The Undead Articles

Anubis: Chapter 1

    2012 AD
    Mary looked at the pictures she was holding, then at the landscape in front of her, trying to figure out where she was standing relative to the map. She did this for about five minutes and was already starting to lose her patience. It didn’t help that the storm was on its way to the excavation site.
    “I can’t figure it out,” Mary said aloud.
    “Are you sure you’re holding the map correctly, honey?” Answered Mr. Boudreau, Mary’s father.
    Mary groaned in disappointment. “No, but this-this um, it's almost impossible to determine where you're standing in the middle of the Valley of the Kings.”
    Mr. Boudreau sighed as he approached his annoyed daughter, taking the pictures from the girl and looking at them. He compared the pictures to the view of the Valley of the Kings ahead of them.
“KV55 is right there,” he mumbled to himself, looking at the spot marked and pointing at the crypt between the mountains and cobblestones. “Nefertiti’s crypt can’t be too far from her husband’s crypt,” he mused.
    “You think Nefertiti was buried in the same crypt as her husband, Akhenaten?” Mary asked, following her father. He only shrugged.
    “Both crypts still haven’t been found, so its possible. Akhenaten was known as a heretical god, after all.”
    Mary pondered this. Mr. Boudreau had searched for the crypt for nearly twenty years, longer than Mary has been alive. Longer than her mother had been alive. Mrs. Boudreau died from a mining accident when Mary was nine. She was crushed by limestone during an excavation. Even ten years later, Mary couldn’t talk about her mother without crying.
    The death of her mother didn’t stop her father in his search for the missing crypts in the Valley of the Kings. If Mrs. Boudreau werealive, she would’ve done the same. Mary traveled with her father throughout Egypt in the search and study of every piece of land that they could get their hands on, always one step closer to the crypt of both Nefertiti and Akhenaten. Until now, they had no luck in finding them.
    “Don’t worry,” Mr. Boudreau smiled, lifting the huge classes up his nose. “There’s always tomorrow. Besides,” he looked up at the sky. “There’s a storm coming.”
    “Don’t you find it a bit strange?” Mary asked as they walked along the path to the excavation site. “I mean, the rainy season isn’t for another month!”
    “Nothing is impossible, dear,” Mr. Boudreau smiled.
    Mary followed her father through the noisy stop of working archaeologists, all in a hurry to remove their tools and equipment before the storm began. The wind rose, picking up sand and dust that hit Mary in the face. She held out her hands to protect her face, her hair fluttering in the wind. Mr. Boudraeu wrapped an arm around her shoulders, leading her to the campsite. Mr. Boudreau opened the door to the motorhome, the metal creaking due to the strong winds. Mary wondered why the storm had come.
    “A sandstorm,” Mr. Boudreau said once the two had settled inside. A loud clap of thunder made Mary scream. The sound was so loud, the lightning so bright, it lit up the small motorhome for a second before everything went dark again. Mr. Boudreau turned on the light, remaining silent.
    Rain fell heavily, pelting the metal exterior of the motorhome loudly and violently. Mary looked at her father, who bowed his head. “I’ll make us some tea,” he said. “It makes everything better.”
    Mary laughed to herself, sitting at the small table. She pushed her knees into her chest, pressing her cheek against the window. Outside, everything looked like a hurricane. Sand, rain and some rubbish were flying around in disarray. Mary was reminded of Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz, looking out at the tornado from her room. 
    Another clap of thunder made her jump and cringe. She’d never seen a storm this bad. She looked out the window again and saw something. Mary straightened up, leaning up against the window, making sure her eyes weren’t deceiving her.
    “Dad,” her heart beat quickly in fear. “Dad, dad!”
    “What?” Mr. Boudreau ran over to Mary. “What happened?”
    “There’s a man out there!” She shouted. “Right in the middle of the storm!”
    Mr. Boudreau pusher Mary into the chair, peering out the window to see what was happening outside. His eyes widened, seeing the man Mary had. 
    “Stay here, Mary. I’ll send someone-”
    Mary didn’t listen. She was halfway out the door when her father shouted at her to come back.