#i will say i was not expecting the hot mummy to be relevant... i thought she was just there.

[realboutfatalfury]

finally finished zero escape 999

[percontaion-points]

TBWSIMBW chapter 16

Today's review might be difficult for some; reader discretion is advised

Click to see the rest of the snark & image descriptions

Click here for the rest of the series!

Chapter 16

Wait, had we only been dating a week?

I simply want to highlight now fast that everything has been moving in this book. 

Yes, they have known one another for 12 years at this point. But Amber has magically gotten over all of her ~*TRAUMA*~ and her dislike for Liam in this singular week. 

 “Well maybe I should get in there first and dump your hot ass. Save myself the embarrassment,” I suggested, raising my eyebrows, smirking at him.

 He laughed and laid down on his back, pulling me on top of him, holding me close. “If you dump my ass I’m going to be begging you until the day I die for you to take me back,” he stated, running his hand down my back. 

“Begging on your knees?” I asked, laughing. 

He nodded, looking at me gravely. “Yep, whatever it takes. Everywhere you go, I’ll be following behind you, begging for another shot. I’ll be just like an obsessive stalker,” he joked, rolling so I was under him.

Maybe the author thought that this was a funny little scene.

But my problem is that I’ve read way too many dark romances… And watch too much Law & Order. This isn’t romantic, this is deranged. 

After an hour in the park we went home to tidy the house. As usual the place was a mess. Jake had already started. We had to do a really good job this time because my mom was due back tomorrow.

I don’t know who needs to hear this, but you could have not thrown a party at all.

We had to do a really good job this time because my mom was due back tomorrow. She had no idea there was a raging party in her house every week.

That would require her to actually be around. And we can’t have that! Oh no! She has to abandon her children, who were already traumatised because of her shitfuck husband. 

 I don’t think my mom would like to hear that the boy from next door sleeps with her daughter every night.

Kind of feel like anything mummy-dearest expects from her daughter holds no relevance. If she wants to be a mother and be disappointed that her daughter is having sex, she doesn’t get to be gone 99% of the time. 

My mom loved Liam, she always had done. [sic]

Do you want to try that one again, author?

 “Jake, he wants to get to know you two again. He says he’s sorry and that he’s changed. He wants you to give him another chance.”

This is further proof that the author has never even known anybody with this level of trauma/abuse. There’s no way that the children don’t have a restraining order against their father. Especially not after what happened. 

Also, there’s no fucking way that the dad could possibly have anything to threaten mummy-dearest with. 

This rapist subplot is absolutely nothing but drama for the sake of drama… And not even well-written. The author should have stuck to writing about a girl discovering her inner slut, and nothing else. 

“It’s not that simple. I don’t want to have to say this, he’s put me in such an awkward position and I’m sorry,” she said quietly.

[...]

“He remarried. He has a son who’s one, he’s your half-brother. Apparently, the woman that he married has a son already. He’s seventeen. Your father wants you to get to know his new family,” she said, sneering slightly at the ‘new family’ bit at the end. 

I’m still waiting for her to explain how this has anything to do with them. Why she’s ALLOWING this man to come back into their lives and retraumatise all of them again. 

“What about this boy, Johnny, your stepbrother? He’s going to be at your school tomorrow. He knows who you are but he doesn’t know about what happened back then. Your father told me that his new family thinks that you don’t want to see him because of the breakup of our marriage, nothing else,” she said shaking her head. 

Jake laughed humourlessly. “Yeah, why would the spineless bastard tell his new wife that he beat the crap out of his old family for years before finally trying to rape his own daughter? Not something you can bring up in normal conversation is it?”

Except that you should. You should say it loud enough for the entire world to hear. Never let this man know a moment’s peace. Tell your step-brother every little detail about what his new father did to his first family. 

 I knew I shouldn’t have got my hopes up for a happy ending. I’d never have a happy ending. 

~ Liam ~ 

“What’s the baby’s name?” Amber asked her mom curiously.

WHY. WHY THE FUCK WOULD YOU DO THIS?!

“Yeah, I know. Listen, about tomorrow, I don’t know how she’s going to react to this Johnny kid. I know he doesn’t know anything, but what if he starts asking her why we don’t see him? He could upset her at school. She’d hate that. She’ll have years of this now,” he said sadly. 

I’m in favour of telling him every single detail, as I said earlier. Then beat him up if he refuses to believe any of that. That way, Johnny can tell his new dad why he got jumped at school! I feel like that would send the message to the entire family loud and clear that they’re not wanted here. 

“You know I’m off to college in a couple of months. Well, I was going to turn down my scholarship to Boston and go to college closer to here so I could still stay with her, but if the worst comes to the worst, I’ll take her with me to Boston. She can transfer schools,” I suggested, shrugging, waiting for his reaction. 

The fact that Liam is doing more for Amber than her own mother really speaks volumes about how fucking shitty that mummy-dearest is. 

I wrapped myself back around her and watched her sleep until I couldn’t stay awake anymore.

Chapter 16 summary: Life continues on for Amber and Liam. They go to Amber’s dance practise the next morning, and then out for lunch. Afterwards, they go home and help Jake finish cleaning up the house following the party. Even more so, since mummy-dearest is coming home tomorrow. 

When mum does come home, she comes with some bad news. Their rapist father is moving into town with his new family. This family consists of a new baby with his second wife, as well as a step-son, Johnny, who is 17 years old. Johnny will be attending high school starting tomorrow. She acts like the father put her into a difficult position about this entire thing, but then fails to explain to her traumatised children how any of this should be their problem. (Aside from Johnny, that is.) Amber is so upset that she storms off. Liam goes to be with her, and holds her until she falls asleep. 

Then we have a random POV switch to Liam, a moment before Amber stormed off. He stayed behind to help clean up a table Jake broke in his anger over hearing all of this, and the two discussed what should be done. But mainly, Liam is worried Jake would go over to dad’s new house and do something rash. Liam obviously wants to be there for Jake, too. 

He then asks mummy, Margaret, if he can stay to be with Amber. Margaret agrees, seeing as how every single adult in this stupid book is a piece of shit. She’s second only to her ex-husband. Anyway, Liam goes back home to get some things, where he has a weird conversation about how Amber is on the pill with his own mother. Then he goes back to Amber, where he spends the rest of the night. 

