AN: STILL DON'T OWN THE MUMMY. SO ANYTHING RECOGNIZABLE FROM THERE STILL BELONGS TO STEPHEN SOMMERS AND UNIVERSAL.
I woke up feeling like I got hit by a freight train. Sleep wasn't so easy to come by last night, not with the dreams, or maybe they were warnings, spurned by the conversation I had had with Ardeth before. The dead walking amongst us again, fire raining from the heavens and a chilling voice in my ear, taunting me that I would be too late. Honestly, I was over this place. While it may have been my idea to come to Egypt for an adventure, I was afraid I had bitten off more than I could chew.
Grumbling a greeting to my brother, Jack looked at me in concern. I wasn't normally much of a morning person, but he could just tell something else was bothering me. He approached me slowly, offering a cup of coffee as a sign of peace. Still mumbling about the sun and lack of sleep, I downed my coffee in record time. Going back to my tent I found it empty. Evy was already up and heading to their dig site. Making the best of the privacy, I changed into a new top and threw my hair up into a high ponytail, off of my neck to give me some relief from the heat. Shaking out my boots to make sure there weren't any bugs in them, I pulled them on as I exited my tent and went over to Jack.
"Are you ok? You didn't seem like yourself this morning." He was hovering worse than he normally did, last night's raid must have shaken him more than he was letting on.
"Yeah. I just didn't sleep that well after my watch." I answered, brushing off his worry. Those dreams couldn't have meant anything, just anxiety over Ardeth's warnings.
"I'm not putting you in the watch rotation tonight. You're getting a full night's rest." He said, looking me over, checking for any other signs that I might not be alright.
"Yes mom," I said with a roll of my eyes. "Honestly Jack, I'm fine. It was just a long night. The coffee is already working." He didn't look quite convinced. It was in these moments that I hated having a twin. It was like we had a built-in censor that went off any time the other wasn't ok and right now I didn't need Jack acting like a frazzled mother hen.
"If you're sure. Come on. We're going to open that compartment today." He said before leaving me to join Daniels and Bernard. I looked around my site, making sure I had everything that I would need for the day. Looking around, I couldn't find my journal. Shit! Where did that go? I had it last night when I was on watch. I set it down when I heard Ardeth approach. Shit! I left it outside the city. I quickly ran back to my watch spot from last night, looking all around and even digging into the sand, searching for my journal. It wasn't there. Fuck! Maybe Daniels saw it and picked it up during his watch. Running back to the group, we started making our way inside to the statue of Anubis.
I fell into step with Daniels. "Hey, did you by any chance see a journal on the ground during your watch? I seemed to have left it out there and it wasn't there when I went to check just now." I asked him.
"Oh, you mean this journal?" he asked, pulling my journal out of his pack. "Yeah, I found it. Read it too." He said smugly. He smirked at me, wagging his eyebrows. Yep, he definitely read it. He knew about this new infatuation I had with Ardeth.
"I swear to God Daniels, if you mention anything that you read to anyone, let alone Jack, I'll make sure you never make it back to Cairo." I threatened, grabbing my journal from his grasp.
"Oh, I won't tell your brother all about the big crush you have on that guy who almost killed you." He taunted me. I punched him hard in the chest, a warning of what was to come if he couldn't find it in himself to keep his trap shut and walked ahead to where Jack and Bernard were. Jack gave me a weird look, having heard Daniels groan in pain when I hit him but I just shook my head and entered the statue room.
Now that the compartment was void of any booby traps, the diggers made quick work of getting out whatever what inside. Which turned out to be a chest. A red chest with black hieroglyphs on it. Kneeling on the ground and bringing a torch close to have some light, Dr. Chamberlain and I made quick work of translating it. "There is a curse upon this chest." Dr. Chamberlain said. Daniels didn't look too convinced.
"What's it say Peggy?" Jack asked me.
"'Death will come on swift wings to whomsoever opens this chest.'" At this, a wind blew through the room and our lights started to dim. The diggers started yelling and ran from the room in fright.
