Author's Note:
This is the point where my computer crashed -and I didn't make backups! Well, some kind friends of mine helped to recover this story (of all the other important documents!) which I thought was really the most important of all! So I'm really grateful that I didn't lose all that was written!

Anyway, back to the future again This scene takes place directly after Chapter 16, well if you can remember what happened then.

We are getting there, folks! I hope to be done soon! Living in the world of fiction has been lovely and addictive. Reality doses in huge amounts are now very unpleasant but necessary.

The physical comedy that you are about to read was not quite my idea. But truly, don't you get emotionally tired too after all the angst? :P
My sister gave me a Cheshire grin when she suggested that Ardeth has to bare a lot more to Alex, hence the need for an oasis scene. So a little humour before we return to even more angst!

Comments and feedback deeply appreciated! (vesania ) Thank you all who have written to me to hurry up and write more.

Merry Christmas to all of you!

Chapter 19

The springtime of Lovers has come,
That this dust bowl may become a garden;
The proclamation of heaven has come,
That the bird of the soul may rise in flight.
The sea becomes full of pearls,
The salt marsh becomes sweet as kauthar,
The stone becomes a ruby from the mine,
The body becomes wholly soul.

-Jalaluddin Rumi

The tranquillity that the shade and the placid pond provided was unfortunately not enough to soothe both minds that were frayed from churning out fractured memories mingling with the constitution of the present day reality.

They sat beside each other on the craggy rock, cupping liberal handfuls of water that were splashed hard at wearied faces and thirsty lips, washing the dust of the earlier encounter off.

Ardeth now washed the wound in his shoulder gently, shrugging off his outer robe to reveal equally dark shirt and pants. Alex Khalan had not glanced at him, preoccupied with wiping her own wound with his sash that she had dipped in the cool water.

"We are not spending all of our time here," He announced to her.

"Why not?" She felt unjustly robbed of a paradise that she had been given for a few moments to enjoy and now this incomprehensible man told her otherwise.

He must have seen her facial expression that revealed the look of a child who had its favourite toy taken away from her, chuckling quietly.

"This is only the opening of the oasis; it is a pleasant sight, do you not agree? Very refreshing for any visitor who takes shelter under its leaves and beckoning water. But what is to come deeper in is the best it offers." He smiled.

"Oh," Came her sigh of relief; trusting that he made a good estimation of the landscape as they got up tiredly and led the horses deeper into the barely trodden trail.

"I am not able to remember a lot of things that I have studied," He confessed as they walked. "It has never been this way before; the memory will only reveal itself when it wishes to. Until then, I beg Allah that it will save me in urgent times."

She knew that he referred to the strange workings that were upon them; his memory lapse, and perhaps the visions they had shared. But they had to talk about it.

"Ardeth, this is what I saw," she said seriously, eyes fixed on the greenery that was before them, dipping her head to avoid the occasional protrusion of large branches. "Fragmentary flashes. Of another time, perhaps ancient Egypt itself. Sometimes blurred, but getting clearer should more contact be made, I think. I see mostly...myself actually, perhaps at a costume party, well, dressed in the ancient Egyptian fashion, and then I was held a knife to someone's stomach, and then I ran from a marshland, a couple hugging each other and then Evy who was dressed like me." Her shoulders slumped defeatedly.

Ardeth ran his hands through his hair, closing his eyes in a brief space of a moment before replying. Thoughts were flowing out of him, without end, but he wanted to give them a voice before they died unborn.

"Then we see differently," he said, troubled. "It disturbs me very much, Alexandra, that something is at work here."

There it was again, her name that his voice gave a sublime shape to.

"Tell me what you see Ardeth."

"I see myself killed." He said gravely.

"What? But I only wanted -"

He laughed grimly then.

"I am sorry for anticipating what you were not asking. That was always the end for what I saw. Blood, a knife which I become more certain with each passing day that belongs to me, and sometimes Rick and Evy O'Connell, and me as well, dressed for Egypt of the Pharaohs. The blood that covers my entire sight signals the end of the vision, but not before I see a woman holding my knife against me."

"So the timeline is the same, I gather, we just see different aspects of ourselves?" She asked dryly.

The horses had stopped their trot at the edge of a slight precipice; concealed by jagged rocks at the side and downward sloping trees was a clearer, deeper pool that sparkled weakly under the glinting sunlight reflected from the leaves, fed continuously by a main waterfall, flanked by two other minature ones. At the far edge of the pool the rocks opened up into a small brook, carrying the water downstream with quiet rippling noises.

"Maybe it is, maybe it isn't," He gestured grandly to the sight below them. "I can only be proud of the good that Egypt offers, at least in the modern day. This, madam, is created for man's pleasure."

