GOMEN MINNA-SAN! I'M SO SORRY! I KNOW I PROMISED THIS CHAPTER EARLY BUT.....ARGH! Well, with summer things happen and you get sidetracked and blagh! I apologize. You can beat me into a bloody pulp and there will be no consequences.

Millennium: bwahahaa. Fear the keyboard. : D I can't believe you spent 40 minutes typing up that review! Well I can, but I can't believe you would take that much time! : ) now there is a good example of devotion.

Jedi Spiderfan: lol! No worries. How were the DBZ fics? Hope you enjoy the chapter!

Hiei Dragon Girl: Why thank you! lol. It's just one of those unexplainable things. Oh yes, I have to read your next chapter!! I'll try to remember to do it tonight, but if I don't never fear, I'll get around to it. Thank you so much for reviewing!

Caks: Oh you're so kind. ; ) Ah yes. Mysterious. YEAH! We should have a poker night! And I'll win loads of popcorn and whatever else we bet with. Thanks for your review!! And btw, your poems are kicking major ass!

Still Anonymous: Hello again! Sorry for not updating. We had a huge storm and my power went out, hence the computers were screwed, and my internet was down. You never told me what you wanted to be called. There was just a blank there. Do you have a preference? Thanks so much for your review and support!

yamis grl: Ah poor Yami. He's so clueless. What happened to your crafty mind? (sigh) well, we can hope that someday he will regain his genius. Thanks for reviewing!

Nandia: Hey! You're from Greece? WOW! That's fantastic! I have a known international reader! (jumps around) Thank you so much for reviewing, I hope you continue reading and enjoying the story!

Pharaohs Angel: Thank you! It's awesome to have some new voices around here. Not that I don't love my old reviewers. I'm so happy that you like the fic! Please feel free to read as much as you like! : )

Ente: Okaaaaay. When we left of before that interruption, Yami and Seto had just faced off. Wonderful. I'm a little hazy about what I want to happen now so if this seems dragged out I humbly apologize. Anyway, onto the chapter. Bakura: Did anyone see me in the Egyptian arc yet? I am FABULOUS! Yami: Yeah. You're a psychopath. Ente: Ignore them. As I was saying.....

Chapter 7 (my favorite number!)

As the first of Ra's rays began to illuminate the new day, a silent battle came to an abrupt conclusion. The desert wind swept up the parched sand, pelting it against figures retreating to their homes as well as those just beginning to emerge from them. Beneath a sagging roof, Seto pulled himself to his feet, swiftly straightening his cloak to make sure nothing underneath it could be seen. He inclined his head slightly to the man adjacent him and motioned to the coins scattered between them.

"Since there was no victor," he said evenly "I would not feel right to take the prize. Therefore I leave it to you. Do with it whatever you feel is best."

Yami raised his eyebrows at the prince's retreating figure. He didn't want his gold back? Well he certainly had enough. Yami swept the coins back into his bag and turned to leave. Casting a final smirk to the remaining onlookers, he left the shelter in the direction of the city, flipping his cloak up behind him.

A small Egyptian girl stepped out into the early morning light, pulling aside a cloth draped across her front doorframe. Her tattered skirt brushed against scratched calves as she walked out onto the stoop in front of her one roomed home. As she took in a small breath of the dry air, a sparkle of something on the step below her attracted her attention. Stooping down she brushed a handful of sand aside to reveal three golden coins stacked neatly in front of her. With wide eyes she scooped them up and rushed inside to show her parents but in her haste, missed the similar golden shimmers before every door that could be seen from where she stood.

Seto looked quickly over his shoulder as he approached the palace to be sure he wasn't being tailed by anyone. The dark outline of his personal guard several meters behind was the only one following the same path. Satisfied, the prince turned back and continued trekking his way around the marble building until he reached a wall with a trelice leading up to a wide window above a low awning. Glancing behind him one last time, he grabbed hold of the supple wooden beams and darted artfully up the lattice with a skill and confidence that can only come from practice. As Seto pushed his foot against the highest beam preparing to jump into his window, he looked up, and almost fell back into the morning air. Standing at the window as though expecting him, was the pharaoh. Seto cautiously took a step back down towards the ground only to receive a poisonous glare from the man looming above him. Grimacing he stepped through the window and met his fathers smoldering gaze.

