The point of this chapter is that shifting the time frame by just a few minutes can change everything. And I mean everything :) I don't think anyone guessed what I meant with that last author's note. Oh goodie, that means more suspense:) I'm actually surprised I've never seen this done before. 'This' meaning the second half of the chapter, from Rick's POV. Ah, well, I'm the first. Yay me:) You'll see. Hee hee. Get on with it, Buffelyn. All right. Here we go...

it's your dead meat from former days i am your crisis the asbestos in your veins i'm your broken fingers i killed you twice i will again revenge is eager see first you'll crash and then you'll burn it's your dead meat formaldehyde didn't faze me i soon returned to track you down for your confession i'll be your poison and your pain i'll be your struggle to be sane

--"car crash weather" bush

My first thought when I start awake is that it must be the turbulence. But Rick has hold of my arms, he is shaking me. "Wake up, Evy. Come on, wake up, we have to go."

My eyes open slowly, unwillingly, and I see all the boys are up and moving around the plane with urgency. Wind whips around us and muffles Rick's words. He hauls me to my feet when I don't seem to understand fast enough. "Are we there?" I ask, seconds before I realize the breeze I feel on my face is coming from the open cargo door. We are still in the air, why is the door open? Rick hands me a heavy backpack and I stand there stupidly, still not comprehending the apparent weight of the situation.

"We have to jump, Evy," says Rick, sliding me into the pack. "He's right behind us."

As Rick moves to help Alex with another of the backpacks, my eyes move to the open door, and I come fully awake. A wall of water displaying a most-unwelcome visage bears down on our little plane. We seem to have cleared the Blue Nile, but it continues to pursue us, crashing over and through the trees like they are mere toothpicks. I look to Izzy. He has the controls in a death grip, and keeps shooting glances back at us as if to hurry us with his eyes. "Go!" he shouts above the wind. "Go! Go!"

Ardeth and Jonathan disappear through the door (Ardeth practically dragging Jonathan, I notice,) and in an instant they are gone. Rick grabs my hands, tries to explain what I have to do, but I can only nod. Alex pulls me to the door.

"You two first!" Rick shouts. "Now!"

I am given no time to prepare, for he shoves us unceremoniously out the door and into the mercy of the wind. Alex is ripped from my grasp and all I can see is an endless expanse of trees below me, rushing forward with alarming speed. Somehow I remember I have to open the parachute, and as I pull the cord the force yanks me back with a violent jerk that knocks the air out of my lungs. Out of the corner of my eye I see a flash of gold. A few more moments of panic, then the wind on my face becomes more regular, my breath returns, as I drift toward those inviting trees which moments before I was sure would be the death of me.

It seems merely seconds, however, before I meet the trees feet-first, crashing through foliage which seems to my body to be made of bricks. With a painful thump I have suddenly stopped moving, and it takes me a moment for the cold mud of the jungle floor to seep into my bones and trigger the thought that I have landed. Everything goes black before I can register anything else.

My eyes snap open to find I am inexplicably moving steadily through the jungle, though it is not the most comfortable journey I have ever experienced. I raise my head and see that my brother is my transport. He is practically carrying me. "Jonathan?" I mumble, and he stops dead.

"Oh, thank God, you're awake!" he cries. "Are you all right, Evy?"

"I'm fine. Where is everyone else?"

"Can you walk if I support you a bit? My arms are a bit tired."

I nod my agreement and we resume our slow trek through the trees. "Where is everyone?" I ask again. I dread the answer but I have to know before another moment passes.

Jonathan seems to be unaware of this dire fact and takes a minute to reply. "Ardeth went to rejoin his people."

"Where's Alex? Where's Rick?"

"They went ahead, to the temple. Sun's coming up in about ten minutes. Keep moving, Evy, the local natives are a bit irritable."

"Do you think they'll make it?"

"Yes." Jonathan's grip on me tightens. "Yes, they will."

"What about Izzy?"

Jonathan doesn't answer again, forcing me to repeat my question. "Evy...the plane went down. We don't...we don't think he made it."

I couldn't have continued the conversation if I'd wanted to, but Jonathan seems to sense my sadness and keeps up a steady stream of talk. I think he intends to make me feel better, but his words have a dismal effect on me. The sun has so far declined to make an appearance, but the butterflies eating away at my stomach will not cease until I have seen my son safe and devoid of jewelry.

