmet, Wadjet, Sobek, and the rest, all of them at various symmetrical intervals between the columns, arranged with unthinkable precision around the square temple, as if they connected its corners and sides to the center in perfect straight and diagonal lines. Everything here had been designed with a craftsmanship Gwen thought even human Egyptians couldn't muster. Now she suspected that maybe these aliens truly had developed this culture before humans. But then came the question: How did humans get these beliefs?
At the very center was an altar, flanked between the gods Osiris and Anubis, with the head of Ra staring out above all three of them, carved arms holding an orb in each hand, the morning and evening star.
Raht told Gwen to be quiet while they walked. As they approached the altar, the tactician removed something from his robe and set it upon the smooth stone slab, an offering. It was a gold scarab, probably an artifact Elastamun would have found on Earth in Ahmed's shop.
Then he breathed deeply, and prayed, his words manifesting as neon green hieroglyphs, "Great lords of day and night, hear my plea. Our world is in danger of falling into chaos, and we seek your wisdom to save Ma'at. Show us the means to fight the dark forces that plague our kingdom, and we will be forever grateful."
As Raht finished his prayer, something happened that disturbed both of them. Raht had been expecting a vision, Gwen an outright appearance from one of the gods. Instead, the statue of Ra blinked, the avian head tilting down to look at the Thep Khufan and human. Then its arms moved, the two stars suspended in midair, now glowing and generating an intense light, crackling with energy like a tesla coil. Ra's arms moved down until his hands were manipulating the light in such a way that the wall behind the altar filled with a great rectangle of light, all but blinding the two people and filling the room with loud rumbling noises. Then, still glowing, something stirred within the rectangle until it gained enough definition to reveal itself as a portal, a swirling hole of sand.
"What is that?" Gwen shouted over the noise of this phenomenon.
"I think it's a portal!" Raht called "If Ra created this for us, we had better enter it!"
"Where does it lead?"
"I don't know, but just trust me!"
Feeling that no other options were open to them, having come all this way, Gwen accepted, and followed the tactician through this portal, to parts unknown.
Captain Drexel entered the pharaoh's study, reporting from a scroll, "My lord, our drones indicate quantum-radio traces of a fleet of cloaked vehicles heading our way. What should I tell the troops?"
"Hold your fire until I say otherwise, I have an agent that can take care of this problem," Rehk'Set ordered.
Drexel bowed and affirmed, "Yes, son of Ra."
Rehk'Set pulled out his video-com again and paged, "Ilais, report in."
"Yes, pharaoh?"
"Commence 'Apep' procedure."
"My lord."
On one of the ships, the figure of Ilais sneaked about like a ghost. She'd flattened herself slim against the floor, paper-thin. The drone of the engines drowned out her cloth-like shuffling as she slinked toward the front of the cockpit. The feet of several different species clogged the floor; She had to carefully weave around a pair of bulging black legs in the gunner's seat. Once there, still cloaked while breaking out a Transylian multitool, a powerful swiss army knife, she flipped out a screwdriver head and removed a panel under the dashboard. Quietly setting down the panel under her left arm and containing the screws by tearing off some of her bandages and wrapping them in it like a parcel, Ilais then removed a small scroll from her robe, making sure that the pilot wasn't looking in her direction.
The scroll contained a wiring diagram for a standard hovercraft. Each model's circuitry was manufactured the same way, so this told her which wire powered what. She tapped a button on the tool to extend a set of motorized cutters. Consulting the diagram, she clipped a single purple wire, the one for the ship's cloaking system. Nothing happened, save a blinking light on the console that the pilot was too focused to notice at the moment. Quickly, unwrapping her makeshift envelope, Ilais covered the wiring board up and replaced the screws with rapid speed. Being a guard had quickened her reflexes.
Unfortunately, as Ilais prepared to sneak back to the rear of the ship, a canine foot thudded down on top of her body. There was one of the few flaws to cloaking devices: Touch.
"What the...Hey!" A Loboan soldier snarled as he slouched forward to see what he'd just stepped on.
All four passengers, the gunner Undyyne, and pilot noticed the telltale sign of another Thep Khufan, sprawled out across the floor of the ship, bandages stretched thin. Ilais' cover had been blown.
"Hot-Ra, this is Starglider," Undyyne's voice buzzed over the radio. "We have an intruder on our craft. Over,"
Ja'Kaal twitched when he heard this, instantly responding, "I confirm, please describe, over."
