Within an hour the quiet in the outer room was disrupted by the first scream from Daniel's darkened sick room. "Sha're! Noooo!" his rescuers heard him wail. By the time Methos barreled into the room followed by Joe and the others, Daniel's fevered cries had fallen into a language that Methos alone understood. The oldest Immortal hurried forward to press Daniel back down onto his makeshift bed then bent to whisper soothingly to his former college roommate in the same language.

"What language is that?" Nick asked from the doorway where he could see what was going on in Daniel's sick room, but still keep an eye on Stephen and the door to their hidden sanctuary.

"Sounds Arabic," Duncan murmured to which Amanda and their unexpected rescuee, Dr. Raynor, both nodded agreement, "but I don' recognize the dialect."

"It's ancient Egyptian," Adam informed them quietly as he wiped a cool cloth across Daniel's face and neck. "A dialect spoken in the region around the city of Abydos about four thousand years ago."

"Sha're!" Daniel cried as he struggled against the restraining hands of MacCloud and Methos. Daniel's blue eyes held the shiny glazed look of one who wasn't really there. "Take me...Something of the host must remain."

Methos abruptly stumbled away from the delirious man as those words slipped from his lips. He felt the shocked stares of the others watching as the nearly unflappable oldest of the Immortals seemed to panic before their eyes. Daniel continued to rave in a mixture of languages as the eldest Immortal lay in a stunned sprawl on the floor. Memories rushed back to Methos one after another of his life before the Horsemen where, until now, his memories had begun. Abruptly, Methos scrambled back to Daniel's side. "The Chapa'ii," he said. "Daniel, the chapa'ii. Do you know where it is?"

"Stargate," Daniel mumbled.

"Yes, Daniel...the stargate," Methos confirmed. "Do you know where it is?"

"Under the mountain," Daniel mumbled.

"Under a mountain? That can't be right! We buried the thing in the desert not under a mountain." Methos protested though the delirious man on the bed couldn't understand. "Daniel, how did it get under a mountain?" Methos demanded. "Daniel, where is the chapa'ii? Have you opened it?" Methos shook the young archaeologist by his shoulders. "Daniel, have you opened it!?" Methos demanded.

"Adam, knock it off!" Joe growled as he pushed the ancient Immortal away from his nearly unconscious young friend. "What's gotten into you?"

"Leave be, Joseph!" Methos growled right back. "You don't know! If they've opened it..."

"Opened what, old man?" Duncan demanded.

Methos didn't answer though. Instead he stalked to the corner of the room sliding down to sit with his back tucked against the point where the two walls met. There he sat brooding for hours as he watched Joe tend to the delirious man in the bed who eventually quieted into fevered murmurs. Each of the rescuers and Raynor recognized some of the languages he spoke as Daniel continued to mumble incoherently. Methos understood more than the others though. He recognized the love words Daniel whispered to the unknown Sha're in a dialect lost thousands of years ago. A dialect lost, Methos knew, when the god Ra had emptied the city. Methos remembered and as the minutes ticked by more and more of his forgotten past returned. The past he now realized he had very deliberately chosen to forget almost as soon as the last of the goa'uld were driven from the planet and the chapa'ii buried deep in the sands of the desert. From those forgotten memories he recognized other words. Words spoken in the goa'uld tongue. He listened as Daniel told some unseen person that he was not a god. It might have been minutes or hours later when Daniel ordered "Jaffa, kree!" that Methos nearly jumped from his skin.

"You know what it is don't you?" Dr. Raynor suddenly demanded. "The chapa'ii. What is it?"

"Hasn't your curiosity caused enough trouble already, Dr. Raynor?" Adam asked quirking his eyebrow at the other man in a way that Mac and Joe recognized as Death coming out to play.

"Adam," Mac admonished sharply before Death's fun could start.

Methos shot them a disgruntled look then subsided back into his brooding contemplation of his former roommate. He wasn't listening to Daniel's fevered mutterings though. From a distant corner of his mind, Methos was listening to the sound of screams. For one who had once been Death and lived with the regrets and guilt of his actions, that wasn't so unusual, but for once it wasn't the screams of his victims Methos heard. The screams were his own.