A Past and Future Pharaoh

Written By: Lady Lunar Phoenix

Original Beta work: White Swan

Updating Beta: Me!

A/N: Cranking up the atmosphere a bit, trying to create a proper setting... Nothing was changed in as much as elaborated.

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He couldn't sleep. He tossed and turned but a glance to the clock proved it was only 3am. Wait... only what? He sat up, going so far as to grab his glasses and slip them on to stare at the numbers. He shoved his arm out from under the blanket reaching for the mechanical device. The machine didn't flinch at the glare Kaiba was giving it in his disbelief. Kaiba discarded the clock back to its mostly original position with callous abandon. His rational mind pointing out the improbability of the time in his nightmare and the time in the real world matching so well. Thus he reached for his cellphone that he kept near his bed side. Flipping it open his cellphone his eyes checked 'that' for the time, perhaps the power had cut off during his restlessness and he just didn't notice? The light blinded him a bit as he looked at the clock on his cellphone yet it showed the same time: 3:00am.

A quick snap of light from his cell cast its glow on his arm catching his eye in a way that was cranking him further awake. Forcing him to flip open the light yet again, casting its glow on him. The light from the cellphone was steady and moderate, but what it showed him was enough reason to turn on the room's light. Shutting the cellphone again he reached clumsily through the darkness towards the lamp next to the bed. It was one of those quint vase shaped base styles sturdy and cool to the touch.

He followed its smooth exterior up until it brushed against the on button and with a press the light from a 40 watt bulb illuminated the room. Hampered by only by the thin fabric of the lamp shade, it was far more than enough for him to see his arm...

And other things...

The sleeve of his bed attire was stained near black, the cuff barely held on and there were noticeable rips in it. His fingers left streaks of red along the lamp revealing its true red shade while he pushed himself to a sitting position. The blanket fell from him folding itself haphazardly onto his lap revealing more of the state of the bed he rested on.

Blood; it tainted the air with it's pungent odor, it stained the bed sheets, and blanket. Both sleeves of his night shirt were shredded as though he was the victim of some vicious animal attack. The blood had clearly seeped up from between the sheets and revealed themselves through the covers. He quickly pulled back the tattered sleeves of his shirt to check his arms. Both, stained in blood, but smooth with unbroken flesh.

Concern caused him to check the rest of the room with this new found alarm his eyes going to the carpet and his mind couldn't quite grasp what it saw. The closest places his eyes went to were the sides of the bed, where he could see bloody footprints. But there was only one pair of feet, and following their path he could see the progression of steps. The path showed someone, likely or rather supposedly Kaiba, walking to the bed, there was a path from the door to the bed, then another path from the bed to the window and back to the bed.

Bringing back what he vaguely recalled thanks to the befuddling nature of his method of going to sleep. Even more enforced by the presence of blood stains on the curtains that covered the window. Looking behind him, he saw the pillow was even covered in all this blood. Alarming him enough that he flung the blanket off him completely, before checking the rest of his person in heightening concern. His clothes were littered with cuts all over, and like his arms, there was nay a scratch on any part of him that he could notice off hand. He threw himself out of the bed only to have his legs fail him. He fell onto the blood covered carpet the moisture of the blood wetting his hands. That 'Kaiba' would fall out of a bed was enough to wound a pride, yet the assault on his senses was also a cause for alarm.

The room spun and there was a slight nauseous feeling in the back of his throat as he knelt on the floor. The irrational nature of his situation caused him to try and simply get his mind and body back into some semblance of balance. He was forced to stay on the floor, unable to get his body to move as it grappled with apparent blood loss.

How could all that blood be just put on the bed without his knowing? Blood was a smell so ingrained in his memory that fake substitutes could not be used. But how could someone move him out of bed, pour all of that blood onto the bed, cut up his clothes, then put him back into bed without his awareness? The wine and pills, even the jet lag made him sleepy but not to the point where he could have missed all of this!

Concern and annoyance rose up in him as he slowly pushed himself to his feet. He felt light headed and tired, but he forced himself to his feet regardless, needing to find the source of this sick practical joke. He staggered to the door, his legs feeling disgustingly of jelly as his view of the door swayed a bit in time with his steps. He opened the door for which the trail changed considerably as mere large splotches of blood found at intervals down the hallway. Considering how much the hallway visually shifted, his instinct made him press his fingers against his neck, seeking his pulse. A pulse that 'should not' have involved a game of: now where did I put... oh, there it is.

