See You in the Afterlife

Chapter Two: To the Giza Plateau

By Gemini

The tune of the Weird Sisters sang out from my alarm as the morning sun spilled into my bedroom.  I ignored the sounds as much as I could, and pulled the covers over my head to shut out the light.

“Bill! Will you turn off that bloody alarm?” Neil shouted. The walls in our flat were paper thin, and Neil’s voice could be heard as clear as a bullhorn in the early morning.  Across the room, a bang came from Sophie’s bedroom; she must have thrown a shoe at the wall again.  Faint sounds of angry Chinese muttering floated out.

I clumsily grabbed my wand off the bedside table and tapped the small clock, accidentally knocking it to the floor with a ringing clang. Silence prevailed after that, and the only indication of movement was the rustling of my bedsheets within the quietness.

The early, and I do mean early, mornings here never changed. My alarm would be the first to ring, consequently waking Neil and Sophie as well.  I was always first in the bathroom, then would get chased out by Neil’s constant banging on the door.  Sophie would sleep in until one of us went to wake her up, usually by yelling loudly by her door until she stumbled out in a groggy mess. Still, she took the shortest amount of time in the bathroom, yet still somehow wound up with the neater appearance.  That was Sophie for you.

This morning was no different. I got breakfast ready by the time Neil came out dressed in his usual strangely coloured garb and sat down wearily at the table. “Morning, Bill,” he mumbled.

“Good morning, Neil! Had a good sleep?” He nodded groggily. Living in a household with six other siblings taught me the importance of waking up early to get to the washroom and food before the others. By doing that for most of my past twenty-seven years, I somehow habitually became a morning person.

“Tea?” As if I had to ask.

“Please.” I levitated a cup of tea to him and he accepted it absentmindedly.

“Me too,” said Sophie, as she emerged from the bathroom wearing her field robes. Curse-breaking could be a dusty job, so we had to wear robes that would let us dig in the dirt without whining about spoilt clothing.  Our field robes were just a fancy way of saying “dispensable clothes”.  I served her tea and laid out breakfast, and we sat at the round table in the morning stillness.

“So where are you two headed off to today?” asked Neil, stuffing his mouth full of toast.

I was just about to tell him that Sophie and I were headed off to the ever-elusive Sphinx, but she beat me to answering.

“Mastabas, as usual. You’d think they’d give us something more exciting to work on other than dusty graves.”  She looked at me pointedly, as if to say, One word out of you and I will do something drastic. I figured there was no harm in telling Neil.  If the Sphinx was going to be excavated, the rest of the department would find out sooner or later. You couldn’t hide something like that forever. Besides, I could trust Neil. He may be a bit outlandish, but he was a good friend. Sophie was often overly critical.

“Me too,” he said absently. “Michelle and I never have anything fun to work on.”

“Fun?” Sophie snorted. “What’s your idea of fun? All the death curses and dark spells they used back then? I’ll make sure to remind you how you’d think it would be fun when you’re wriggling on the floor from a Scarab Hex next time we’re working together.”  Sophie could be pessimistic at times, and she really wasn’t a morning person.

“I’m sure that won’t happen,” replied Neil breezily. “If anything’s going to go wrong on our digs, it’ll be you overanalysing the hieroglyphics again and thinking the entrance is that way when it’s this way and not in a nice calm hall but rather through some sort of pit of doom.”

Contrary to popular belief, Neil and Sophie really don’t mind each other.

After the usual breakfast jousts, we cleaned up the little mess we made (well, the mess that Neil made…) and readied ourselves for the day. This consisted largely of waiting for the beginning of work hours to roll around while we lounged on the couches.

When seven-thirty arrived, Sophie and I got our tools and gear bags together to Apparate out.

“Where are you two going?” asked Neil.

“We have to go into work a bit early today,” I answered.

“Why?”

Sophie and I looked at each other.  “Because Sophie forgot to finish up one of the reports last night.” 

She raised an eyebrow at me.

Neil tsk-ed disapprovingly. “Sophie, Sophie… You’re slipping.”

I grinned at her as she exhaled slowly, obviously trying to keep from saying anything she would later regret. She said through clenched teeth, “We’ll be seeing you later, Neil. Have a nice day.”

He waved jauntily as we Apparated from the comfort of our sitting room to the designated Apparition Point on the Giza Plateau.  The heat hit us immediately, as well as the loud chattering coming from the people gathered around the Point. 

There weren’t as many people as I had expected: mostly workers in Ministry robes and Gringotts uniforms were milling around the area.  There were archaeologists, treasure hunters, architecture guides and a few other curse-breakers that I recognized.  Behind them all loomed the readily awaiting Sphinx.