"We should not be here. This is not good." Beni said, looking around in case of a threat. For once, I actually agreed with him. Something was really off about this place. Dr. Chamberlain ignored Beni's observation and continued on with the translation.
"'There is one, the undead, who, if brought back to life, is bound by sacred law to consummate this curse.'"
"Well let's make sure we don't bring anyone back from the dead then." Daniels said. This was the first time that I could tell he was genuinely scared of what may lie ahead.
"There's still more here. 'He will kill all who open this chest and assimilate their organs and fluids, and in so doing, he will regenerate and no longer be the undead, but a plague upon this Earth.'" I finished the translation.
"Well, we didn't come all this way for nothing. Let's crack open this chest." Daniels ordered. Beni, however, didn't look like he was up for the task. He was paler than normal and sweating profusely before he turned tail and ran out of the room screaming about a curse. Jack seemed to be worried too and told me to leave while they opened it.
"You don't believe in curses Jack. There is no way someone is going to come back from the dead and kill us." I argued in vain as he pushed me through the tunnel and back out into the sun.
"I don't care. If anything happens to you, mom will kill me. I'd take a curse over that any day. Now stay here and don't do anything stupid." He told me, before turning and going back inside. I sighed before kicking some sand up and heading over to my tent to get my water skin, taking a sip and splashing some on my face. This wasn't fair. I was the one that had done the research for this trip, gotten the education required to be in this field and now, during a moment of big discovery, I was forced to stay outside and hope they wouldn't mess up any artifacts. This was bullshit! My eyes scanned the hills surrounding the city, searching for him.
Why was I so caught up on this guy? He had tried to kill us. I knew Jack was concerned. Normally I'm quick on the draw and I don't ever hesitate. But last night I did. There was something in his eyes that stopped me. Even though I could tell he was trained and fully capable of killing me, there was surprise in his face when he realized I wasn't just another man. For a split second after that, I could have sworn I saw a slight smile, like the sight of a woman in battle amused him. And then there was something else, almost a recognition that went deeper than our previous encounter on the steamer on the Nile.
At dusk they came back out, not empty handed though. Each of them was carrying a jar and Dr. Chamberlain had a big black book in his hands. "What was in it?" I asked Jack, walking up him.
"There was that book there that Dr. Chamberlain has, and these jars filled with sand." He said before handing me his that had the head of Horus on it. I inspected it before laughter overtook me. "What? What's so funny?" Jack asked me. By this point, the sound of my laughter had brought Bernard and Daniels over to us as well.
"That's not sand in those jars. These are canopic jars. During the mummification process the vital organs are removed and put into sacred jars that are then buried with the deceased. Each jar has a son of Horus carved on the lid and that signifies which vital organ was placed inside," I paused and turned to Bernard pointing at his. "That in Imsety, it contains the liver. Hapi, the one with the baboon head, contains the lungs. Duamutef, the jackal, contains the stomach. Finally, that one is Qebehsenuef, and those were intestines inside it."
"What about the heart? Wouldn't they want that too?" Daniels asked.
"The heart was left in the body as it housed intelligence and feeling, and you would need those in the afterlife." By this point Rick and Jonathan had joined our group in front of the fire.
"Say O'Connell, what do you think these babies'll fetch back home?" Jack asked him with a shit eating grin. I smacked him on the back of the head. "What?" I just rolled my eyes.
"We hear you boys found yourselves a nice gooey mummy. Congratulations." Bernard added. There were times that I really regretted introducing Bernard to my brother and Daniels, who had been friends with Jack since we were children. Bernard used to be so sweet and most of the time he still was. But he had obtained a certain quality that only came from spending a large amount of time with my brother and his friend. In short, he could sometimes be a really big ass.
Not to be left out, Daniels added, "You know, if you dry that fellow out, you might be able to sell him for firewood." They all started laughing at this.
"Oh yes, ha ha. What wit you three possess. I too need three people in order to make a joke work." I retorted. Honestly, sometimes they acted like children. Jack and Bernard looked down at my scolding. Daniels just smirked and wagged his eyebrows, daring me to continue so he could out me in front of the others. I glared at him before turning my attention to Evy, who was walking up with something in her hands.