He stopped for a moment to catch his breath; his body leaned against the wall as he tried to retrace what happened in that nightmare. He remembered waking up only to find the window open to his room. But was that the nightmare or when he woke up? Lightheaded as he was, there was no concrete way he could tell when he was asleep or awake. The footsteps to the window implied that 'that' was when he was awake. So was the trip to the kitchen the dream? If that had been the case what happened to his clothes?

What... 'did' happen to his clothes?

Memories of the Thousand Knives flickered into his memory. As his fingers worked on each button of his shirt to check how severe the damage was, he tried to remember what snapped him awake. The Knives had sped towards him... He called out to Mahaado... No, not him by name... Dark Magician, that's what he said. But... did he snap awake then? Perhaps that was what happened, the shock made him wake up...

So what happened at 'that' point. Using the wall as a brace he pulled off the shirt then held it out for inspection, his sight confirming that whoever did this only slashed up the shirt from the front and not the back. Each hole stained with the blood that he supposedly spilled in whatever... Knives... That must have been the reason for the cuts, to simulate the Thousand Knives attack he'd seen. But there wasn't a thousand cuts on the shirt, otherwise there would be nothing holding the front of the shirt up on his body. He frowned in concern, the whole thing was a wash with blood, a glance down showed the his pants just as heavily soaked.

Just how could someone know what he was dreaming with such precision that they could have a replica of his clothes, damaged for effect ready?

He pushed himself from the wall, the shirt left carelessly over one arm as he resumed his walk. He remembered the Scarab and the door opening, but... He veered into the wall as a wave of dizziness altered his course of direction as he strained to stay focused. It was just so easy at the moment to let his thoughts wander off in other directions. He had been distracted then too, thinking about that fabled past in Egypt. The Egypt he couldn't allow to exist any longer. That's what the Prince was back then, a distraction as well. Something he could focus on to take his mind off the death of his mother and the destruction of his village. It worked rather well, the boy at the time proved to be able to dispel a great deal of negativity with just his presence alone.

He had appeared as a small bundle of cloak too big for such a small child, shuffling through the city market blindly. Grown ups would see and walk around him as he shuffled around, his small plaintive voice calling for his 'Maha'. As Set followed the boy around he'd watched as the small child would suddenly stop, grab the front of his hood. Pulling it up the child would give a visual sweep of the area then continue on, though it was odd that he wouldn't just take the hood off. But a flash of gold on that tiny wrist had given him the hint he needed; this wasn't just a little lost boy. This was a child of some level of nobility, after all who would place gold on the person's of one so young otherwise? He caught up with the child at that point placing himself directly in the way of the child and then letting the boy bump into him. The boy bumped into him as expected and fell down, but with a stubborn set of his posture the little one pushed himself back up and picked a new direction to go in. So Set had stepped in the boy's way again just to see how the boy would react.

Right back into the legs the kid went, though to the child's credit this time he peeked out from under his hood to see what was going on. He seemed able to realize that he wasn't facing someone he was looking for as he moped a, "Not Maha." and turned to try another direction to resume his search. Set had gathered up the small child, who remarkably didn't resist being picked up though he seemed to protest the hood being removed. "No!"

"Look kid, you're not going to find anyone if you're dressed like this, you can't even see where you're going."

He had done it again, walked into the wall when he should have turned. He was distracted, confused, the loss of blood was playing with his mind. He struggled to clear it, the blood stains on the floor larger now then before. It had started out as spots along the carpet but now it was a steady line. An impossible response to spilling blood, his shirt and pants were soaked through with blood. The clothes though kept the blood from spilling to the floor, so... it had to drip down from the face, hands and feet. Yet the patterns seemed to say that he had moved smoothly along undisturbed by anything. Allowing gravity to work it's power over him, compelling the blood to drip on the floor. It had slowed down apparently after a while but clearly for a time it was unstopped by anything. A steady clean series of lines that ran down the carpet of the hallway.

