Much better waking up after this one than the last .... ^..^
I am struggling through a series of narrow passages inside an Egyptian temple of massive proportions. Luxor and Karnak combined at the height of Egypt's empire, and connected to tombs and chambers like those of the Valley of the Kings. I am following my friend, guide and mentor; the Great Raisuli (yeah, it's Sean Connery).....
We have been on a raid into this temple, trying to capture or kill an evil magus who has usurped the crown of Egypt. He is a cross between Ernst Stavro Blofeld from the Bond films, Fu Manchu, and the magus from the John Fowles novel. If he doesn't actually have magical powers, he is a superb manipulator and illusionist.
Unfortunately the hunters have become the hunted; our small group of followers have been killed or cut off from us, and the pursuit is not only hot on our trail, but are obviously trying to drive us in a particular direction. In a sudden ambush Sean and I are able to break out of the closing net, and after narrowly avoiding several traps, we race towards a possible escape. By now we are down to practically nothing in terms of weapons. I am carrying a long knife, and Sean has the short remainder of his broken sword, now barely more than a dagger itself. Our guns have long since run out of ammo, used as clubs and hammers for a while, then finally discarded.
The escape route is an illusion however; a final trap, if not the one intended. Our foe appears just moments after we have dodged into a small chamber with a narrow window to the outer world, and bars have dropped behind us. He comes up with a small guard force, and takes some time to gloat over our impending death. While he can't easily get to us through the bars, and admits he may not even know how to reset them, he laughs because we have left ourselves only two exits; through a huge labyrinth that he has never explored fully, and that none of his teams have ever come out of, or out a small doorway further along, with a drop down a sheer wall of some 60 or 70 feet, to a vast section of desert patrolled by lions and other things. He gleefully says goodbye, and closes the outer doors.
With no other choice we enter the even narrower passage into the labyrinth. As we pass one huge block of stone it slides from the side wall, closing off the route back except for a small slot 3 or 4 inches wide at the top. The channel shows both the wear and tear of water or some other liquid rushing down it at great force, as well as char marks; I don't really like to think about the options that represents. Quickly we move down the corridor, and perhaps 50 feet along we can see a pair of small doors that open outwards.
With a lot of effort we force them open. Sure enough, the drop to the ground is a long one, and we can see numerous lionesses lounging in the shade of the tall facade. Rolling desert and light veldt stretch off for miles in around, and leaning out we can see that the building is met by a wall of equal height running off as far as we can see in either direction. Perhaps 8 to 10 miles off we can see what might be a low line of bushes and scattered trees. Well away from the wall in a weirdly ordered pile what appears to be clothing of various styles is lying. As we look out we can also see that piled up against the wall between the lions and the area directly below us, another mound has grown. This looks like a heap of torn and shredded cloth, rotting corpses, and animal dung. From the direction of the possible tree line, we can now hear an elephant's call.
There is another sound, something moving about behind us. Sean declares that one of us must try to escape outside, while the other braves the labyrinth alone. He grabs my arms, lowering me as far as he can out the doorway. I begin swinging and running along the wall, trying to throw myself towards the hopefully softer pile of refuse, even though that will put me close to the now watchful lionesses. Even hanging as low as I am, a straight drop would break if not shatter both legs. With one final swing I let go of Sean's wrists and sail out towards the pile. To my surprise, I land perfectly near the top, blasting it away from me into the face of a lioness charging towards me, and rolling back down the side I come up on my feet, knife out in front of me, just in time to catch a second lion leaping at me. She dies on the blade and knocks me into the wall as her corpse butts into me. There at my feet I can see a gold and black .45 automatic; without pause I grab the gun in my left hand, jack the slide and see at least one round, and fire into the other lionesses who are now racing along the ground. Two of them drop, and the rest run away from the gunfire, stopping well out of easy range. There they sit and watch me.
Looking about I can now see other weapons scattered about, and belts still holding clips and ammo pouches, even a few packs. Shouting back at Sean I tell him to wait, and I quickly gather up two more automatics, and nearly a dozen full clips. I run back and begin throwing them up to him, with rather remarkable success. Just in time also it seems, as no sooner has he loaded the first weapon than he spins and fires three times back into the corridor somewhere. I'm yelling at him to hold on, while I try to drag over as much of the pile as I can so he can try jumping as well. He yells back that there's no time, and fires again back into the labyrinth.
