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“Keep digging, for fuck’s sake!” Derek screamed at the panting, sweating crew, his voice reverberating off the close-set stone walls. “I’m not paying you to stand around!” The mouse stormed out of the subterranean dig site, back into the recently unearthed vestibule to the ancient temple ruins and hub for the excavation effort. Retrieving a loose cigarette from the breast pocket of his khaki shirt, he lit it and took a deep drag, leaning on a wall displaying an intricately carved mural. Glancing at a depiction of some sort of bull-headed deity causing a rainstorm to fall on the farmland of an appreciative populace, the art style no better than a child could have made, he scowled and wiped the mud from his boots on the chipped surface. “Fucking worthless,” he muttered, about the work crew, the mural, the whole expedition. Time was running out. Only a few days ago, one of the locals had stumbled upon the entrance to the ancient temple, unearthed deep within the jungle during an earthquake. Long thought lost to history, it had seemingly reappeared just like [i]that[/i], after decades of well-organized expeditions had failed. Derek had paid handsomely for the directions to the temple, but it wouldn’t take long for better planned, more [i]legitimate[/i] expeditions to arrive. By the time anyone else got there he hoped to be long gone, nabbing anything valuable before some boring museum got a hold of it. Technically, that would make him a foreign national stealing a country’s history, but his buyers didn’t give a shit and that was all that mattered. [i]If he found anything.[/i] The work crew had unearthed plenty of stone pillars, monuments, and statues of various stern-looking deities, but that meant fuck-all if it wasn’t small enough to stuff in a sack and smuggle out of the country undetected. So far, there was not a whiff of gold, silver, jewels, [i]anything[/i] of value. The site was going to be the find of the century for whatever expedition made it there first after he was gone, probably charge tourists out the ass for tours when it got all nice and cleaned up. Derek kicked up a spray of dirt and pebbles, huffing in anger. He was already out a fair amount of money to pay his good-for-nothing crew, double their usual rate to account for the condensed timeline. The ingrates. Tossing his cigarette on the ground, he grabbed a flashlight and stomped into one of the rooms excavated the previous day. Maybe the crew had overlooked something, and he just needed a fresh set of eyes to locate the key to his future and the haul of a lifetime. The room was easily the size of a small home, its ceiling stretching high into the shadows his flashlight could not pierce. An elevated square stone structure stood in the middle, some sort of pool or bathing area if he could hazard a guess. More murals lined the walls, depicting feminine forms in various states of undress around bodies of water. Not titillating in the slightest since the art was so poor, but maybe good enough to chip off and sell to some freaks out there if nothing else turned up. A thick layer of dirt still coated any surface within reach. He had instructed the crew to work quickly; if anything of value was not immediately apparent, move on. Derek ran his free hand along the far wall, fingers digging into each crack. He paused near the corner, brows furrowing. There was a seam, a brief vertical indentation at eye level running to the floor. He wiped at the millennia of accumulated dirt, a crevasse of some sort taking shape under the glow of his flashlight. In minutes, he created enough space to pry his fingers into the gap. He found a handhold and pulled. A groan of stone on stone reverberated in the room, and dust fell from between the gap. The outline of an entrance took shape. Derek’s heart leapt as he glanced back at the cleared walkway to the veranda. If the crew had heard the noise, none had approached yet. In hiring them, he had promised a percentage of anything he found and sold. But if he found treasure and never told them, they’d be shit out of luck, right? He’d get to keep it all. Propping his flashlight on the stone surface, he readjusted his grip and pulled harder, a doorway taking shape inch by hard-fought inch. The growing gap revealed nothing, the interior a complete darkness that hadn’t been disturbed in ages. When there was enough space to squeeze inside, he stopped and sat on the elevated bath, sweaty and panting. When he recovered, he collected his flashlight and sidled inside the entrance. An ancient staircase stretched down into the darkness, the ceiling close enough to touch. The surrounding walls were covered in depictions of a vast underworld, of horned demons torturing wailing sinners and a bull laughing and lording over it all. Rivers of blood flowed through the scene, and winged beasts attacked anyone who tried to escape. The supernatural was bullshit, Derek knew, but his mouth grew dry all the same as he descended the steps, alone and enveloped in darkness. He reached a landing soon enough, which opened into a large room filled with dozens of stone caskets perched on platforms. Each casket contained symbols in a language he didn’t care to understand and depictions of beings he could only assume were royalty. The figures on most caskets were surrounded by prodigious displays of wealth: seated on golden thrones, adorned in copious jewelry, overlooking landscapes of luxury. [i]Jackpot.