[poptod]

The Ivory Haunting (Ahkmenrah x Reader)

Description: His face is engrained into your head but his name is nowhere. Where does he exist? Why are you so obsessed?

Notes: this is strangely creepy and i dont know why. its not what i meant to do but i think its cool anyway. gender neutral as fuckin always WC: 3.1k

+

There's this carving – more of a bust or sculpture – that has your mind twisted every which way. It's a stupid thing, really, but you can't get his expression out of your head, and thus it haunts your waking and sleeping hours. The style is Egyptian, you think. He's wearing a crown on his head, one that you've seen in a couple museums before, and he has an absent smile on his face. While you scroll through the endless amount of photos of ancient Egyptian statues online, you note that it's an all too common expression.

At this point you can't even recall where you first saw it. Could've been through the endless internet surfing or the many museums you visited in your travels, but at the end of the day you're stumped. What was his name? Where did you meet him?

It's clear as day. His alabaster skin. He looks straight at you with empty eyes, the irises having eroded many years ago in the hot sahara sun. His nose has long fallen off, leaving behind a jagged scar that drags from his brow down to his lips, where that haunting smile sits so easily. They're full, his lips – sweet, and soft, even for stone. At each end are little dips, showcasing the slight smile. His chin is a little big, but it makes way for the sharp contrast of his jawline. He has cheekbones – mostly hidden behind the crown – and his ears are a little large. The trait that draws your attention each time is his eyes. Blank. Like they had truly been staring at the world for thousands of years.

You don't get out much anymore, not since the restrictions were put in place. There are moments, especially in the dead of night, in which you want so desperately to leave your tiny apartment, but the curfew states otherwise. Policemen and government workers roam the streets and you'd rather not get into a tussle over something so small as an urge.

Still, you stare outside your window, wondering why it feels like you're suffocating. This is how you spend a lot of your time nowadays, staring at the streets. There's hardly any cars out, and the sidewalks are barren, a sight you'd seen only once before during the original quarantine. London is not a quiet city. It's quite the opposite, and to see it muted is in the least upsetting.

Your job is... easy. Considering the state of the world, you're incredibly lucky, retaining your job and keeping away from the outside. You also get a lot of free time. Usually you'd spend it in front of a television, or in a good book, but now it's in front of your computer screen. The typing marker flashes in front of you, placing behind it the clear words you've searched at least a hundred times by now.

ANCIENT EGYPTIAN BUSTS

By now you know what the first images are going to be. Nefertiti, mostly – her bust is by far the most famous. Then there's of course Akhenaten with his elongated skull, followed by several advertisements for Kemetic worship.

You don't know much about Egyptian history. Or, at least you didn't use to. Now you recognize the faces, though rarely do you ever remember the names of the many forgotten dead. You're just looking for one – one name, one bust, one dead man.

He's nowhere, not in the books you buy or the articles you read. When you sign up for an online course of ancient Egyptian history, you expect to see his face in a textbook, but he's not there. Sometimes it feels like you're the only one who remembers him, which is funny – you don't even know him. Either way it's a way to occupy the time, since you have so much of it lately.

The British Museum is reopening. There's a whole thing about COVID, of course, and the only way to enter is to get tickets online. Only a handful of people are allowed inside the museum at once, and since you don't hear about it until later, you are set to wait a month and a half before you can visit. Bitterness wells up in the pit of your stomach, but like most things you set it aside. None of it really matters anyway – yes, not knowing his name feels like drowning mid-air, but it won't kill you.

From the moment you reserve a ticket to the moment you can actually use it, you dream of him every night. Sometimes it's actually him, no longer a statue, taking your hands and leading you somewhere you don't belong. His skin is warm, unlike his statue, but just as soft as you imagined. His nails are meticulously cleaned and his eyes are bright, full of a life you're desperate to understand. It doesn't make any sense. You're yearning so deeply for him, for something you've never known before, and every second away feels like pure horror in your veins.

Why do you need him this much?

You look at yourself in the mirror, fixing a strand of hair that falls in front of your eyes. You're dressed well – at least comparatively to your former few weeks of dress – and a quiet excitement thrums in your heart. Today is a day you're going to go out, and to make it better you're going to the museum. They have an Egyptian exhibit. A foolish part of yourself hopes you'll find him there, nestled in the corner of a long and fruitful hallway filled with Egyptian statues.

It's... disappointing, to say the least, to find out there's only one room for Egyptian exhibits and it's occupied by only one thing, besides broken pots and stone dolls. The main exhibit's name is Ahkmenrah, a young Pharaoh older than the Great Pyramids of Giza. All information on him can be fitted onto a four by six stone plate. While standing in his room, surrounded by hieroglyphs you've been studying hard to understand, you look him up on your phone. There's little mention of him, but the one article you do find on him has a 3D recreation of his face. He looks white and you know the article's bullshit.

While absently holding a conversation with one of the curators, you discover there's a store of Egyptian exhibits kept underneath the museum that aren't fit for showcase since the downsizing. Whatever that means, you find a sliver of hope, one that pales quickly at the realization you'll never be able to go down there. They wouldn't let some random visitor (who wasn't even an actual historian) to go see closed off exhibits.

Fischer, the director of the museum, hires you four months after you send your resume in. The second he does you set your plan into motion – there's no time to waste.

The same day he gives you the keys, you're sneaking in under the cover of night. For some reason, the lights are still on in the main museum, but fortunately that's not where you're headed. You unlock the backdoor, sneaking through the night guard's break room until you find the door to the basement. Flipping through the keys on your ring, you quickly find the right one, shoving it into the keyhole and almost wrenching the door open.

You run down the stairs. It's almost sprinting, but you can't be too loud with your shoes. There's nothing in your mind except him, his funny little smile, the somehow soft alabaster of his skin. You need to get to him. Something inside you says he's here – he's here, he's here, and there's nowhere else you can be without your whole body combusting.

You stop dead in your sprint, chest heaving as you're faced with the open boxes filled with Egyptian busts. With frantic eyes you look them over, searching desperately for one familiar face, finding none until the very last open box.

It's here.

He's here.

The broken nose, the formation of the resulting scar, you recognize every. Fucking. Inch.

Each box contains little notes on who the statues are (if known), the material, the time period, and other such relevant information. Your hands shake as you reach forward, slipping the piece of paper out of the paper stuffing.

