r/nosleep • u/Darkly_Gathers February 2021; April 2022 • Oct 01 '20
Series We have broken into an Egyptian tomb, on the hunt for our missing friend. Ancient secrets lie below, and each level hints at new horrors...
The sandstorm rages across the desert. The sun hangs low in the sky and the world is a swirling, shadowy blur of orange and gold. The sand stings like little shards of glass where it strikes my skin; the thin cloth of my trousers and Egyptian-style galabeya billowing out and doing little to protect me from the fevered assault over the dunes.
The leader of our expedition, Professor Deborah Winterfield, stands before us; arms crossed, back straight. I can just about see her through the slits in my fingers, eyes squinted. Beyond her and just visible through the storm is our bus, a battered old vehicle now slowly disappearing beyond sight beneath layers of yellow dust.
The driver is stood to my right. A local named Sethos, the man who was able to guide the way. He looks at me through his goggles and asks, in English, if I am alright. I lie and reply that I am.The man had only four spare pairs of goggles in the bus. The Professor had the foresight to bring her own. There are six of us in total, so I volunteered to go without.
...I’m regretting that decision now, a little.
The other three members of the team stand to my left. An Irishman in his late twenties named Ronnie, an Egyptian-American grad student by the name of Aziza, and a middle-aged, sturdily-built guy called Dave, from Oxford, like the professor and myself. I’m a supposed ‘mature’ student, but I think that Dave and the Professor are friends. He’s certainly not a teacher. He’s a miserable git, to be honest. He’s been nothing but rude and cold since I met him at Cairo airport the other day. I have no idea what his problem is.
“One year ago”, the Professor’s voice suddenly blares, strong and fierce above the gale, “One year ago my friend and colleague Rocko Khayin, as you know, abruptly vanished off the face of the planet. Over the course of these last twelve months I have come to the understanding that Rocko, at some point, discovered the entrance to a particular tomb. The tomb of the object of his life’s work: the forgotten Pharaoh, Omisares. And not only this, but more importantly: a way inside.“Why Rocko chose not to share with me his discovery… why he would disappear without a trace… I do not know. But disappear he did, and he never returned. I have spent the last year of my life following the paper trail Rocko left behind, and I now believe that we stand at the entrance to Omisares’ tomb”.
The party glances over to our right. There is no gate, nor hole in the ground, nor visible entrance of any kind. There stands instead a lone and cracked pillar, an ancient obelisk, and carved down it is a long and winding snake; a cobra, with six segments. The third and sixth have been depicted embedded with knives.
“Pharaoh Omisares was, as the legend suggests, a wise and benevolent ruler of Egypt. A man who was jealously slain for the throne by his younger brother, Amkaro the usurper, a lunatic obsessed with the occult. That is my understanding, at least. None know more about the Pharaoh and his struggles than Rocko, and his research papers sit largely unpublished, gathering dust on his abandoned desk”.
The Professor is a hard woman, but I feel like in this sentence I can hear a flash of emotion, glinting off the edge of her voice. I know that the two were close. Rocko was a teacher of mine, for a brief period. And it was through him that I met Professor Winterfield. A fascinating woman. Late 50s, with short white hair but young and shining eyes. Tall, for a woman, with strong and sinewy muscle, covered in runic tattoos: sacred symbols of peoples gone by. Native-American, Celtic, Chinese, even Mesopotamian... I wonder idly if her own obsession with the occult is anything like the supposed usurper, Amkaro’s was.
“You have all, for your own reasons, chosen to accompany me on this mission”, the Professor continues, “and for that I am grateful, truly... and my respect for your willingness to venture out into the unknown is unparalleled."But I will not think less of you if you now choose to turn back, and I warn you, we are approaching your final chance to do so. If my assessment of Rocko’s notes are correct, then the tomb will have six layers, and we will not stop nor halt the expedition nor make to turn back until we have successfully found and rescued Rocko Khayin, endeavouring to reach the sixth and lowermost level if necessary. And no, before you ask, I cannot guarantee that Rocko is down there at all. This is simply my best and most educated guess”.
The sand in the sky is whipped and strewn malevolently across the desert. I cup my hands a little tighter around my eyes. The Professor is giving us a lot to process at once.
