Rick was getting his ass kicked.
His punch was swept aside and followed up by a vicious back hand that snapped his head to the side. Before he could recover pain exploded across his abdomen as a fist drove into his gut, lifting him clear off his feet.
Gasping for air, Rick stumbled back, his face twisted into a snarl as he glared at Imhotep. The priest only grinned smugly as he advanced, the firelight writhing in the dead man's eyes.
His fury burning as bright as the gouts of flame that shot up out of the jagged crevice close by, Rick lunged, his fist aimed for Imhotep's smiling face. The priest took the blow, but before Rick could follow it up with another he spun away, delivering a gut busting kick to Rick's side. Two more blows to the face knocked Rick back several paces, stars exploding across his vision and obscuring the cavern.
He didn't know what was wrong. Everything felt out of balance. He looked at Imhotep and beyond the fury he heard a wild keen, an implacable unease that declared the man an abomination. More than that though was the implacable desire to cut him down, not for vengeance, but to retain the balance that had been ripped apart by his resurrection. Only he wasn't sure what balance had been broken and why did he keep getting flashes of familiarity with the way Imhotep was moving? His moves were archaic at best, but Rick felt like he should know them.
Beyond that was the strange way his rage was beginning to echo. He could feel it pushing against his breast bone, thrumming through his arms and legs, only it went somewhere else as well. And threaded through the rage were the indistinct flashes of other. Determination would bloom in the back of his mind, and Rick would stumble, seized with the certainty that it was not his.
Pain flared across his jaw as Imhotep scored another hit, and Rick staggered back into another scorpion statue, the priest's hand tight around his neck.
Panic clawed at him as his airway became restricted. His fist caught Imhotep in the stomach and as the priest bent forward he brought his arm down, breaking the hold on his neck. Rick slammed his knee into Imhotep's stomach and shoved him away, taking a few steps back as he tried to remind his body how to breathe.
Rick always listened to his gut, and right now it was telling him that he was missing something. Like fighting with one hand tied behind his back. Everything felt off, jagged pieces trying to fit together, trying and failing without the last fragment that brought everything into one clarifying whole.
A glimmer of intuition not his own slid into place, followed by a cool draft that flowed through his insides like cold water on a hot day. A whisper that contained no sound prodded at him, urged him forward only there was no forward, only flailing confusion. Rick dodged another swipe from Imhotep, threw himself behind a pillar. He didn't know what the hell was going on, but if it didn't knock it off right now he was going to get himself killed.
Another silent whisper, and suddenly Rick clenched his jaw in determination. Only it was faint, a bare sliver of the drive that carried him through life. His gaze catching on a brazier full of darting flame, Rick was suddenly reminded of the black veil Evy had worn while trying to find Hamunaptra. It had been sheer, allowing only a hint of the smooth skin beneath to show through. The determination he felt was faded, as if seen through a veil.
Intuition told him to push. Confused, Rick tried. Without realizing it he lifted his hands and pushed at nothing. Feeling like he'd lost it, Rick was about to put his hands down when he realized that he'd felt resistance, the barest thread of opposition.
Fear skittered down his spine and Rick gave a muffled shout of surprise. He darted out from behind the pillar and out in front of the massive double doors. What the hell was going on?
With a shout Imhotep lunged out from around another pillar, a fist colliding with Rick's cheek bone with dizzying force. Rick tried to block, and only got a knee to the stomach for his trouble. The strong bone of Imhotep's palm struck Rick in the chest and he staggered back, only to have his legs swept out from underneath him. Rick flailed as he lost his balance, and white pain flared across his arms as his weight carried him to the ground, his arms catching him before his face could hit the unyielding stone.
The kick Imhotep landed against his side while Rick was on all fours almost shattered his ribs. The force of it alone was astounding; tossing him high into the air with false strength that infuriated Rick even as it terrified him. As much as it hurt, Rick twisted with the blow and managed to land on his feet, one hand coming down to keep him from overbalancing. Straightening up, Rick had one moment to see the glee that twisted Imhotep's lips up into a dark smile before the rage swept over him.
As it settled around him it crystallized, sealing away all doubt and fear until it left him empty, standing in a strange calm that was impervious to gushing flame and the distant shrieks of the damned. Eyes like stone, Rick lashed out, his fist catching Imhotep across the face with a satisfying crunch of bone on bone. And as the blow landed, Rick felt the strange resistance give a little.
Lips curled back from his teeth in a snarl, Rick struck Imhotep several more times, each blow echoing against the barrier that pressed down on his mind the more he struck at it. He was so close, he could sense that he was moments from breaching through to the other side, and not even his confusion could stop him from slamming his fist into Imhotep's solar plexus.