King Ahkmenrah

Date: ca. 3,100 - 3000 B.C.

Period: Old Kingdom

Place of origin: Egypt, Cairo

Medium: Ivory

Ahkmenrah.

Sudden clarity strikes you as it never has when you recall searching his name online. He's the exhibit. He's the mummy upstairs. He's actually here.

The blood in you freezes for a moment, caught up in shock and relief. Now you know his name. A small part of you is finally able to rest with the answer, but the rest of you knows exactly what to do – go upstairs. Find the exhibit. Lay at his side. After all this time you still don't know why, but the ache of neediness in your heart is enough to leave you weak to your inner desires.

Now that your head is clear, or at least unhindered by your questions, you note a worrying amount of sound coming from upstairs. Footsteps pound on the ceiling as you climb the staircase, leaving you curious and terrified. That many people shouldn't be in one place – it's a death wish for the modern plague. You grit your teeth, fingers curling up in to fists that dig your nails deep into your palm. Is it safe to go upstairs? There's definitely people up there and you have no idea who they are. The museum could be being robbed right now and you wouldn't have a clue. It's a death wish.

Why are you still going up the stairs?

Why are you opening the door?

This shouldn't be happening. There's enough people to fill the whole first floor, ranging from the public entrance of the museum to the African exhibits in the back. Almost all of them are wearing historical outfits, in such a wide array you might've thought they'd stolen them from the exhibits, had they not looked exactly like the wax figures. The marble statue of the Roman on his horse is no longer on its' pedestal. Actually, he's talking to a woman a few feet away from you, though he is still on the horse.

You should be passed out on the stairs going by how fast your heart is beating, but instead you stand in the doorway petrified. Your eyes sit wide, scanning back and forth over the crowd, searching for something you don't know of. With all the stimulus in front of you, you don't even know what to think. The exhibits must be coming alive. Does someone watch over them?

It's then, with little clarity in your head, that your eyes land upon the night guard. She doesn't look in the least bit rattled, so you easily assume she's used to this. Her calm is so alarming to you that you blink yourself back into your body.

These are... people. Just people. They haven't been put under some curse that'll bring chaos to the world. All they're doing is partying, and though the noise level is a tad unpleasant, it's just about as rowdy as some teenagers.

When you realize you aren't in danger, you bolt from your place at the door. Twisting through the gathered crowd, you slowly make your way to the staircase, ascending with quick feet as your eyes lock onto the Egyptian hall. It's a few more feet until you turn sharp, shoes squeaking as you slide into the room. The familiar gold lighting greets you, shining off the open sarcophagus, which you skid to a halt in front of as your lungs desperately try to catch up to your legs.

Of course it's empty. Your Pharaoh – or Ahkmenrah, you suppose you should use his name now that you know it – must be downstairs, where the life of the party is. Why would he stay up in this empty room, all alone? From here you can barely even hear the music that was once pounding into your ears. Still, for a moment you stare at the bottom of the vacant coffin, caught in the awe of such a long-standing history.

"What are you doing here?"

The words catch you by surprise, and in reaction you whip around, eyes wide as the voice continues, "who are you?"

My King. Before you can even process the thought, the words roll onto your tongue, but to your immense relief you catch yourself before actually opening your mouth.

"I..." it barely comes out with how little you've physically spoken recently, "I work here."

As usual, your voice carries that quiet, calm, slightly annoyed tone that makes people wonder why you're being so difficult. It's not really something you can control, but the King doesn't seem to notice. Maybe it's worked to your advantage this time; despite your racing heart and frozen feet, you keep an even tone.

"I don't think I've seen you here before," the King says, his eyes narrowing as he steps closer. You try to back up, but you're already pressed against the sarcophagus, and his glare keeps you from running.

"I just started today," you answer honestly.

"Ah," he says, his voice softer the moment he begins to believe you. "This must be rather alarming for you, then."

You're not afraid to admit he's right.

"A tad. How do you speak english?"

"I learned it during my time at Cambridge University," he answers. He's from over 4,000 years ago, so you know he didn't attend as a student.

"You were on display there?"

"Yes," he says with a bright smile, one that catches you entirely off guard.

It practically blows you away – his demeanor changed so quickly, from a stern Pharaoh to a sweet, young man who probably bought his girlfriend flowers every Monday. For a moment you wonder why you were so caught up in him before knowing him; now that you've heard his voice, seen the way he moves, your interest increases tenfold. It's not enough to see him. You need to touch him. You need it more than anything.

"I've been looking for you," you blurt out, but the words come out so slow it sounds like you consciously chose them. You bite the inside of your cheek as you watch his smile falter.

"What do you mean?" He asks. He's standing in front of you now – if you extended your arm and took a small step closer, you'd be touching him.

"There's a sculpture of you," you say softly, swallowing the lump in your throat, "but I didn't know how to find your name."

"How'd you find me, then?" He asks, but he looks less offended. Now there's a keen look in his smile and in his eye, like he's going to enjoy this, like he knows something you don't.

"Sheer luck," you say with a shrug. It's mostly true.

"I think I know you," he says, and his smile quirks further upward.

"What?" You say, trying to back up again as he steps closer. The sarcophagus is, unsurprisingly, still behind you. "How?"

"Back when I was a King, I had a slave my brother killed," he says in the least comforting tone, "but my father had this idea."

Another step closer. You can feel the heat of his naked waist on your shaking hands.

"See, he had a magician in his employ, and he would do anything for me. Especially since I loved that slave so dearly. Truly," he leans forward a little, placing his hand on the gold case behind you and trapping you against him. His chest is practically right against yours, but what you are close enough to feel is his breath, soft on your collarbones. "And so my father retrieved the soul with a special spell and sent it into the future, to possess another at birth, and to lie in wait until I called for it."

You can't feel your – well, anything. There's a pressure on your chest, but you can't tell if that's your wildly beating heart or just his warmth skewing your senses. All you can do is stare up at him wide-eyed. He can't be telling the truth. Magic doesn't work like that, it can't work like that, that's a sick story and he's telling it like it's nothing more than normal. Possessing a newborn child. Sending souls into the future. It can't make sense. You almost feel bad for your past self – under the employ of someone so cruel as to take a soul from the afterlife for his own pleasure.