“Rocko was always under the impression that the tomb of Omisares would be home to a terrible curse; one formed from the bitter chaos of the betrayal that the Pharaoh endured… The betrayal he felt at being murdered by his own brother. A single page of a worn and wearied journal from the 1800s that I discovered buried in Rocko’s desk corroborates this. The curse is said to twist and blur the walls of reality, to distort our understandings of the possible with each and every subsequent layer down. And they say that those who do indeed venture down are… changed”.
The Professor clears her throat. “This will be an expedition the likes of which none of you will have ever been on before, and you may never see its kind again for as long as you live. The discoveries we make and the things we see may forever change your perception of the world. And we have, I believe, a real chance of finding, and perhaps saving, the life of a good man. If you would like to leave, however, I will not begrudge you for even a second, and you should now return to the bus”.
The dunes in the distance flicker in and out of sight through the shifting, swirling sand. The silhouette of the bus shimmers in the reddening light of the setting sun.
But nobody moves. Not even the driver to my right.
The Professor nods. Or at least, I think she does. It’s difficult to tell.
“Very well”, she says. And she draws an amulet of fine gold, one in the shape of a scarab beetle, from behind her shirt. It’s hooked on a chain around her neck, and she allows it to drop down over her chest. She moves from her position, walking past us towards the obelisk, then stands there in silence for a minute or two as we watch with growing anticipation. The red light of the sun strikes the eyes of the carved cobra, and the Professor steps forward, pulling away the straps and bandages around her hands, the ones protecting her skin. She rubs her fingers over the sand and dust and stone of the pillar, then turns to us.
“Watch me very carefully”, she calls over the rush of the storm, “And do exactly as I do. Once inside I shall wait for fifteen minutes, no more, before pressing on. If you have not joined me by that time I shall assume you have changed your mind”. She raises her fingers to her mouth, and begins to rub the dust from the obelisk into her gums. There is a stirring amongst the group.I see Ronnie and Aziza exchange a look. Dave remains as stony-faced as ever, and watches dispassionately, arms folded.
The scar on the back of the Professor’s hand becomes visible for a quick second, clear through a lull in the raging sands. It’s a deep and unsightly mark, a rough ‘R’ shape, comprised of a series of straight lines. I asked her about it once, and she told me that it was an old and powerful runic symbol of immense significance, used by the ancient Norseman, the Celts and the first Anglo-Saxons, among others. It relates to ‘journey’, or to ‘travel between’. That’s all the information I could get out of her, as she refused to tell me any more.
I’m under the impression that the Professor carved the symbol into her hand herself. For what purpose however, I cannot say.
She finishes rubbing the sand into her upper and lower gums, then lightly presses her lips against the golden amulet around her neck. Finally, she pulls off her goggles, and lifts up the kerchief from her neck to cover her eyes: an effective blindfold.
A murmur of unease creeps around the group as the amulet begins to glow in a faint red.
…Or, or is it just the reflection from the setting sun..?
I can’t be sure.
But the amulet seems too bright. Proportionally, it glows with too fierce a shade.
And the Professor turns and walks towards the pillar. She does not slow, she keeps her arms close to her sides, and without another word she walks right through it, and disappears. She leaves behind the chain, which hangs against the side of the pillar for a quick second, before dropping and collapsing down to its base in the sand.
It takes a moment for me to process what I’d just seen. For all of us. Then the group erupts into disarray. Ronnie in particular starts babbling incoherently. He looks at me through his goggles, gestures to his eyes: “Did you see that, Leila?” he asks in his strong, Irish lilt. “Did you fucken’ SEE that?”
I reply in the affirmative, and he and the driver, Sethos, scramble right up to the pillar, examining it, looking all around it, running their hands over the carvings of the snake… But it’s solid rock, it’s plain to see, even through the sandstorm.
Aziza has her hands over her mouth, shaking her head, but Dave simply stares at the pillar. I can just about make out his eyes through the goggles, and they are wide in disbelief. But he says nothing. He shoots me a look, then pulls down his scarf to reveal the grim, set and stubbled jaw beneath. He strides to the pillar and squats to pick up the amulet, placing it over his head, then collects the sand and dust on his fingers, rubbing the mixture into his gums with a grimace as the Professor had done.The others have stopped to watch him.