All the shooting has roused something else as well; from behind what must be some obscuring low dunes a dozen or more ragged men and women are approaching, armed with a collection of broken spears, makeshift clubs, and one or two knives. I'm about to fire on them when I realize that they aren't going to attack, but are coming forward to help me, and to drive the lions off or at least keep them at bay. I shout instructions to them to carry everything they can over to a spot below the wall as fast as they can run, set up three men who show that they know how to use the guns and rifles we are starting to find to hold off any attack, and then I dive in and start lugging clothes. Within what seems like less than two minutes I have a pile almost 20 feet around and 10 high, and I yell at Sean to jump. He spins about and empties both guns as he throws himself backwards out the window. Whatever the hell is in there, he wants to make sure it can't come out after him, and breaking his neck or his back is apparently better than the alternative. As he falls towards the pile of clothes something huge and dark fills the small doorway and blocks it. It is covered in what might be a mix of feathers and fur, with scales underneath; it is also so large that all I am seeing is part of a limb and it's side, shoulder, or hip. Sean crashes into the pile and rebounds off the side much as I did; but other than "a bruised dignity perhaps" he says he is unhurt.
Now we have a bit of peace and relative safety. Sean and I quickly discover that the rag-tag band of 16 men and women are mostly survivors of our enemy's "exploration teams". Victims he has had driven into the labyrinth to either kill them or see if they make it out. A few are from expeditions led to assault the temple, as far back as 30 years ago. As we begin to search the huge pile of clothes we had used to build the mound, I see that what we have looks like the costume trailers for a dozen Hollywood costume dramas have been looted and dumped here. There are dozens of cavalry officers uniforms, including hats, boots, and even sabers; Roman Legion tunics of wool or coarse linen, along with full sets of what turn out to be very ornate gold plated Lorica; Civil War uniforms, and even French Foreign Legion gear. Scattered about underneath is an assortment of rifles, swords, handguns, and best of all crates of ammunition. Quick examination shows that none of the ammo are blanks, and all of the clothing etc. appears to be nearly new. No one can explain how it got there or why; the only possible clue comes when a pair of good horse drawn wagons are found amidst the wreckage of several others, behind another set of dunes. Any horses that might have been used have long since been taken away, or perhaps eaten by the lions. None of the survivors had ever realized there might be usable weapons there; since most of them arrived alone, they had fled the lions, often losing several others in the process. Even with 16 of them together none had felt safe trying to come back and look, until they heard our gunshots.
We rapidly get our tiny army re-clothed and armed, and barring some language barriers establish at least the start of a plan. There is no way to get back up to the still open but now blocked doorway Sean and I had leapt from; there is also no obvious gap or opening in the wall in either direction, and none of our little band know if there is water or shelter beyond what is indeed a narrow belt of light forest. No one there has ever gone beyond the forest, as the other side reveals only more hot and arid veldt. We load up the carts with the remaining weapons and ammo, including a half dozen really fancy but very functional recurve bows, with nearly 1000 aluminum shafted hunting arrows at a rough count. The mix of modern and ancient has me truly baffled; but I'm not going to look too closely at the largesse. On a whim I load up as much of the (Clothing? Costumes?) as we can haul with ease as well. I figure we can try selling the stuff or trading it if we ever reach anything besides more wall.... finally, we skin and dress the dead lions, and fill every container we have with water from a clear but tiny stream that runs nearby. With no really good choices, we agree to head north along the path of the huge wall, well away from it while still keeping it visible to scouts on our flank. It seems the best choice, as in theory going north should eventually run us into the Mediterranean. Hopefully the damn wall ends long before that, and we can find a village, or nomads, anything and anyone that are not in league with our overly cunning enemy. I look at our tiny troop; some have dressed in the gear most like what they wore originally; some have dressed for comfort, some for style, some for safety. I have one guy wearing a pair of Foreign Legion white pants, tall Confederate cavalry boots, a loose white lined tunic with a Roman Lorica breastplate over it, a pair of bracers, and a cocky cavalry hat with a feather in it. He has a sword on one hip, a long rifle like a Martini-Henry or Enfield slung over his shoulder, and a .45 Colt revolver on his other hip. He might well drop from exhaustion, but at least he feels safe.... and actually looks sort of stylish. Sean has somehow found what looks like Bedouin dress, with a robe, tunic and baggy pants of linen, and a keffiya and headband. I am wearing a rather eclectic mix myself; the white Foreign Legion pants with a pair of black boots, a white loose cavalry shirt with an open black officers coat, and a black cavalry hat with a feather as well. Like my oddly clothed comrade I have a sword on my left hip, the gold and black .45 on the other, and a very nice rifle stuck into the side of a cart for ready access. Time to go; we all grab a cart handle, our two scouts fan out to the sides, and we head north. The lionesses are trotting cautiously off to the other side, back towards the carcasses of their former pride mates; possibly to see what we did to them, but more likely to take advantage of the free meal. Waste not, want not.......