But he's standing before you. He's 4,000 years old, and he's standing in front of you, pushing you against his own coffin and trapping you there. Do you belong to him, then? Is that why you can't get him out of your head?

"When did your search begin?" He asks softly, a gentle curiosity evident in his brow.

"A – about a year ago," you say, your voice so broken and shaky you're surprised he understands it.

"Last winter?" He asks knowingly, almost sweet, like he's doting on you. Then comes the part that really makes it shine; he reaches up and pets your hair, moving in long, soft strokes.

You nod, unwilling to meet his gaze any longer. How red you must be by now.

"I called on you then. It took you a little while, but I'm glad you made it," he says, pressing a soft kiss to your forehead. "Unfortunately, I suppose you haven't retained any memories, since you didn't know my name."

"I guess not," you agree quietly. "I just have instincts."

"Instincts?"

You're reluctant to share with him the many instincts you'd had even in the short time from meeting him to now. The pure need to touch him. Past You probably had a crush on him, and even though you aren't really that person anymore, there's a need inside you to hide that fact from him. 

"I wanted to call you my King when I first saw you," you admit, your voice still quiet in hopes of him not understanding you.

"You won't have to call me that anymore. Maybe a tad around my parents, but when we're alone you may use my name."

"When we're... alone?" You question nervously, heart pounding at the thought of spending more time with him.

"You do work here, don't you?" He says with a sly grin. "I think I'll be seeing you quite a lot."

Oh.

Oh no.

Oh God.

If this is how you react just from spending five minutes with him, you can't imagine spending whole nights at his side. You'd explode. From what you don't know yet, but the pulsing rush in your heart is strong enough to worry you, and very rarely do you ever worry about yourself. The words in your head – your immediate reaction – simply won't pass. You can't bring yourself to say them, so you say what he wants to hear.

"As long as you want to."

[mst3kproject]

Dawn of the Mummy

Like Horrors of Spider Island, this is a movie predicated on putting a bunch of attractive women in a dangerous situation so that we can watch them run around and scream, and like Devil Fish, they’re all Italian but we’re not supposed to notice.  The director, Frank Agrama, is best known for the Robotech movies, and most of the actors were never in anything else (one of them did play a victim in Bloodsucking Freaks), so it can fairly be said to star nobody and feature nothing.  Boy, it sucks.

Long ago, the evil Pharaoh Sefreman rode around Egypt being an utter bastard because he was a god incarnate and he could do that. He wanted to continue doing it after his death, too, so a priestess puts a curse on his tomb – if his treasure is ever stolen, Sefreman and his armies will rise and kill!

Thousands of years later, a bunch of robbers blast the tomb open despite the dire warnings of the wicked queen from Snow White.  It’s not them who end up angering the mummy, however, it’s a bunch of models and their photographer, who decide that an undiscovered tomb is the perfect place to hold an impromptu photoshoot.  After way too much pointless dithering, Sefreman makes with the rising and killing, culminating in a full-on zombie feeding frenzy.

The leader of the three robbers is a guy named Rick.  It’s been a while since we had a Rick.  The actor playing him, Barry Sattles, overacts so hard in every scene that you’ll be looking for tooth marks in the rocks.  The guy who dubbed his voice is even worse.

And that’s just one tasty morsel of the delicious cheese platter that is this movie.  The ancient Egyptians dress in taffeta and gold lame.  The dubbing is atrocious.  Sefreman’s ‘treasure’ is a bunch of cheap souvenirs with a layer of gold spray paint.  People running through wide open desert can’t seem to keep ahead of slowly shuffling zombies. The music is intrusive and both it and the accents are obnoxious stereotypes – the end credits in particular are set to a cartoonified ‘Egyptiany’ piece that reminds me of the theme from Killer Klowns from Outer Space.  If I had to pick a stinger I don’t think I could do it.  I mean, there’s the wicked queen popping into shot screaming, there’s the guy getting attacked by a rat, there’s the lady wandering through the tomb wailing about how lost she is, there’s Rick screaming Sefreman’s name over and over… it’s hilarious.

There’s not much of a plot through the middle part of the film – just Sefreman and his minions wandering around eating people and horses.  Occasionally there are hints of story, like one of the models falling in love with Rick (why!?) or the photographer’s desire to be famous, but these never really amount to anything.  The climax is a total free-for-all, as zombies invade the streets of the town and crash Omar the Hookah Guy’s wedding! This is plenty amusing, but would be more so if we had a better idea what the hell was going on.

Sefreman is finally defeated by two of the models and a couple of guys from the town, who lure him into a shed full of dynamite and blow him up.  This actually isn’t a bad ending.  I’m pleased that they didn’t decide to try to turn Rick into the hero, and that the women didn’t need personality transplants in order to save the day.  After the shack blows, they squeal and jump up and down and hug each other – which is exactly what we would expect from the characters we’ve been following this entire movie.  Omar’s wedding is a fun choice of climax, since we get to see some Egyptian culture, and there’s even a sort of subplot in which it’s rather heavily implied that he’s got to marry this girl in a hurry because she’s already pregnant.

I do have many questions about the old woman I’ve been referring to as the wicked queen.  How does she know where Sefreman’s tomb is when supposedly everybody who did know was killed?  She’s played by the same actress as the high priestess who sealed him up – is she supposed to be a descendant?  Maybe even the same person, immortal for some reason?  Why does Sefreman kill her when she immediately swears her devotion to him? Why does she talk about Sefreman ‘reclaiming his kingdom’ when that was never mentioned in the curse?  All the curse was supposed to do was keep his treasure safe.  The best I can say about her is that she’s slightly more explicable and relevant than the pet shop hobo from Hellraiser… but that’s a low bar.

So what is this movie about, besides the obvious ‘mummy killing women’ level?  I don’t think it’s really meant to be about anything.  Dawn of the Mummy is just a monster movie, but it carries with it a certain amount of baggage from its genre. Mummy movies in general are about the West’s unease with archaeology.

Archaeologists dig up all kinds of things, of course, but tombs are a major subset, because the dead bodies of our ancestors are a wealth of information about how they lived.  Modern science can tell where people grew up, what their diet was like, what diseases they suffered from, the colour of their hair and eyes, and all kinds of other things… but there’s still the fact that you have to dig up somebody’s dead body to get there.  Some people are okay with the idea that their mortal remains might be a subject of study in centuries to come.  Other people are not.

