Sure the title is a little ironic, and maybe overdone,but I like it even thou I don't own it. or the other material I'm using in this.

The Prince of Egypt

"AAAHHHH!"

Ka tag!

The shrouded figure had drawn out a large dagger from his robes and thrashed it at the wall behind him.

A tiny deformed Spear Cretin screamed as he died being nailed to the wall.

"What in the world is that?!" Solomon exclaimed starring at the demon.

Before another word could be said the stranger knocked the table off its legs and dragged the old man and the boys to one side. The windows suddenly crashed and exploded toward the interior sending hundreds of glass fragments inside.

Balls the burning fire crashed through the walls as screams echoed in from the streets.

"What's going on grandpa!?" Yugi fearfully asked before turning to the stranger.

Solomon glanced out through a shattered window to see the gleaming helmets and shining steel. "Pharaoh's soldiers?! But why are they here? What do they want?"

"They want the boy. Same as I do only dead." The drifter said as he gathered the spilt food all over the floor into a travel bag.

"But why Yug?" Joey demanded holding onto the younger boy protectively.

Stranger: "Because they believe that he's the lost prince."

Joey: "Say what!?"

Yugi heard the desperate cries of the people outside. Immediately he pulled away from his brother's grasp, "Come on, those soldiers are hurting our friends!"

Joey followed Yugi to the upper rooms of their home.

Outside an infantryman had an elderly woman holding a baby cornered by a hut. The soldier was about to jab his weapon in when a stone was thrown from the air and knocked him out cold. The woman ran away without a second to loose.

The two boys were standing by the window with leather swings and rounded stones at hand. They launched and threw years of collected rocks toward the soldiers nearing the building or too close to a fleeing neighbor. "Come on Yug, at this rate we'll be throwing figs at them before they're gone." Joey said launching another stone at a soldier's head knocking him out.

"I'm not a good a shot like you. I'm lucky just to hit them."

"Just distract them long enough so our people can get away."

A thundering crash rumbled below as screams rose from the floorboards underneath their feet. "Grandpa!" they exclaimed at the same time. They raced toward the stairs when the floorboards under Yugi suddenly collapsed. "Aaaahhhh!"

Joey: "Yugi!"

The younger boy fell on his back in the middle of what used to be the family room. A soldier trashing the room saw the boy and charged toward him. Yugi tried to get up and run, but the fear of the soldier's spear drained all the motion from his legs. He shut his eyes tightly, waiting to feel the cold heartless steel run through his small body.

Whack!

The soldier backed off with surprise as his sword was diverted by the strong thrash of a long pole, "Stay away from my grandson!" shouted the hoarse tone of an elderly man.

Yugi opened up his eyes to see his grandfather standing between him and the guard. "Grandpa don't! He'll kill you!"

But he was too late. For more soldiers had already entered the apartment and restrained the old man, capturing him. Yugi tried to help him but a large soldier grabbed him by his long black hair and kicked him hard in the stomach, sending him to the other side of the room. He felt himself being lifted up again painfullyby the hair, and even a harder blow to his cheek and another to his lower chest.

"NO! YUGI!" Joey cried out as he ran toward the infantryman. The soldier only thrashed his shield at the older boy knocking him out on the opposite wall.

"Joey!" Yugi shouted, only to receive a punishing plow to his already throbbing abdomen.

"Ankhu, that's enough fun for you. We're moving out." called the guard's commander.

"What shall we do with these two?" the abusive soldier asked lifting the boy higher off the ground. Yugi waited in horror of what the decision would be. But nothing prepared him for what he heard next.

"The prisoner chariots are full, so leave them alive to tell the tail."

Yugi glanced over to see the guards drag Solomon outside where a large chariot waited. His eyes widened, realizing that they were taking his grandfather away. Probably to be tortured or some other cruel fate. Immediately he struggled to free himself from the soldier's grasp.

Ankhu only grinned at his desperate hostage, "A feisty little thing aren't you? Well this will teach you a lesson." And he threw the boy through a wall that was deteriorating from the flames set off in the house. Yugilanded hard on his left side,his skin was scorched by the flames and surging pains traveled through his body. The boy could only look onward with his face in the dirt as his grandfather was loaded into the chariot and disappeared in the fire's black densesmoke. The harsh ash and shoot stung his eyes trying to see the moving horses. The boy's vision grew blurry with pain and exhaustion. Yugi tried to get up again but fell back on the glowing hot wood that was once his home, "Grandpa…." was all he could say before passing out.

Meanwhile in Men-nefer the Pharaoh Dartz was enraged when the search reports showed no traces of what he was looking for. "How could this have happened!? Fifteen years and not a trace of him!"

"We searched everywhere my lord Dartz." A servant named Sisis said in apology bowing even lower than before.

Dartz sat back on his throne where a lavender spirit bird waited respectfully on the arm, "Everywhere? The towns? The forests? The desert?!" he questionedrubbing his temples.

"We search the a the the deserts, the Oasis's, ha ha houses, and e e every cradle." The guard said hesitantly with a fearful stutter. (If you might have guessed he's not the sharpest tool in the shed.)

"Cradle?" the silver haired pharaoh asked, hoping his ears had misheard the soldier's confession.

"Yes."

"Cradle!?" he shouted. Flames were surging within his multicolored eyes. He immediately calmed and rubbed the crow's chin, "Did you hear that my pet? All these years they were searching for a baby. Be gone all of you!" the soldiers did not wait a spare second to escape the throne room, and their master's wrath. He stood up again allowing the spirit crow to perch on his hand, "It's up to you now my pet. Go out into the deserts and find me a young man of fifteen, who bears even the slightest resemblance of his wretched father!"