"Sneaking out to wallow with the common filth?" the pharaoh hissed sticking his face directly up against his son's, so close their noses were almost touching. "Do you know what the people would say if they noticed who you were?"


Yami fell back onto the sand folding his arms behind his head. 'This is really a wonderful way to spend my days,' he thought sarcastically burrowing his toes into the warm sand. (A/N: There is no synonym for sand! If anyone can think of one I will be amazed. Anyway.....) He closed his eyes against the blinding light filling the air and let himself once again cross the border between dreams and reality.

Foggy shapes spun past him, their hazy forms calling out to him with strangely familiar voices. White walls flew by and bright figures danced past. A particular shadow stood at his shoulder never moving on. It wore a bright flowing dress but other than the fact that it was female, Yami could not distinguish any features. Soft music played across his ears, stirring something in his memory that had almost been forgotten. Yami blinked, the visions disappearing to be replaced but the blue sky he had left. But now, there was someone standing over him. Someone so uncannily similar to the dream people that he had to wonder if he was truly awake. A man draped in creamy white robes was peering down at him, a smiling gracing his dark face.

"Ra em pet[1]," he said casually, motioning towards the fiery orb above them. Yami raised an eyebrow in confusion as he casually wrapped a hand around the hilt of a dagger strapped to his side.

"Now really," the man said straightening up. "There's no need to cut me open when I'm the one who took the effort to find you." Yami glowered.

"And why did you take the effort Annu?[2]" he growled pulling himself gracefully to his feet. The priest looked at him for a long moment before replying.

Seto clenched his teeth as he felt an open hand come crashing down on his face and leave it stinging. He looked steadily at his father, bracing himself for another blow. This time a fist connected with his chest and the prince crashed to the floor knowing it would leave a mark that no one would be able to see beneath his robes. As his father's fury rained down upon him, Seto let his mind drift away. Away from the pain being inflicted upon him, away from the fear people showed when the saw him. All he wanted, was someone who didn't care about nobility, someone who would understand...

Yami sat expressionless as Mahado spoke. He didn't move when he heard of the pharaoh's ruthlessness, he didn't blink when he heard of the countless murders. The priest looked at him with an expression that was half irritation and half confusion. Yami raised an eyebrow at him.

"I know all this," he said rigidly. "Why do you expect a reaction from something I already know and live with every day of my existence?" Mahado gave him a calculating look.

"He nearly killed his son today." The priest smiled grimly as he watched shock, sympathy, and rage play over the young man's features in quick succession. He wasn't heartless after all. Life had been cruel to him without question, and he had hardened from the experiences, hidden himself away so that none of that devastation could reach him again.

"What?" Yami whispered. "Why would he kill his only son?" "Actually he wasn't trying to kill him," Mahado replied solemnly.

"The pharaoh was punishing him for disgracing himself by associating with people of a lower class." He paused and looked pointedly at Yami who glared.

"Even if I happened to meet the priest, prince, whatever he is, that doesn't make me involved with how he is treated. Why should I give a damn if he dies? Maybe then we'd actually get a decent ruler!" Yami paused and took a deep breath before plunging back into the torrent of feeling rushing through him, tearing up old things he had tried to forget. "Why come to me of all people? Me who would kill all of them as soon as I was given the opportunity! Why? Why!? WHY!?" Yami fell to his knees and drove his fist into the sand creating a deep crater in the parched earth. "They killed my family," he cried so softly it was almost not spoken at all. "They took away everything that made life worth living. But I can't die!" he cried in anguish. "I can't follow them because I promised! I promised, I promised, I promised..." Mahado looked down at him, watched as his shoulders shook with deep racking sobs so powerful the priest feared he would be ripped apart. Yami choked, taking a deep breath as he regained his composure. He lifted his head to look up into the face of the man standing above him. Mahado looked down at the young man before him, his hands clenched in the gritty earth, his whole body taut with grief. Blood red eyes glared up as tears slid slowly down his face. "Don't you even try to make me feel sympathy for them any of them! They don't know what it is to be hurt, to have your heart wrenched out and ripped to shreds but to have to keep on living. That," he choked out, "is more agonizing than any harm anyone could possible inflict." He stared down at the ground though he did not really see it. "I'm so alone," he whispered.

