~~~~~~~o0o~~~~~~~

Chapter One

Egyptomania

It was scorching that day, buffeted by the golden sands that enveloped the valley of the kings. The archaeological dig was well underway, with half the staff huddled under canopied tents on the surface while the other half toiled vainly in the sand. Small brushes and trowels cleared away the desert grain by grain, gently freeing artifacts that had been hidden from the sun for thousands of years. Pottery shards, clay beads still colored with earthen shades of red, blue, and green, small, trivial items that had survived a millennium through accidental preservation.

It was among these items that one worker sat, smaller than the rest, turbaned head bending near to the ground as their slender hands worked diligently on unearthing an ornate burial urn. It was light, and mostly intact, probably abandoned by ancient grave robbers with no interest in Canopic jars just like the rest of the odds and ends scattered around the empty, newly discovered tomb. Carefully, the worker brushed away the sand, freeing the edges of the container and revealing the stopper that sealed the jar closed. It was formed to look like a man's head. His skin was the same terra-cotta brown as the rest of the pot, paint chipped in some places where kohl outlined his dark, serious eyes. More careful excavation soon showed that he wore a striped red, yellow, and blue headpiece that exposed his ears. The worker observed a bit of chipped pottery under his chin, probably where a beard had been attached in the early New Kingdom.

"I guess it could even be as early as the 18th Dynasty." The worker's voice was feminine, and breathless from the suffocating heat that beat down on her back as she turned to wave over a nearby man with light brown hair and a small beard.

"Professor Yoshimori, I may need someone to transport this Canopic jar for me, it seems a bit fragile."

The professor ambled over and knelt down next to the young girl, eyes sparkling with pride at the careful procedure the future Egyptologist had accomplished. "I'll take care of it Aymi, this is quite a find! Unfortunate that it doesn't seem to be in a set with the other Sons of Horus, but we may be able to find a name."

"I certainly hope so." Aymi responded, her wide lavender eyes crinkling at the edges as she smiled at the professor. "It would be nice to know whose tomb was raided so heartlessly that even the liver was tossed outside. Hopefully we can find the other three jars to reunite Imsety with his brothers."

"Why not find the body while we're at it? It's ridiculous, the whole tomb is wiped out with no records of who it was constructed for. They must've been infamous indeed to have the wall murals chipped away so furiously."

Aymi nodded, a few light strands of hair falling out of her turban and into her eyes. The golden tips of her bangs glinted brightly in the afternoon sun.

"Well, hopefully your theory of a hidden burial chamber is accurate. After all, it's rare for an antechamber to be the only part of the tomb. At least… here in the valley. The Pharaohs were pretty affluent."

Professor Yoshimori sighed and patted her back, careful not to knock over the slender teenager when he did so.

"Yes, I hope so too. Sadly it looks like we won't have permission to break down that false wall until the Egyptian government has finished its survey. For now, at least we're making headway on the items buried here outside." As he spoke he gently removed the jar from the sand, turning the vessel delicately in his hands.

Aymi's eyes scanned the detailed base of the jar, observing the illustrations painted on the side and straining to make out a chipped cartouche carved on the side.
"Akhenam-?" She pronounced slowly, squinting at the jar. She felt a pang of guilt in her stomach, saddened that she could only make out half of the glyphs making up the name.
The professor, seeing this, shook his head in wonder. The girl was still a junior in high school but she already could read Ancient Hieroglyphics more accurately than many of the adults on his team, so he didn't doubt the validity of her translation. If he didn't know of her Japanese heritage, Yoshimori could've sworn she were Egyptian herself. Perhaps she had some ancestors from Egypt? He would have to ask her grandfather the next time they spoke…

"Though it's half the name, this is the closest we've gotten to discovering this Pharoh's identity. And, it does appear as though we're close to making a breakthrough. Maybe the government will surprise us and let us open the hidden chamber before you have to return home."

Somehow, Aymi doubted this statement. For one, the Egyptian Government was not known for being lenient when it came to their property. After all the mistreatment of their dead and their treasures during the 19th century's Egyptomania, they'd become much more protective and strict. Sometimes Aymi was happy about this, since it kept unethical things such as mummy "unwrapping parties" from ever happening again, but it was also a pain when working on digs with the professor. Not to mention, she had to leave for Japan the next day, so she wasn't holding out for any miracles.

"Aymi, I'm going to take this over to be photographed and tagged. Why don't you head down into the tomb and cool off for a bit? We need etchings of the few glyphs left on the wall and you may see something we've missed."