"Look what I found." She said excitedly. Rick forced Beni to vacate the space in between him and Jonathan and Evy plopped down. "Scarab skeletons, flesh-eaters. I found them inside our friend's coffin. They can stay alive for years feasting on the flesh of a corpse."
"Gross." I inputted.
"I have to agree with you. Unfortunately for our friend, he was still alive when they started eating him."
"Double gross." I shuddered. I really didn't like bugs.
"So, somebody threw these in with our guy, and then they slowly ate him alive?" Rick asked. I gagged a little.
"Very slowly." Evy confirmed.
"Just what I needed, an irrational fear, death by man eating bugs." I quipped.
"What did he do to piss off the powers that be?" Jonathan wondered out loud.
"He probably got too frisky with the pharaoh's daughter." Rick said with a smirk, one that the rest of the guys in the group were quick to return.
"Lovely. Must everything automatically go that way with men? Have some class, or at least the decency to have a good poker face." I scolded them.
"According to my research, our friend suffered the Hom-Dai, the worst of all Ancient Egyptian curses, one reserved only for the most evil of blasphemers. In every book that I've read that mentions it, they've never said that it was actually used. They feared it too much. It's written that if a victim of the Hom-Dai should ever arise, he would bring with him the ten plagues of Egypt." Evy informed us.
"Why the hell would they give someone who was so evil the power to bring about the plagues? I mean honestly, who's bright idea was it to make them near invincible?" I asked.
"The curse doesn't actually exist Peggy. There's no need to worry about plagues and mummies coming to life. It's not real." Evy reassured me. I wasn't too convinced. My conversation with Ardeth last night and the dreams I had afterward were making me weary of staying here another night.
With all the talks of curses, I think we were all a little on edge and quickly decided to turn in for the night. I was somewhat reluctant. I did not need another restless night of dreams filled with juicy mummies and hell on earth. I laid in my tent staring up at the ceiling for what seemed like hours before a fitful sleep took me. Opening my eyes in my dream, I found myself inside the ruins, except they weren't ruins. The city was still inhabited, or at the very least, there were some people there. I was in a preparation room, filled with men wearing jackal masks, servants of the god Anubis, and men standing guard who were wearing head coverings like the pharaoh but with strange tattoos on their foreheads and cheeks. Their bodies were also littered with tattoos, but whatever language they were written in wasn't one that I was fluent in, or even able to recognize.
There were bald men, their bodies completed painted in gold, that were being mummified alive. Some were in the process of being wrapped, others were having their brains removed through their nostrils. I winced. Reading about the process of mummification and watching it be performed on the living were two entirely different things. One of the servants called for a Medjai to help him hold down a priest that was trying to fight back. "What is a Medjai?" I wondered. I didn't have to wonder for long as one of the men with the head covering like a pharaoh came to assist him.
As I continued my survey of the room, more Medjai and servants of Anubis came in, escorting another bald man. A priest I assumed. This one, however, was not covered in gold paint. A group of Medjai held him down and forced his tongue out of his mouth and held it there as the servants grabbed a large knife and cut off his tongue. They then began wrapping him in the same gauze they used on the others and placed him inside a sarcophagus.
If I thought this couldn't get worse, I was wrong. I watched as another man came over with a large pot and dumped its contents into the sarcophagus. I looked over and saw thousands of scarabs biting into the body, starting the very slow process of eating him alive.
And just as suddenly as I was thrust into the dream, I was pulled from it by an unearthly scream. I shot up in my tent, almost bringing it down around me. "No! You must not read from the book!" I heard Dr. Chamberlain yell. Getting out of my tent, I made my way over to where Jack had just come out of a tent with Bernard and Daniels. "And what were you three doing in there?" I asked with a shit eating grin on my face. Bernard looked shocked and disgusted and Daniels like he wanted to punch me. Jack, however, did punch me in the arm but I saw his eyes go wide.
