Preface: How do you go back? How do you go back to something you knew wasn't right, even though it was all you knew? What do you do when you're shown that there is something more, something to fight for?

Memory is a way of holding onto the things you love, the things you are, the things you never want to lose.

The Wonder Years

Chapter 1

"Sir! Look what I just found, a full pot!" The boy was not much older than ten, round faced and innocent. He used his brush and hand pick to gently pry the pot from the ground. The pot only had a few cracks and chips, nearly perfect. The pot was decorated with faded pictures of men and women clad in gold, surrounded by hieroglyphs. The boy brushed a few more specks of dirt from the pot and held it up to the burly, plum faced, heavy set man who had walked up behind him.

"Well done my boy! Very well done, you're better than half the men on the dig, you are!" Mr. Alton beamed at the boy, who could see the pride radiating in the large man's eyes. The man ran a dirty hand through his short, grimy blonde hair. The boy watched as the man pulled out a handkerchief from the back pocket of his trousers and used the filthy rag to buff the pot gently before using it to wipe the beads of sweat forming at his brow. The boy turned back to his digging, barely listening as the old man whispered, "Oh Benjamin, how is it possible? King George himself would be pleased."

Something loud and clanking broke Benjamin from his memories. He opened his ruby eyes to see the flight attendant pushing the drink cart past him down the aisle. As much as it bothered Ben to not be polite he closed his eyes, pretending to sleep as the woman went past. She was lucky; the stuffy red-eye from Seattle to Cairo would have been hell, literally, if Ben and his companions hadn't had their "drinks" before.

Benjamin Jonathan Montgomery had been a vampire for nearly eighty years. In those eighty years, he had all but forgotten about most of his human memories. He'd never experienced a memory like this before. It had played like an old black and white movie being projected at some old movie theater; only this movie theater brought back the painful repressed memories that people were glad to have forgotten. The memory was crystal clear, nothing like the normal fuzzy memories he had of being a human.

After the woman moved down the aisle, he opened his eyes. He shook his head once to shake out the memory. Was it real? Had it really happened? To Ben, it felt real, like it had happened just a moment ago.

Ben leaned forward in his chair and started massaging his temples. Useless gesture or not, the simple motion seemed to relax his mind. It must have just been a fluke. He really didn't remember his human life that accurately. After all, the incident in Washington had only just happened a few days before. All that activity and interaction with others of their kind must have surely put his mind in overdrive.

A soft velvet hand grabbed his left one, and gently pulled it into the lap of an olive skinned woman. Her ruby red eyes matched his, but had a depth as large as an ocean. Her round face was framed by a wave of black hair that seemed to sparkle in the light.

It took everything he had to muster a smile real enough to put Tia's mind at ease. As much as he loved her, it wasn't something he was quite ready to talk about, let alone explain. How do you explain something you weren't even sure of yourself?

Tia wasn't convinced. She brought her other hand to Ben's face, caressing and pulling it closer to her. As their eyes leveled, her gaze hardened, making it clear that once alone, he was going to have to talk. Ben kissed her lightly, affirming that he got the message and closed his eyes.

Mr. Alton was standing in his canvas tent over a large map on an even bigger table. He turned to look at whoever had just entered his tent. Upon recognizing the intruder, he broke into a large welcoming smile.

The speed in which Ben opened his eye's startled Tia. It wasn't often that anything at all bothered Ben. Just as Tia opened her mouth to question him, Ben spoke. "It's nothing darling, just feeling all of the air currents. In fact, we'll be hitting a patch of turbulence soon that you, Amun and Kebi refuse to let me manipulate. Not to worry."

It was true, they were about to hit some turbulence, and it was true that his companions had forbid him from using his gift while in the air.

"We don't know what could happen if you messed with the atmosphere while the pilots were trying to fly! Let the humans operate without interference Benjamin!" Amun had been very adamant since the beginning about keeping his talents under wraps.

