Chapter 12
The Wealthy Son, the Secretary and the Mummies
It happened just a few minutes before the Girl and the Chimera met.
The Wealthy Son and the Secretary were wandering about the alleys of the Ghost Quarter looking for the pearl.
"They can't have gone far," the Wealthy Son said, looking up, left and right to the houses peeking over the tall stone walls before giving his smartphone a look. "According to this, the pearl should be somewhere close by."
The Secretary said nothing as she followed closely behind.
"Who even was that?" the Wealthy Son wondered aloud. He was speaking of the woman who showed up out of nowhere and snatched the pearl away from them at the last minute.
The Secretary finally broke silence to give her insight. "Based on the words she spoke before that flash of light, I believe she's a Western Sorceress, or at least someone who learned Western sorcery."
The Wealthy Son groaned. "Ugh! So now we got foreigners butting into our business? That Thief's already giving us enough trouble! What more are we going to have to deal with?"
Suddenly, the Secretary grabbed the Wealthy Son by his shoulder and spun him around.
"What are you - ?" The Wealthy Son tried to ask a question, but was stopped by the Secretary cupping her hand over his mouth.
Putting a finger over her own lips, the Secretary went, "Shh!" And then she glanced sideways to the back of the road.
Is someone hiding behind that corner? The Wealthy Son wondered. He soon found out.
"Come on out," the Secretary called out. "I know you're there."
Suddenly, a voice came out and said, "Whoa! How'd you know? You psychic or something?"
A second voice snapped, "Idiot!"
Two people stepped out. They were the ugliest pair of monsters that the Wealthy Son had ever seen in his entire life. To him, they looked like shriveled up mummies, only without any wrappings and dressed in modern clothes.
Mummy A and Mummy B had been looking from house to house for the Thief and the Hypnotist when they ran into a man and a woman wearing sharp business suits as they huddled over the man's smartphone. Thinking it weird people like that were exploring what were basically abandoned ruins, Mummy A got the idea to follow them. He was glad to find his police instincts were still intact, because as soon as he heard the man mention the pearl, he knew he hit pay dirt. It sounded like they were close to finding it.
Too bad they got found out before they found the pearl though.
"You don't seem surprised to see our ugly mugs," Mummy A observed. Well, at least the lady wasn't surprised. The man practically jumped out of his skin when he saw the Mummies. "Since you're also looking for the pearl, I take it you guys are like that wizard?"
"So you were eavesdropping on us," said the Secretary.
"Not like you already knew that," said Mummy A.
The Wealthy Son turned and cried out, "Wait, you knew the whole time we were being followed?"
But the Secretary ignored him and kept her sharp eyes on the mummies. "I don't know anything about a wizard, but that sounds like who you're working for. If both he and you are after the pearl, that makes you our enemy."
"Seems like it, yeah," said Mummy A.
The Secretary bent down a little to a battle stance. Mummy A raised his fists.
"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" Mummy B stepped in between them. "Hold up! Can't we all just get along? We should talk this out like civilized people. Violence never solves anything."
Everyone stared at him.
And then the Wealthy Son told Mummy B, "You really are an idiot."
Mummy B rolled his eyes and sighed. "Fine. Violence it is, then." And then to Mummy A, he loudly whispered, "You can take the lady. The dude looks waaay weaker and wimpier, so I'll take him."
"I can hear you, you know!"
Mummy B shouted back at the Wealthy Son, "You were meant to!"
That was when the Secretary seized her chance to attack.
"Whoa!" cried Mummy B. He saw the Secretary's fist go flying to his face and shrank back, too slow to get away. Luckily for him, Mummy A came to his rescue and caught the Secretary's punch in his palm.
With a twist, he tried to shift the Secretary's whole arm behind her back, but she quickly untwisted from his grasp and kicked out her foot. Mummy A bent backwards and the tip of the Secretary's shoe cut across the air in front of his face.
After letting out a low whistle, he said, "You've got some nice moves."
"Thanks," said the Secretary. "You're not bad yourself. Those moves though . . . Were you in law enforcement?"
"Once upon a time," Mummy A answered.
As he and the Secretary danced around, exchanging and blocking each other's punches, chops, elbow strikes and kicks, the Wealthy Son and Mummy B bent low and slowly crab-walked in a circle while locking eyes.
"Come on," Mummy B goaded the Wealthy Son. "Give me your best shot, which I'm sure ain't much. You look like you've never held anything heavier than piece of paper."
"For the record," said the Wealthy Son, "my mom used to make me carry all the groceries when I was a kid. And one more thing . . ."
He straightened up, spread his arms apart and began floating up to the sky. Curtains of lightning dropped to the ground from both his hands.
" . . . I can do more than just a little heavy lifting."
Mummy B looked up, jaw dropped. And then, keeping his eyes on the Wealthy Son, he called out to Mummy A. "Hey, Partner? On second thought, mind if we switch? I wanna fight the wushu business lady instead. And you can deal with the dude that can fly and shoot electricity out of his fingers."
He turned to see the "business lady" was gone. Instead, he found his partner pinned down by a huge, orange tiger.
Mummy A glared at Mummy B while pushing the tiger's set of sharp, pointy teeth away from his face. "You were saying?"
"Never mind. I'm cool with the flying dude."
With a crazed laugh, the Wealthy Son threw lightning at Mummy B's feet. Mummy B jumped around, yelping in fright, which only made the Wealthy Son laugh more.
"Dance, monkey! Dance!"
"Come on, dude!" Mummy B cried out in dismay. "That's so offensive!"
But the Wealthy Son just shouted back, "Like I care!"
And then he threw some more lightning at the mummy.
