The Cursed City of An'Kah - An Alternative Universe: Alfie Solomons

Chapter Seven: The Competition

The next morning, Alfie felt like he'd been through hell. His body ached and his face ached even more. Looking in the mirror, he could see that his face was black and purple. He wondered what William looked like. That was if the man had woken up from being knocked out cold by Alfie. Nailah had still been sleeping and she groggily got up from bed. Upon seeing Alfie's face, she brought up her hands to her mouth and gasped.

"Oh, Alfie!" she said, coming over to inspect him.

"Don't you worry about me, I'm gonna be fine," he said, shooing her hands away.

She shook her head with dismay.

"We have an important meeting today about the dig, you can't go looking like this," she said.

"So you're more worried about some meeting instead of my wellbeing?"

She placed her hands on her hips and frowned at him.

"Of course I worry about your wellbeing you brute, but of all nights you chose to box, it had to be last night," she fussed.

She walked over to the privacy screen and began to undress.

'Well, why don't you go by yourself?" he said, walking over to pour water into a basin.

He splashed the water onto his face and dried with a towel.

"No, no, no. You need to be there, my contact, Rahim, he won't sign off on the papers unless you are there. He admires you and he told me you needed to be there for him to know you joined the expedition," she said, throwing her silk night shift over the screen.

"An admirer, eh? Well I don't wanna disappoint a fan," Alfie said, getting dressed.

He heard Nailah scoff and then emerge from behind the privacy screen. She was wearing a white short sleeve blouse, tan medium length skirt and short black boots. She looked like a dream to Alfie.

"Come here," he said.

She frowned, going over to him, arms folded. He gently moved her arms away from her chest, then unbuttoned a few buttons on her shirt.

"What are you doing?" she said, bring her hands up to slap him away.

"Wait a minute," he said, opening up the shirt so her cleavage would show.

"Alfie, I don't want my breasts on display," she said.

"They aren't, just a little peek for the lads. Believe it or not, it helps with negotiating," he said.

"How on earth do you know that?" she said, walking to the mirror to make sure he hadn't shown too much.

"Cause, anytime a woman with her cleavage showing is in the room, I always make a dumb deal," he said. "Same applies with a lot of gents."

"And the world is still somehow ran by men, how is that?" she said, shaking her head in disbelief.

Before it was even nine a.m. the two traveled across Cairo to meet with Rahim. When they arrived, Rahim was in awe of Alfie.

"Dr. Solomons, sir, you...you are a legend," Rahim said, shaking Alfie's hand.

Alfie looked over at Nailah and grinned. "Hear that, I'm a fucking legend."

She rolled her eyes and took a seat in front of Rahim's desk.

"Mr. Gamal, shall we?" Nailah said, trying to get the documents signed as quickly as possible.

"Oh, did you not get my message?" Rahim said, frowning.

He walked behind his desk and took a seat. Nailah shook her head with slight confusion.