It certainly was beautiful -she was not able to critically examine it with an artist's eye, but the appreciation of it ran as deep as it would for one who had been starved of life's most basic needs.

She nodded; no words were needed.

"We rest here. Until we are fit enough to leave for Hamunaptra," He told her firmly.

She nodded again, this time more vigorously than the first, a slight touch of annoyance that gave way to grudging concurrence. The water's edge was more than tempting; all that what she wanted to do was to position her sullied self under its unadulterated flow, that it may once again present her physically and mentally immaculate.

"What are you waiting for?" Ardeth drawled.

"I will be tending to the horses from here. Be assured that you are out of my line of sight. I believe I am far too old for the antics of young boys. Just make sure you do not stay in there too long. Come back up before it turns completely dark." He added wryly.

Alex stared at him strangely for a while, before snatching up her small pack and making her way down the modest precipice. It was tempting to bask in the swirling eddies of the water for much longer than she had decided to, but Ardeth had not yet cleaned the shoulder wound; the lengthier her bath was, the more prolonged his wait for his would be.

She climbed up the slope slowly, relishing feel of spotlessness.

"Your turn, Ardeth."

"Only seventeen minutes?" He raised his brows questioningly.

"Yes," was all that she said, refusing to rise to his bait. "You need to clean your wound."

He shook his head.

"It is not a large wound. The horses are there," He nodded his head in their direction. "I will not be long. And after this, we are going to talk." He made his way down the same path that she had trodden, swinging his bag over his shoulder.

Alex sat idly for a while, watching the horses walk free, wondering why Medjai never tied their horses. Were they so invincible that their horses displayed their power?

She shook her head. Or simply, she was thinking too much. Ardeth was most probably getting old and careless, just as he had said, she concluded.

Taking the reins, she carefully tied the black stallion to the nearest tree that stood away from the edge of the precipice, lingering indulgently over the number and the method of knotting the reins -not too tight, not too loose either, she thought idly.

But a sudden gunshot that sounded like it was within range of her and Ardeth had frightened the horses that were only partially restrained; her white horse had jolted abruptly, the black stallion broke free of her slack grip on its reins, taking off after its counterpart in a direction yet unknown to them.

She swore, rooted to the spot for a few seconds, stunned and turned in the direction of the pool, panic in her mind and limbs.

"Ardeth!" Alex hollered. "The horses!"

But he had also heard the gunshot all too clearly and with reflexes that remain quick despite his injury and exhaustion, grabbed what he could of his scattered clothes, cursing himself for his carelessness. He was already running towards her at her shout, up the slight slope, clutching nothing but his heavy, black outer robe down the front of his body, giving her a glance of heavily muscled thighs and an exquisitely sculpted upper body that she would have taken multiple looks at if not for the runaway horses.

Damnation!

She cursed under her breath again, but this time, her expletives were not directed towards the horses, but at herself for her own reaction to a man who simply wasn't wearing enough. If he had noticed her staring at him, he made no mention of it.

The curses that she had said were repeated this time in a male voice, only louder, in Arabic and a few other languages that she had not recognised, as he approached her side, not slowing in his charge towards the horses.

"Woman," He growled, "What are you waiting for? Run! They are our only transport!"

She obeyed mutely, feeling somewhat scandalised at the near naked man running frantically by her side after the equally frantic horses, trying her hardest not to peek at the side where he struggled to pull his robe over his head as he kept up with her.

A few muffled curses in Arabic were let out again through the outer robe as he pulled the offending item over his neck and shoulders.

Ardeth was, unfortunately, doing an admirable job in getting dressed very fast as they sprinted.

"You said there would be no one around for miles! What was that gunshot?" She gasped out, knowing that she was already tiring, her hands at her sides, trying to pinch away the burgeoning pain.

"Hunters, maybe," He bit back at her through gritted teeth; in truth, he did not know too. "Horus, my falcon died this way."

He did not seem to be weakening. Yet. The robe, to her outraged delight, was barely hiding anything; it still hung limply down his wet calves and thighs, his muscles coated with a sheen that the mixture of the remnant water droplets and perspiration provided. It flapped as he ran alongside her barefoot, tantalising those who even prided themselves on their unwavering strength and dogged self-control.

He was not overtly bulky, she thought, yet the ruggedness that was found in the hard planes and ridges of his body, too well defined for words, proclaimed him too devastatingly masculine to resist, that the difficulty she had in breathing did not completely stem from the exertion of running.

The run was nothing short of electrically charged and exhilarating, she was finding out, with a man whose body she seemed to only notice for the first time, a beautiful form that complemented his stunning features.

