Never My Money
Rated PG-13
Disclaimer – All characters belong to Stephen Sommers and Universal.
The Mummy, through the eyes of the accidental hero.
Chapter 1
"Son of a bitch." It's never English that answers you back. The cuffs were only half-picked and half-picked just wasn't gonna be good enough. "Yeah, yeah, all right." I swung my feet off the bed, (if you could really call a plank of termite-infested wood a bed) and was being dragged out of the urine-infested hellhole cell before my feet hit the floor. I managed to hide the small pin under the shackles, the sharp point digging into my wrist. But I had other things to worry about at the moment, besides a little blood dripping out from under the cuff. Like getting the hell out of here. And then beating the living hell out of that little weasel.
For some reason, they felt they needed two guards to escort me...okay, drag me along the screaming halls of the Cairo Prison. The buzz? The American scum is finally getting hanged. You can just feel the love emanating through the walls.
But the turn we took wasn't the usual way to the courtyard. Hrmm. The chance that they would be letting me go was about the same as a blizzard passing through here to snow on my unmarked grave. We stopped in front of a door, and as one of the guards let go long enough to throw the door open, I elbowed the other guard, throwing a clinched fist into his face. My half-second of freedom didn't last too long though – the batons were out in full force, battering me into the small cell on the edge of the courtyard. This was strange enough, but then the two Brits standing on the other side next to Hassan really made me wonder what the hell was going on as the guards brought the batons down on my back, forcing me to my knees.
"Who are you?" I asked, not really giving a damn if they were talking or not. I dropped my hands down...I had to get the pick out from under my skin. "And who's the broad?"
"Broad?" she repeated, huffy. Yep. Brit.
"I just a local sort of missionary chap, spreading the good word, and all that." Boy, was he a bad liar. "This is my sister, Evy." He reached back, grabbing his sister, forcing her forward, though I could tell she wanted to stay as far away from me as possible.
"How do you do?" she asked, attempting to be polite, but her attempts were lost on me. I had other shit to worry about.
"Well, I guess she's not a total loss," I said. Hassan's and my attention were both drawn away as half of the gallows suddenly they were erecting collapsed in the center of the courtyard. Hassan barked out some orders before telling his esteemed guests he would be back. This was my chance. Hassan knew me well enough to watch my hands. These two wouldn't have noticed had I been picking the lock right in front of their faces...well, the "missionary chap" might have.
"Um, excuse me?" I glanced back at the broad, who was all but waving to get my attention. "We've found your...your puzzle box. And we've come to ask you about it." Bad lying must have run in the family.
"No."
"No?"
"No. You came to ask me about Hamunaptra." Both of them panicked, as though anyone around here had actually heard me over the noise.
"How...how did you know the box pertained to Hamunaptra?"
"Because that's where I was when I found it. I was there."
"And how do we know that's not a load of pig's wallow?" her brother asked, leaning down toward me as though he could look menacing. Something sparked in my head – I had seen him before...but where?
"You know, do I know you?" I asked. The way he flinched and tried to back-pedal with the ever infamous "I've just got one of those faces" line – the kasbah. Bastard was the one who picked my pocket. That's where the box had gone. I reached through the bars, decking him in the jaw. The beating I received shortly there after was well worth it.
The woman, Evy he had called her, stepped over her brother, tempting fate to come closer to the cell.
"You were actually at Hamunaptra?" she asked, her eyes as big as a kid at Christmas.
"I just decked your brother," I pointed out.
"Yes, well, I know my brother," she answered, shrugging. I had to laugh; maybe she wasn't wound as tightly as she looked to be.
"Yeah, I was there," I finally answered with a grin.
"You swear?"
Oh, she walked right into that one. "Every damn day."
"Oh, I didn't mean that," she stated, flustered. "I mean-"
"I know what you meant. Seti's Place. City of the Dead." Well, it was now, anyway.
"Could you...could you tell me how to get there?" Okay...now I was hearing things. "I mean, the exact location."
"You want to know?" I motioned for her to come closer.
"Yes."
"You really want to know?" She leaned in further at my prompting, growing more and more excited by the idea that I was about to tell her.
"Well, yes!" I grabbed her through the bars, and to make sure I had her attention, I laid a hard kiss on her. Bet she'd never been kissed before, let alone by an American in a prison.
"Then get me the hell outta here!" The beatings commenced from behind, as Hassan stepped back up to the cell, motioning for them to take me to my doom. Just then, the lock of the cuff I had been working on finally popped, and I swung back, using the added weight of the shackles to nail the guards with. "Do it, Lady!" I hissed, as the guards latched onto me, more running into the cell to drag me out.
It's funny, really, how much the promise of death and carnage will bring even the quietest of men to his feet screaming. And that's exactly what every man in that prison was doing as they looped the rope around my neck.
"Any last requests, pig?" the hangman asked.
"Yeah. Loosen the knot and let me go." He repeated the appeal to Hassan, sitting up in a guard-protected box with the woman. As if I really needed to hear the answer, down came, "Of course we don't let him go," punctuated by a smack up the back of the head from the hangman. Ass.
I glanced up to the cozy little booth, transfixing a glare on Hassan. The woman is babbling on something or other, but it seems to finally catch the warden's short attention. Of course, when the idiot tries to put the moves on the prude, he had the tenacity to be offended when he smacked his hand away. And that's when my worthless life flashed before my eyes.
