The Methos Chronicles is an Internet animated series of one-minute shorts using Macromedia's Flash technology. It can be viewed with motion and sound on iFilm.

Preview

Methos: (voiceover) I've died, been reborn a thousand times and died again. But in the 5000 years that I've been alive, I've rarely thought back to the beginning and the secrets I buried there. Unfortunately, secrets never die when you're immortal...

Episode 1

[Tokyo, present day. Methos is drinking misu soup in a bar. The news is playing on a TV.]

TV news announcer: Tonight in a special breaking report we go live to Egypt, where Dr. Mina Abadi has recently made a miraculous underwater discovery. Dr. Abadi...

Mina Abadi: Good evening. The completion of the second Aswan High Dam 30 years ago in southern Egypt caused the flooding of significant areas of archeological interest. Over the past five years, my research team at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo has conducted extensive reconaissance of the submerged areas. But it wasn't until last week that I discovered what appeared to be small fissures in the bedrock. Using a state-of-the-art heliox diving system, I was able to navigate down one of these crevices only to discover that it was the roof of a large tomb. And in the middle of the tomb was a single, magnificant, intact sarcophagus.

Heliox is a mixture of helium and oxygen used for very deep diving, usually to greater than 200 feet.

[Methos gasps and drops his bowl of soup.]

Episode 2

[Flashback to Ancient Egypt.]

Methos: (voiceover) Before the world knew what time was, I was married to a beautiful nomad girl in the deserts of Sinai. We lived in a land of heat, pain, and death.

[Sand stirs on the horizon.]

Wife: Methos, what is that?

Methos: (whispers) Egyptians. (louder) Go.

[Mounted soldiers wearing jackal- and falcon-head helmets attack.]

Wife: I'm not going to leave you.

Methos: Run!

Soldier: Kill them all! The Pharaoh Djer orders it!

[Methos swordfights with soldiers. His wife gets struck with a lance in the back during the melee.]

Wife: Methos!

Methos: No! Argh!

[As he's shouting, Methos is slashed with a sword on the shoulder and falls down dead.]

Soldier: The Pharaoh Djer has ordered death to all who occupy his lands.

Another soldier: They are all dead sir, every last one of them.

[Methos gasps and wakes up from death.]

Episode 3

[Flashback to Ancient Egypt.]

Methos: (voiceover) I don't know how long I wandered in the deserts. I became a skeleton, not eating or drinking for months. But I could not die. The desert could do nothing to me that Egypt hadn't already done.

[Pharaoh's palace, Ancient Egypt.]

Court announcer: Attend! The pharaoh's secretary will now hear complaints.

Complainant: This nomad from the desert was caught stealing figs. What shall be done with him?

Secretary: From the looks of him, he should just be locked up with the old camels. Heh heh. But seeing him boil in oil would be one option. Or perhaps we could be so lenient as to only take his tongue. Noooo, I feel more in the mood for a good beheading — kill him now!

Court announcer: The Pharaoh Djer comes! Bow down!

Djer: Stop! [to the court] Leave us. [to Methos] You, stay.

Episode 4

[Cairo, present day.]

Methos: (voiceover) Cairo, a damned, deadly city if ever there was one.

[Methos is viewing a museum display case with Dr. Khattemi, director of the Egyptian Museum.]

Dr. Khattemi: The Egyptian Museum here in Cairo houses one of the world's greatest collections. For instance, here in this room you'll find a wonderful assortment of—

Methos: Does Dr. Abadi work at this museum?

Dr. Khattemi: Uh, well, yes. She has just discovered the tomb of the Lost Pharaoh.

Methos: Yes, I know all about it.

Dr. Khattemi: I see the tablet interests you. It depicts punitive expeditions of Egyptian warriors which are thought to have ventured into the Sinai penninsula during the First Dynasty. It was known to many as the Smiting of Sinai.

[Methos breaks the glass case holding the tablet and takes it out.]

Female tourist: Gerald, honey, that man just broke that case!

Methos: Would you be so kind as to inform Dr. Abadi that I'd like to talk to her about Pharaoh Djer and the scarab of swords.

Episode 5

[Cairo, present day. Methos is locked in a jail cell.]

Methos: (voiceover) You would think that after 5000 years I would have learned how to stay out of jail. But, contrary to popular belief, time can't heal the deepest wounds. Wisdom is a slave to pain.

[Present day. Dr. Abadi's group is raising the sarcophagus out of the Nile.]

Scientist: Dr. Abadi, come look at this. There's some sort of scarab, but very unusual.

Dr. Abadi: How extraordinary. I've never seen anything quite like it. Where was it?

Scientist: It was attached to the back of the sarcophagus.

[Flashback to ancient Egypt.]

Djer: I have waited a long time for you.

Methos: Who are you?

