At first I was too stunned to do anything but watch as Bast launched her green war machine into the middle of the carriers.
She slashed one carrier to pieces with a single swipe, then stepped on another and flattened him into a metal pancake. The other two carriers attacked her holographic legs, but their metal clubs bounced harmlessly off the ghostly light with showers of sparks.
Meanwhile Sadie stood in front of the obelisk with her arms raised, shouting: “Open, you stupid piece of rock!”
Finally I drew my sword. My hands were shaking. I didn’t want to charge into battle, but I felt like I should help. And if I had to fight, I figured having a twenty-foot-tall glowing cat warrior on my side was the way to do it. “Sadie, I—I’m going to help Bast. Keep trying!”
“I am!”
I ran forward just as Bast sliced the other two carriers apart like loaves of
bread. With relief, I thought: Well, that’s it.
Then all four carriers began to re-form. The flat one peeled himself off the pavement. The sliced ones’ pieces clicked together like magnets, and the carriers stood up good as new.
“Carter, help me hack them apart!” Bast called. “They need to be in smaller pieces!”
I tried to stay out of Bast’s way as she sliced and stomped. Then as soon as she disabled a carrier, I went to work chopping its remains into smaller pieces. They seemed more like Play-Doh than metal, because my blade mashed them up pretty easily.
Another few minutes and I was surrounded by piles of coppery rubble. Bast made a glowing fist and smashed the sedan into kindling.
“That wasn’t so hard,” I said. “What were we running for?”
Inside her glowing shell, Bast’s face was coated with sweat. It hadn’t occurred to me that a goddess could get tired, but her magic avatar must’ve taken a lot of effort.
“We’re not safe yet,” she warned. “Sadie, how’s it coming?”
“It’s not,” Sadie complained. “Isn’t there another way?”
Before Bast could answer, the bushes rustled with a new sound—like rain, except more slithery.
A chill ran up my back. “What...what is that?”
“No,” Bast murmured. “It can’t be. Not her.”
Then the bushes exploded. A thousand brown creepy-crawlies poured from the woods in a carpet of grossness—all pincers and stinging tails.
I wanted to yell, “Scorpions!” But my voice wouldn’t work. My legs started trembling. I hate scorpions. They’re everywhere in Egypt. Many times I’d found them in my hotel bed or shower. Once I’d even found one in my sock.
“Sadie!” Bast called urgently.
“Nothing!” Sadie moaned.
The scorpions kept coming—thousands upon thousands. Out of the woods a woman appeared, walking fearlessly through the middle of the arachnids. She wore brown robes with gold jewelry glinting around her neck and arms. Her long black hair was cut Ancient Egyptian–style with a strange crown on top. Then I realized it wasn’t a crown—she had a live, supersize scorpion nesting on her head. Millions of the little nasties swirled around her like she was the center of their storm.
“Serqet,” Bast growled.
“The scorpion goddess,” I guessed. Maybe that should’ve terrified me, but I was already pretty much at my maximum. “Can you take her?”
Bast’s expression didn’t reassure me.
“Carter, Sadie,” she said, “this is going to get ugly. Get to the museum. Find the temple. It may protect you.”
“What temple?” I asked.
“And what about you?” Sadie added.
“I’ll be fine. I’ll catch up.” But when Bast looked at me, I could tell she wasn’t sure. She was just buying us time.