I slowly turned around and saw a dark cloud coming right at us. It was clicking and I heard the flapping of thousands of little wings. "Locusts!" I yelled as we all started running towards the entrance into the city.
"Run!" Jack yelled. Not turning back, I wasn't sure who all had followed us, but I was right behind Bernard. We got into the tunnel and I was pushed by Jonathan into Bernard, causing him to fall and me to fall on top of him.
"My glasses! Where are my glasses?" he asked frantically. I rolled over off of him to help him find them when we heard Beni run up behind us screaming at something that wasn't there to leave him. As he passed us, we heard the tinkle of broken glass and I saw Bernard pick up his glasses, both lenses broken.
"Come on Berny. We have to keep moving." I said, calling him by the nickname I gave him our first semester of college. I grabbed his arm and started leading him deeper and deeper into the tunnels. Something ran out quickly in front of us. I stopped and turned us around and there it went past us again. Berny was starting to panic so I turned us around again, determined to get out of here, when I came face to face (kind of) with the mummy that Rick and Evy had been talking about. I screamed and Bernard tensed up, only being able to see the general shape of the creature before us. The creature picked me up and threw me into a wall. I landed, hard on my back, black spots dancing in my vision. Just before I passed out, I saw the creature do something weird to Bernard and heard Bernard give out the most painful scream I had ever heard.
I came to in someone's arms. Whoever they were, they were tall, that much I could tell because I was getting a weird sense of vertigo. Turning my head slightly, I saw a black clad chest. Before I had the opportunity to look up, I heard guns being cocked and saw Rick, Evy, Jonathan, Jack, and Daniels come to a screeching halt in front of us. "What are you doing with my sister you sick freak?" Jack yelled at the one holding me. I felt the vibrations of whoever he was as he spoke.
"I told you to leave or die. You refused. Now you may have killed us all for you have unleashed the creature that we have feared for more than three thousand years." It was Ardeth who had me.
"Relax, I got him" Rick said.
"No mortal weapon can kill this creature. He is not of this world." As Ardeth said this, two of his men brought out Bernard. Wiggling to get down, I fell out of his arms and over to my brother and Daniels who were holding him. I checked over Bernard and was shocked that he no longer had his beautiful blue eyes, or his tongue. He moaned in pain as I ran my fingers through his hair, trying to soothe him.
"You bastard." Daniels yelled at them.
"What did you do to him?" Jack accused.
"Jack, they didn't do this." I told him quietly. I then went on to explain how we got separated and how the creature came for us.
"We saved him. Saved him before the creature could finish his work. Leave, all of you, quickly, before he finishes you all." He gestured to his men, "Yalla. Imshi." His men moved, making their way back into the tunnels. "I must now go on the hunt and try and find a way to kill him." He finished before walking to join his men.
"I already told you, I got him." Rick said again.
"Know this. This creature is the bringer of death. He will never eat, he will never sleep, and he will never stop." He turned to join his men. I quickly got up from my place by Berny and walked over to him.
"Thank you, for saving us." I said quietly. He looked startled, not expecting me to be fluent in Arabic.
You are welcome. Please be careful on your journey back. Be quick." With one last glance, he left to join the rest of his men on the hunt. We packed up quickly, leaving behind anything that was not of importance, racing out of the city and back to Cairo. We rode hard. I tried to focus on the road ahead, but my treacherous thoughts kept going back to how it felt to be in his arms. I already knew that he must be strong. It takes great strength to be able to use a sword for an extended amount of time, but in his arms, I could feel his biceps and abs beneath his robes. I blushed. I shouldn't be having these thoughts. They were unseemly for a young, unmarried woman to be having about a man. Plus, I had bigger problems. Starting with how I was going to protect my brother and friends from this thing.
AN: Thank you so much to those that have favorited this story. I'm trying my hardest to get through the events of the movie so I can start on the original plot that I have planned so thank you for bearing with me. I'm almost done with chapter 4 so I'll probably end up posting that either Monday or Tuesday.