Most of that had gone to the wind since what had happened in Washington. To Ben, Amun had been worried for nothing, and meeting the Volturi hadn't changed a thing. He was flying home to Cairo, not Volterra.

Tia squeezed Ben's hand, oblivious to the undercurrent of his thoughts. Ben knew that this wasn't over, but for now he had more time to work out what he would say.

Ben settled back into his chair, staring blankly out the window.

"Benjamin, son, come over here. Can you tell me what you think of this?" Mr. Alton was motioning towards a boy with midnight black hair and brilliant honey brown eyes who looked to be in his early teens. He seemed to be holding up what looked like a rock with old hieroglyphics on it.

The boy made his way across the dig site, careful not to inhibit the work of the other archeologists. He was older now, eighteen and strong from laboring around dig site after dig site. His hard work was evident by the sweat glistening off his shirtless body. If the boy hadn't had a strong English accent, the locals could have mistaken his tan as him being one of their own.

As he reached Mr. Alton, he smiled as he examined the rock before taking it. The hieroglyphs were old, certainly older than anything he'd ever seen, especially during this dig.

The second the rock touched the boy's hand it grew hot to his touch, but nothing about its appearance had changed. The rock had four triangles on it, two normal but one upside down, and two with a line through it again with one upside down. To the boy it seemed like rock was speaking to him. He felt different than when he felt the normal hunches he got while touching the earth. The rock seemed to be actually speaking a foreign tongue, one that the boy, somehow, understood.

The boy stood completely still. The rock seems to be saying 'Hello Benjamin, we've waited a long time to speak to you,' but it was absolutely absurd for a rock to speak, let alone say hello.

"Sir, I have no idea what this is, it doesn't look like normal Egyptian hieroglyphs. Should we call my father to translate it?" The boy asked without taking his eyes off the symbols. He was uneasy about the possibility of calling his father, but he felt like he had to protect himself. The rock was still speaking to him.

The boy was oblivious to how closely Mr. Alton was examining his reaction. Mr. Alton knew full well that this wasn't an artifact from the dig site. Mr. Alton smiled to himself and swelled with pride, he knew it, the boy wasn't just lucky after all; his destiny might one day supersede the field of archeology. Mr. Alton thought that most certainly the boy would find a better life then this, the boy deserved it.

"No son, I don't think we need to bother your father, he's a busy man…" Mr. Alton stopped speaking abruptly. He'd been interrupted by a loud and sudden bang, followed by a series of confused and panicked shouts in Arabic. Mr. Alton seized the rock from the boy, "Run Benjamin! They are here! Go! Now! Find your father, hide!"

The boy had no idea who "they" were, but ran just like his mentor had told him to. He looked back as he ran, to spare one last look at Mr. Alton before finding his father.

The boy stopped mid-run frozen in terror Mr. Alton was on the ground, struggling, pinned by what looked like a man. The man had Mr. Alton pinned by just his knees, no small accomplishment. The boy watched as the man bent his head down towards Mr. Alton's neck and watched in horror as Mr. Alton ceased to struggle against his attacker. Suddenly the ground beneath the boy's feet was urging him to run, run as fast as he could. The boy, too shocked to deny the pull, ran as fast as the ground could carry him home.

"Ben?"

Tia's voice seemed to wake Ben. It took him a few moments to realize that there was an excess of movement happening around him. They must have landed.

Ben stood up, and closed his eyes one more time to make sure that all the traces of the memory were gone.

He opened his eyes and turned to face Tia, "I know I have a lot to tell you, but we need to find Amun and Kebi and get home first." He held his hand out to her, willing her with his eyes to accept.

Tia considered Ben for a moment, and weaved her hand into his. "I trust you Ben."

As they stepped foot on the gravel of Cairo, he felt a familiar nudge of from below his feet. The feeling still felt the same as always, loyalty, consistence, patience. But this time there was an undercurrent of sadness and urgency Ben rarely felt. Ben projected back a feeling of confusion. He didn't feel another nudge the rest of the way home.