We stood in a silenced reverie as everyone jostled around us.  We had seen the Sphinx before, of course; it was almost impossible to visit the area without seeing the majestic creature. However, it was different to see it from a working standpoint.  We simply stared with a raw eagerness.

“Bill! Sophie!” The three of us turned around to find Michelle running toward us.

“Michelle? What in the world are you doing here?” I asked her.

“It’s a long story,” she answered. “But I’m glad you two are finally able to work on the Sphinx with me and Neil now.”

“You and Neil are working on the Sphinx?” I was so confused, but I tried not to show it.

“I’ll explain later,” she said, waving her hand. “Madame Bashir wants to debrief you now.”  She grabbed my arm impatiently and dragged me toward the open-aired tent with Sophie following.

           

Karei Bashir stood at the front of the little gathering of people that I recognized as my coworkers as we stepped into the shaded tent. A few boards were set up around her, decorated with diagrams, maps and all sorts of symbols.  Off to the side, boxes upon boxes of curse-breaking equipment lay.  Sophie and I deposited our belongings there as Karei called us over. 

“Ah, Sophie, Bill, hello. Now that you’ve arrived, I can begin,” she said in her usual clipped voice.  Her dark hair was pulled back into a tight bun, and she was dressed in casual robes that would become dirty within the hour. Karei was Hard Work personified.

“Attention please,” she called into the foray.  The rest of the eight or so curse-breakers turned to her expectantly.  “Because of the latest… incident… with Amir and Ella, Bill and Sophie will be joining us on the dig.”  There was a murmur of interest throughout the little group. “I expect you will show them around, answer their questions, and give them the benefit of doubt.”  She turned to us again and the others went back to getting their gear ready.

She launched into the briefing right away. “The archaeologist teams discovered a new set of chambers about a month ago,” she told us. “Needless to say, this was quite the breakthrough in Sphinxology.  We’ve been working around the clock trying to figure out where they lead.” She pointed to one of her map boards with her wand as Sophie and I looked on with Michelle standing behind us.

It showed an aerial view of a cutaway under the paws of the Sphinx. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing.  A small tunnel led off from the centre of the paws, fading away shortly from its starting point; apparently, the diggers had not gotten far yet.

“At the end of this tunnel, there is a solid wall.  Unsurprisingly, it’s covered with hieroglyphics.  The translators are still working on them now, and guards are stationed around the perimeter. Our job is to do what we always do: break through the barriers and get to the good stuff.”  Her eyes began to gleam, as did mine, I’m sure. Egyptian treasures had that effect on people who have come across them before.

“I don’t think I need to tell you what may possibly lay behind these walls,” she continued.

The ancient Egyptian culture was laced with secrets as old as magic itself. The two are always connected, and the key to magic lay hidden within the twists and turns of the past, in a place unknown. I hoped to Merlin that at least a part of it would be found in the Sphinx.

“It’s already a monumental task keeping the damn Muggle tourists from visiting the scene, and it will continue to take time and effort to keep up the border charms around here. So, due to the proximity of the Sphinx to Muggles, we couldn’t risk the entire department of Curse-Breakers working on this assignment.”  I could see where this was going. 

“We chose six main teams – twelve Curse-Breakers – for the job. Unfortunately, a few days ago, one of the teams, Amir and Ella, disappeared.”

Michelle bowed her head as Karei said this, and Sophie frowned. “Disappeared how?”

“They were working within the tunnel late one night, and the next morning, they were gone. None of the perimeter guards had seen them exit the tunnel, and there was no trace of them inside, except for the open tool case they had left behind.”  I felt chilled.

“Is that why you called for us, then?” asked Sophie. 

“Yes.” Karei sighed. “We had to keep the curse-breakers evenly divided: not everyone could work on the Sphinx, and there are so many other tomb and mastaba curses that need to be broken.  We chose some of the best” – at this Michelle blushed – “and left the others to do the regular work. But now it seems as if we need to look into the Sphinx more closely.”

”Don’t worry,” she continued, “the others will show you what’s what.”

“We certainly will,” said Michelle.  Karei smiled at us before leaving, and I felt a familiar voice call out as I turned around.

“Bill? Sophie?”  A dumbfounded Neil stood at the entrance to the tent. 

“Hello Neil.”  I waved to him.  Sophie smirked.

“What are you doing here?”

“We work here. What about you?” I asked.  He only looked more confused.

Michelle sighed. “Neil, they’re filling in for Amir and Ella.”

“Oh! Well, that’s excellent! Sort of. At least we won’t have to hide our paperwork and artefacts around the office anymore.”

“Not that we could find it in that mess anyway,” Sophie said.

“Look,” broke in Michelle, “Karei asked me earlier to show you around the site.  Shall we do that now?”  We agreed, and Sophie and I followed Michelle to the Sphinx as Neil walked between us.

