Stepping off the junkyard-worthy bus, Leoma gazed at the orange-tan sand surrounding the area for hundreds of miles. Just in the distance were the Great Pyramids, and the large canyons that held the Valley of the Kings and Queens in their nook. Today was the day she would start her first real expedition. It would be much more professional than her last archeological camp in high school.
The other nineteen students pushed her aside so they could pile out of the stuffy, sweaty bus. Everyone had their own set of tools around their waist, a flashlight, and a backpack with a change of clothes. They were ready for a day of digging in the dirt.
Just a few feet away stood an old, wooden shack, with a large sign atop it reading in Egyptian: Guides for Hire. That's where the students would be paired into groups of five and given a guide to the excavation sites.
Leoma's group, made up of Greg, Jeana, Mark, Brant, and herself, would take on Akinohotepu's Palace. The Palace was the supposed to be the tomb of the last pharaoh before the civilization was conquered and destroyed by the Romans. It was known for being full of hundreds of mummies and hieroglyphs, but little more. Even the mummies were mostly slaves killed for the purpose of serving their master in the afterlife. His actual tomb and body however, had never been found.
“Hey, Leoma. I bet you twenty bucks that I make a find before you.” Greg nudged Leoma back into reality long enough to gloat.
“Oh yeah?” Leoma leaned towards him giving him a glare.
“Yeah.”
“You’re on.” She smiled and trotted towards the shack with the rest of the group, hoping she was better an archeologist than the one kid known for being at the top of the class. She was originally planning to use that money to treat herself to ice cream once they returned to the school.
The twenty students stood around the shack while four, dusty, tired looking guides trudged out to greet them.
Leoma’s group waited as their guide, a young man with brown hair and blue eyes, walked up and yawned. He was younger than most of the kids in the group, being native to the area he could’ve taken the job when he was nine if he’d wanted to.
“Hi, I’m Kadin and I’ll be your tour-guide for the day.” His voice was monotone and his hair ruffled, bored of saying the lines in Arabic that he had to say.
“Whoa, wake up on the wrong side of the bed?” Greg and the others snickered. All of the students had been required to learn Arabic when they'd transferred here.
“Yeah, yeah, whatever smarty.” Kadin rolled his eyes. “Follow me and I’ll take you to the site.” He turned and walked around the shack, as did the group.
There they, as well as the other groups, piled into roofless jeeps and started the engines. They sputtered off in different directions, headed towards the different sites.
Leoma moved a large bottle of water out from under herself as she sat in the bumpy back, coughing on the dust that erupted from the jeep’s tires.
“Hey, man! Do you have a license?” Jeana leaned forward from her seat behind Kadin and poked him in the shoulder.
“Nope!” Kadin shouted above the sound of the cheap engine and dust.
Jeana blinked then leaned back in her seat beside Leoma and Mark. Since they were all squished in the vehicle, and there was no traffic except a snake here and there, no one wore seat belts.
By the time they arrived at their site, everyone had gulped down their canteen of water, and had to replenish them from the jugs in the jeep.
Kadin hopped out of the jeep and stretched before scratching his side while he waited for the hot crew to pile out.
After falling out of the cramped jeep when she opened the door, Leoma stood up and gazed in a locked stare at the immense Palace front. All that could be seen were the gigantic stairs, the rows of columns, and the outline of the face of the building. The rest of the palace was sealed in the rock itself. The morning sun hiding behind the canyon east wall shadowed the area around them.
“Wow.” Leoma breathed. She’d only seen this palace in pictures up until this point.
“Yep. I can practically feel that twenty in my hand now.” Greg sighed and began walking severely upright in stature towards the steps.
“Welcome to the Palace of Akinohotepu.” Kadin almost mumbled before taking the keys from the jeep and beginning up the journey of stairs. They were over one hundred fifty feet wide and led up about fifty feet in a gradual slope.
The group of five was heavily panting by the time they reached the top, and all instantly sat down on the dusty front hall. They gazed up at the speckled blue columns, knowing that the place must have been brightly colored when originally finished.
“Come on. I’m not getting paid to watch you sleep.” Kadin, unfazed by the stairs, walked into the darkness of the palace holding his flashlight.
The group groaned and complained about their guide as they willed their bodies to move after him, since he was the only one that knew the area inside. They could easily get lost.
“Slow down.” Mark called as Kadin led them quickly past the entrance hieroglyphics.