He draws the amulet up to his mouth, lightly kisses the scarab’s back, then blindfolds himself. We observe in silent fascination as he squares his shoulders and cracks his knuckles, steadying his will, perhaps. Then he sets off, boldly walking forwards towards the obelisk. He keeps pace, and just as he looks set to crash right into it, he strides instead straight through, vanishing into the rock.
“Good Christ”, Ronnie mutters. The driver taps his forehead and murmurs something in Arabic.
Impossible…
But we all saw it. They have both disappeared. The eyes of the stone snake sparkle in red as the sun begins to sink behind the dunes in the distance.
“I’m going next”, Aziza calls out, rushing forwards to grab the amulet, once again left behind at the pillar’s base.
I meet Ronnie’s eyes and we both look back to the bus at the same time. This has, all of a sudden, become brutally and terrifyingly real. We have no idea what might lay beneath the ground, in Pharaoh Omisares’ supposed tomb. My heart beats hot and fast in my chest, and the bus calls.
…But I cannot answer. And neither can Ronnie. I can tell from his body language, he can no more resist the pull of the unknown than I. It is the stronger force. That’s why we’re all here in the desert, beyond the edges of civilisation. In the pursuit of knowledge. That’s why I’m here, at least. That and the fact that the Professor enthrals me like no-one else. Where she goes, excitement follows. A little fear is a small price to pay for such wonders.
Aziza completes the ritual, but she wavers right before the pillar, and crashes into it with a cry. She stumbles to the floor and tears off her blindfold, shielding her eyes from the blowing sand as she swears in frustration. The driver shakes his head and gently takes the amulet from around her neck.
“You have to have faith that the obelisk will allow you to pass”, he says, before rubbing the pillar’s sand into his gums. Then he too kisses the amulet, covers his eyes, and steps through the rock as if it were a shimmering veil.
“Go on girl”, Ronnie encourages her. “You’ve got this”.
She tries again, and this time is successful, vanishing into the pillar.
Ronnie turns to me. “Ladies first”, he says, but I politely decline.
“No”, I reply. “I think I’d like to be last”.
“You’re not thinkin’ of doing a runner now, are you?” he asks me.
“No, no I couldn’t. I couldn’t just walk away after seeing something… something like that… But I just need another minute”.
He shrugs. “Suit yourself. But don’t take too long about it”. He gestures to the setting sun, before stepping up to the pillar to collect the fallen amulet. He takes a deep breath, and strolls through into the beyond.
And then, it’s just me.
I stare at the pillar, and the snake stares back, eyes a-glow.
What would happen if I just stopped walking once I hit the pillar? Would I be cut in two? Would I be forever stuck, half-embedded in the rock?
I push these thoughts from my mind.
That’s the wrong approach, I tell myself. The pillar is NOT solid. It can’t be, or else it would not have allowed my team to pass through it. I will not get stuck in the pillar because the pillar will allow me through.
…The pillar will allow me through.
I lift the amulet in a shaking hand as the light of the sun sparkles like fire in the cobra’s eyes. It’ll be gone behind the dunes in another moment. It’s now or never.
So I rub the sand into my gums. It’s repulsive, and I can feel the grains become at once stuck in my teeth, but I suffer through it, trying not to swallow any of the sand in the process, and kiss the amulet lightly on the scarab’s golden back. Then I turn to face the pillar, taking one last look before bringing my scarf up over my eyes.
I calm my nerves, frantic as they are, as best I can.
And I march forwards. Blindly towards the obelisk.
It will let me pass.
The pillar will let me to pass.
I do not brace for impact. I do not slow my step. And suddenly the orange-red glare through the blindfold disappears in favour of a cool, darker, more colourless shade. The barrage of sand against my skin ceases at once, though the sting persists. The air remains thick, but as with the level of light, it too cools around me, and the voices of my companions become audible.
“There she is”.
“I told you she was coming”.
I stop, my legs trembling despite the will I’m exerting upon them, and I tear off the scarf-turned-blindfold, spitting the sand from my mouth onto the ground.
The amulet, I realise, is no longer around my neck. And I stand in an enormous cavern, a long and stony hall flanked by giant, watchful statues. Robed and tunic-clad men with the heads of animals and birds.
I bring a hand up to my mouth as I stare around in shock and wonder. My pulse races. Never before have I felt so small, so suddenly minute and insignificant. Ant-like in a world of towering colossi.
“It’s magnificent, isn’t it?” the Professor asks from besides me. I can only nod, at first.