"Looks like a female Thep Khufan, has a Transylian multitool and a wiring diagram," the fish warrior complied, "Wouldn't give her name but she has the sign of the Rigil clan. She managed to cripple our cloaking device before we caught her."
Ja'Kaal knew immediately what that meant, so he ordered, "Restrain her however you can and make sure she can't stretch her way out."
"Affirmative, Starglider out."
Within the next 10 minutes, the invisible fleet soon arrived at Rehk'Set's palace complex. As he braked, Ja'Kaal ordered, "All craft, stop. Hold your position until my next order, acknowledged?"
The other ships complied with this command.
Ja'Kaal pulled out a pair of tactical binoculars and observed the palace. "I was right, their fleet is quite dense. That red shield is protecting the palace like a dome. We might not be able to send support down with you after all."
"Then, how do we get in?" Ben asked.
The commander scanned to the east, and noticed how close the riverbank came to the palace. Zooming in slightly, he also noticed pipes threading from the base of the complex. "It's possible that they haven't guarded the water pipework. That could be a suitable entrance."
Ben looked at his watch and picked a form he really dreaded using, but figured it was necessary. Soon, the tucked seatbelt collapsed around what was now a 5-inch alien: Gray Matter.
Marnor took interest and giggled, "A Galvan, eh? Quite a rarity in these parts."
"Here, let me help you," Ja'Kaal offered, stretching his fingers to wrap Ben and bring him onto the dash for a better look. Ben felt weird being embraced in bandages that large from his perspective, but appreciated the gesture nonetheless.
Staring out at the vista through the glass, Ben used his advanced mind to consider the tactics, then explained – his high-pitched voice still getting laughs out of the gunner, "Ja'Kaal, I think you're right. I could probably sneak into the palace through a faucet or something, then disable the shield from inside. But the question is: How would I get in there from up here?"
"I have an idea," the blue commander answered as he reached below the dash for his bow and arrows. Mounting one, he asked, "Attach yourself to this arrow, you will see what I mean."
Ben felt nervous about what this guy was going to do, but shook his head and accepted, "Well, you're the leader," before jumping onto the shaft of that arrow, his frog-like adhesive skin sticking to the wood. With a free hand, Ja'Kaal hit the canopy switch twice in quick succession so that only a tiny gap was open.
"Brace yourself, child," he commanded while aiming through the gap. Staring down what looked like a log from his perspective at the massive arrowhead, Ben shivered for a moment. Then with an audible "TWANG!", Ja'Kaal fired the arrow.
Ben felt like he was reliving that tailspin from his last hovercar trip, only much faster and on a larger distance. The guards below couldn't see where it was fired from, but knew its destination. Two of them broke from their post and rushed over to the drainpipes to find out. By an incredible stroke of marksmanship, the arrow landed with a "CLING!" right near the edge of one of the pipes. Still dizzy from all that high-speed spinning, Ben tried to remember the plan and quickly set his part into motion. He jumped off the arrow and, just as those guards were approaching the shore, he flipped around and began scaling the ceiling of one of the pipes. It was about as exhaustive as the time when he scaled an air vent in the house of Howell, that conspiracy theorist who caught him when the Omnitrix glitched into keeping him like that longer than usual.
The guards failed to see anything other than the arrow, but recognized the gold color of its feather as the Golden Guard. One way or another, they knew that group was here somewhere.
In the meantime, Ben nearly exhausted himself from scaling the now vertical pipe, but by chance he happened to find a side path that opened into the floor of a sauna. Probably a luxury for the pharaoh.
"Man, that commander really knows his stuff," Ben muttered while trying to catch his breath. "Now, if I were a shield generator, where would I hide?"
But to throw a wrench in his plans, the watch timed out. Two gossiping female Thep Khufans in gray robes were discussing something just outside the sealed wooden door, but stopped upon noticing the red flash behind it.
The swirling sand portal ended in a similar temple to the one they were just in, except the sky outside was entirely dark.
Right by the entrance stood a lone Thep Khufan in dark robes and whose head was shaped like a jackal's. Gwen could see the similarities between this, Loboans, and the creatures on Earth, but the muzzle was longer and thinner, the ears taller and more sensitive. Glowing yellow eyes leaked from its black head, lined by the kohl makeup almost every Egyptian human was adorned with. Unlike all the Thep Khufans Gwen had seen so far, this being wasn't wearing a mask or headdress, the animal head literally was their head. What kind of being was this?