"Okay." She agreed, rising to her feet and brushing the sand off her khaki pants. Passing the other archeologists, Aymi walked across the valley until she was close enough to enter one of the canopy tents the team had set up for equipment. Some of the techniques used in recording their finds were more technologically advanced than others, such as the cameras used to photograph artifacts, but Professor Yoshimori was a firm believer in the "old ways are good ways" camp, which is why she retrieved some etching paper and charcoal then headed down into the tomb.

The stairs down were narrow and plain. The walls and stairs had, at one time, been painted bright hues of royal colors, but now only dull specks remained in the corners of the stairs and a few neglected mural bits not scraped off by the grave robbers.

'They must've had some vendetta against you, Pharoh." Aymi thought, bowing her head in hushed respect. She knew it had all happened thousands of years ago, but she felt bad for this man who had no doubt had immeasurable power when he was alive, yet was reduced to scattered body parts after his death.

'Kind of like Osiris.'

Aymi smiled sadly, perhaps the Pharoh wouldn't have minded so much to be like one of his gods… had his tomb not been raided in the process.

With that thought in mind, Aymi reached the bottom of the stairs. The antechamber was a rectangular space about as big as her living room at home. There were chunks of plaster on the floor and large chinks in the wall where chisels had been taken to whatever had been carved there, but aside from the piles of debris the room was vacant. Humming quietly with her voice bouncing back at her from the empty room, Aymi held up a large sheet of tracing paper and held it up against a portion of the wall that seemed to be less mutilated than the others. Carefully, she withdrew the charcoal stick from her pocket and used it to darken the paper, ridges from ancient writing raised darker on the page from her work. Patiently she documented the room this way, numbering pages in the order she made them, from left to right and from top to bottom.

Content, Aymi leaned back and observed her handiwork. 40 sheets of paper werecompletely filled in. Most of them revealed nothing, just some trenches and scratches in the wall, but a few had seemed promising so she'd set them aside. She picked them up now, carefully observing each one.

"Beloved ruler… beloved country… times of war… millennium… high advisor Akhenaden…" Aymi's eyebrows screwed together in thought. Akhenaden. The name was similar to the halved cartouche, but according to the context he was an advisor, not a Pharoh. However, one full name would be enough to make at least SOME understanding of the story, and Aymi was itching to figure it out. She spent the next few hours pouring over the etchings with scholarly persistence, managing to piece together a few possibilities. From hints in the broken text, she was fairly certain this Akhenaden was not only the Pharoh's advisor, but his brother. The Pharoh himself was an enigma. It was like someone had erased his name from history, much like another Pharoh with an infamous reputation.

'Maybe these two nameless Pharaohs are related? Maybe the brothers both ruled!' She thought, her inner fire sparking at the amazing revelation. 'Ancient family members of power often overthrew each other… since Akhenaden's name is left on the walls, it's possible that he's the one who chipped off his brother's name! He might have even killed him off and taken over the throne!'

Excited, Aymi scanned the pages until she was certain she had read everything still left on the walls of the ancient tomb. She was disappointed there were no other clues, but if she were right, it would mean she had the name of one of the nameless Pharaohs! Proud of herself but still not deluded enough to believe she'd figured anything out through pure speculation, Aymi knew she had much more research to do before she could be certain of anything.

Sighing, she released the pent up energy that had been building and shifted her left foot forward, privately showing respect for the Pharoh, whoever he may have been.

"Help me tell your story." She whispered. A chill ran down her spine.

~o0o~

Aymi emerged from the tomb a while later, a small frown painted on her lips. Her chest felt heavier than it had before she'd entered the dusty chamber, and she was confused with herself for this discovery. Why did she feel so odd, when she'd made such exciting discoveries?

Shaking her head to clear her thoughts, Aymi walked back towards the dig site, the sand crunching quietly beneath her work boots. Spotting the professor, the slender young woman quickened her step.

"Professor, you'll never believe what I found! Look at these etchings, I found the name of the advisor…" Immediately the two were deep in conversation, Aymi pointing out the glyphs backing up her theories and Yoshimori excitedly scribbling down notes in his field journal.

Before too long the pair became surrounded by a small regimen of archeologists, each more than willing to lend what they could to the conversation.

"-glyphs seem to support-"

"-might indeed loan some credibility to Aymi's theory-"

"-possible that the Pharoh's advisor might have governed in the place of any royal children remaining-"

