05 - The Curse of the Mummy's Tomb (8 page)

A few more steps.

I walked up to one of the tall stacks of cloth. Linen, most likely. The
material used for making mummies.

Gathering my courage, I examined some of the tools. Not touching anything.
Just staring at them in the wavering light of the flashlight.

Mummy-making tools. Ancient mummy-making tools.

I stepped away. Turned back toward the crowd of unmoving figures.

My light traveled across the room and came to rest on a dark square area on
the floor. Curious, I moved closer, stepping around twin mummies, lying on their
backs, their arms crossed over their chests.

Whoa. Easy, Gabe.

My sneakers scraped noisily along the floor as I made my way hesitantly
across the vast chamber.

The dark square on the floor was nearly the size of a swimming pool. I bent
down at its edge to examine it more closely.

The surface was soft and sticky. Like tar.

Was this an ancient tar pit? Was this tar used in the making of the mummies
that hovered so menacingly around the room?

I had a sudden chill that froze me to the spot.

How could this tar pit be soft after
four thousand years
?

Why was everything in this chamber—the tools, the mummies, the linen—preserved so well?

And why were these mummies—at least two dozen of them—left out like this,
scattered about the room in such strange positions?

I realized that I had made an incredible discovery here. By falling through
the floor, I had found a hidden chamber, a chamber where mummies had been made.
I had found all of the tools and all of the materials used to make mummies four
thousand years ago.

Once again, the sour smell invaded my nose. I held my breath to keep myself
from gagging. It was the smell of four-thousand-year-old bodies, I realized. A
smell that had been bottled up in this ancient, hidden chamber—until now.

Staring at the twisted, shadowy figures gazing back at me in faceless horror,
I reached for the beeper.

Uncle Ben, you must come quickly, I thought.

I don’t want to be alone down here any longer.

You must come here
now
!

I pulled the beeper off my belt and brought it up close to the light.

All I had to do, I realized, was push the button, and Uncle Ben and Sari
would come running.

Gripping the small square tightly in my hand, I moved my hand to the button—and cried out in alarm.

The beeper was ruined. Wrecked. Smashed.

The button wouldn’t even push.

I must have landed on it when I fell.

It was useless.

I was all alone down here.

Alone with the ancient mummies, staring facelessly, silently, at me through
the deep, dark shadows.

All alone.

I stared in horror at the worthless beeper.

The flashlight trembled in my hand.

Suddenly, everything seemed to move in on me. The walls. The ceiling. The
darkness.

The mummies.

“Huh?”

I stumbled back a step. Then another.

I realized I was gripping the flashlight so tightly, my hand hurt.

The light played over the faceless figures.

They weren’t moving.

Of
course
they weren’t moving.

I took another step back. The sour odor seemed to grow stronger, thicker. I
held my breath, but the smell was in my nostrils, in my mouth. I could taste it,
taste the decay, taste the four-thousand-year-old aroma of death.

I tossed the worthless beeper on the floor and took another step back, keeping my eyes on the hovering mummies.

What was I going to do?

The smell was making me sick. I had to get out of there, had to call Uncle
Ben.

Another step back.

“Help!”

I tried to shout, but my voice sounded weak, muffled by the heavy, foul air.

“Help! Can anybody hear me?” A little louder.

Tucking the flashlight under my arm, I cupped my hands around my mouth to
form a megaphone.
“Can anybody hear me?”
I screamed.

I listened, desperate for a reply.

Silence.

Where
were
Sari and Uncle Ben? Why couldn’t they hear me? Why weren’t
they looking for me?

“Help! Somebody—please help!”

I screamed as loud as I could, tilting my head up to the hole in the ceiling,
the hole I had fallen through.

“Can’t anybody hear me?”
I shrieked.

I could feel the panic grip my chest, freeze my legs.

The panic swept over me, wave after paralyzing wave.

“Help me!
Somebody
—please!”

I took another step back.

And something crunched under my sneaker.

I uttered a high-pitched yelp and stumbled forward.

Whatever it was slithered away.

I exhaled loudly, a long sigh of relief.