Silently, this being beckoned them to follow, and the two visitors exited the temple to a copy of the island they were on, but the river was black like that of the Styx, and rather than their parked hovercraft, this strange being operated a simple wooden boat that the human Egyptians would've used. A simple lantern dangled from a pole at one end, illuminating the being's hand as it beckoned Raht and Gwen into the boat. Once there, it pushed off with a long stick to propel the boat upstream, opposite of where they had come.
"What is this?" Gwen whispered with a slight hint of fear in her voice.
"I think we have entered the Underworld," Raht answered, "I honestly expected something more direct, but I will not question the gods' will."
Gwen looked over her shoulder at the man rowing the boat, and asked, "Then...is that Anubis?"
"Probably. We always thought that he ushered souls to the afterlife, but never before have either of us witnessed this ourselves." Raht warned the girl, "We had best remain quiet, for we are both in sacred territory."
The boat ride was long and unsettling. Nothing resembling the territory they left was in sight here, not one building or plant life. The whole place was a black, endless void disconnected from reality, as if the surface world was a 2D plane and this place was thousands of feet below it, like how a video game has to switch from one map file to another when loading levels. Gwen was starting to take back her joke about Ben feeling lonely without her. She could've used his snarky personality here to help break the mood, although Anubis might not have approved then.
Then the craft took a huge plunge down a sharp cataract and splashed into a second stream, colored red instead of black. Here, Gwen could see restless souls along the rocky walls on either side of the river, stumbling about in moaning agony with no means to reach paradise. For a moment, those souls almost made her think of that terrible story about the attack, but she couldn't let such dark theories plague her mind at a time like this. Raht simply hoped the sun god would bless those poor souls with his light and warmth soon; he felt something wasn't right, yet thought that could've explained the problem with the pharaoh.
Finally, the boat swerved around a bend into a massive lake that Gwen could swear was filled with lava instead of water, complete with a sulfuric smell reminiscent all too well of the volcano under the Navajo settlement. A large dark island rose up out of it like the K'veer mansion, complete with a long dock, and Anubis steered his boat up to it.
Anubis suddenly pointed them to join a long line of souls in this dock, as if saying, "Wait your turn." Then, the boat strangely sank into the lava and Anubis seemingly disappeared in a flash of light, probably teleporting somewhere else for his duties.
"Well..." Gwen muttered, "This'll take a while. I wonder how Ben's doing?"
Ben sat up on one of the benches in the octagonal steam room and tried to flatten himself against the wall behind the door frame, trying not to be seen. One of the two Khufans opened the door and stepped in. Not saying a word, she looked around, and too late, she sighted Ben hunkered up against the wall. Still silent, she lashed out with both arms and ensnared him with speed that reminded him of Ghostfreak's minion. Cutting off those bandages, she lifted the imprisoned boy over her shoulders and effortlessly carried him out of the room, ignoring his muffled pleas to release him.
"What did you find, Valerian?" Her partner asked with humorous curiosity as they walked down a hallway together, prisoner in tow.
"Ben Tennyson, the pharaoh's prime target. The one with the Omnitrix."
"Shouldn't we let the guards do this?"
"I was a guard, too, you know. Alongside the pharaoh's little friend, no less."
"Is that right?"
"Yes, Rel'Hathor. That is, until the pharaoh demoted me for trying to get...close his adviser. Thought he was hiding something."
Neither of the mummies knew that Ben could hear what they were saying.
As they walked, Rel'Hathor got a good look at Ben's eyes as they protruded from his wrappings. Still struggling underneath those bandages, she considered something, then suggested to Valerian, "You know, I think we should bathe this being before handing him over to the guards. Who knows what the pharaoh would do to him?"
Valerian considered the possibility, then nodded, still feeling Ben struggling against his bindings on her shoulder.
Just before turning around to return to a crossroads in the hallway, a guard called, "Stop, what are you two carrying?"
Both servants stood at attention, then Rel'Hathor anxiously stated, "Um, we caught the pharaoh's target, SIR!"
"By sheer luck!" Valerian agreed "Yes, I apprehended him myself in one of the steam rooms!"
The guard eyed Ben's ensnared figure carefully, then ordered, "Give him to me, I will have him delivered to the pharaoh at once."
"Not yet," Rel'Hathor insisted, "He needs cleaning. Once that is done, THEN we will give him to the pharaoh."
The guard hesitated, his partner watching with intent, then nodded, "Very well, but be quick about it, and report to the nearest guard you see when you are finished. Understood?"