We came to the front of the massive stone structure, in front of the long paws. Walking toward the Sphinx between the paws, the air shimmered and the scene changed.  We passed through the shielding charm, put there especially so the Muggles wouldn’t see anything different. 

There was a black square opening in where the Sphinx’s chest met the ground.  “Well, that’s a change,” said Sophie softly.

“Oh don’t worry,” Michelle comforted. “The stone will all be replaced eventually. We had to actually cut through the Sphinx to get in, but we’ll seal it after we’re done, of course.” The beauty of modern wizarding archaeology was the ability to replace and repair objects as if they were new.

She stepped into the opening daintily and vanished into the darkness.  I followed her cautiously, with Sophie, then Neil, bringing up the rear.

The tunnel was dark and long, but torches adorned the stone walls to let us see where we were stepping. Still, we needed to use our wands to light the way.  The hieroglyphics stood out at us as we walked, and images of Anubis and Re looked down upon us as we passed. 

Metallic clinking sounded out through the tunnel, obviously from picks and tools.  Wizarding archaeologists worked very much like Muggle archaeologists.  Magic was hard to use in digs because there was little control over what it could do to the dirt and artefacts.  Still, we always managed to find a use for it somehow.

After a minute or two, the tunnel we were in opened into a wide square chamber.  It was empty, except for the five or so workers at the far wall, digging, muttering and writing.  The room was unusual in the fact that there was really nothing in it.  No statues, no sarcophagi, nothing but the wizards’ tools lying around.

The far wall, however, the one that the others were working on, was what intrigued me most.  It was covered in strange hieroglyphics and images, some of which I had never seen before. Yes, this would be a most interesting puzzle.

“Don’t mind us,” Michelle said to the other workers as they looked up in curiosity. “We’re just showing Bill and Sophie around.”  They nodded and returned to their work, some of them pausing to wave at us.

We stepped to the wall and Michelle began pointing out the bright images.

“This is the Sphinx here, in the centre, quite obviously.  And around it are various hieroglyphs which seem to represent the gods.” Sure enough, the very distinct image of the Sphinx sat in the centre of the wall.  The images were carved in stone, not painted, and their quality was still very intact. Being kept in a sealed room for thousands of years probably helped.

“We really don’t know what it means,” said Michelle mournfully.  “When Ella and Amir disappeared, we also discovered this.” She pointed to the bottom of the wall, where stones lay in ruins. “Someone had come in and smashed it.”

“It’s a shame,” said Neil. “Everyone’s been walking on eggshells lately.  More and more accidents are happening. It must be the forces of darkness,” he concluded, raising his eyebrows conspiratorially.

“Karei’s been pushing everyone these past few days,” Michelle went on.  “They want us to finish before anything else goes wrong, especially because of what happened with Ella and Amir. Who knows?”

“Well, we’re here now,” said Sophie. “We’ll just have to work harder than ever, won’t we?”

Michelle looked only slightly comforted. “Guards are being placed here when there isn’t anyone working now.  The Department is getting very cautious – we’re all taking turns to guard in shifts.”

“You and Sophie will probably have to help stand guard too,” said Neil. He grumbled, “You’d think working on the Sphinx would be all fame and glory, but no…”

“Nothing worthwhile rarely is, Neil,” replied Sophie.

“Look, you don’t actually have to jump into the digging today,” said Michelle. “Neil and I are on schedule to show you two everything we’ve found so far.  You’ll need a bit of background before you start the real work.”  Michelle turned and began to lead us out of the chamber, waving to the other curse-breakers before leaving. I didn’t want to follow – I wanted to stay in here and discover anything that needed discovering – but Michelle was right. We couldn’t just jump into the project without learning more about it.

We walked back to the tent where all the curse-breaking information was kept.  For the next few hours, Sophie and I were given a crash course in Sphinxology’s latest finds.

The dangers in this project seemed almost non-existent, besides what had happened to Amir and Ella. But they were among the best curse-breakers I knew – that’s why they were originally put on this team. Their disappearance was not a by-product of their carelessness; it was from something else unknown. 

The curses were hard to find, much less be broken.  That was the puzzle of it all: the absence of intricate puzzles.  It all seemed so simple, yet why hadn’t anyone found the answer, or even the real questions?

We studied the files for the remainder of the day and luckily, there were no mishaps with the other workers.  Karei told Sophie and me that we were nearly ready to begin with the actual digging the next day, so we all headed home.

Michelle opted to come back to our flat with us, as she sometimes liked to do.  She could barely stand her own roommate, whose cleaning habits were much like Neil’s: non-existent.  She continued to put up with him though, and Neil, Sophie and I knew it was because she couldn’t bear hurting anyone’s feelings. That, and the fact that a good roommate was hard to come by.  I’d rather have the messiest people in the world (and I had one of them) as my closest friends and roommates than have a spotless person whom I couldn’t talk to.

