The Tomb

 

“I am going to an excavation in Egypt tomorrow.”

“Again? But you just got back.”

“This is important, Clyde. It cannot wait.”

I packed my bags immediately and left the next morning with my colleague Harry. It was to examine an unknown sarcophagus that had just been discovered in an underground cave system. The unearthing process was still underway when we arrived there, and not long after, tremors coursed through the ground below us. They lasted for maybe ten seconds, but they were strong enough to scare Harry. Hours passed as the work went on; we decided to take a nap in our tent as evening approached. I told the workers to let us know if we were needed.

Not long after, I woke up to tremors yet again. However, I found that Harry’s bed was empty. I got off my bed at once and stepped outside. The workers were frantic. I asked them what was going on and they said that some of the staff had gone missing without a trace. They said the police were on their way as well. The workers believed it to be a curse—that the one buried there was warning us against excavating their remains. I wasn’t convinced.

The police arrived half an hour later and told us to pack everything and leave. They said that something similar had happened a few miles from where we were around ten years ago as well. I thought it was ridiculous and refused to vacate the premises. Most of the workers left the area, but a few remained with me to continue the project.

I started to have second thoughts about the endeavour, wondering whether I should have heeded the others’ warnings. An hour later, I noticed something odd: there were faded footprints on the sand that led deeper into the cave. I walked ahead and found them leading up to a wall. The tracks ended there. I felt the wall and moved my hand along it to see if there was any hidden latch. That is when I accidentally pushed in a hidden block of stone.

The wall opened to a dark hallway. I tried to turn around to get the others, but I was suddenly pulled in. I fell forward and onto my knees as the wall behind me closed shut once more. I slowly walked ahead until I arrived at a room. Looking ahead, I saw a man standing next to a stone slab—and on it was Harry. He was unconscious. The man standing next to him was reciting something. I understood what he said: he was chanting some kind of resurrection spell. I grabbed a knife from my pocket and attacked him. He resisted, but I managed to stab him in the neck in the struggle. Harry woke up to the man’s screams and fell off the stone slab; he didn’t seem to have any memory of what had happened.

The attacker tried to grab my knife while I was distracted, but I stabbed him again—this time, in the chest. As he collapsed on the floor, the room began to shake. Sand began to cascade from the walls of the cave as the tremors grew stronger and louder. Harry and I rushed out of the room and reached the wall at the end of the hallway as the entire room began to crumble and fall.

We got through the hidden doorway just as the hallway began to fall apart. We sighed in relief as the doorway closed, leaving only muffled sounds of destruction. The other workers at the site rushed towards us after hearing the noise. We withheld the details about the resurrection attempt and just said that Harry had fallen into a pit further ahead. With that, we closed off that area and decided to scrap the excavation, saying it was too dangerous.