Free Egypt by Patti Wheeler Page B

found him pacing.
    “This isn’t it,” Dr. Aziz was saying to himself. “This isn’t the place.”
    We all looked at each other, not sure how to react.
    “All those years of work, and I’ve got it all wrong.”
    “How could you say that?” Serene asked.
    “If we’d found any evidence this was the place, we would forge ahead,” he said. “However, I’m afraid Cleopatra is not here.”
    “But all of your research led you to this location,” I said. “And we’ve found the steps.”
    “We have no proof that there will be anything of significance down those steps. The chambers we’ve seen on the radar appear to be empty.”
    “But they may not be,” I said.
    “I’m telling you, we are in the wrong place. This is just like my experience in the Valley of the Kings when I was certain I had found the burial place of Nefertiti. Once again, I’ve made a terrible mistake. I must stop this excavation at once.”
    He then stormed across the tent and disappeared out the door. We just sat there, quietly looking at each other.
    What happens now, I don’t know, but I’m afraid the fellowship may be coming to an end.
WYATT
    12:13 PM
    Khalid just informed us that the military police are insisting the excavation continue, regardless of what Dr. Aziz says. Why they are being so adamant that we continue, I’m not sure; but it does make me question their motives. Dr. Aziz argues that he is in charge and the decision is not theirs to make. Outside, tensions are growing. People are arguing with one another and there’s all sorts of shouting. I’m honestly worried things are going to spiral out of control.

    The military police
GANNON
    Lots of the workers were taking down tents and packing up tools and equipment, while the military police yelled and pointed guns at everyone, demanding they get back to work. To tell the truth, I don’t trust these guys at all, but there was really nothing I could do so I just started jogging away, wanting to remove myself from the whole mess.
    I climbed a far dune and walked down the back side until I couldn’t see or hear the camp anymore and then continued into a small valley between the dunes and just sat there for a while, trying to clear my head.
    Several dust clouds swirled in the wind, spinning across the desert floor like a crazy band of Tasmanian Devils. My shoes were filled with sand so I took them off and dumped it out and walked around barefoot for a while. The sand was new, almost cool, just put down by the storm and not yet baked by the sun.
    Walking through this valley, looking up at the dunes on either side, I was caught by surprise when my foot struck a hard object. Wow, did it hurt and I hopped around on one leg a few times and finally fell back into the sand, thinking for sure that I’d cut it wide open. I brushed away the sand from my foot and breathed a huge sigh of relief at finding only a small scratch near the arch.
    I was putting my boots back on when I noticed what I’d stepped on. The edge of a long, flat stone buried in the sand. I knelt down and carefully brushed off the sand, exposing a rectangular slab with etchings across it. Because of the storm I couldn’t tell where anything had been and wondered if this stone was part of the same complex we’d been excavating or if it was some completely different section that Dr. Aziz didn’t even know about.
    I kept scooping sand away and suddenly it started to give and sink down beneath the stone, almost like sand falling through an hourglass. I scrambled backwards on my hands to keep from being sucked down with it and watched as more of the stone was revealed. When the sand finally stopped, one side of a large entryway stood before me with all kinds of elaborate carvings on it. I stood up to take it all in and that’s when my eyes caught sight of something I could hardly believe.
    On one side of this stone slab was a grouping of smaller tiles, each carved with the same design. After focusing on it for a moment,