Kadin stopped and waited as the teens in training read the pictures, even though he knew what was already on them from leading tours back this way.
“So...Akenohotepu’s body was mummified right after the Roman conquest.” Greg spoke loud enough for everyone to hear.
“And the Romans killed all his remaining children.” Jeana sighed.
Leoma didn’t bother to read hers out loud, since it was all information she already knew because of her extensive research. It just stated that this area was a large burial for those that were dead from right before the conquest and right after, if their bodies weren’t crucified.
“Yeah, yeah. And then the Romans took over and absorbed the culture before they fell. Thieves ravaged only in the front of the palace’s open area because of the small tunnels, traps and mazes, said to have been here to safe-guard the mummies.” Kadin recited what he’d been taught to memorize as he leaned against the wall.
“Heh heh, more for me to find.” Greg rubbed his hands together and trotted over to stand and wait beside Kadin for the others.
The other students slowly pulled themselves away from staring at the wall and followed their sarcastic guide down the pitch-black main hall, all turning on their flashlights.
More hieroglyphics lined the walls, but they were easily read, since they just explained the history up until the conquering.
They continued walking for about a quarter hour until they came to their first room. It was just a small room with six passages leading to the empty mummy tombs.
Staring at the walls with the names of the mummies on them, the students began to get impatient as Kadin just stood there with his arms folded.
“Well?” Brant threw up his arms. “You was in such a hurry to get us here, man.”
“This is it.” Kadin shrugged.
“But you said there were more tombs and mazes.” Jeana set her hands on her hips.
“There are, but they can only be reached by small remote-controlled cars. So they suspect that there are other hidden entrances to the passages...except no one’s found them yet.” Leoma explained as Kadin opened his mouth to answer.
“Yeah. What she said.” Kadin folded his arms, feeling his pride bashed.
“Well...I’m going to start where the small entrances are and work from there.” Greg beamed a smile Leoma’s way before turning to Kadin. “Where is it?”
Kadin leaned against the west wall and pointed at the mummy tomb entrance. “It’s down the hall and to the left. You can’t miss it.”
Greg, followed by Jeana, Mark and Brant, hurried down the hallway with their flashlights.
Finally relieved that the teens were off his back, Kadin sighed with satisfaction and watched their lights disappear into the blackness.
Turning to sit down along the open hallway, Kadin nearly plowed into Leoma as she stared in his face.
“Aren’t you goin’ with them?” Leoma raised an eyebrow and stood her ground, forcing Kadin to back up before they bumped.
“It’s only a couple yards away. If they can’t find their way back from there, then they shouldn’t be schooling for this kind of job.” Kadin narrowed his eyes angrily at her. “Wait...what are you still doing here? Cutting class?”
“Ha ha, very funny, wise guy.” Leoma turned quickly, flicking her hair in his face as she trotted over to one of the walls to read the ancient writing. “That small passage was carved out only about a hundred years ago, with picks and shovels by thieves. There would be little point trying to get in that way, especially if they suddenly decided to quit for no reason.”
“There are booby traps you know.” Kadin smiled haughtilly.
“Maybe...maybe not.” Leoma walked out into the hallway to read more hieroglyphics. She disappeared for several minutes, her flashlight glow being the only way Kadin could tell that she was still there.
Finding peace and quiet, Kadin settled down on the sandy floor and turned off his light for a nap.
“I got it!” Leoma hurried back into the room and shown her light square on his face.
“What?” Kadin squinted awake, very irritated.
She quieted down some so Greg wouldn’t be able to hear her. “I know where the passage is!”
“Does it look like I care?” Kadin snorted before trying to go back to sleep.
“Hey, you’re the guide. You’re getting paid. You have to come along with me in case I get lost.” Leoma set her hands on her hips and pointed the bright beam in his face some more.
“All right, all right.” Kadin blocked the light with his hand as he stood up, turning his own light on. “Now where is this passage that intelligent archeologists couldn’t find for over six decades?”
“Here in the hieroglyphics, it reads that there were several levels on top of one another during the mummification processes just inside the palace.”
“Yeah, so?” Kadin shrugged.
“And the Egyptians would keep air passages open until they were finished, then they would close them up...right?”
“Get to the point.”
“Well, that area in there wasn’t the mummification room. It was actually out where we first were. So an air passage has to be out there.” Leoma hopped a few times before running out the hallway to the front of the palace building.