The Egyptians would almost certainly have been horrified by what has become of their dead.  Mummies were meant to remain in their tombs for all eternity so that the souls of the departed would have a home, with their grave goods to take care of them.  A mummy in a museum, separated from its context, means a soul that is alone and penniless in a foreign place.  If they could have put curses and booby-traps in their tombs to prevent this, they would have.  What does that mean for archaeologists?  Do we have the right to disrespect these people’s wishes, just because they’ve been dead for a really long time?

Archaeologists will frequently lament the fact that their profession is also basically destructive – once you’ve dug something up and taken it apart, it will never be pristine again.  Modern archaeology takes great care to preserve as much as possible so that people in the future, who will presumably have better techniques, can still learn something, too.  Dawn of the Mummy sort of deals with this, as we see two groups of people who have no interest in preserving what they’ve found. Rick and his friends blow holes in it looking for a treasure chamber, and the models are in their own way nearly as destructive.

Dawn of the Mummy devotes significant attention to the fact that light is damaging to artefacts.  Mummies on display in museums are always under dim light, because bright light will degrade the wrappings and tissues that have spent millennia in darkness. But the first thing the photographers do is set up a bunch of bright lights, and we see shots of icky blue fluid bubbling out of the mummy’s wrappings where this hits it.  I wondered if this is supposed to be what activates the curse – since the title is Dawn of the Mummy, maybe the magic mistakes it for sunlight falling on him?  If so, the writing should have taken care of that I wouldn’t have to sit and figure it out.

The models also touch everything they come across, leaning on walls and statues covered with thousand-year-old paint, getting makeup all over everything and probably sweat, too, as they constantly complain about how hot it is in there. The movie never entertains the possibility of actual archaeologists finding Sefreman’s tomb, but any who did would find it hopelessly compromised.

Mummy movies are also about imperialism, which is inextricably tied to archaeology.  Modern Egyptology in particular began when Napoleon’s troops raided the country for stuff they thought was pretty, and as I discussed in my review of The Pumaman, a lot of this is still kicking around in museums, private collections, and garage sales, with no provenance or context.  Archaeology derives from treasure-hunting, embodied in Rick – he’s not here for knowledge, he’s here for wealth.  The models are not really any different.  They want images of this exotic place that will please their audience, without much caring about the context behind them.

The mummy, with his magical powers and undead army, is a punishment for this greed, and represents the west’s constant fear that conquered peoples will fight back.  You see this in those facebook graphs talking about how white people will become a minority in America unless we make abortion illegal.  Why should that be a problem?  Because we’re afraid we will be treated as we have treated others. Sefreman’s magic is completely unknown to the Americans and they have no defense against it.

Of course, none of this is actually relevant in Dawn of the Mummy.  These themes are inherent in the premise, but they’re not part of the story this particular movie is telling.  The result, with its Styrofoam tomb art and ostentatious overacting, is great to make fun of but impossible to take seriously – perfect material for some do-it yourself MST3K.

[killerkyara]

Physicalities

She’d been mentally counting the minutes to nearly an hour before their captor pushed her way into her tent once more; which was reminiscent of abodes within her homeland. Soft rugs and sitting pillows covered every surface, and off in the corner sat a daybed, similarly adorned. Candles lit the space and diminished the scent of death that hung in the air outside. If not for her wrists clamped by cuffs and chained above her head through the tent wall, she wouldn’t recognize this to be anything close to a cell.

In fact, she wouldn’t be surprised if this was Britney’s personal quarters. Or one of them, at least.

She watches the elf come close, lips quirked, crouching beside her form which had already been stripped of her armor before she was bound to prevent hidden weapons. Britney skimmed cold fingers down her back to get her to twist slightly so she could address the arrowhead embedded in her shoulder.

Without a word of warning, she dips a scalpel-like blade from her belt to the wound, wrenching out the arrowhead skillfully, quickly. Kyara grits her teeth, but doesn’t give the other woman the pleasure of hearing her pain, watching as she removes the head and remaining inch of the shaft attached and turns it about between her slender fingerstips before her.

“Ranger make. Sleek, sharper than anything. You can’t help but admire it, the craftsmanship, no?” She purrs.

Face flat, Kyara murmurs darkly, “That’s surely what I was thinking about when it struck me.”

Britney chuckles, taking up a small bottle from the kit she’d brought inside with her, dousing it over the wound; Kyara recognized the sting to be antiseptic. At least she was honest about tending to their wounds before the bounty was collected, she thought. From the same kit, she picks up a roll of bandages, and Kyara willingly holds her arm out as much as she could to allow her to wrap the wound.

Glancing down to the tattoos on her legs illuminated by candlelight, Kyara grunts, “I’m sure stripping me down was all apart of checking me over, yes?”

Cutting her a coy look, Britney purrs once more, “You believe I have ulterior motives besides making sure you are in apex condition? I thought we were closer than that, you and I.”

Kyara all but snarls then, “You don’t even know my name.”

“What is it, then?”

Their eyes meet. Kyara furrows her brow then, and in close quarters, the air between them grows hot and charged.

“Kyara.” She allows.

“Kyara,” Britney repeats, dramatically; Kyara goes stiff as the hunter smoothly straddles her lap, balking slightly as she takes up her hair and skews her chin up to look at her. “A name as gorgeous as the rest of you, I did not doubt that.”

Kyara dons the same smolder as before, and whether it is apart of the same act or not, her dark eyes are flaming, driving Britney to press her lips to hers with ferocity. She tasted cold and metallic, but even then the rogue was somewhat breathless under the force in her advance, hands pinning her elbows to the tent wall, smoothing down to squeeze flexed biceps, hard.

“You are tense,” Britney notes against her mouth, pulling away slightly. “You must be the one usually in control...Even within your group you are your own force, no?”

Kyara says nothing...Staring her down, and running her tongue over tingling lips.

“Does it get you going to be powerless?” Britney grins, taking up a ring of keys from her belt. Ky’s eyes go wide, but as quickly as they’d appeared, Britney tosses it to clatter at the floor behind her, within sight, but just out of reach. “To see your freedom, so close, and yet so far...?”