"If you would open your ears you would see that you are not." Yami drew in a sharp breath his eyes filling with desperate hope as looked up at the priest.

"Play no mind games here sir."

"A moment ago you asked me why you should care if the prince dies, and I shall give you the answer.... He shares your blood." Yami snapped to his feet and shoved his face into Mahado's.

"Don't," he hissed, "even joke about something like that." The priest took a breath. He had feared that Yami would put up a defensive stance. It was only going to make convincing him more difficult.

"You don't have to believe what I say. All I ask is that you listen." Yami glowered but didn't move away. Without anymore hesitation Mahado launched into the explanation of Yami's past. He recounted Yami's birth, his biological mother's death, the pharaoh's murder, Kaigo's adoption of Yami and how Yami's uncle had seized the throne and driven the country almost as far down as was possible. He told Yami how he had watched him struggle through his childhood, how he had witnessed his cousin's abuse and yet been unable to help either of them...until now. Throughout the whole narrative Yami's face had been steadily filled with both confusion and frustration finally giving in to downright fury.

"Now that you know who you really are," Mahado said quietly, "you have a responsibility to your people." Yami cracked.

"To my people!" he thundered. "My people! Since when have I even been one of them? Since when has one of them shown me even the slightest bit of concern? What do I owe them? Nothing! I have a responsibility to myself and to no one else! No one!" He paused half a second for breath. "Just because you have told me where I came from doesn't change who I am! I am nobody, and no one in this country would ever follow me if I had the foolishness to get up and proclaim that I was a supposedly dead prince."

"That is where you are wrong my friend. Most would follow anyone who stood to help them. You already have done that, but now is the time to put aside your mask and discover who you are." Yami almost screamed in frustration.

"I already know who I am! It's the same as it ever was and I refuse to be a pawn in your attempt to save these people. If it's so damn important then go save them yourself. I don't need to go performing acts of heroism to fulfil my life!"

"Then why do you help them?"

"By Ra are you even listening to me! I don't want to be pharaoh, I am satisfied with who I am!" Blinded by rage Yami snatched his bag and sprinted off toward the city. Mahado did not attempt to follow him.

"You cannot run away from fate," he said softly. "It will find you, no matter where you run to."

[1] Ra em pet- the sun is in the sky

[2] Annu- High Priest

Ente: Tada! Again, I'm sorry for taking so long to post this. I just got back from the beach where there was not computer! Can you imagine? I almost didn't survive. I was going to add more onto this about what happens when Yami reaches the city but I decided to just post this and save that for the next chapter. I'm actually surprised. I think there are only going to be three or four more chapters. Anyway-
Yuugi: R!
Yami: .....
Yuugi: (nudge)
Yami: Oh! E.
Ryou: V!
Bakura: Somebody shoot me.
Yuugi and Ryou: IEW!
Ente: Thanks for the enthusiasm guys. : ) Listen to them, they're usually pretty smart. Review perdy please! I promise to have the next chapter up faster than this one. Sorry for that again. Thank you for reading!
Yuugi: So when do I enter the plot?
Ente: (dies)
Yami: (picks up Yuugi and carries him into his room)
Bakura: Well now that that's over you can close this window or just move on to another site....what are you still here for? The chapter's over. GO!
Yuugi: (bursts out of his room) And don't forget to review!
Everyone: (dies)

July 29, 2004.