"It's alive. It's really alive!"
The look on the man's face was filled with panic. His mind was filled with images of that terrifying stare. Terrified, he stumbled back and nearly fell on his bum.
"It's alive! It's alive!" he screamed as he ran out. A few of the rest froze. They had not expected such a display of fear.
They turned and looked. What was alive? Where? It was just a prop. In fact, it might even be made of plastic. Alive? Who was he kidding?
The others held back their laughter as they watched the man run out. The guide merely shook his head.
"It's just a prop," reminded the guide. "Alright, follow me to the next location."
The tour ended.
The group returned to the hotel.
The man who had been scared out of his mind earlier turned all the lights on in the room and then threw himself under the sheets. He wouldn't stop shaking. He yelled at his friends when they returned to the
room.
"Close the door! Hurry up! We're all dead if that thing gets in here!"
His friends burst out into laughter.
"Did you lose your mind? What thing? What's going to come into our room?"
"You said it yourself. It was a prop. Look at you, scared witless because of a prop.
You're embarrassing yourself."Original content from .
"Come on, stop shaking. It has to be a prop. There's no chance something alive will survive inside."
The rest laughed again. They had not seen such a coward before.
He had nearly wetted himself because of a prop.
"It was alive!" the man shrieked. "I swear it was alive. It looked at me. It was definitely alive!" He stood up with a fierce look on his face. "When have I ever lied to you guys?"
The others froze immediately. He had been right. This friend of theirs had never lied to them and he had never shown himself to be a coward. His behavior earlier today had been out of the ordinary. "It was alive?" someone asked again.
"It was alive!" the man asserted. "I saw his eyes under the layers of cloth. Those were the eyes of a living man!"
He had been standing some distance away but he had seen it. Their eyes had met. His scalp was still prickling with numbness right now.
The temperature in the room seemed to have plummeted.
They shivered and stared at the air conditioning. No one had turned it on.
Why was it freezing?
"Are you sure it was alive?" someone else asked. His eyes were flashing with excitement. "Are you very sure that the thing lying on the platform is alive?" The man nodded.
He was very certain that there was a living person hidden under those layers of linen cloth.
He was very sure of it. In fact, he had never been so sure of something.
"This is going to make the news!" an excited blond said. "It's going to be on the front page of everything if it is true! Think about it. The mummy in the pyramid isn't a prop but an actual living person. Think about the headlines!"
They weren't thinking only about the headlines. They had never heard of a living person being trapped as a mummy or of someone turning up for work at the pyramid and that his job was to pretend that he was a mummy. That meant that no one knew about the living person inside the pyramid.
"What are you planning to do?"
Alarm flashed across the man's face. He knew his friend enjoyed thrilling adventures. He had been the one who had suggested this trip to the pyramids.
"I'm going to find out the truth!" The
blond grinned widely, then looked at everyone. "Is anyone going to join me? This is some newsworthy
material. We should do someth.net
Think about how dull the trip would be if we don't!"
The rest appeared hesitant.
"No, don't go!" The man who had suffered the fright in the first place blurted out. "Don't cause any trouble. We're here to have a vacation. We're not here to cause trouble."
"What are you afraid of? Why are you so timid? Who cares if it's a living person? What's so frightening about that?" The blond laughed. "You're not afraid of the dead. Why should you be afraid of the living?" The rest finally nodded then. He was right. They weren't afraid of the dead. Why should they be terrified of the living?