Tombquest: Book of the Dead

The Returner

Alex woke up.

He woke up in the dark to the feeling of being pushed around. Another push, a quick pull, and his eyes finally blinked open.

He coughed and gasped and felt huge gulps of air enter his lungs, and opened his eyes the rest of the way.

He shut them immediately against the sudden flood of light. The single image he had at that moment, snapped like a photograph, was of his mom standing over him, face pale, with blood on her hand.

~~

He woke up again to another tug-of-war. He couldn't say if it was an hour or a minute later, just that this time a nurse was trying to pry a paperback book from his hand.

~~

The third time he woke up, it was to voices. He felt better this time, more alert. He slowly opened his eyes. The room was dark, with only a little dim light leaking in from the hallway. Two doctors were standing by the bed and whispering.

This is the one I was telling you about," said one. "This kid was clinically dead. Called it myself."

"How long?"

"Two minutes was the longest, but it was the machines doing the work after that."

Alex heard the words clearly, but his mind struggled to process them.

Dead? he thought. Like dead dead?

"And now?"

"Totally normal. BP, vitals, everything."

Alex drifted off again, but he remembered the words clearly the next morning. He certainly felt normal. In fact, he felt better than he could ever remember — no pains, no pinpricks. He was waiting for his mom to arrive so he could tell her. A nurse was buzzing around the room, and the TV was on above them.

"It's a strange day, indeed!" said a newscaster with impressive hair. "Reports of unusual events are coming in from several locations. None more unusual than what happened in England, just after sunrise."

A graphic appeared at the bottom of the screen. THAT BLOODY RAIN IN LONDON, it read in large red letters.

"Several reputable sources confirm seeing, and in some cases feeling, what seemed to be blood falling from the sky in England's capital. The red drops turned back to rain before any quick-thinking Brits could get a sample of the sanguine stuff, but witnesses are standing by their gory story."

The screen flashed to an elderly man. "Oh, it was blood, all right. I was a medic in the army, so I know what it looks like, don't I? Could even smell it. Has a coppery smell. Very distinctive."

The screen flashed back to the anchor. "Now we're taking you to central Egypt, where an unidentified light source briefly turned night into day over a large swath of the Sahara desert ..."

Alex's eyes flicked from the TV to the door.

"Alex, honey," his mom said, rushing into the room.

"Hi, Mom," he croaked.

He could feel tears in his eyes, but he wasn't even embarrassed, and he didn't push her away when she covered his mussed-up hair with kisses. The nurse retreated tactfully. And then his mom heard the TV: "We now take you to the Egyptian capital, Cairo."

Her head whipped around. Her piercing eyes quickly scanned the screen and the headlines scrolling across the bottom.

"It can't —" she began, but she abandoned the sentence. Her mouth hung slightly open as the live report continued.

"Mom, the news says —" Alex began, but she cut him off.

"Oh, don't listen to this silly stuff!"

She fumbled for the remote and clicked the TV off.

The room was silent, just the two of them again. Something had changed — Alex could still see the love in his mom's eyes, but his heart sank just a fraction as he saw the old worry lines deepen around them once more.

~~

They ran test after test, but by Saturday morning, they could no longer justify keeping a clearly healthy boy lying in an adjustable bed wearing a paper robe. When his mom took him home, for some reason Alex couldn't get over how familiar everything seemed. The way his mom had to jiggle the key in the lock, the dinged-up mailboxes in the entryway ... it was as if nothing had changed, as if he hadn't even been away.

As if I didn't die and come back. The words flashed through his mind, and he shook his head fiercely to clear them.

"Oh, don't do that, honey," his mom said, like always. "You know it's not good for you."

His mom was just as upset at home as she had been at the hospital. She sat down at the computer to fire off an email only to pick up her phone and rush out into the hall to make a call. She abandoned sentences halfway and riffled through the thickest and oldest books in the bookcase.

"I'm fine, Mom," said Alex. "Really."

She just smiled at him and put her hand on his forehead absently. "You stay here and rest, okay?" she said. "I have to check on some things at work."

"But it's Saturday," Alex said, putting down the copy of Watership Down that Ren had given him. As weird as his mom was acting, he still didn't want her to leave.

"I won't be too long," she said. "Just need to take a look at a few things."

The tone of her voice — a little too breezy — told Alex she was holding something back. "Is there a problem with the new exhibition?" he guessed.

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you," she said, forcing a quick smile. "I'll be back as soon as I can."

"I could come with you ..."

"NO!" she all but shouted. She paused and started again. "Not today, honey. You have a nap. Doctor's orders."

"Doctor of what?" he said.

"Egyptology," she answered. It was one of their standard jokes, and for just a moment a small, sad smile brightened her face.

"Okay," he said. He wasn't tired at all, but he went into his room and climbed into bed. A minute later, he heard her talking on her phone. He caught snatches through the door: "Ja, natürlich" ... "Jetz gerade?" It was German. He figured it was his grandmother — until the talking became shouting. "Das ist nicht richtig! ... War er verletzt? ... Nein, Doktor!"

Doktor? thought Alex.

The call ended.

The door slammed.