We reach the safety of the pyramid and nothing happens. No fireworks, no congratulatory hurrah. Alex looks at me expectantly through the semi-dark, waiting for me to do something. He knows who I am, I think he's known it from the beginning, and for the first time in my life I'm a parent. My son is asking me to help him, and I am utterly out of ideas.

I am spared, however, for we hear a loud click as the bracelet falls from Alex's wrist. We both stare at it there in the sand for a moment, and when he looks at me his smile is one of relief. Perhaps one that also says, 'This doesn't mean I like you or anything,' but it's a smile all the same, and I am perfectly willing to accept whatever olive branch he might offer, no matter how small.

Our attention is drawn to the jungle as Evelyn and Jonathan emerge from the darkness. Alex runs to meet his mother, and they share yet another tearful reunion. Jonathan claps me on the back, and finally I see him smile again. The sun has begun to rise.

"Can we go home now?" Alex asks, and as Evelyn and Jonathan reassure him that yes, it's over, I see something that makes me believe otherwise.

The Bracelet no longer sits on the sandy floor of the temple entrance. I leave my companions and go to look at the spot where it fell. It's not there. It's just not there.

Out of the blue Imhotep appears and I feel the cold steel of a blade ripping through me. I can't react except to look at the man with disbelief. No mortal could accomplish the look of such pure hatred that is shining in his eyes. As he pulls the blade from my abdomen I see Anck-su-namun behind him, holding the book in one hand and the bracelet in the other.

As fast as they came they're gone, and I've never felt so alone. I chance a look down, and as my hand falls away from the wound, the blood nearly overwhelms me. The knife went in right of center, maybe not instant, but deadly enough.

I've seen plenty of battles. I've seen men get blown to bits, I've heard them cry to indifferent gods with their last breath, I've carried the memories of friends killing, dying, dead. I've murdered men, I've prayed that they don't get me first, that my bullets will be more accurate than theirs. Call it what you will, call it the life of a soldier, call it duty, call it whatever makes you feel better. I've looked death in the eye, and rarely flinched at its toll.

I'm finding out that it's a little different when you're the one dying. As I sink to my knees I suddenly become aware of other people around me. The first thing that snaps into focus is Evelyn's face, and my first thought is that I can't do this to her. I can't leave her again. I love Evelyn, but mostly all I've had have been the memories of her. Sunlight catching her hair as we walked down a random Cairo street, laughter twinkling in those beautiful eyes as she stood on tiptoes to kiss the end of my nose. Thunder rolling in the distance as she cuddled closer to me under a star-filled sky, the electricity of the coming storm filling the air with a sort of anticipation that had less to do with nature and more to do with two people in love. More often than is welcome, those memories have been tainted by others filled with the abject terror that I'd lose her before I'd gotten a chance to tell her so many things I wanted to. In the end, there was still never enough time. Even more that that, I remember the day I left; I remember the horrible certainty in the pit of my stomach that I was never going to see her again.

I don't want to be just a memory to her. I don't want to leave.

"Rick?" she asks, or at least I think she does. All sound seems muted somehow, as if my senses are shutting down one by one. She wraps her hands around mine and I am relieved to find I can still feel her with me. "Rick?" she says again. "Rick, answer me."

It almost hurts to speak, my throat is so tight. "I'm sorry, Evy."

"No. No, Rick, it's not your fault." She is shaking her head back and forth almost violently, and tears fling from her eyes to the ground. I'm not sure if I'm crying, too, for everything has become numb. Even the pain has faded to a manageable ache, and I'm sure that's probably not a good thing.

My eyes move to her brother, who is holding onto Alex a few feet away. It occurs to me that in this past week I haven't inquired anything of Jonathan, and I wonder what sort of a person he is now. I wonder what he meant to Evelyn in these eight years since I knew them last. My son looks so tiny in his uncle's arms, and I can only be grateful to have known him, even though it was only for a few hours. I hope someday he's grateful that he knew me, if just for a little while.

"Rick?" I hear Evy's voice again, but it sounds far away now. I can still feel her hand clutching at mine, my only tie to the rapidly vanishing reality of the sand and sun that floats around the edges of my awareness.

Somehow I know I have strength to speak only once more, and I know the three words, three words that I didn't get to say enough times, will be the last thing I say to her. Through the fog that has clouded my senses I'm glad my own last memory is of Evelyn's face.

"I love you," I can feel myself say, though I cannot hear my own words. Evelyn is replaced by an icy blackness that creeps over my eyelids and forces them closed with a finality that not even love could overcome.

~*~*~*~

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