Caught up in their conversation, they didn't notice the man who emerged from the tomb behind them. He stood in the doorway, hidden by the shadows of the valley, staring intently at the young woman currently surrounded by her coworkers.

A hot breeze wrapped his robes around his ankles and toyed with the white cape that was cinched around his shoulders, sunlight glinting off the large ankh dangling from a chord around his neck. He had a dark, native Egyptian complexion and unusually dull blue eyes that seemed impossibly empty.

Aymi shivered, the weight on her chest becoming oppressive and her knees buckled. She swayed and was caught by a number of hands before she could fall, though she still felt impossibly heavy.

" -symptoms of heat exhaustion." She faintly heard the professor say. "Let's get her inside so she can cool off."

The girl squeezed her eyes shut and allowed herself to be steered into one of the enclosed tents and lowered onto a cheap fold up chair.

She focused on her breathing, barely registering the sound of Professor Yoshimori telling her to take it easy, and the tent flap closing as her co-workers left her alone inside to recover.

It felt like an eternity that she sat there, waiting for the overwhelming heat to subside. Instead it pressed down harder on her chest, and she felt her mind go oddly watery, memories brushing against each other and rising to the surface one by one. The last thing she saw before she was overtaken was a pair of dull blue eyes, narrowed with seething anger.

Images of her life flashed through her mind unbidden, and Aymi experienced it all in a muddled dream-like state that had her gasping wildly for breath as the mysterious man pointed his ankh at her head.

Her mom, holding a chubby little hand as a toddler-aged Aymi waddled though the bright supermarket, laughing childishly at her little brother's silly made-up games.

Her grandpa, proudly showing his collection of Egyptian papyrus scrolls and an old gaming table that had come out of an ancient tomb.

Aymi herself, hugging her brother as he confided in her about the bullies who had been accosting him at school, and the day after when she had gotten the jerks expelled for breaking into the principal's office.

So many memories, some good and some bad, like the jealousy she had harbored when her brother had received a legitimate ancient Egyptian treasure from their Grandpa, when all she got was another book on hieroglyphics.

The flash of anger she'd felt, when she found out her dad had gone back to work and wouldn't be coming back until after Christmas. Next year.

The desperation when her hard work awarded her nothing, and the tears flowed as freely as the pouring rain flooding over her prone form.

In an instant, it was over, and she could move and breathe freely again. The weight was still there, firm but no longer oppressive. It felt like she had been twisted, violently, from the inside out.

The first thing she noticed was a bright, golden light that enveloped the figure in front of her. The shifty Egyptian man eyed her in shock, his hand still clutching the ankh that was pointed between Aymi's eyes.

The second thing she noticed was that the light seemed to be radiating from her chest. She looked down, paling when she noticed that her long sleeved khaki shirt had been unbuttoned, supposedly by the stranger. That, however, was surprisingly not the most disturbing part. Beneath her shirt, sitting directly on her skin, was a wide golden collar that hugged tightly around her neck and covered her chest like armour. It shimmered with power, emitting the strange light that was slowly growing dimmer by the second. Hieroglyphics covered every inch of the collar, and her lilac eyes grew wide as she skimmed over the insanely complicated protective spells that they described. A single cartouche decorated the center of the collar.

"Pharaoh Akhenamkhanen..." The stranger breathed in shell-shocked awe.

Aymi didn't have time to process any of what had just happened. Her eyes were already rolling up into her head as she slumped back against her chair. As she lost consciousness her arms fell lifelessly to her sides.

~~~~~~~o0o~~~~~~~

Still gaping, the mysterious Egyptian man stepped towards her and reached out towards the collar, reverently stopping himself before he could touch the golden jewelry. He'd tried that mere moments before, and that was what resulted in him being ruthlessly pushed back in a flash of golden light.

It had been hard enough for him to use the ankh to enter the girl's mind. It was like pushing through thick syrup, even with his target's seemingly weakened state. The little he was able to see consisted of mere snippets of memory that somehow obscured her soul room, of which he could only make out a few shimmers of gold and the aroma of lilies. He'd been left stumbling through half-formed scenes and had come crashing back into reality, tightly clutching the Millennium Key, convinced the thieving girl was tricking his mind somehow.

Now, he shook himself and looked back at the door to the tent. The girl's comrades would be coming back to check on her soon, and they could not find him here.

His gaze shifted back to the girl.

She was a mystery. At first, he had thought she had simply stolen the only remaining treasure from the tomb. But now...

The man lowered his head in a curt bow, his left foot slowly shifting forward.

"Until we meet again."

He turned on his heel and disappeared out into the heat, his thoughts raging wildly within his mind.