Djer was a First Dynasty pharaoh who lived circa 3000 BCE (Egyptologists give different dates varying from 3100 BCE to 2900 BCE).

Interestingly, in the History of Egypt, written by the Egyptian priest Manetho (an alias for Methos?!?) for the Greeks in the third century BCE, Djer is mentioned as the first physician and anatomist.

Djer: I am the falcon god, the pharaoh of the Upper and Lower Nile. I have ruled Egypt since time began. And you, you are my heir.

Episode 6

[Present day. Drs. Khattemi and Mina Abadi are riding an inflatable raft down the Nile.]

Dr. Khattemi: Some crazy caused a stir in the museum yesterday. Broke a display case. Wanted to talk to you about the Pharaoh Djer and the scarab of swords.

[Dr. Abadi stops the raft.]

Mina Abadi: A scarab of swords? How could anybody know about that? Oh, where is he?

Dr. Khattemi: In jail, I'm sure. Why?

[Flashback to ancient Egypt.]

Not quite since time began. There were at least two pharaohs before Djer: Hor-Aha and Narmer. And before Narmer there was the legendary Scorpian King (recently seen in the film The Mummy Returns).

Djer: In time, you too will tire of the power. In a moon, you will take my head and begin your own journey, and I shall be done with this world. But until then I will teach you what I know so that what I have built will not die with me. I will be like a father to you, and you, like a good son, will guard my reputation.

Methos: (voiceover) I yearned to pierce his body with a thousand swords and shove his reputation down his blood-choked throat. But of necessity, I held my tongue to bite with better venom.

Episode 7

[Present day. Methos is lying on a bed in the jail cell.]

Cell guard: Here is the man who destroyed the artifact.

Mina Abadi: Are you Adam Pierson?

Methos: Dr. Mina Abadi.

Mina Abadi: I'm here to find out how you know about the scarab of swords.

Methos: Have you opened the sarcophagus?

Mina Abadi: No, not yet. But how do you know about it? Who are you? I'm intrigued, Mr. Pierson.

Methos: If you take me to him, I can make you the world's most famous Egyptologist.

Mina Abadi: Take you to who?

Methos: The Pharaoh Djer.

[Flashback to ancient Egypt.]

Methos: (voiceover) Day and night I lived with rage but never showed it. It wouldn't have been revenge to kill him and give him exactly what he wanted from me. So I dreamt up a far better punishment and struck when the time was right.

[While the pharaoh is sleeping, Methos creeps up outside his window and shoots a poison dart at him. Before he revives, Methos wraps Djer's body in mummy bandages.]

Methos: This is for my wife, who was murdered at your command.

[Methos covers Djer's face with the bandage.]

Djer: Nooooo. You can't.

Methos: (voiceover) It was to be an eternity of suffering for him, and the beginning of glory for me. The next morning I became the new pharaoh of Egypt.

[Present day, at an archeological dig in Egypt.]

Guard: This area is restricted. You cannot be here.

Mina Abadi: I'm Dr. Abadi with the Egyptian Museum in Cairo. I received a permit this morning and this man is with me.

Episode 8

[Museum warehouse, modern Cairo.]

Guard: Open the gate, Dr. Abadi.

[The door rolls up displaying warehouse shelves full of artifacts. Methos and Dr. Abadi enter and open the sarcophagus. Instead of mummified remains, there's Djer's intact body.]

Mina Abadi: Oh, my God.

Methos: Djer. It's been a long time—

Djer: Methos.

[Djer falls out of the sarcophagus.]

Methos: —but I'm ready now to give you what you wanted. Your punishment is at an end. Now you're just a liability.

[Methos draws a sword from the scarab. Dr. Abadi bonks him on the head with a vase to stop him.]

Methos: Argh!

Mina Abadi: What on earth is going on?

[Methos drops to the ground, letting go of the sword.]

Djer: (moaning) Methos. Methos.

Mina Abadi: And how did you get in there?

Djer: (moaning) Methos. Methos.

[Djer draws the other sword from the scarab.]

Djer: (moaning) Methos. Methos.

Mina Abadi: What do you think you're doing?

[Methos gets up and picks up the sword again.]

Mina Abadi: What's wrong with you people?

[Methos and Djer swordfight.]

Mina Abadi: Guards!

Guard: Don't move or I'll shoot.

[Methos disarms Djer but before he can strike the beheading blow, the guard shoots him in the arm.]

Methos: Argh!

Djer: May Anubis spare your life until I have the opportunity to take it.

Mina Abadi: Stop the other one. He's getting away.

[Djer steps out of the warehouse to face a busy street.]

Methos: This is not good.

On-screen text: The Pharaoh Djer has escaped. End of Season One.

Egypt didn't actually start pyramid building until circa 2600 BCE, several hundred years after the time of Pharaoh Djer. D'oh!