Before Kyara could answer, not that she would, she had pounced upon her again, her cold touch sliding dangerously close to what remained upon the rogue’s frame. In a burst of strength, Ky’s leg slips astride hers, wrapping around her hip as an anchor as she flips them to the side, landing Britney upon the ground pinned beneath her hip. Her arms are extended behind her instead of above now, still bound to the tent. Britney lets out a breathless noise.

“Free me from the wall.” Kyara instructs, jaw clenched; her eyes, expression, all hinted that she too, was caught up in the haze of lust. Wide-eyed, Britney sits up slightly, reaching for the chain. After a series of clicks that required no key, Kyara let out a sigh of relief as her arms were freed. Still cuffed, but mobile.

Tucking her legs against her core, Kyara expertly maneuvered her arms beneath herself to bring her cuffed hands in front of her instead, and Britney watched, awestruck. Then she was the one upon her, ungarbing the elven woman out of her leathers like a machine, cuffed or not, she still had use of her fingers. Sliding down upon her, lips made their way from neck to just above her waist, where Kyara quickly takes inventory of her belt.

There. Another key, this one smaller, singular, gold. It was a gamble, but Kyara didn’t expect Britney to be naive enough to only keep only one capable of locking and unlocking cuffs, or to toss the only copy away off her person. 

In a breath, Ky moved lips from the other’s skin to take up the key between her teeth, and suddenly, she shoots upward to drive the top of her head into Britney’s jaw. Dazed, she lay there beneath Kyara with a pained groan as the rogue hurriedly takes up the key from her teeth and fumbles to unlock the cuffs, breathing out a sigh of relief as they clicked and fell away from her wrists.

“I’m sorry, dove. In another life...” She clacks the cuffs into place on Britney’s wrists instead, locking them with the key. “One where you weren’t trying to sell out my comrades, you would have felt me here tonight.” As Britney prepares to cry out for guards, she uses the bandage roll still out from her kit earlier to fashion up a makeshift gag, wrapping it around her head over mouth like a mummy.

But her motions are surprisingly soft otherwise. Kyara wasn’t trying to hurt her, not at all. She stands then, sashaying in lingerie to pick up the key ring dropped on the floor earlier, turning to eye the elven woman a moment where she was no doubt slewing curses beneath the gag. She purrs, “But maybe we’ll see each other again, and maybe I’ll let you get off that time.”

[ @blackbay-wra ] relevant: @quai-mason, @brian-wellson, @ephriza-dawnblade, @mycoronervinny, @renghar-the-pal

[tearlessrain]

so this turned into Scorpion King: Book of Souls Liveblog Part 1, because I got started late. witness a bunch of people trying to make one man’s considerable hotness singlehandedly carry an entire hour and a half long movie with very limited success under the cut.

I do want to state right up front that there’s only one reason I’m watching this and that reason is that for some reason zach mcgowan is the protagonist, so I’m not really up to date on the whole mummy/scorpion king franchise, the last one I saw was the one with all the jackal dudes and that was a while ago. so I have no idea what’s going on.

oh good they’re just going to town with the exposition, very thoughtful

so if the sword was forged in the fires of hell by anubis then who the heck did they fight when they were taking on the jackal headed dudes because I kinda assumed

are these two series actually related or

holy shit this is so Extra already look at this shit

y’all this is my jam I am living right now

also as people following my art blog may note, I am a huge fan of black and gold aesthetics. this movie is really just ticking off all my boxes right off the bat, it’s terrible, but five stars.

they’re REALLY going to town with the exposition

sword forged in the fires of hell that condemns souls to ��the neverending darkness” and must be somehow destroyed... are we talking about anubis or sauron here.

this is just lord of the rings, but bad and with a sword. lord of the sword.

okay prologue is over and some dudes have smashed their way into a tomb. if the last however many mummy movies have taught me anything it’s that this might potentially be a bad idea

I love how they’re just not even setting up any of the characters we’re just diving right in I’m getting strong “yeah you all know the drill by now” vibes here

#squadgoals

really though the gal on the left is pretty badass, she hasn’t done or said a single thing but I respect her and her bootleg Xena vibe

and like shoutout for putting at least one actual black guy in egypt I guess

so I guess the one in the middle is... psychic or something? not that “hey if you plunder this blatantly cursed tomb it might be bad” requires psychic powers to know but

I mean that giant black sarcophagus they found recently in real life turned out fine I’m sure this will be great go nuts dude

uh oh it’s the fang of sauron anubis

oh that doesn’t seem good, but it’s actually the better option since for a second there I thought there were pulling a “black guy dies first” in ancient goddamn egypt

wait we’re still doing exposition okay the narrator is back. hi narrator I missed you.

look  I know it’s campy and all but can we take a sec to unironically appreciate how wicked COOL this guy looks with his glowing eyes and crap. this movie is just so satisfying to look at, every single shot has been peak aesthetic

“SEND THE BIRD” and then it’s actually just a regular bird that was anticlimactic

HOLY GREENSCREEN BATMAN

holy FUCK WE’RE ONLY JUST NOW AT THE TITLE SEQUENCE WHAT

okay I guess now we’re going to ACTUALLY start the movie, third time’s a charm

and we’re off to a fantastic start my friends

and judging by the choices of the cameraman in this scene I can tell they’re trying desperately to distract me from the fact that the dialogue sounds like it was generated by a neural network that was fed several dozen mediocre fantasy novels.

it’s working.

I am being personally attacked. god.

oh no some people on horses are coming I assume from the background music that this is a bad thing

OH it’s bootleg Xena and her merry band of deeply mediocre extras okay

I understand the adorable small child’s father must die but must it be at the hands of the worst mediocre extra. seriously he’s been on screen for five seconds and I already hate him.