The dull thud of his fist striking flesh was overshadowed by the muted crack of what sounded like breaking glass. It was more something he felt than heard, a ripple of sound that scraped through his bones like nails over a chalkboard. He would have been stunned by the mute sensation if he hadn't been bombarded by the determination he had only sensed earlier.
Now it washed over him like the tide, burying him under a fierce will forged by constant battle. Crystallized rage shattered, and in its wake Rick was seized by foreign knowledge that was suddenly as familiar as the stock of his shotgun pressing against his forearm. In a wild rush all the pieces clicked together and there was nothing more Rick wanted than to rip Imhotep apart with his bare hands, to wipe away the blight that twisted the lifeblood of the desert into a black caricature of its former glory.
Out of the corner of his eye he saw another scorpion statue, and at the base rested two axes. When normally he would have hesitated, Rick lunged for them, scooping them up and swinging them around, his hands sure as he gripped the short staves. In that moment it didn't matter that he had never fought with two handed axes before. He knew how, and he held them both before him, waiting for Imhotep's move.
Imhotep's chosen weapon was a long stave with axe heads fastened at opposite ends. A difficult weapon to wield if never used before. Imhotep handled it with skill, the stave swinging and dipping in his hands as he advanced. Rick moved to meet him, swinging one axe to block a blow to his torso and followed it up with several one handed parries.
Rick didn't think, instead let his body follow through with the moves that rose up to meet him. Even as his mind tried to protest the ease with which he drove Imhotep back, his arms moved with a will of their own, slashing and blocking with a skill pulled from beyond shattered remains.
He saw Imhotep plant his weapon against the ground, and he read the tense muscles and angled limbs. Knowing what was coming he tried to step back out of the way, but the priest was too fast for him. Resting his weight on the double headed staff Imhotep used it to lever his weight forward, slamming his feet into Rick's chest with breath stealing force.
Rick felt the heat of the brazier before his back slammed into it, and he threw himself forward as fire and oil spilled from the shallow dish that held it. He rolled to his feet as a sea of liquid fire rose up behind him.
Black sand exploded in Ardeth's face as his blade severed the Anubis warrior's head. Breathing hard and his face slick with sweat and blood, Ardeth looked up, ready to face his next foe.
He was met with the elated cries of his fellow Medjai as they celebrated the death of the last Anubis warrior, their swords lifted to the sky in joy. Looking around Ardeth saw the blood that stained his brothers, the bodies of the fallen interspersed with those that yet held onto life. Their cries rang through him, fed the will and determination to prevail that had kept him swinging when every muscle in his body ached.
Beneath the triumphant cries of his people, he felt a tremor of dark power.
With that intuition came the sharp determination of other that pierced him. He had felt Rick break through the barriers he had erected, but the breach had only sharpened the battle lust that had seized him. Two minds connecting two bodies, two battles shared through their hearts if not their blades. It had hurt, but the pain had only blended with the steady burn at his side where an Anubis warrior had gotten too close.
He could feel Rick's struggle, his desperation not to lose a mantra that filtered through the bond to Ardeth, where it continued to echo the intensity he himself had harbored only a few moments before. Rick was still fighting, engaged in his battle and the ferocity that touched him kept him shaking.
Reaching out with the senses that he had been honed through long years of training, Ardeth attempted to follow that feather soft flicker of shadow beneath sunlight. What he found sent nausea coiling down into his stomach, leaving him cold beneath a burning sun. Ignoring the cheers that filled the air around him, Ardeth sprinted. It hurt to move, to push his body beyond a point of pain and exhaustion to simple movement.
He flew over the bloody sands, racing towards a high dune that concealed the approaching horror. He could feel it, a blight upon the light of his home, a seething hunger that reached for him, clicking claws and stinging poison. Ardeth was barely aware of the others following him, their harsh breaths and the patter of their feet over sliding sand of no consequence. His senses were filled with the encroaching evil; his heart was far within an ancient temple fighting a monster beyond legend.
Ardeth raced up the dune, his sword held in a tight fist. He was so tired, his steps broad and awkward. He stumbled and righted him self with a burst of strength that he could not afford. He looked out at the far horizon and the light blinded him, but even with the spots that danced across his vision he could see. They came over the distant hill like the plagues of old, a visible taint across the sands he loved.
This army was triple the size of the one before, and Ardeth could only watch in growing horror as they kept on coming. More and more poured over the horizon as if from the depths of hell itself and still they came. The dark power that summoned them hung heavy in the air, a bitter pall that gagged him with the stench of rotting things. Yet he could not truly smell it, for it was through his magic that he felt it at all. His power recognized the taint that spilled towards him, shuddered before it.
With the true might of the Army of Anubis bearing down on him, Ardeth recognized that the lives of his people rested in the hands of the man that shared his soul. A man that even now strove to overcome an evil so terrible that history had literally purged itself of even its name.
"God help us."