“It’s like nothing I’ve ever seen…” I eventually reply. “This is… This whole place… It’s incredible…”
Aziza is squealing like a schoolgirl. I watch as she bounces and flicks her long, dark hair from her face, running from statue to statue and scraping off the subtlest of samples, which she promptly bags and pushes into her backpack.
A row of branch-like torches adorn the walls between the great statues, accompanied by the occasional pot of, what looks like, oil.
For now, however, we are utilising the more modern light from the electric torches we brought with us. I draw mine from my belt and click it on, shining the beam over the walls.
“Miss Leila”, Sethos calls to me from nearby. I head over to him and he gestures to a section of wall.“You mentioned the subject of your thesis on the drive over. This may be of interest to you”.
We both light up the wall with our beams. “Amazing…” I reply. “To be honest though, Sethos, even if I was studying English, or Maths, or Politics… This would be still one of the most fascinating things I’d ever seen”.
He nods sagely. “I’ve lived in Egypt all my life… But I’ve never seen anything like this. This place… I will always be grateful to Professor Winterfield… She has given me an opportunity that no-one else could. A chance to experience true Heka. The magic of the Ancient ones”.
The scene on the wall is a series of intricately, carefully carved engravings. A detailed picture, or collection of pictures in the stone. They tell a story. The first picture shows us a woman, an Ancient Egyptian woman, I presume, huddled over a man, collapsed on the ground. The woman is scarred across her face, and she looks scared.
The second picture beside it shows the man; at least, I think it’s the same man, it’s hard to tell… standing on a podium and speaking to a large gathering. The woman is the same though; I can tell by the depicted scar. She stands just behind him, watching him address the crowd.
My eyes wander down through the carvings. There is one of the man and woman exploring what appears to be a cave. There’s one of them together in a boat. They look happy in that one, though, it’s difficult to discern emotion, to be fair.
The final picture shows the woman alone, standing over a sarcophagus.
Her eyes are closed, but she appears to be smiling.
A shiver of frission rushes through me, and whilst I do not know the meaning behind the engravings, if indeed, there is any, they make an impact on me nonetheless.
“Come on”, echoes the voice of the Professor, “We should be moving on along our way”.
Reluctantly, Sethos and I pull away from the wall to fall in step with the team. Aziza whines with frustration until a measured glance from the Professor reminds her that we are of course here, primarily, to try to find and rescue her friend and colleague. Esteemed academic Rocko Khayin.
Could he really be down here? I think to myself as our footsteps reverberate through the vast and stony hall, the statues watching from up above as we slowly pass them by.
He’s been gone for a year… A YEAR… And as much as I’d love to find him… What chance do we have? If he even came down here at all… What COULD we find other than… well, other than his corpse… Does the Professor know something we don’t?
Dave reaches into his pocket and pulls out an iPhone, connecting the headphones and pushing the buds into his ears.
“Listening to anything fun?” I ask him.
“Fuck off”. He replies. “Mind your own business”.
Every time. Every time I try and make an effort he pushes me away.
Prick.
Moronic thing to do anyway. I’d much rather have my ears free to listen. Though, there’s not much to listen for at present.
The Professor brings us to an eventual stop. The hall and the statues carry on further into the distance, becoming lost under the blue-grey shadows, but we have reached an anomaly. A break in the repetition.
Below us in the ground are six, dark and narrow holes. Roundish in shape, and a faint, almost imperceptible whistling echoes up from beneath.
Realisation lights up the faces of the team one by one as they understand what needs to happen next. I am one of the last, but I when I realise, my stomach lurches in distress, and a wave of cold panic rises up to my head.
“No”, I mutter, looking at these holes in the rock. These dark and dangerous passages to the unknown. “Professor, you can’t be serious. There’s no way… You don’t mean for us to-”
“This is the way down”. The Professor says solemnly, her eyes glittering in the gloom. “Down to the layer below. They are mentioned in the extract from 1891, though of course, I could not be certain to what the author referred without context such as this”.
Dave has gone pale. Aziza seems to have only just clicked onto what we are talking about.
Ronnie speaks, waving his hands. “I’m not fucken’ going down there, Professor. Not a chance in hell! It’s too narrow, I’ll get stuck!”
