Short Story - Tears of Anubis

Adom strides across hot sand, a gaunt spectre of the dark Egyptian night. He is the quiet rustling chitin of the scorpion. Every step toward the tomb is lightning in his veins, an adrenal hum.

Tonight he will feed his family.

The table has become a still life to Adom. Every day the same look of hunger on his children's faces, the same pained eyes on his wife. Tonight, the same as last, there would be only day old bread, bought with the last penny. Egypt is a tomb, his house a frieze on the wall depicting the terrible dictatorship.

As Cairo burns yellow on the horizon Adom creeps toward the old temple. “I am the asp,” he thinks. “I can sting and go unseen, I can take what Haji asked for and return to my family a provider.”

“To the west there is a temple,” Haji began as he puffed on the hookah, “Americans dig there.” Adom crests the dune, a stark rectangle breaks the horizon. “They are young students and will frighten easily.” The sky is a shimmering ink stained by ancient stars. “At two A.M., they change the watch.” A flashlight sweeps and bounces around the darkness. “You should only have one archaeology student to frighten.” Adom scrambles over the dune, the shadow of a spider. “Take this sickle-sword. Wave it around. The Americans will run away and you can take whatever they have found.”

Dalilia begged him not to go. “We will wait for the riots to end. You can find more work at the museum.”

“If I get an artifact for Haji, we will eat for years. I must go.” Dalilia waited for the children to sleep before she wept.

Treasures have lain in the Egyptian sand for generations. Tonight they should be freed for the starving destitute people of the Nile. The entrance to the Temple of Anubis glows with the blue light of a television. It throws pale, spastic shadows across the valley. Adom takes a breath, and enters the tomb.

A narrow, low hallway passes under a few long strides. The glow from the TV intensifies as he passes the into the inner chamber. Shovels, brushes, and baskets are carefully ordered around the small chamber. A man in khaki shouts and knocks over a small stand. Adom stretches out his right hand, the sickle-sword an iron tendril in the night and his face a grim sneer. The man is short, stumbling, and Adom steps far enough into the room to let him leave. A rifle. The archaeologist's eyes turn cold. The television goes out, and the black of the desert night rushes in.

The sharp click of the hammer becomes a flash and roar. Adom is blind and deaf, all his heat is trickling down his chest. A gurgle, “soldiers.”

“Yes, soldiers,” the man spits, “we replaced the archaeologists tonight.”