He soon overtook her despite the wound in his shoulder that quite possibly was not cleaned yet, the last hundred of meters that spanned the distance between them and the horses was covered easily by him in the sudden spurt that she had seen athletes perform in their last lap of a race. He was an athlete, she realised, an athletic of the most brutal kind, those who trained with rough sports for purposes of protection and survival, not for accolade. His body was a tough testimony to it all -perfectly shaped and curved, ridges and hard lines in the right places, a grin forming on her face as she mentally slapped herself for the unhealthy amount of uncontrollable and inappropriate thoughts that were stringing themselves through her mind.

Alex had stopped, doubling over, hands over her abdomen and sides, breathing hard from the short sprint. The pain of running had finally taken over the imaginative thrill of seeing a man who ran primitively through a forest barely dressed.

Ardeth shouted a few commands in Arabic which the horses continued to ignore, wanting to stamp his foot in frustration, yet also knowing that he was now running for another reason; he was unable to stop running even if he wanted to, for the wind had provided just enough resistance as he ran to press the wet robe against his body. Its shape was most unfortunate -a wide and sharp V in front and then splitting again from the thighs downward, unless cinched together with something and worn over something else. Without a belt, he realised belatedly, it would fall away with a slight pull. But he was nearing the black stallion, which thankfully slowed down, and pressed himself tight to its side in the hope of shielding himself in the front, before grabbing its reins roughly.

The white horse galloped a little further before turning around to obey its master's call, slowing down to a trot in front of Ardeth.

Alex heard a rapid volley of Arabic from a distance and the sound of hooves, hearing the horses return with an annoyed Medjai who dressed too little.

Probably ready to do away with our only source of transport if the horses haven't decided to kill themselves yet, she thought sardonically, finally glimpsing a dripping being who was flanked by their stallions. Only a tad bit of imagination was needed to convince herself that Mount Olympus had created another capricious god who displayed a mighty physique but exhibited human characteristics, gifted with horses of good and evil, black and white

Excessive mythology was never too good for a female, she thought. Always made one sway towards the side of the silly romantics, despite the constant reality pinches she conducted on herself.

It was a mighty effort that she mustered up to keep her eyes trained only on Ardeth's face, aware of but ignoring the unhealthy amount of bareness that was shown unwittingly.

He, on the other hand, was experiencing an emotion aside from tiredness and fatigue that he had not remembered since the days of his youth, an emotion that had once again grown foreign. Embarrassment and shyness.

"Your horse, madam." He handed the reins back to her with as much dignity as he could muster, choosing humour as his shield, ignoring the pointed look on her face. "Do teach it some obedience."

"Obedience? To a tree trunk perhaps? Or maybe I should talk dear white horse to circle a tree enough times so that the reins will be firmly lodged in the crack of the trunk and" She snorted.

"I do get your drift, Dr. Khalan. I only meant to jest." He replied somewhat stiffly. "It is also very much my fault for forgetting to tie them up. Forgive that grave error."

Alex sighed and took stock of their situation: two wounded people, newly exhausted from another kind of chase, badly in need of rest, possibly arguing over what should be let go.

"Let's just go and get rest, Ardeth."

"Not so fast, Dr. Khalan. There are still some things to discuss."

The short walk back was filled with more stumbling and cursing from the doctor, while her Medjai companion seemed to glide smoothly over dips and undulations of the ground without second thought.

"There is still that troubling gunshot that we have not quite answered, Ardeth." She leaned back into a large rock, sighing inwardly.

"The oasis is a large place," He said. "But you know that there is something more important that we should get out in the open."

"Yes, yes. I hear you. The touch and its electrifying effect," She said dryly.

"You simplify it too much. I am tempted to call you ignorant -those who are unaware of the greater powers at work unseen by us."

"Making me a believer?" She questioned.

He shook his head vehemently.

"No, when you see enough, you will believe as I do. But for now, I wish to finish my bath in peace. I wish to get dressed and I pray to Allah that there will be no more heart stopping distractions this time." He got up gingerly, holding is left hand tight against the crotch lest the robe flapped unnecessarily, and disappeared down the precipice once more.

She exhaled and got up, this time tying the horses down tightly, muttering more curses under her breath as the overactive mind started to visualise all that lay beneath that robe.

It did not take long for Ardeth to finish all that he had to do, relieved that there were no horses that demanded his attention, yet unsettled by the sudden shyness that had accosted him earlier.

"It is true then, Medjai, that we are both seeing strange whirlpools ofthings?" She called out as he climbed back up, dressed as appropriately as he could. It was more disappointing than she cared to admit, and then decided to resolutely focus on their more important line of conversation.

"We shall call them visions," He corrected her, stretching the kinks out of his shoulders.

