Return of the Mummy (3 page)

A young woman came running across the sand. Her long black hair flew behind her head as she ran. She carried a brown briefcase in one hand. A camera, strapped around her neck, bobbed in front of her.

She stopped in front of us and smiled at Uncle Ben. “Dr. Hassad?” she asked breathlessly.

My uncle nodded. “Yes?” He waited for her to catch her breath.

Wow. She’s really pretty,
I thought. Her long black hair was sleek and shiny. She had bangs cut straight across her forehead. Beneath the bangs were the most beautiful green eyes I’d ever seen.

She was dressed all in white. A white suit jacket and a white blouse over white slacks. She was short — only an inch or two taller than Sari.

She must be a movie star or something,
I told myself.
She’s so great looking!

She set her briefcase down on the sand and brushed back her long black hair. “I’m sorry I shouted like that, Dr. Hassad,” she told my uncle. “It’s just that I needed to talk to you. I didn’t want you to disappear into the pyramid.”

Uncle Ben narrowed his eyes at her, studying her. “How did you get past the security guard?” he asked, pulling off the hard hat.

“I showed them my press card,” she replied. “I’m a reporter for the Cairo
Sun.
My name is Nila Rahmad. I was hoping —”

“Nila?” Uncle Ben interrupted. “What a pretty name.”

She smiled. “Yes. My mother named me after the River of Life, the Nile.”

“Well, it’s a very pretty name,” Uncle Ben replied. His eyes twinkled. “But I’m not ready to have any reporters write about our work here.”

Nila frowned and bit her lower lip. “I spoke to Dr. Fielding a few days ago,” she said.

My uncle’s eyes widened in surprise. “You did?”

“Dr. Fielding gave me permission to write about your discovery,” Nila insisted, her green eyes locked on my uncle.

“Well, we haven’t discovered anything yet!” Uncle Ben said sharply. “There may not be anything to discover.”

“That’s not what Dr. Fielding told me,” Nila replied. “He seemed confident that you were
about to make a discovery that would shock the world.”

Uncle Ben laughed. “Sometimes my partner gets excited and talks too much,” he told Nila.

Nila’s eyes pleaded with my uncle. “May I come into the pyramid with you?” She glanced at Sari and me. “I see you have other visitors.”

“My daughter, Sari, and my nephew, Gabe,” Uncle Ben replied.

“Well, could I come down with them?” Nila pleaded. “I promise I won’t write a word for my paper until you give me permission.”

Uncle Ben rubbed his chin thoughtfully. He swung the hard hat back onto his head. “No photographs, either,” he muttered.

“Does that mean I can come?” Nila asked excitedly.

Uncle Ben nodded. “As an observer.” He was trying to act real tough. But I could see he liked her.

Nila flashed him a warm smile. “Thank you, Dr. Hassad.”

He reached into the storage cart and handed her a yellow hard hat. “We won’t be making any amazing discoveries today,” he warned her. “But we’re getting very close — to something.”

As she slipped on the heavy helmet, Nila turned to Sari and me. “Is this your first time in the pyramid?” she asked.

“No way. I’ve already been down three times,” Sari boasted. “It’s really awesome.”

“I just arrived yesterday,” I said. “So it’s my first time down in —”

I stopped when I saw Nila’s expression change.

Why was she staring at me like that?

I glanced down and realized that she was staring at the amber pendant. Her mouth was open in shock.

“No! I don’t believe this! I really don’t! This is so
weird
!” she exclaimed.

“Wh-what’s wrong?” I stammered.

“We’re
twins
!” Nila declared. She reached under her suit jacket and pulled out a pendant she wore around her neck.

An amber pendant, shaped exactly like mine.

“How unusual!” Uncle Ben exclaimed.

Nila grasped my pendant between her fingers and lowered her face to examine it. “You have a scarab inside yours,” she told me, turning the pendant around in her fingers.

She dropped mine and held hers up for me to see. “Look, Gabe. Mine is empty.”

I gazed into her pendant. It looked like clear orange glass. Nothing inside.

“I think
yours
is prettier,” Sari told Nila. “I wouldn’t want to wear a dead bug around my neck.”

“But it’s supposed to be good luck or something,” Nila replied. She tucked the pendant back
under her white jacket. “I hope it isn’t
bad
luck to have an empty one!”

