The Quiet Dogs

The desert dogs are still tonight. I cannot think to hear them sleep. I cannot sleep to hear them think. Perhaps you think me mad to speak of such absurdities yet I shall recite such lest my mind give way utterly, breaking beyond all rationality, and while cognizant of it costing me the last thread of reason I possess, it's inevitable that I commence at the inception as if such a fruitless exercise could bring one back from the gates of hell itself, for I who have seen the wonders and horrors of man's unbridled longing for the eclipse of mortality have looked through the eyes of a living skull upon the barren wasteland of shattered dreams and vanquished hopes to rest, gasping, upon an eldritch plain of bleached bones, begging for succor...

In Alexandria the trail stopped and we, mindless fools, entered that gruesome tomb he'd guarded with massive images of himself. Could any man look upon rock-hewn images a hundred feet high erected over four thousand years ago without some measure of consternation and dread? My porter and I strode through that humbling vestibule and thence down the protracted excavation that terminates in the burial chamber. The sensations of dread and doom were tangible and pervasive as we entered the pharaoh's final resting place. He had lain here for millennia undisturbed in Stygian silence, and this thought, despite the occupant having long departed from this locus, left me undeniably apprehensive.

As my map had indicated, there was a carving of Anubis, the dog god, on the ceiling above the sarcophagus alter, and his sinuous hand was pointed to a section of the wall lost in the gloom at the end of the repository. We made our way there and I indicated to my assistant that he was to chisel away a section approximately three feet square, where the floor met the wall. The damn fool's nerve gave out and, shouting in terror, he bolted for daylight. There was no help for it but to assume the task myself, infirm though my constitution is by nature, and I set about clearing the occlusion. After a great ordeal, I maneuvered the stone block aside and was greeted by a gush of fetid air. After waiting a few moments for the atmosphere of the hidden cell to become breathable, and with torch in hand, I entered.

Words cannot describe the sights that greeted my eyes, but among the burial treasures that lay everywhere glinting with gold and inset with ivory and lapis, an extended crook fashioned in the guise of an elongated ankh extended from the polished granite flooring. I proceeded at once to this object, drawn by some inner compunction that led me to violate the requisites of photographing and cataloguing the room's contents prior to investigation.

The artifact was jet black and smooth to the touch, yet it was not its coolness, but rather something else that caused me to hesitate: no human hand had touched this object for over four thousand years. Impulsively, I drew it toward me to assess its heft and discovered its concealed function—it was a lever! New excitement coursed through me as I eagerly awaited the revelation of its purpose. A faint grinding sound was audible and a subtle vibration beneath my feet bespoke the long-awaited genius of some ancient master architect. Soon I would see. Soon I would know. I played my torch about to locate evidence of the machinery's effect. While I searched in vain for a newly opened doorway or vestibule, the rumbling from beneath me came to a pause and at that moment I made a bleak discovery: my entryway had vanished!

The traces of my footsteps through the dust ended at a featureless slab. My attempts to move the obstruction were as futile as my shouts for assistance and I immediately returned to the ankh, noticing that my electric torch was now casting a faintly yellowish beam and, shuddering at the thought of being entombed in pitch darkness, I pushed the massive switch back to its original position; all hope now rested on this not being a malevolent trap: the doorway should—it must—reopen.

My hammering heart sounded like a drum in the silence that greeted me. Penning these last words, I do not know when, or if, they and my corpse will ever be found. Someone will have to retrace my studies and at least this might serve as a warning to ... wait a moment. I hear that awful grinding noise again—the machinery is starting at last! My torch is dying quickly now but I'm holding it trained on the doorway panel. Relief cascades over me until I realize that the imprisoning slab isn't moving ... But there! Behind me I can make out a different panel sliding open, opposite from that through which I had entered and oh blast my torch is out and what was that? At the last moment I dimly saw ... something misshapen and scabrous scuttling through the aperture and ... I am not alone.