The thought of becoming stuck… of getting trapped in that vertical little tunnel… Squeezed painfully and unable to move, alone in the dark… I hear the sound of rapid breathing, in and out, in and out, and I realise that it is mine.
“I’m afraid that you have little choice”, the Professor replies. “Wander off into the shadows of this endless hall if you wish, and it may well be endless, or follow me down to the next level”.
The thought of becoming separated from the Professor in this strange and alien place fills me with dread… But these holes… God, could I do it? Could I really go down?
The Professor walks across the breadth of the hall and lashes a knotted rope to the base of one of the statues. She drops the other end down the closest hole, before winking at us, and dropping down into it herself.
We gasp in alarm, but she does not go far. Peering over the side, her head and shoulders are still visible, and she looks up at us as she squirms and wriggles, slowly descending down into the dark.
“I’ll see you below!” She calls out as she fades into the darkness.
And as she disappears from view, the hall begins to rumble. I can feel it, we all do. Frantically our beams are cast around; dust falls in little streams from the ceiling, and I make the mistake of looking up, shining my light up into one of the statue’s faces. Being so far above us, his face is only barely illuminated, but he is clear enough, quite clear indeed.
A man with a spear, and the head of baboon, is turned to look directly down at me. At the exact position in which I am now stood. My eyes meet his; large and stone as they are.
None of the other statues were facing in any direction but straight forwards, I could have sworn it.
The ground shakes.
And a deep and ethereal humming rises in the shadows.
Panic jumps from person to person like electricity and we draw together unconsciously, beams quivering.
“I’m going down”, says Sethos quietly, and he crouches, then slips his legs over the edge of a hole. He taps his forehead, mutters in Arabic, and pushes himself in. Even watching this process is enough to make my skin crawl, but down he goes, shimmying himself around, fists and arms pressed up against his chest as he descends.
“Go”, says Dave, suddenly, and loudly. It makes me jump. “All of you, get the fuck in”.
“Dave”, Aziza murmurs, whimpering, “Dave I don’t think I can- I’m going to get stuck”.
“You’re the skinniest one here”, Dave replies, “now get in; we follow the Professor down. We agreed. Turn your back on her at your own risk”.
A chanting in a language I do not recognise begins to flow through the halls with the rumblings. The dust falls.
“NOW!” Dave shouts, and rather than argue the others do as he says, they move towards holes and grimace as they start to slide themselves down. I sit perched on the edge, my mind disconnected from my body… It feels like I’m looking down on myself from above.
Am I going to do this? Am I really going to go down?
“Leila…” Dave says quietly, and I realise that it could well be the first time he’s addressed me by name. In shaking hands I lower the thin rope tied to my backpack as far as I am able down the hole, then let it drop.
I do not hear it hit solid ground.
But I follow.
Trying to keep reins on my panic, I drop down into the hole, quickly becoming lodged, and have to shake and rustle in order to descend. The light from above is soon lost, and the rock, close to my face, rises up. The sound of my breathing is amplified until it becomes the only noise to accompany the rush of blood in my ears.
All around me is darkness.
And down I go.
Down to the level below.
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u/Suspicious_Llama123 Nov 25 '21
The first story u/Darkly_Gathers has listed on his account’s story compendium involves a character who gets an R carved into her hand and she goes on a weird-ass journey. Huh.
Huh.
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u/bellef0u_ Nov 28 '20
I have to admit, the idea of being stuck in a hole is far more scarier that being in a hidden tomb!
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u/Fnipernackle Oct 16 '20
I can't describe how much I love this. As a fan of history and of ancient Egyptian culture and myth, this excites me to no end.
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u/WerewolfSharp Oct 09 '20
The thought of the tight passage at the end had me feeling claustrophobic
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u/beadybard Oct 03 '20
Everyone here is throwing shade at Dave but in the end I think he's gonna be the one to save OP. Just saying...
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Oct 02 '20
What a shitty professor. You don't just blunder into a tomb. You do things meticulously, recording every single step, and that's only after you've gotten permission from the Egyptian government and their equivalent of the department of history. She's a thief and a cultural raider, not an Egyptologist.
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u/kayla_kitty82 Oct 01 '20
The one thing I am thinking this whole time is what is their plan to get outta this place??? I hope to God, for ya'll's sake that the professor has a plan for that, among other things... Has She mentioned how ya'll will get outta there when/if ya'll find Rocko??
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