“I hope so, too,” Uncle Ben commented dryly. He turned and led us into the pyramid opening.

I’m not really sure how I got lost.

Sari and I were walking together behind Uncle Ben and Nila. We were close behind them. I could hear my uncle explaining about how the tunnel walls were granite and limestone.

Our helmet lights were on. The narrow beams of yellow light darted and crisscrossed over the dusty tunnel floor and walls as we made our way deeper and deeper into the pyramid.

The ceiling hung low, and we all had to stoop as we walked. The tunnel kept curving, and there were several smaller tunnels that branched off. “False starts and dead ends,” Uncle Ben called them.

It was hard to see in the flickering light from our helmets. I stumbled once and scraped my elbow against the rough tunnel wall. It was surprisingly cool down here, and I wished I had worn a sweatshirt.

Up ahead, Uncle Ben was telling Nila about King Tut and Prince Khor-Ru. It sounded to me as if Uncle Ben was trying to impress her. I wondered if he had a crush on her or something.

“This is so thrilling!” I heard Nila exclaim. “It was so nice of Dr. Fielding and you to let me see it.”

“Who is Dr. Fielding?” I whispered to Sari.

“My father’s partner,” Sari whispered back. “But Daddy doesn’t like him. You’ll probably meet him. He’s always around. I don’t like him much, either.”

I stopped to examine a strange-looking marking on the tunnel wall. It was shaped like some kind of animal head. “Sari — look!” I whispered. “An ancient drawing.”

Sari rolled her eyes. “It’s Bart Simpson,” she muttered. “One of Daddy’s workers must have drawn it there.”

“I knew that!” I lied. “I was just testing you.”

When was I going to stop making a fool of myself in front of my cousin?

I turned back from the stupid drawing on the wall — and Sari had vanished.

I could see the narrow beam of light from her hard hat up ahead. “Hey — wait up!” I called. But the light disappeared as the tunnel curved away.

And then I stumbled again.

My helmet hit the tunnel wall. And the light went out.

“Hey — Sari? Uncle Ben?” I called to them. I leaned heavily against the wall, afraid to move in the total darkness.

“Hey! Can anybody hear me?” My voice echoed down the narrow tunnel.

But no one replied.

I pulled off the hard hat and fiddled with the light. I turned it, trying to tighten it. Then I shook the whole hat. But the light wouldn’t come back on.

Sighing, I strapped the hat back onto my head.

Now what?
I thought, starting to feel a little afraid. My stomach began fluttering. My throat suddenly felt dry.

“Hey — can anybody hear me?” I shouted. “I’m in the dark back here. I can’t walk!”

No reply.

Where
were
they? Didn’t they notice that I had disappeared?

“Well, I’ll just wait right here for them,” I murmured to myself.

I leaned my shoulder against the tunnel wall —

— and fell right through.

No way to catch my balance. Nothing to grab on to.

I was falling, falling down through total darkness.

My hands flailed wildly as I fell.

I reached out frantically for something to grab on to.

It all happened too fast to cry out.

I landed hard on my back. Pain shot out through my arms and legs. The darkness swirled around me.

My breath was knocked right out of me. I saw bright flashes of red, then everything went black again. I struggled to breathe but couldn’t suck in any air.

I had that horrible heavy feeling in my chest, like when a basketball hits you in the stomach.

Finally, I sat up, struggling to see in the total darkness. I heard a soft, shuffling sound. Something scraping over the hard dirt floor.

“Hey — can anyone hear me?” My voice came out a hoarse whisper.

Now my back ached, but I was starting to breathe normally.

“Hey — I’m down here!” I called, a little louder.

No reply.

Didn’t they miss me? Weren’t they looking for me?

I was leaning back on my hands, starting to feel better. My right hand started to itch.

I reached to scratch it and brushed something away.

And realized my legs were itching, too. And felt something crawling on my left wrist.

I shook my hand hard. “What’s going on here?” I whispered to myself.

My entire body tingled. I felt soft pinpricks up my arms and legs.

Shaking both arms, I jumped to my feet. And banged my helmet against a low ledge.

The light flickered on.

I gasped when I saw the crawling creatures in the narrow beam of light.

Spiders. Hundreds of bulby white spiders, thick on the chamber floor.

They scuttled across the floor, climbing over each other. As I jerked my head up and the light swept up with it, I saw that the stone walls were covered with them, too. The white spiders made the wall appear to move as if it were alive.

