Searching the Annex

Mezmer (Shane), Gazala (Richard), Dr Jacob (Chris), Hubert (Kevin), Gunter (Jeff), Wonton (Darryl), Cooper (Ian) were at the eastern dig site. Bernard collapsed marmalading. Fleur was marmalading back at the main marquee.

Cooper had just retrieved an old skull from the tunnels. It had a large diamond inside it. But out here, in the direct sunlight, the bone of the skull began to smoke. He quickly put it in a sack, and placed it in Wonton's pup tent.

Cooper went back inside the site, crawled into the tight tunnel, and explored some more. The horizontal crawl opened into a small chamber. It was filled with sand and dust which had seeped through cracks in the ceiling. So, he cleared more of the debris out. Gazala, Hubert and Gunter joined him down in these cramped claustrophobic tunnels, and set up a bucket-chain to ferry the dirt outside. 

Cooper found and cleared a headless (dry) skeleton. It had a gold medallion. When carried outside in the sunlight, this medallion also smoked. They soon discovered that the skull, with the gem, always pointed at the medallion, like it was magnetic compass. They were very careful to keep the two items apart.

When this chamber had been cleared out, there were more of the slabs of hieroglyphs on the walls. Wonton came down and analysed them. They were the same as the slabs he had already examined back in the tunnels beneath the marquee, except they had the word "annex" added. They imparted the same information:

1. Annex to the Tomb of the Dark One
2. Censer of Karnaim - wielder of undead
3. 503 error
4. To possess the censer would require a great price
5. Three "words of power" were required

On the western wall of the chamber, there was a stone cylinder plug, about the size of a dinner plate. It had a pentagram carved on it. 

"Baal"

Cooper managed to pull it out. There was a small fridge-sized cavity behind it which contained a delicate wooden coffin - like the size you would either put ashes in or bury a baby. It was so old and dry that it was incredibly delicate - much akin to the strength of balsawood. 

Cooper managed to delicately remove it, and carefully placed it into a sturdy wooden newer box. But he never opened it.

Written on western wall of this fridge cavity was the a single glyph. Wonton read it silently: "Baal". The second Word of Power? Or the name of what was in the coffin?

As night was approaching, they left the Annex, and all headed back to Marquee with their retrieved items.

During the night, down the marquee shaft, they could hear the slap slap of the skinned creatures. The ladder was up, so Cooper decide to try to drop two grenades on them. The grenades went off, but he was not sure he damaged them.

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Suspecting that there might be additional annexes on the other cardinal directions from the marquee, the group spent half the day searching out at the same distance (5 km) north, south and west. No results.

So, then, going on the theory that there might be annexes on the points of a giant pentagram, they tried spots at 72 degrees from the Annex, both north-east and south-east. No hits here either.

"Slappy feet"

That afternoon a supply truck arrived from the main Légion Étrangère fort to deliver some more food, water and diesel. The group deliberately reported none of their findings to the soldiers.

The night passed quietly - but they heard slappy feet below. The generator was left running all the time.

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The next morning, they decided to explore more of the main tunnels down the marquee shaft; after all there were to two unexplored slab doors off the so-called "Blood room" (this was the room where most of the deaths had occurred; it had dried blood all over the walls and floor). They were quite-rightly worried about more creatures, so were very careful. They were careful to ensure that there were always two or three armed watchers at all times.

Mezmer and Wonton stayed up top and pontificated on archeology, while everyone else did all the risky, dangerous and dirty work down in the tunnels.

Down in the Blood room, they decided not to touch the slab door from where the creatures always emerged (the one that Cooper threw the shoe at), and so opened the other door. Since nothing leapt out, Cooper carefully explored it with mirror. There was a short passage that terminated into a room that was full of dirt and dust.

Before they explored this further, they wanted to block the first slab door so that they wouldn't be surprised by a creature. Gunter and Cooper delicately used the stone slab from the opened door and propped it up, with wooden supports, to lean against the creature door.

Then they all spent the rest of that day cleaning out dirt from that passage and the blocked room. 

It was getting dark outside, so they returned back up the ladder to the marquee for the night. The creatures did seem to be more active at night. They withdrew the ladder too.

Sure enough, during the night they heard slappy feet below. How did they get past that blocked door?

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The next morning, in the Blood room, the creature door had been opened, despite having a slab blocking it. The slab had fallen down. So, they carefully reblocked it again, and tried to prop it up better.

Down at end of passage 2, the one they were clearing out yesterday, there was now one of the skinned creatures. Its back was to them, and it was crouching down in a squat, seemingly dozing, but swaying. They all quietly backed away and went upstairs to discuss what to do next.

One idea discussed was for four of them to form a semi-circle in the Blood room with chau-chat submachine guns, and then some brave soul would retrieve to the creature. Four chau-chats all firing would hopefully be enough. But they would only get one round of shooting, and if it didn't drop, they'd be in trouble.

"Qui est le plus courageux ?"