She hesitated to call them fragments of lost memory that were trying to rejoin themselves once more, for doing so would be admitting that there were many things that she needed to and did not yet want to grasp.

"Visions?" She snorted. But Ardeth was regarding her thoughtfully.

"But it seems that I dream them at night too. Do you?"

She shook her head, telling him the negative.

"Then you add another dimension to this. How is this then, that we see different things, unclearly, yet we know that they concern us, and I dream also at night?" He was perplexed, recalling himself telling O'Connell that only the journey was written, but not the destination. He sounded so sure then, high up in the skies in the dirigible, pouring out words like a prophet on the O'Connells, wishing that he had the same convictions now as he had then.

He needed to get dressed, fast.

"I want to try something, Ardeth. Give me your hand. Just do not let go until untiluntil we know there is no more." Alex suggested hesitantly.

He was frightened at her tone, at her suggestion, torn between wanting to grab the root of the problem with his fist and running away when the opportunity finally presented itself for him to do so. Afraid suddenly, inexplicably of what he might see, of how the course of destiny will be altered. But history is already written, praise be to Allah, he reminded himself grimly; all that he was about to see was only a deeper revelation of it.

So he agreed, even though the war of doubt and want still waged strong, putting both of his hands out in invitation, watching her place her own in his before they closed their eyes, fearful of what would assault them next.

"I swear by the book of the dead, Rick, that I heard horses, far in the distance. They are somewhere around." Evelyn O'Connell pursed her lips, picking up the unfortunate gun that misfired when she tried to catch it as it fell from its holster.

"That can't be true -it's been, what, way enough time for them to reach Hamunaptra and find whatever needed to satisfy good ol' Bembridge." Her husband frowned.

"I am very concerned for them, honey." She frowned back at him.

"Look, Ardeth is one tough guy. If Alex Khalan is not as unflappable as she looks, he will have to rescue a damsel who finds herself in wailing distress every 28 seconds. It's good practice, by the way, since the Medjai Chief will one day have to acquire a female breeder." Rick supplied dryly.

"A female breeder, indeed!"

"But our aim is fulfilled," He said somewhat smugly. "My memory works perfectly fine. Even after a decade I managed to remember the direction of era legendary Oasis that was near Hamunaptra."

Evy considered him for a moment.

"Oh well, I suppose you are right. It is so silent and peaceful here. It's not been often that we find ourselves in a place of total stillness and peace, is it not?" She breathed in the night air deeply, appreciating the occasional fall of twigs and leaves.

"That, honey, is because you scared half the animal population off with that misfire of yours. The pocket of silence that you hear, is no coincidence."

"It was an accident, Rick!" She protested.

"The noise of the good jungle will return, given sufficient time."

That remark earned him a slap on the forearm and he groaned at his own foolish attempt in trying to out-speak his smart mouthed wide.

"And have you actually realised that we found this oasis by accident, not insulting your good memory, but because we saw a row of trees from a distance when it's printed as another 50 miles east on the map? And that we are now more than slightly lost in this oasis?" She fretted and fidgeted a bit.

"I know that honey," He soothed, before taking her hand and leading her towards their campsite. "We will get out. We somehow manage to get out, if my judgement serves me right, we did get out the last time, albeit with a bit more difficulty than expected," he said ironically.

"And Ardeth is..."

"I am as concerned about them as much as you are, even though I do not act like it at times. And we will find them, if not in the morning, then maybe the day after, maybe in Hamunaptra itself, or maybe back in Cairo, when everything is finished," He said seriously.

"Rick O'Connell, you finally speak sense." She said with no small amount of relief.

"There is something really big that is coming -maybe not for us, but maybe for Ardeth. Perhaps the gods finally realise that the boring life of a particular Egyptian chieftain needed sprucing up."

"Haven't we got enough excitement already? Now that the son and Jonathan are back safely, it looks like we did end up with a lot more than what we bargained for."

"I recall that someone did mention that Egypt was in her blood," He hummed a little, before gazing at her pointedly. "If I hadn't told you already, I approve of that statement wholeheartedly so long that Egyptian blood is confined in a library or a museum where it belongs, even though Dr. Whitsun the creep has suddenly decided that your help is not big deal after all."

"Times have changed, Rick," Evy mused mysteriously. "I think I might be finally starting to agree with you. It wasn't as if I did not glimpse the catalogue at all; there were some interesting customs, I think, judging from the artefacts that I managed to peek over Dr. Whitson's shoulder, that might have passed down to the generation of Ramses II."

"Do you think they would be of any help at all to Ardeth and Alexandra? Is that the reason that got you hightailing out of that Museum? Or, might I say -" The smug grin that appeared on his face was adorable only to her.

"Now, Rick. You are finally getting it." Came her wry reply.

"So the lady speaks."