"Drift on a river,

that flows through my arms,

drift as I'm singing to you,

I see you smiling, so peaceful and calm,

And holding you I'm smiling too."

Yugi opened his eyes to the light of the bright sun's rays. His sides ached from the ruthless blows to his small frame and his lungs still burned from the inhaled smoke. "Yugi? Yugi. Wake up." A concerned voice said from above his throbbing head.

"Joey?" he asked weakly trying to adjust his eyes to the blinding light.

A familiar face block the sun above the boy's head. Two dark hazel eyes starred down concerned and upset. "Yugi? Are you alright?"

Yugi finally achieved full conciseness and groaned from the pain, "I think so. A little sore but nothing feels like it's broken."

Yugi sat himself upward so he could see his surroundings better. They were surrounded at all sides by the yellow sands of the wide dunes that hid their home village from invaders for decades. Only a few lone trees forming a small oasis was near them. Besides that only desolate sands could be seen.

By the small lake that pooled the oasis the stranger was kneeling down filling four water-skins.

"What's he doing here?" Yugi asked trying to climb to his feet. Joey grabbed him by the arm and helped support his brother, "That guy saved us."

Immediately the younger boy turned to the blond with urgency in his voice, "Then that wasn't a dream!"

Joey shook his head, unknowing what else to say.

Yugi gazed down at the sands mournfully. The memories of the recent events played like a cruel tune that lasted a lifetime longer than the actual occurrence, "Then…Toshka's…"

"Still standing, barely. But unfortunately I was unable to rescue your grandfather." The unidentified drifter said as he approached the two brothers, skins at hand.

The stranger handed each of them one sack as Yugi whipped away a growing tear from his eye, "Where have they taken him?"

The man gazed pitifully at the young man. He knew the boy had a sensitive heart but was willing to hear the worst, "Knowing Dartz's plans the prisoners will be taken to the capital. Probably to be interrogated for other accomplices to the lost prince's disappearance."

Both boys starred at him confused. "Wait a minuet! I thought you said that Yugi was the prince. Now you're talking like he not?" Joey exclaimed grabbing a hold of the drifter's robes aggressively.

The man calmly held the boy's wrists and forced him off. "Listen, during the rebellion many of our offspring had to flee, along with the prince. For fifteen years Dartz's soldiers had been hunting down every new born that had escaped searching for the prince."

Yugi swallowed heavily, "How many are left?"

Stranger: (sadly) "Over hundred babes left the palace, I fear only ten are still alive within the country. Maybe less."

Disgusted with the stranger and the trouble he brought, Joey stepped away and grabbed Yugi by the hand, "Come on Yug, we're leaving."

Yugi: "Huh? Where?"

Joey: "We're getten grandpa back. That's where."

Stranger: "You cannot do it on your own."

Joey turned back and glared at the shrouded drifter, "And why not?"

Stranger: "Wither you believe me or not he is one of the supposed princes of Egypt. If we can find the real prince then all the problems within the country would be resolved."

Yugi: "But, I thought you came to our village to kill the prince?"

Stranger: "It was my job, but not my intention. My true mission is to find the prince and restore him to his rightful throne."

Joey: "To hell with you andthe country. These creeps want my brother dead!. I'll do whatever it takes to protect him and get our grandpa back. I'll take them beyond the reaches of the Nile if I have to!"

Stranger: "Pharaoh's soldiers are spread far and wide. You can not get near the city where they have your grandfather without being captured yourselves, or killed. And the Egypt's rival tribes still hold the lands of the upper Nile River. The only way any of you will find peace, is the prince."

The older Egyptian boy stopped in his tracks. His head faced the eternally dried sands while his mind faced the reality of their savior's words.

"If you want to save your grandfather you must come with me."

The sun-bleached haired teenager gazed over to his adoptive brother. Yugi looked up at him and nodded, "We don't really have a choice."

Unexpectedly, Yugi drew away from Joey and walked toward the traveler, "If we help you find the prince, can you help us rescue grandpa?"

The stranger knelt down to one knee and rubbed the top of Yugi's head gently, "I may not know whose son you really are, but I promise you with my very soul I'll protect you and your brother."

"Hey don't forget me you guys." shouted a familiar voice from the trees. The boys old childhood friend Tristan stepped into view packed up and ready to go.

Joey: "Hey hay Tristan! You made it out too!?"

Tristan: "Of cores. You think I would just let you guys run away from home just like that?"

Yugi looked back from his friends to the stranger, "If I'm not intruding sir, but…who are you?"

The drifter smiled underneath his darkened cloak and grasped the sides of his hood. He tossed it behindhis head to reveal a young looking man with light blue eyes and fairly long lavender hair, "My acquaintances address me as Imhotept. But in the old pharaoh's imperial court, I was known as the Dark Magician."

Quotes for the next chapter:

"In order to find the prince we need the map that was stolen from the library..."

"Don't worry Bakura, I'm sure you'll find a job…"

"Hey! Where did that little thief go!?"

"He doesn't look like a prince."

"Maybe you want to come with us."

Response to reviewers:

Cindy I wanted to see if a good cliffhanger would catch someone's attention. But thank you for saying I'm evil.

The Dark Magician: I hope you don't mind if I use your character name in this. I didn't know whowas going to be under the drifter's shroud

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