Kadin blinked a few times before glancing at the wall, and then walking after her. He found her at the foot of the staircase, kicking away the sand on the floor.
“You really think they would’ve left little more than a crack between the surrounding stone and the passage stone?” It was obvious to him that this girl was wasting her time.
“No. They would’ve sealed it with tile.” She replied hotly, getting down on her knees and brushing the sand away. “And...when they had an air passage, it would’ve had to be almost straight up, since they would’ve begun work at an angle level with the ground. Then that level would go for a while and lead down to the lower levels and so on. It was a trick to fool the thieves.”
“And you really think that the entrance to the other rooms would be outside the palace corridors.” Kadin leaned back against the wall with another yawn.
Leoma had her fill of him, “Look. I am trying something here that just might work. So instead of ridiculing me maybe you should help so it won’t take as long.” She stood up and poked him in the chest a few times.
“Naaaa, I’d rather ridicule. It’s much more fun than babysitting older, pampered teens.” Kadin stood his tallest and glared down at her.
Leoma stamped her left foot hard on the floor as she spoke, “Why you...conceded...no good...camel-riding buffoon!”
Kadin blinked a few times as he felt something move under his feet. “Hey...do you feel that?”
“Shut-up! I’m yelling at you...you...” Leoma paused and stared at him a moment, feeling something under her feet also. “What is that?”
At the same time, both glanced down at their shoes and saw the sand sinking below their feet through opening cracks in the floor. Neither had time to do anything except yell as they instantly dropped down the small air passage, slid down the slope, and landed in a heap of sand and dust at the bottom!
Sticking his head out of the large pile of sand that broke their fall, Kadin felt around in the blackness for his flashlight as he choked on the dust.
Leoma, also coughing, rolled out of the sand and dust to sprawl out on the floor. Even though she’d just managed to survive a large fall, she still had to enforce her victory, “Hah! ‘Cough’ Told you!”
Kadin finally managed to find his flashlight and turn it on, “Oh yay, whoopee. Now we’re stuck down in an ancient tomb, with no way out, and no one knows we’re even down here!”
“But I was still right.” Leoma made a snoot at him, picking up her flashlight and turning it on. She shown it on the walls, revealing colored, but faded hieroglyphics, preserved in the tomb for thousands of years. “Whoa. They’ve still got paint on them.”
“Oh will you wake up! We’re going to die down here, and all you can think about doing is marveling at stupid paintings.” Kadin stood up and blared in his temper-tantrum.
Leoma whirled around to face him again, “If I can read this, moron, I might be able to find us a way out! So be quiet and let me think!” Then she whirled back around and began reading again.
Feeling himself so hot that he might explode, Kadin gritted his teeth and clenched his fists, but he remained quiet. He could blow up at her after they were out...if they ever got out. So he let out a silent growl before stomping over to the opposite wall and beating it with his fist.
“Hmmm. It says here...that the door to the passages was disguised like the rest of the wall...and it was pointing east, towards their sun god.” Leoma stood at triumph.
“All right...which way’s east?”
“Umm...”Leoma turned around a couple of times. “I think it might be...that wall.” She pointed at the one to the left of Kadin.
“Okay...then where’s the door?” He raised an eyebrow.
So she walked over and began feeling along the wall for cracks, “If we push on it the right way, it should slide open in the middle.”
“Heh, either that or it’s a layer of rock we’d have to chisel through.” Kadin half laughed at the words while he spoke, banging his head back against the wall. He leaned back a little further and gazed up at the solid ceiling, watching the small sand particles seep from around the air passage.
“Hmmm. I could’ve sworn this was the east...” She paused and stared at Kadin.
He quickly noticed. “What?”
“Don’t move.” She quickly walked over and looked at his back.
“What? A scorpion?” Kadin sat forwards and stood up quickly.
“No. Ahhh. The door.” Leoma smiled as she pointed at the small indented crack in the wall. “You’re weight moved it some enough to spot.”
“Heh...lucky me.”
“Come on. Help me push.” Leoma stuck her flashlight in her pocket and braced her body weight against the door side, trying to push it.
Quick to get himself out, Kadin also put his light away and pushed against the door for all his worth.
With a few grinding sounds, and some sand falling here and there, the door suddenly swung open and the two fell on the ground on top each other.
Quickly taking his light, Kadin shown it on the wall ahead of them. Open doorways were everywhere, and the hallway seemed to go on forever, veering off into other halls. “Well...I think we found the maze.”

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