I guess the protagonist’s name is Matthias, other writers might have let us know that when he was introduced, but these guys know damn well that it literally does not matter what his name is. they could have had her ride up and be like “we’re looking for a man named Jebediah Switchboard McDougal” and anyone who’s voluntarily watching this movie in the first place would just be like “that’s fair”

yeah just in case you weren’t sold after the blacksmithing or the hunting scenes, let’s have him just singlehandedly take down half a dozen ninjas in less than a minute. just fuck me up

oh shit they shot him

oh shit they shot him again

they’re just boromir-ing the hell out of this dude

and yet he’s still going to town on those ninjas

NO NOT THE ADORABLE CHILD WHY WOULD YOU DO THIS

I’ve decided I don’t like bootleg Xena after all

it’s a good thing he’s got three arrows embedded in his torso because that is the worst cage ever. it’s made of like. bamboo and string. have you seen this man’s arms how did they expect that to effectively contain him.

whoa it’s... BOOTLEG XENA 2.0: GOOD GUY EDITION

or not. she didn’t free him or anything she just killed his original captors and then took off with the cage with him in it

no I think she is good she’s... healing him? by... getting scorpions to sting the hell out of him? has the FDA approved this.

I’m sorry I can’t take this scene seriously the background music is way too close to the “ooga chakas” from hooked on a feeling. also the sheer degree to which they’re pulling a reverse male gaze here is kinda overshooting sexy straight into unintentionally funny. I mean I know this is the entire reason I’m watching this insanity but like even I think this is excessive.

“the scorpion king escaped” that is giving him way too much credit he was stolen by the superior bootleg Xena.

and in case NONE of the previous things drew your attention away from the lack of a plot, here’s just straight up nudity because why not.

I thought I had a thing for zach mcgowan but I’ve got nothing on this cameraman.

also there’s some kind of “reluctant chosen one king” thing going on I guess but like they literally couldn’t have put less effort into it

I haven’t heard people this concerned about what the moon is doing since I left evergreen state college

aaand apparently he can see and speak to... ghosts now? ghosts that spit thousands of arrows from the sky? know what why not I’ll accept literally anything at this point.

oh they aren’t ghosts they’re just really sneaky dudes

it’s a shame jebediah switchboard’s one and only weakness is extremely shitty cages because he sure ends up in them a lot

hmmmm we’re getting some uncomfortable racist undertones and misogyny in one go okay. not worse than I would expect from a movie of this.... caliber, but I’m not thrilled, especially since this whole situation has yet to have a single actual point to it.

actually okay it’s veered quickly away from “rudyard kipling-esque Vague Native Tribe Encounter” and into... some kind of weird mad max thing mixed with a D&D campaign that’s gone wildly off the rails. but they’re on thin fucking ice.

I really appreciate that matthias is approaching this situation with exactly the same strategy with which I play skyrim, which is “sneak up on everybody one at a time even though there are a ton of them and that shouldn’t be possible, shoot them all with a bow you looted off one of them”

and now they’re just... suddenly free and back on their horses, then matthias had a vague fake deep exchange with the leader and they rode away. there literally was no reason for that entire interlude. nothing happened, there wasn’t character development or anything. this godforsaken movie could have been ten minutes shorter.

“the plot is down there, just past that greenscreen” is what I heard there.

I’m sorry I’m dying for some reason all I’m getting from this visual is “wait are you saying the panel is all the way on the other side of the convention center” like the costumes are just mediocre enough that in bright light they don’t look like they’re actually actors in a movie.

the moon’s rising. but I can’t for the life of me remember why that’s important. she’s got some kinda egyptian steampunk millennium rod though.

okay the lenses must align with the cipher. did anyone mention a cipher before who knows.

good job matthias you solved the moon puzzle and your prize is a metric ton of blue jello.

all right through the jello portal they go. to find the book of souls, probably.

in this case I actually do need more exposition. are we just not gonna explain ancient egyptian jello narnia. no. okay.

stop forcing zach mcgowan to be quippy I know all the cool movies are doing it but this is neither the time nor the place nor the actor for it.

oh my god they’re being attacked by a rock golem thing and I don’t think a screenshot can fully capture how bad the cgi is. not of the rock monster itself, but trying to integrate it with the real actors and set pieces was... oof.

okay a mostly naked woman has risen out of some nearby water and called off the rock golem with no explanation. why not.

neither of them looks into this so much as confused as hell

honestly, same.

oh god no they’re trying to make the rock golem be the comic relief this movie never needed. please don’t. you can barely handle writing the plot relevant dialogue now’s not the time to get fancy. I take it back, trying to make zach mcgowan be quippy was actually somehow not the worst option.

she IS the book of souls!

okay that’s a pretty cool visual I’ll give them that. digging the iridescent moon tattoo.

and that seems like a reasonable stopping point because I started this kind of late and have to get up for class in the morning. tune in tomorrow for, I assume, more of zach mcgowan running around in various states of undress while absolutely nothing coherent happens around him.

[josephborrello]

Magnitude and Direction, Issue #43 | 4 Oct 2019

Hardware, Prototyping, and Fabrication

⚙ Last week's issue of The Prepared featured Boltcutter, a list of hardware VC fund Bolt's favorite shop tools. It's a who's-who of tools that I think everyone should have in their workshop and I'm proud to say I personally have many of the tools listed. ⚙ This plotter artwork is great for people like me: who can't draw, but have lots of tools and machines. What do you do when you have to machine a part, but it's made out of highly radioactive fuel rods? Hero dogs like Lassie are all well and good on the TV, but if a random dog (or even a dog you knew) was barking at you with no apparent danger or trouble in sight, would you "listen" to them and follow? Maybe not, and that's where a new vest designed to give dogs the power to "speak" comes in.

Software and Programming

🔈🔉🔊 It's easy to make a user-friendly volume adjust, but a user-unfriendly one? Well, that's much harder (and more fun... at least until you lose it and throw your computer against the wall.) A problem unique to the 21st century: What do you do when a computer thinks your last name is "offensive"? A modern version of the Linux operating system, running on a very not-modern version of a Toshiba laptop.

Science, Engineering, and Biomedicine

Stellarium: a free, open-source planetarium for your computer. For a while, we've thought heart disease was a relatively new issue. Recent scans of mummies, however, are telling a different story. 🪐 The hottest new Soundcloud artist? NASA's InSight Mars lander.

Mapping, History, and Data Science

From The Prepared: How Civil War-era legislation is driving multibillion dollar IT investments today. You've heard of VHS v. Betamax, HDDVD v. Blu-Ray... Now you can add Wi-Fi v. HomeRF to the list of behind-the-scenes tech standards wars that ended up shaping the very fabric of our society. ⚙ I wasn't totally sure where to put this, since it very much involves software, hardware, and engineering, so I decided on putting it here, since it's an important piece of history: Here is a visualization of how the Enigma Machine worked, the famous encryption device used by the Nazis in WWII and cracked, in part, by father of computing Alan Turing. The way the animation moves the "bits" of data around really captures the nature of this computing device, which was totally electromechanical.

