Sumer
The place with earliest known civilization
Uruk, the first true city in the world
Current Location: South of Iraq, Warka, Iraq
In a tiered pyramid-shaped temple that was commonly known as Ziggurat, a young archaeologist was staring at the cloudless sky. The sun was merciless today. Unlucky for him, he had to come here to take some additional pictures inside the temple that they had just recently excavated.
"It was believed that the ancient summers had twelve cities. All of them were major cities and each had their own Ziggurat," the woman standing next to him spoke. She too, was staring at the cloudless sky, her face was red from being in the sun for too long, her skin tanned. "But that wouldn’t make any sense, considering this is the thirteenth one that we have found."
"I know," Thomas Pelin responded. He looked at the time. It was exactly ten in the morning. "We should get going. I want to take the photos and leave this place as soon as possible."
Aside from the fact that a thirteenth temple could actually change what they knew so far, this temple was also different from the other ones. It looked too perfect, too old. They had suspicions that the time this temple was created could be different from the others.
Caresse, the woman next to him, nodded.
She grabbed her camera and started taking pictures of the walls.
"I will start here. You take care of the ones inside." Caresse said.
"Yeah. Yeah." This was not Thomas’ first rodeo with archeology. In fact, he had been here for the past three years, so he was quite familiar with the path.
He started walking deep into the darkened path that was only illuminated with the bulbs that were located twenty meters away from each other.
Since this Ziggurat wasn’t a part of the first twelve that they found, the budget that they spent for this mission was considered lacking compared to the other twelve. It was so lacking that they actually had to cut back on resources. That included electricity and people.
For instance, the bulbs that were supposed to light this place twenty four seven had been reduced to twelve. And right now, there were only four people inside and outside the Ziggurat.
So far, the other two should be inside this Ziggurat excavating the rest of the temple. Caresse was taking pictures outside while he was going to the deepest part of the place and clicking some pictures too.
"Hm?"Thomas frowned when he noticed his shadow move. Soon enough, he realized that it wasn’t his shadow but the bulbs.
*Crack*
Thomas paled when he saw a crack appear next to one of the bulbs.
Then the ground started shaking.
Panicked, Thomas immediately ran back. The place was already declared as safe. Something like this... shouldn’t have happened.
However, it was already too late for him.
The next thing he knew, a large boulder sized rock covered his pathway, giving him nothing but darkness.
Then... pain.
His screams echoed but soon it stopped. Then the Ziggurat slowly... crumbled. What remained of the once majestic temple was a tall rectangular tower with ragged edges.
At twenty feet, the tower like rock stood tall and proud in the middle of the ruins.
...
Alaska
The next day
"Sumerian texts?" Ava smirked at Jude. "You think I can read Sumerian?"
"What do you know about them?"
"Nothing. I’ve never been to Iraq. And I wasn’t that interested in them."
"Ah... I forgot. You never had any proper witch education."
"Right," Ava nodded. "So? Why are you asking me?"
"Well, Amore has been asking about Sumerian texts about... dream walkers."
"Again?"
"I don’t know why she wants to know more about dream walkers but I have this feeling that she’s hiding something."
Ava nodded. Of course, Amore was hiding something. She was hiding the fact that Romeo wasn’t well. However, Ava couldn’t help but wonder how Amore knew about dream walking. Why was she asking questions about it?
Did she notice something?
She really should talk to the Shaman about this.
"Well... the woman was sheltering her criminal son. She knew that her son was crazy and yet she was protecting him. A woman like that has too many secrets."
"Why are you so calm about this?" Jude asked, curiosity apparent in his eyes.
"Should I be interested in that woman’s business?"
"Her son killed Gabriella."
"And?"
"And? I don’t know? It felt suspicious. I feel like you know what is going on..."
"Even if I knew, I wouldn’t tell you." Ava smiled. "Why don’t you just focus on your case? Hm? Let me work on mine."
"And that is the transportation of my specimens."
"Specimens? You mean the humans that you trafficked from Texas? Yes."
Jude made a face."Look if you do something about it they would surely suspect me. Only a few people know about this special transaction."
Ava snorted.
"Right."
"Ava... it’s not time yet. I told you to wait. We can’t be hasty."
"I am not going to do anything about it, Jude. Don’t worry."
"I smell a but?"
"But... other people might do something."
"Other people?"
Ava just shrugged in response.
Did they really think she would let them get a hold of any more people for their stupid experiments?
"What’s that supposed to mean?"
Again Ava didn’t answer. She just smiled then slowly turned her attention to her laptop.
"It’s not like telling you would change anything," Ava added.
"Hey! What does that supposed to mean?" Jude asked. But he only received silence in response.
Ava heard Jude grunt but she ignored him. Instead, she focused her attention on her racing heartbeat.
Something was happening, she thought inwardly.
Matthew.
"Hey, I need to leave."
"What? Where are you— you mean now?" Jude watched as Ivy’s appearance became Ava’s. "Where are you going?" he asked.
"Home." Ava said. Her heart was already pounding so hard against her chest, it was the only thing she could hear. "I am going home," she said just as her body vanished into thin air.
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