[/i] He approached the nearest casket and set his flashlight on the platform, angling the light on the edge of the stone lid. The top of the casket contained an uncannily realistic drawing of a mouse woman’s face, her expression severe. She wore diamond earrings and a collar necklace containing a rainbow of gemstones. Assuming she had been buried with such finery, and the other caskets followed suit, he was about to make out with a serious haul. Giddy and already counting his money, he found an indentation in the bottom corner of the casket lid and lifted. It was solid stone and his muscles ached, but in time the lid gave way and he raised it enough to send it to the floor where it broke into a million pieces. The woman’s smoky eyes remained whole and stared up at him. Collecting his flashlight, Derek looked inside the coffin and gave a low whistle. “That’s one dusty bitch.” A desiccated corpse resided within, dressed in fine purple robes interlaced with golden thread. Her hands lay folded across her chest, each finger bearing a glittering ring. She wore the collar necklace depicted on the shattered lid, the string still whole despite the great passage of time. Even in death her face had a regal countenance, with a serious, stoic expression somehow still present as her body wasted away. A small part of Derek’s brain half expected her to leap out of the casket, screaming an unholy shriek as she tore him to pieces for defiling her final resting place. But ancient curses were bullshit, a relic of cheap monster movies. Still, he couldn’t help but hesitate before he reached inside and tore the necklace from her remains. Propping up his flashlight, he ran his fingers over the array of pristine gemstones, whistling at the sight. Even one gem would fetch a hefty price, to say nothing of the dozens that made up the necklace. His life was about to change, he could just picture it. Mansions, every luxury and indulgence he ever dreamed of, the finest of wine and women whenever he wanted. On a lark, he draped the necklace across his chest and tied the string behind his neck. It would all be sold, sure, but why not enjoy the spoils for a moment? Derek grew flushed and broke out into a heavy sweat which soaked through his fur and clothing in moments. Body weak, he leaned hard against the platform, fumbling with his buttons then throwing off his shirt. Was it something he ate? [i]That figures[/i], he thought. [i]Discover the find of a lifetime then immediately get the shits from the locals’ shit food.[/i] He waited for the wave of nausea to follow, but it never did. Instead, [i]something[/i] moved under his skin. It felt like scores of ants were marching just below the surface. Panic rising, he scratched at his fur, two hands nowhere near enough to relieve every itch. Deeper than his skin, his body was changing, every detail caught in the harsh glow of his flashlight. His arms and shoulders, muscles hardened from a lifetime of physical labor, lost their definition, becoming soft and lean. His hair, an ever-present buzz to keep his head cool in the humid jungle, shot upward and outward into thick flowing locks that cascaded across his shoulders and down to the small of his back. The collar necklace, the only adornment remaining on his torso, rose, pressed upward by two billowing breasts burgeoning beneath. His pants grew uncomfortably tight from an onslaught of growth, squeezed by his widening hips, thickening thighs, and rounding rear. He dropped to his knees, struggling to remove his belt to relieve the building pressure. When he finally forced his pants off, snaking his tail out, he was greeted with a lessening motion within his underwear. Breathing hard, he pinched and pulled at his underwear, growing woozy at the sight. His manhood was shrinking, now barely as long and thick as his finger and disappearing with each passing second. His balls followed suit, deflating like balloons until they faded from sight altogether. He clutched at his crotch, as if holding his decreasing member would somehow stop the process. It slipped away between his fingers. When he lifted his hands away, he was greeted with a yonic opening, partially obscured by a shroud of curly hair. Derek screamed then stopped, clutching at his throat as a foreign, much higher pitched voice not his own had come forth. He spied the collar necklace draped atop his prominent breasts and connected the dots. Rising to his feet, he rushed to the casket and worked at the knot he had tied at the back of his neck. “Stupid fucking ancient curses,” he muttered in another’s voice. The simple knot he had tied just a minute before refused to come undone. “Fine, you want your shit back, bitch? Give me my fucking body back and I’ll-” Derek froze, hands slowing falling to his side. In his mind’s eye, he saw the temple as it was long ago: the lavish opulence of its royalty, the nightly dancing and revelry, the temple grounds extending for miles, a dynasty without end. Near the top of the temple, in a wing that perfectly caught the morning sun, were the quarters of the priestess Shaela, confidante and soothsayer to the royal family. Though the sun shone brightly and the farms yielded abundance, her astral encounters with the gods brought about by the ceremonial smoke portended that even the great summer must end. But she needn’t fear, as the end of an age may not mean its true end. She worked night and day to imbue the royal jewelry with great reviving magics and a piece of the owner’s soul. Great expanses of time would pass, she knew, but the dynastic royalty, and herself as its humble servant, would be back. She even spied the moment of her rebirth, years away, of a detestable grave robber reaping what he sowed. Shaela breathed deeply of the stagnant, dry air of the tomb, lungs working for the first time in millennia. She stretched and delighted in a body young again, the aching joints and brittle bones of advanced age relegated to her leathery remains lying in her coffin. The sight of her dead self did not shock her, as everything was proceeding according to plan. As the seconds ticked by, every living moment a gift, the thoughts and memories of this body’s previous owner faded like a bad aftertaste, lost forever. Good riddance. She eyed the array of caskets lying in the tomb, recalling from Derek’s memories the work crew digging out the temple’s main floor. Contact with just one bit of jewelry was all she needed to bring back the royal family, set to rule again as the gods intended. She smirked, approaching the nearest casket. [i]Prepare, world, for the return of your rightful rulers.[/i]