And then I felt something brush against my ankle.

I cried out, and the flashlight dropped from under my arm. It clattered
noisily to the floor.

The light went out.

Again, something scraped silently against me.

Something hard.

I heard soft, scrabbling sounds down on the floor. Something snapped at my
ankle.

I kicked hard, but hit only air.

“Ohh, help!”

There were creatures down there. A lot of them.

But what
were
they?

Again, something slapped at my ankle, and I kicked wildly.

Frantically, I bent down, grabbing for the flashlight in the darkness.

And touched something hard and warm.

“Ohh, no!”

I jerked my hand up with a startled cry.

In the darkness, groping for the flashlight, I had the feeling that the
entire floor had come to life. The floor was moving in waves, rolling and
tossing, seething beneath me.

Finally, I found the flashlight. I grabbed it up in my trembling hand,
climbed to my feet, and struggled to turn it back on.

As I stepped backward, something slid against my leg.

It felt hard. And prickly.

I heard clicking sounds. Snapping. Creatures bumping into each other.

Panting loudly, my chest heaving, my entire body gripped with terror, I
jumped up, tried to dance away as I fiddled with the flashlight.

Something crunched loudly beneath my sneaker. I danced away, hopping over
something that scuttled through my legs.

Finally, the light flickered on.

My heart thudding, I lowered the yellow beam of light to the floor.

And saw the scrabbling, snapping creatures.

Scorpions!

I had stumbled into a disgusting nest of them.

“Ohh—help!”

I didn’t recognize my tiny, frightened voice as I cried out. I didn’t even
realize I had cried out.

The light darted over the slithering creatures, their tails raised as if
ready to attack, their claws snapping silently as they moved. Crawling over each
other. Slithering past my ankles.

“Somebody—help!”

I leapt backwards as a pair of claws grabbed at the leg of my jeans—into
another of the creatures whose tail snapped against the back of my sneaker.

Struggling to escape from the poisonous creatures, I tripped.

“No!
Please—no!”

I couldn’t save myself.

I started to fall.

My hands shot out, but there was nothing to grab on to.

I was going to plunge right into the middle of them.

“Nooooo!”

I uttered a frantic cry as I toppled forward.

And felt two hands grab me by the shoulders from behind.

A mummy! I thought.

My entire body convulsed with fear.

The scorpions snapped and scrabbled at my feet.

The strong hands gripped my shoulders, pulled me hard.

The ancient, bandaged hands.

I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t think.

Finally, I managed to spin around.

“Sari!” I cried.

She gave me one more tug. We both stumbled backwards, claws snapping up at
us.

“Sari—how—?”

We moved together now, making our way toward the center of the vast chamber.

Safe. Safe from the disgusting nest of snapping scorpions.

“Saved your life,” she whispered. “Yuck. Those are gross!”

“Tell me about it,” I said weakly. I could still feel the hideous creatures sliding along my ankles, still feel them
slithering between my legs, crunching under my sneakers.

I don’t think I’ll ever forget that crunching sound.

“What are you
doing
down here?” Sari cried impatiently, as if scolding
a child. “Daddy and I have been looking everywhere for you.”

I pulled her even farther from the scorpions, into the center of the chamber.
“How did you get down here?” I cried, struggling to calm my breathing,
struggling to stop the pounding in my chest.

She pointed with her flashlight to a tunnel in the corner that I hadn’t seen.
“I was searching for you. Daddy and I got separated. Do you believe it? He
stopped to talk to a worker, and I didn’t realize it. By the time I turned back,
he was gone. Then I saw the light moving around in here. I thought it was
Daddy.”

“You got lost, too?” I asked, wiping beads of cold sweat off my forehead with
the back of my hand.

“I’m not lost.
You’re
lost,” she insisted. “How could you
do
that, Gabe? Daddy and I were totally freaked.”

“Why didn’t you wait up for me?” I demanded angrily. “I called to you. You
just disappeared.”