Events and Opportunities

I don't know about you guys, but I've got a busy few weeks ahead of me...

TONIGHT, 10/4 This year's Futureworks Incubator closes out with a party and showcase down at the Brooklyn Army Terminal, featuring over 50 of the hardware and manufacturing startups that went through this year's program.

Monday, 10/7 Join GRO-Biotech and Insight Data Sciences for a talk and Q&A about different careers in data, the most suitable backgrounds for each of them, and how Insight Data Sciences can help you make the transition.

Monday, 10/7 If you don't mind being suspended over the East River for a bit, head over to Cornell Tech for the inaugural seminar in their HealthTech.NYC series, uniting engineers, clinicians, and leaders intent on disrupting and improving healthcare through technology. The first event will examine how precision medicine can be applied in the context of cancer care with speakers joining from sema4, Englander Institute for Precision Medicine, Flatiron health, and the NYU Perlmutter Cancer Center. (And yes, you can take the subway to get there as well, if you're afraid of heights)

Wednesday, 10/9 In honor of National Nanotech Day (10/9 >> 10^9, for the uninitiated, myself included) the Nanotech NYC meetup group will be gathering together for their next Nanonite social, with a collection of researchers, enthusiasts, and entrepreneurs, as always.

Saturday, 10/12 The next edition of Hot Glass Cold Beer returns to the Brooklyn Glass studios in Gowanus, featuring live glass blowing, open studios, and effectively endless amounts of beer. As always, getting a ticker in advance (versus at the door) means you'll be guaranteed to get one of their hand-made glasses (which you can subsequently drink out of for the rest of the night).

October 11-16 Innovation Week at Mount Sinai. What started as just the SINAInnovations conference is now a week's worth of activities dedicated to bringing New York's biomedical innovation communities together. Here's the full lineup:

Friday-Sunday, 10/11-13 Mount Sinai Health Hackathon. The 4th annual Mount Sinai Health Hackathon will be an exciting 48-hour transdisciplinary competition focused on creating novel technology solutions for problems in healthcare. This year’s theme is Artificial Intelligence – Expanding the Limits of Human Performance.

Tuesday, 10/15 Careers & Connections 2019. GRO-Biotech's next big event, the Careers & Connections mini-conference and networking event, is being held concurrently with emerging healthcare technologies conference, SINAInnovations. We have hit capacity for event RSVPs, but a wait list has been started so you should still register!

Tuesday & Wednesday, 10/15-16 SINAInnovations Conference. The Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai is hosting its eighth annual SINAInnovations conference around the theme of Artificial Intelligence. A range of talks and panels will focus on the explosive growth of AI in our society and in particular in medicine, featuring international thought leaders across the range of relevant domains.

Tuesday, 10/15 The Careers & Connections reception ends around 7pm, which would leave you just enough time to get down to Tir Na Nog for the second half of the New York BioPharma Networking Group's October after-work gathering.

Wednesday, 10/16 Right after Careers & Connections, GRO-Biotech is hosting a fireside chat at BioLabs with Adam Wollowick from Stryker and Jack Wu from Adlai Nortye on what a career in business development looks like and how you can start a career in bizdev.

Some other upcoming events to keep on your radar...

Saturday, 10/19 New Lab's annual open house birthday celebration is back, with a theme this year of Light+Motion. As always, you can expect pretty much everyone affiliated with technology, design, science, and/or entrepreneurship to turn up for what's one of the bigger bashes of the year.

Saturday & Sunday 10/19-20 The biggest bi-annual graduate career symposium in the country is back at NYU Med showcasing all the career trajectories you can pursue post-PhD. This is one of the best opportunities for graduate students and postdocs to learn about the breadth of career paths for doctorates and an amazing place to network with the next generation of scientists. More info on the two-day conference can be found here, and the registration link is here.

Monday 10/21 It's not always science and startup events here. One of my favorite organizations, the Society for the Advancement of Social Studies (aka SASS) is back with more barroom history, this time with a focus on the spooky, scary, and ghoulish.

Wednesday, 10/23 VR investors and practitioners in the healthcare space will gather at RLab in the Brooklyn Navy Yard for a showcase of the latest and greatest VR technologies and applications in the healthcare space.

Wednesday, 10/23 Scientists, artists and everything in between meet up once again at Peculier Pub for the October edition of SciArt's Synapse social mixer.

Thursday, 10/24 The NYC biotech/life science/entrepreneurial communities get together at JLABS once again for the October edition of their Innovators & Entrepreneurs mixer.

Saturday, 10/26 The Future of Care conference is back at Rockefeller University featuring some of the latest breakthroughs in clinical care and the innovators helping shepherd them from bench to bedside. Applications close today!

Tuesday, 10/29 Join Columbia Nano Labs for their annual Industry Day conference. Learn how you can use and leverage the Nano Labs facilities, hear from a panel of entrepreneurs who have done just that, and listen to faculty and technical experts discuss the way these sophisticated tools contribute to cutting-edge research. (Yes, this was rescheduled from the originally planed date of 9/5.)

Thursday, 10/31 Pitching your startup in front of investors doesn't have to be spooky. The Mid Atlantic Bio Angels 1st Pitch events offer NYC's biotech entrepreneurs the chance to pitch their innovations in front of a panel of real investors and receive critical feedback on their pitches and business plans. The 1st Pitch events are also a great place to learn about the latest innovations in the NYC biotech ecosystem and connect with some of its major players.

Friday, 11/8 The Intrepid museum's Innovators series returns for another evening of showcasing startups powered by NASA technologies, plus networking and mingling between scientists, entrepreneurs, and technologists.

Friday-Sunday, 11/8-10 For 36 hours on November 8-10, HackPrinceton will bring together 600 developers and designers from across the country to create incredible software and hardware projects. They'll have swag, workshops, mentors, prizes, games, free food, and more.

Map of the Month

⚡ Here's a live map of carbon emissions being generated by electricity generation around the world.

Odds & Ends

The Son of Sam is sorry for what he did. (Naturally, the only place I could've possily found this website is the incomparably scattershot Web Curios.)