Fear20

Thursday, November 4, 2021

King Tut Day 2021

A Story by Randomflashbang [NOW]

On some dark passage I lay down. My head resting on clammy concrete smeared with soot and expired event posters. It is peaceful, actually. The printed faces on the walls stare back at me and at each other in frozen glee and tease at euphoria. If only I’d been laying here months ago. missed opportunities... Where was I? Actually, where am I? These walls are new to me. The rushing street behind my head is a loud blur. Any fact there is to be found is certainly not laying on the ground here. But, is true knowledge worth losing all of my smiling paper friends? I consider this. Something drips. Time returns, and I consider how long I have been considering. This isn’t like me at all.

Probably.

I get up. One of the frozen faces flutters out, my abrupt standing disturbing the posters placid lifestyle and pulling it into my focus. I accept my bright new friend and slide their image into my pocket to get more acquainted with later.

But It’s not alone in there. I explore further, probing each jean pocket and the pouch in front of the frayed hoodie that I’m wearing. Two permanent markers; black and red. My wallet is gone, but I probably still have enough coins to get by on. My room key hangs around my neck. Dead phone. In the pocket I slid the flyer in, I find a large ring that I’d never seen before. It’s heavy. Maybe old? Hand-worked with a bronze glint to it and an angry flat stone. This stone is turquoise. Ancient protection. I think I read that somewhere. Millenia-old civilizations spanning the equator collecting as much of the stuff as possible to ward off ghosts and hexes and plagues unknown. It’s not mine. But it is entrancing. And it was in my pocket so... maybe it is? Not the sort of object that just slips the mind though. Shit. How did I get here?