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The spear is flying true. There is no way to stop it now. Even the fool O'Connell’s desperate lunge cannot keep it from piercing the Scorpion King’s chest, giving him power over Anubis’ army. Imhotep can feel the smile as it begins to curl the corners of his lips. His time has finally come. He will finally rule Egypt, the Black Lands, as he should have centuries ago.
Just as he draws in a deep breath and prepares to shout his triumph to Ra, time slows and stops, leaving both the spear and the Scorpion King himself frozen. He turns, expecting to see some foolish human tasked beyond their strength by the effort of holding time. He does not; what he sees is far worse. The body is only vaguely familiar as that of O'Connell's woman, but the soul that resides within it he is intimately familiar with. She is the one who forced him into this half-life, the daughter of his pharaoh.
He should have known she would find a way to return to this world, given that her obsession with finding immortality at any cost had more than rivaled his own. Still, he had not expected her to enter into her next incarnation and infect it with the madness that had led to her first death. He should really retreat for now, but instead he locks eyes with her, hoping that she is still weak enough that he can cow her into doing his will. A moment passes and then another as each of them fights to prove their superiority over the other.
They would have no doubt continued their battle indefinitely save for the fact that just as the third moment passes battle erupts outside of the temple. The screeches and howls Anubis’ soldiers make as they descend upon the Med-jai are horrific even to one as battle hardened as he is, and the Mad-jai's dying screams only make it more horrifying. That horror is more than enough to make him break eye contact with Nefertiri, not to mention telling him the true cost of Nefertiri’s interference.
Without anyone to control them, the army of Anubis has gone rabid, acting on nothing but their instincts. They will kill everything in their path and send it to Anubis’ realm in the Underworld, and thanks to Nefertiti, the first in line to be killed are the people of the Black Lands. He is incensed; he has worked hard to gain the power of Anubis and control the sands, and this spoiled princess is destroying them without a thought.
Still, he does not have time to dwell on such things. He is a polymath; and as long as he does nothing foolish, Nefertiri will be no match for him, even in this backwards time. It will of course take him longer than it once would have to defeat her, thanks to the power she has undoubtedly accumulated since she had him put to death for treason, but defeat her he will. It is an inevitability, and one he looks forward to.
For now though, he must create a stronghold for himself. Which means leaving this battle behind and returning to his seat of power in Memphis. Once there he can call upon Nutt to protect it from those that would enter and do him harm, even unto the War-dogs of Anubis.
~*~*~*~
Imhotep is winning his war against Evie and Rick is glad, he would not want Evie ruling the world in her present state. Whatever madness took root in her when she was resurrected in Ahm-Shere continues to make her more violent, no matter how they try to control it and her. He is no longer even able to control her physically and the last three asylums they sent her to for treatment were inundated with strange deaths within days of her admittance and forced to shut down.
Because he loved her, and despite his better judgment, he’d been willing to dismiss these events as coincidence as long as she didn’t do anything to Jonathan or Alex. Now that she’s crossed that line and beaten Jonathan bloody and unconscious he can no longer live in denial. They can no longer count on her good will to keep her from harming them, which means they need to get out of the house now, before they become victims of another string of mysterious deaths. They will have to go through with the tentative plans he and Jonathan had discussed during Evie’s last stay in an asylum. It isn’t ideal, but he feels semi-confident that between the two of them, they can steal Alex away and reach Memphis before she realizes what they are up to.
It’s a long shot of a chance, but the only one they have. Nobody but Imhotep stands a chance of standing up against whatever power Evie is using. He most likely won’t welcome them with open arms, but as long as they're willing to give up information on Evie, Rick believes he will keep them alive. Imhotep doesn’t seem like the type to waste valuable resources.
~*~*~*~
When Imhotep’s guards report the arrival of a trio of white heathens, he is shocked. He used the power of Nutt to set up protective wards around Memphis, wards that should have kept anybody that was not of the sands out. This is far from the first time he’s set this kind of ward, and no foreigner has ever passed Nutt’s judgment and been considered worthy of entering into the place she protects.
Their presence is a curiosity and quite possibly a threat. One that he will face head on by meeting with them at the guard post where they are being held.
His arrival at the guard post is unannounced, as he had ordered, and he is able to get close enough to the interlopers to see their faces without alerting them to his presence. What he sees shocks him. He knows these men and knows that it should be impossible for them to pass through Nutt’s wards unharmed, and yet here Nefertiri’s minions are.
It is concerning, though not unduly. After all, there are only two circumstances that would account for Nutt allowing them to reach Memphis. The first is that they came here seeking safe haven and have broken ties with Nefertiri. The second is that Nefertiri found a way to breach his wards, something he does not feel at all arrogant in doubting.
For now, at least, he will let things lie and allow these foreigners into his realm. Willing or not, they will be valuable resources in his fight against Nefertiti.
~*~*~*~
They’ve been in Memphis for over a month now, and Rick has to concede that living in Imhotep's stronghold is immeasurably better than living with the new mad version Evie, even if they are being followed everywhere by a number of the doghead guards that Imhotep managed to bind to his will.
Alex is flourishing under the attentions of the women that have taken shelter in Memphis and is the happiest he’s been since this whole mess began. Even better, Jonathan has finally had a chance to heal from the wounds Nefertiti inflicted on him, though it is unlikely that he will ever be as strong as he once was.
Imhotep has treated them with mercy that Rick hadn’t dared to hope for back when he and Jonathan had first hatched their plan to come to Memphis and he is very grateful for that fact, even if he doesn’t expect it to last. Once Imhotep feels confident that they aren’t setting him up for a trap on Evie’s orders, he’ll come to them, and Rick is prepared for that. He still has the information he stole about Evie’s plans for the war effort and if that isn’t enough to convince Imhotep of their loyalty, he will offer to help Imhotep destroy her, himself.
~*~*~*~
It has taken him almost three years to defeat Nefertiri, reclaim the Black Lands, and gain control of the entirety of Anubis’s army, but the wait was worth it. Those years gave him the time he needed to court his consort.
Richard O’Connell is nothing like Anck-su-namun, but he makes Imhotep much happier than she ever did. He is a soldier in his own right, capable of understanding the pain of battle, and able to stand on his own two feet. He has given Imhotep everything he ever dreamed of.
Despite his place at Imhotep’s side, Richard has never been comfortable living in his palace and being pampered. He does not imagine Richard will like accompanying him on his campaigns to gain control of the world much better. Diplomatic situations are truly not his consort’s specialty. Something that is unsurprising given how much of a child of the sand he is. He was born to run free as all children of the sand are, and has chafed under his forced confinement to the Stronghold these last three years.
Now, though, the time has come when Richard is once more free to roam the sands. The only thing stopping him is Imhotep's refusal to let him go. The thought of being separated from Richard, even for a moment, is a painful one for Imhotep and one he hoped he would never have to address. Still he knows what he must do; he must let his golden bird fly where the wind blows him or see Richard’s love turn to hate as he comes to blame Imhotep for keeping him caged.
He can only hope that Richard will understand the gift he is being given and return once the sands no longer call him. Because if he does not, Imhotep too is a child of the sands and he will force the sands to give Richard up to him, before seeing to it that Richard can never leave his side again.