Spiders hung on invisible threads from the chamber ceiling. They seemed to bob and float in midair.

I shook one off the back of my hand. And with a gasp, realized why my legs itched. Spiders were crawling all over them. Up over my arms. Down my back.

“Help — somebody! Please!” I managed to cry out.

I felt a spider drop onto the back of my neck.

I brushed it away with a frantic slap. “Somebody — help me!” I screamed. “Can anyone hear me?”

And then I saw something scarier. Much scarier. A snake slid down from above me, lowering itself rapidly toward my face.

I ducked and tried to cover my face as the snake silently dropped toward me.

“Grab it!” I heard someone call. “Grab on to it!”

With a startled cry, I raised my eyes. The light beam followed. And I saw that it was not a snake that stretched from above — but a rope.

“Grab on to it, Gabe! Hurry!” Sari shouted urgently from high above.

Brushing away spiders, kicking frantically to shake the spiders off my sneakers, I grasped the rope with both hands.

And felt myself being tugged up, pulled up through the darkness to the tunnel floor above.

A few seconds later, Uncle Ben reached down and grabbed me under the arms. As he hoisted me up, I could see Sari and Nila pulling with all their might on the rope.

I cheered happily as my feet touched solid ground. But I didn’t have long to celebrate. My entire body felt as if it were on fire!

I went wild, kicking my legs, brushing spiders off my arms, scratching spiders off my back, stamping on the spiders as they scuttled off me.

Glancing up, I saw that Sari was laughing at me. “Gabe, what do you call that dance?” she asked.

Uncle Ben and Nila laughed, too. “How did you fall down there, Gabe?” my uncle demanded, peering down into the spider chamber.

“The wall — it gave way,” I told him, frantically scratching my legs.

“I thought you were still with me,” Sari explained. “When I turned around …” Her voice trailed off.

The light on Uncle Ben’s helmet beamed down to the lower chamber. “That’s a long fall,” Uncle Ben said, turning back to me. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

I nodded. “Yeah. I guess. It knocked the wind out of me. And then the spiders —”

“There must be hundreds of chambers like that,” my uncle commented, glancing at Nila. “The pyramid builders made a maze of tunnels and chambers — to fool tomb robbers and keep them from finding the real tomb.”

“Yuck! Such fat spiders!” Sari groaned, stepping back.

“There are millions of them down there,” I told her. “On the walls, hanging from the ceiling — everywhere.”

“This is going to give me bad dreams,” Nila said softly, moving closer to Uncle Ben.

“You sure you’re okay?” my uncle demanded again.

I started to reply. Then I suddenly remembered something. The mummy hand. It was tucked in my back pocket.

Had it been crushed when I landed on it?

My heart skipped a beat. I didn’t want anything bad to happen to that little hand. It was my good luck charm.

I reached into my jeans pocket and pulled it out. Holding it under the light from my hard hat, I examined it carefully.

I breathed a sigh of relief when I saw that it was okay. It still felt cold. But it hadn’t been crushed.

“What’s that?” Nila asked, leaning closer to see it better. She brushed her long hair away from her face. “Is that the Summoner?”

“How did you know that?” I demanded, holding the hand up so she could see it better.

Nila stared at it intently. “I know a lot about ancient Egypt,” she replied. “I’ve studied it my whole life.”

“It might be an ancient relic,” Uncle Ben broke in.

“Or it might just be a tacky souvenir,” Sari added.

“It has real powers,” I insisted, brushing it off carefully. “I landed on it down there”—I pointed to the spider chamber — “and it didn’t get crushed.”

“I guess it
is
a good luck charm,” Nila said, turning back to Uncle Ben.

“Then why didn’t it keep Gabe from falling through that wall?” Sari cracked.

Before I could answer, I saw the mummy hand move. The tiny fingers slowly curled. Out and then in.

I cried out and nearly dropped it.

“Gabe — now what?” Uncle Ben demanded sharply.

“Uh … nothing,” I replied.

They wouldn’t believe me anyway.

“I think we’ve done enough exploring for now,” Uncle Ben said.

As we made our way to the entrance, I held the mummy hand in front of me.

I wasn’t seeing things. I knew that for sure. The fingers really had moved.

But why?

Was the hand trying to signal me? Was it trying to warn me about something?