That night found the four of us lounging in the sitting room with nothing to do, so we did what any self-respectable group of people would do: snap open a few bottles of Butterbeer and complain. 

“I’m bored,” whined Neil.  Sophie threw a pillow at him, which he caught deftly and tucked under his head as he flopped down on the sofa. 

Sophie sat in the old armchair as Michelle and I occupied the loveseat.  The humid night air clung to our damp robes as we sat in the sweltering heat.

*    *    *

The next morning, Sophie and I were ready to head off to our first day at our new workplace.  Between the two of us, there were four cases of tools.  Neil had one.

“Is that all you’re going to bring?” Sophie asked dubiously, standing in the middle of the room with her arms crossed.

“A true professional needs only his wand,” replied Neil.

“You mean Michelle doesn’t trust you with most of the equipment, right?” I called as I made sure the door was locked. 

“Exactly.”

We Apparated out with our equipment, once again popping onto the Giza Plateau.  Unfortunately, we had Apparated right into a crowd of people.  What hit me first was the noise. From our living room to the Plateau, the sudden onslaught of a talking buzz was thunderous. 

What I couldn’t figure out at first was why there were so many people on the Apparition Point. Usually, you Apparated right in and then stepped away as quickly as you could. Most accidents were prevented this way, but if there were too many people…

“Oh no!” cried Neil.

As the three of us tried to gather our fallen supplies together, dodging the thinning crowd of onlookers, we looked up to find that Neil had splinched himself.

“How in the world did you even get your Apparition license?” Sophie moaned.

“I don’t know,” wailed Neil helplessly. “There must be something seriously wrong with the Ministry.”

By this time, the crowd had cleared, fearful that something else would happen.

“Why are there so many people here?” asked Michelle, frowning. “I’m going to go find out what’s going on. I’ll be right back.”  She headed out into the mass of wizards, walking toward the direction of the curse-breakers’ tent.

The Medi-witches and Accidental Reversal Squad arrived on scene and promptly began to sort out the mess. They cleared everyone away from the area, and began casting all sorts of spells to restore Neil back into one body. One of them engaged Sophie in taking them back to our flat so they could help fix the mess.

It was a little strange watching Neil being slowly restored portion by portion, so I took a little walk instead.  I glanced toward the curse-breakers’ tent where I glimpsed Michelle energetically chatting with a solemn-looking Karei – a lot of arm-waving was involved.  There was another woman there, shaking her head as Michelle made a ton of flurried gestures at her.

With my curiosity piqued I headed over, aware of the nervousness and fret of the people around me.  The Plateau was very crowded, and I had to push my way through to the tent.

Michelle’s vigour was apparently reaching its peak, and I grabbed her arms as she waved them in the air, bringing them gently to her sides. “Is something wrong?” I asked, as she whipped her head around.

She was breathing hard, and her eyes flashed angrily as she calmed herself down.

“Something’s happened, Bill,” announced Karei. “We’re still trying to figure it out.”

“What is it?” I asked cautiously.

“They stole the stele,” blurted out the brown-haired woman.  I turned my head in her direction, getting a good look at her for the first time. Her robes were messy and covered in dirt, and her bangs were plastered to her sweaty forehead.  I assumed she was one of the diggers – they all had an unkempt appearance. 

“What are you talking about?” I asked.

“Bill, this is Geralynn. She’s an intern at Gringotts, helping out with some of the more manual work,” Karei said. “Geralynn, this is Bill, one of the curse-breakers.”

Geralynn wiped her hand on her robes before offering it to me. “There was a stele that we uncovered late yesterday afternoon,” she explained as we shook hands.  “It had a ton of hieroglyphics on it, and we were going to get them translated today.”

“And it’s gone? How do you know it’s stolen?” I asked. Michelle sighed heavily when I asked.

“Because they took a few other items with them,” replied Geralynn. “And they left a little mess for us in the storage area too.”

Questions began to rise in me, begging to be answered.  For such a highly guarded project, it seemed almost impossible for anything to be infiltrated, much less stolen. 

“There’s no trace of the thieves either,” said Karei. “We have no leads on it at all. It’s like a little tornado came in and carried away the objects.”

Michelle had kept silent through the explanations, but she spoke after Karei. “We need to find out who did this, Karei.  There must have been something important on that stele. There’s something important in everything we’re finding!” Her voice began to grow hysterical and she started to lapse into French.  I held her arm again, and she soon grew quiet.

At that moment, Neil and Sophie came into the tent. Neil was walking tentatively, probably still reeling from being splinched.

They took in our sombre looks quietly.

“So,” Neil began. “What did we miss?”

~ * ~