But at the end were the doors to the kitchen from his dreams? Waking time? Regardless, his target now in sight, he strode down to the kitchen with most of his normal posture. Normal posture, stalking panther, was there really a difference? He shoved open the doors with a bit more force then needed, however; he was exhausted from the walk alone and felt he couldn't open the swinging doors otherwise. A flick of the lights revealing a pristine kitchen unmarred by any supernatural activities, real or otherwise. Despite that something felt wrong to him even if he was still at war with himself if it was a dream or reality. It was the way how everything seemed spotted, newly clean things shown in the light while untouched things, though clean, lacked that luster. His eyes narrowed as he stalked towards one of those cabinets, staring between the two different spots before opening the them.

Blood spilled down, freed from their dam pouring in small rivers from the cabinet while blood pooled down around each glass before him. The scent assailed, him driving him back against the counter behind him, disturbing the pots and pans.

The sight of blood brought back snippets of memory, snippets of blood... the shards of the broken glass had formed into the knives that cut into him... spilled his blood... Returned to normal? No, that couldn't be possible! Things didn't just shatter and mend themselves! The Knives flew at him one slamming into his shoulder knocking him back, another hit his stomach goring him with pain when his cry was answered. He fell as lavender armored feet touched down to block the spell. He blacked out from the pain, but at least now he remembered what happened... "MAHAADO!"

He pushed himself from the counter, spinning on his heel and heading for the doors when he slammed into something stomach high. In his state it sent him sprawling over the form, unlike normal when he could just correct his balance swiftly. He hit the floor, the lump under him not moving and in his irritation he got to his knees over what had gotten in his way out of nowhere. How could something get behind him so quietly without letting him know? He grew apprehensive as he braced himself to look down.

Mahaado laid there, his eyes glazed over staring straight ahead without awareness. It was the look that monsters possessed when summoned during Duel Monsters in fact. The fact that Mahaado had manifested himself at all was already shock worthy, coupled with the fact that he didn't look like an imposing magician rather as a ten year old. Or, shock of shocks, unlike when he was around Yugi, Kaiba could clearly touch him, otherwise how could he stumble over the boy like that. All those pieces of information were enough to send anyone into a state of overdrive worthy hyperventilating from mounting terror. But for Kaiba, as blood from his clothes and somewhere else, stained Mahaado, he didn't see a child...

He saw the mutilated corpse of his fellow High Priest, laid out below him, his body cut into three pieces thanks to the scythe now still. The dripping of blood from the counters matched the tempo of the blood dripping off the blade after it had stilled from taking Mahaado's life. At least that's what Set imagined to accompany the burning torches of the room. An arm laying here... organs exposed in the body cavity there...

He was too late to save anyone, Mahaado was a personal guard, for him to fall was a sign that the last lines of defense had collapsed. Mahaado had fallen, where was the Pharaoh? The smell of smoke from torches, the funeral... Gods have mercy... Mana was screaming, wailing, their beloved Pharaoh was gone, taking with him Mahaado and the Shadows. No way remained to contact Mahaado... No way to... Come home... Nothing to come home to... he was too late and that Book was now useless...

Those dead eyes kept staring at him, eyes that said nothing, conveyed nothing, yet all the while damning him for his arrogance. His breath was caught, he choked on air as he stumbled up to his feet and ran for the double doors. Stumbling and panicking as he tried to escape only to hit the carpet again, he turned to face the doors as he struggled to breath. Blood that had struggled to keep up with all the physical actions Kaiba had been partaking since he woke up was being forced into overdrive. His hands were shaking terribly as he watched between swings as Mahaado got up, slowly like a doll under the control of someone else.

He couldn't get up, even as he saw Mahaado turn towards him. He couldn't catch his breath as the child made his way towards Kaiba, his clothes stained in blood. Were there organs revealed under those robes? The boy didn't open the door with his hands, rather he just walked blindly into them and through them like a real person... A real person... Yugi didn't have the power yet to summon Mahaado fully, so he was always a ghost when he manifested for Yugi. Yet now he was solid, a body that could be touched... Or touch back.

The world swam before his eyes, his focus on Mahaado fell further and further away until he fell limp to the floor his awareness fled. So much blood...