"Yes, sir!" both servants simultaneously affirmed.
"You may go now."
"Thank you," Valerian finished before carting Ben off into a second hallway. The corridor twisted and turned, until finally they turned left, into a door that opened into a lavish bathroom, a large tub taking up the middle of the circular room. Shelves containing jars and bottles of cosmetic products and various grooming tools filled a portion of one wall, the rest occupied by a large dressing table. A pair of sinks occupied another, and a third was lined by a group of cabinets, along with some equivalent of a toilet, with a curtain hung up around it for privacy.
Rel'Hathor locked the door while Valerian set Ben down at the foot of the tub. From what little he could see, this room seemed to be reserved for important guests or ambassadors, and the pharaoh must have had one of his own elsewhere in the palace. Then a question rang in Ben's mind: Why would Thep Khufans require bathing? He'd guessed that their bandages were a type of skin, but how often would that need cleaning? But then he considered that since other aliens were here, they'd need to be bathed also, and must have other methods of relieving themselves that TKs didn't.
Then Ben tried to look at the bright side: At least here he was getting special treatment by two women, rather than standing among a bunch of naked aliens in a public shower like last time.
Finding a pair of scissors on a shelf among other things, Valerian proceeded to cut Ben's bindings while Rel'Hathor started the water flowing.
Ben almost immediately wanted to say something, but Valerian covered his mouth and whispered, "Be quiet, intruder!"
"Valerian, be nice. Do you even know what goddess bears my namesake?"
The ex-warrior just nodded, before swiftly removing his clothes, then wrapping her fingers around his arms to lift him into the tub. Rather than leaving him with a full tub of water, instead, the tub was only filled halfway, leaving the two mummies to scrub down his naked body with soap and sponges. The activity from both of them was so frantic and sudden that he couldn't get a word out. Part of him welcomed this because of the attention, but another part was disturbed by how unfamiliar it was. What surprised him most was how unfazed either of them were by his humanoid...features. Apparently they were well used to this.
As she worked on his shoulders, Rel'Hathor noticed Ben's translator, and laughed, "Oh look at this, Valerian! Someone brought this human a translator!" Then she leaned closer to his right ear and playfully asked Ben, "Do you like this? Only very special people have the privilege of being bathed by us servants!"
"Ugh, I would if miss Salarian or whatever hadn't kidnapped me first," he grumbled as the mummy in question scrubbed his legs.
Valerian looked up at him and complained, "Do not blame me, we were personally ordered to apprehend intruders on sight. In fact, you should be lucky we're doing this for you, Ten-ee-sohn. The pharaoh would likely kill you, cut off your arm and take that little thing away."
Trying to talk his way out of being captured, noticing these maidens were almost done, he pointed out, "You two sure gossip a lot. I could hear everything you said back there. What if I said I could take down the pharaoh for you? That way, warriors like you don't have to work for him."
"I highly doubt that, human," Valerian argued, "This palace is filled with soldiers and mages, and there is a barrier surrounding this place. You will never evade his forces."
"Why don't you just tell me where the shield generator is? I have friends outside that can take care of those people after I turn it off,"
Rel'Hathor thought about this as she started drying Ben off with towels while Valerian stretched out her arm to pull the drain plug, then informed him, "You did not hear this from me, but if you ascend one story and enter the second door on your left, you will find the generator in the pharaoh's personal quarters. I service him from time to time, so that is how I know its location. I recommend disguising yourself, however."
They let him put his clothes back on after drying the boy.
"Oh, don't you worry, ladies," Ben smiled as he activated the watch again, this time selecting Benmummy once more, feeling the need to put his training into action. When the green light faded, his deep voice stated, "I was never here!"
The two servants stared wide-eyed at what just happened, then Rel'Hathor quietly opened the door for Ben. As he stepped through it, Ben turned around and added, "Oh, and uh...thanks for the bath!"
"You are most welcome," the kind servant nodded before waving him along with her hand as if to say, "Go before someone sees us!"
Benmummy searched for a staircase while the two servants walked back the way they had come, resuming their normal duties.
"How in the name of Isis did that human turn into one of our kind?" Rel'Hathor asked, letting all of her tense politeness drop.
"I hear the Omnitrix can collect the DNA of others, whatever that means," Valerian muttered. "Maybe he simply collected a sample?"
"I just hope he can use that form to take down the pharaoh."
"Excuse me?" One of the guards overheard their conversation.
"Nothing! Just...looking for our next orders, sir!"