“We didn’t hear you,” she replied, shaking her head. I was really glad to see
her. But I hated the way she was looking at me, like I was some kind of hopeless idiot. “I guess we got involved in our argument. We thought
you were right behind us. Then when we turned around, you were gone.” She sighed
and shook her head. “What a day!”

“What a day?” I cried shrilly. “What a day?”

“Gabe, why did you
do
that?” she demanded. “You know we were supposed
to stay close together.”

“Hey—it wasn’t my fault,” I insisted angrily.

“Daddy is so mad,” Sari said, shining her light in my face.

I raised my arm to shield my eyes. “Cut it out,” I snapped. “He won’t be mad
when he sees what I’ve discovered. Look.”

I shined my light onto a mummy crouching near the tar pit, then moved it to
another mummy, this one lying down, then to the row of mummy cases against the
wall.

“Wow.” Sari mouthed the word silently. Her eyes grew wide with surprise.

“Yeah. Wow,” I said, starting to feel a little more like normal. “The chamber
is filled with mummies. And there are all kinds of tools and cloth and
everything you need to make a mummy. It’s all in perfect shape, like it hasn’t
been touched in thousands of years.” I couldn’t hide my excitement. “And I
discovered it all,” I added.

“This must be where they prepared the mummies for burial,” Sari said, her
eyes darting from mummy to mummy. “But why are some of them standing up like that?”

I shrugged. “Beats me.”

She walked over to admire the stacks of neatly folded linen. “Wow. This is
amazing, Gabe.”

“Outstanding!” I agreed. “And if I hadn’t stopped to tie my sneaker, I never
would have discovered it.”

“You’re going to be famous,” Sari said, a smile spreading across her face.
“Thanks to me saving your life.”

“Sari—” I started.

But she had moved across the room and was admiring one of the upright mummies
close up. “Wait till Daddy sees all this,” she said, suddenly sounding as
excited as me.

“We have to call him,” I said eagerly. I glanced back at the scorpion nest
and felt a chill of fear tighten the back of my neck.

“People were so tiny back then,” she said, holding her flashlight up close to
the mummy’s covered face. “Look—I’m taller than this one.”

“Sari, use your beeper,” I said impatiently, walking over to her.

“Yuck. There are bugs crawling in this one’s face,” she said, stepping back
and lowering the light. She made a disgusted face. “Gross.”

“Come on. Use your beeper. Call Uncle Ben,” I said. I reached for the beeper
at her waist, but she pulled away.

“Okay, okay. Why didn’t you use
yours
?” She eyed me suspiciously. “You
forgot about it, didn’t you, Gabe?” she accused.

“No way,” I replied sharply. “Mine broke when I fell into this place.”

She made a face and pulled the beeper off her belt loop. I shined my light on
it as she pushed the button. She pressed it twice, just to make sure, then
clipped it back onto her jeans.

We stood with our arms crossed, waiting for Uncle Ben to follow the radio
signals and find us.

“It shouldn’t take him long,” Sari said, her eyes on the tunnel in the
corner. “He wasn’t far behind me.”

Sure enough, a few seconds later, we heard the sounds of someone approaching
in the tunnel.

“Uncle Ben!” I called excitedly. “Look what I’ve found!”

Sari and I both started to run to the tunnel, our lights zigzagging over the
low entrance.

“Daddy, you won’t believe—” Sari started.

She stopped when the stooped figure leaned out of the darkness and
straightened up.

We both gaped in horror, our flashlights making his mustached face glow
eerily.

“It’s Ahmed!” Sari cried, grabbing my arm.

I swallowed hard.

Sari and I stared at each other. I saw her features tighten in fear.

Ahmed.

He had tried to kidnap us. And now he had us all alone down here.

He stepped forward, a flaming torch held high in one hand. His black hair
glowed in the flickering flames. His eyes narrowed at us in menace.

“Ahmed, what are you doing here?” Sari called, grasping my arm so hard, I
winced.

“What are
you
doing here?” he asked softly, his voice as cold as his
eyes.

Holding the torch in front of him, he stepped into the chamber. His eyes went
around the room, as if inspecting it, making sure that nothing had been moved.