Meanwhile, Mummy A was able to throw the tiger off and scramble back before she could swipe his head off with her massive paw. And then, fingers balled into a fist, he threw a punch. The tiger jumped aside and Mummy A's attack blew a hole in the wall.
Mummy B saw and was surprised. "Whoa! Cool! I didn't know you got super strength."
"We're freak mutants transformed by an evil wizard's magic spell! Of course we got super strength!"
As the tiger jumped away from Mummy A, she did a somersault and transformed back into a human. She threw a punch back at Mummy A, and then another one. Mummy A dodged both. The Secretary's fists left behind trails of bright blue light as they sailed past him.
**********
Meanwhile, in a house that overlooked the fighting, both the Thief and the Hypnotist were leaning against the wall, sound asleep. The Hypnotist had her head resting on the Thief's shoulder while their hands remained stuck together, connected by an apparently sticky Pearl of Fate. After fleeing from the Chimera and the Giant, they ran around for a bit before coming across a house with an opened gate and took shelter in it. Exhausted from all that running, they sat down on the living room floor and immediately conked out.
BOOM!
When Mummy A punched a hole in the wall, there was a loud burst of thunder that roused the two criminals from their slumber.
"I'm up! I'm up!" cried the Thief.
The Hypnotist made a big snort.
They turned and faced each other, bleary-eyed. And then, fully awake, they jumped up and tried to get away from each other, only to be pulled back together by the pearl stuck to their hands and crash their foreheads together.
"Ow!"
They each took a moment to rub their sore spots and were startled again by a beastly roar that came from either a lion or a tiger.
The Thief and the Hypnotist exchanged looks and then, pointing opposite ways, they shouted at the same time, "This way!"
They paused and looked at each other again. And then, pointing opposite ways again, they said, "No, this way!"
After another pause -
"This way!"
They glared at each other.
"I know this place like the back of my hand," said the Thief. "So you should follow me."
Defiantly, the Hypnotist went, "Oh yeah? Well, I got magic powers that comes with a ninety-nine-point nine percent accurate fortune-telling. And that fortune-telling is telling me that YOU should follow ME!"
"Nuh-uh!"
"Uh-huh!"
"NUH-UH!"
"UH-HUH!"
CRASH!
Suddenly, a mummy man flew into the house, blowing the doors off their hinges. He hit the ground and rolled to a stop beneath a wall-mounted altar. His feet were pointed up and he laid upside-down.
"Ow, that hurt!" the mummy groaned. "Lucky Boss Man made me super-tough, like Superman. Ow! Huh?"
He rolled his eyes to the corner of the room where the Thief and the Hypnotist stood, huddled together. They looked like they were holding hands, but then the mummy spotted the pearl between them.
"The shiny!" he cried out.
Both the Thief and the Hypnotist screamed. And then the Hypnotist scooped the Thief up into a princess carry and took off running deeper into the house.
A thought crossed the Thief's mind as he was taken up the stairs. Huh? Why's she carrying me? Shouldn't I be the one carrying her?
**********
Mummy B watched the pair go to the next floor and then stood back up. He hurried out of the house to call out to Mummy A. "Hey, partner! I found the - !"
He never got a chance to finish, because the Wealthy Son descended into the courtyard and threw another bolt of lightning at him. After convulsing while electricity danced through his nerves for several seconds, Mummy B blacked out and collapsed.
The Wealthy Son gave the fallen mummy a cold look and then raised his hand. Above it, a spear made out of white-cold ice appeared. He was prepared to skewer the shriveled-up monster, but then -
"HEY!"
The Wealthy Son spun around to see Mummy A charging in from the gateway.
Mummy A had heard Mummy B call out and broke away from the Secretary. She tried to stop him, but he slipped past her and made it to the house just in time to stop the Wealthy Son from finishing off his partner, by tackling the Wealthy Son to the ground and keeping him pinned face down with his arm twisted behind his back.
"Ow! Get off of me!" The Wealthy Son roared, enraged at being detained like a criminal. He struggled to break free, but Mummy A had a solid hold that was strong from years of experience doing the same thing to tougher-looking guys. So, it was up to the Secretary to come to the rescue.
From the gateway, she pushed a gust of wind from her hand and blew Mummy A off the Wealthy Son. She tried helping him to stand back up, but the Wealthy Son ungratefully shook her off while throwing an angry glare at the mummy.
"That hurt!" he said. And then he threw the ice spear.
Mummy A ducked away from the spear and then threw a punch at the Wealthy Son. But the Secretary got in his way and blocked the attack with her forearm.
Mummy A took a few steps back. He gave his fallen partner a glance and then returned his gaze to his enemies.
Not good, he thought. My partner's down and I'm outnumbered.
Running away would be the obvious thing to do in a situation like this. But the only exit was blocked by the very people he wanted to run away from. And one of those people just made more ice spears appear out of nowhere, floating in the air above his head, so flying wasn't an option either. Not that either Mummy A or Mummy B could actually fly, anyway.
So this is how I go, Mummy A thought. Well, on the bright side, at least I don't have to listen to what that convict has to say anymore."
He gave Mummy B a glance.
I'm just sorry this moron's coming with me.
"Any last words?" asked the Wealthy Son. "No? Good!"
Mummy A scowled. Why bother asking if you're not even going to wait for an answer?
"Now, good-bye!"
The Wealthy Son brought down his hand. But at that exact moment, a huge dark shadow darted into the courtyard and swatted the Wealthy Son to the left side, and then the Secretary to the right side.
With the Wealthy Son's control interrupted, the spears all dropped to the ground. Their blades stuck into the concrete, allowing them to stand upright as a sort of fence between the mummies and the dark shadow that saved them, which turned out to be a wolf-like creature with overgrown arms.
"Come with me if you want to live."
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