Fantastic Four #19

Issue Details

Synopsis

PRISONERS OF THE PHAROAH! While studying an Egyptian exhibit, Reed Richards reads off a hieroglyph about a substance which apparently restored the blindness of a pharaoh during a mostly unrecorded era of the Egyptian empire. Telling Alicia of this discovery, the Fantastic Four decide to use Dr. Doom's time machine to travel into the past and retrieve this element in order to restore Alicia's vision.  There the FF are attacked by an Egyptian army that takes them, prisoner, when their powers fail them. Brought before their master, the Pharaoh known as Rama-Tut, the FF learn that he is a time traveler from the year 3000 who came to this time because his future was one without conflict and adventure and he had grown bored. He explains that upon arriving in Egyptian times.  Upon his arrival, Rama-Tut lost his vision but soon restored it with a radioactive isotope from his ship and was able to conquer the area and rule. Hoping to entice the Fantastic Four to travel back in time, he planted the hieroglyph so that he could battle the historic figures.  Making Sue his "queen" and putting the other members of the Four into slavery, all seems lost until the Thing spontaneously returns to normal due to exposure to the Egyptian sun.  Escaping, he is able to get a hold of Rama-Tut's Diode-Ray and free Sue, however, the radiation from the weapon returns him to his Thing-form. Freeing the others, the Fantastic Four lead up a rebellion to bust up Rama-Tut's kingdom.  With no means of defending himself, Rama-Tut fled this era in his time ship, leaving the FF to find the isotope that could restore Alicia's vision. The Fantastic Four then use their Time-Platform to return to the present.  However, upon traveling through Dr. Doom's time machine, Reed realizes that it won't transport radioactive substances, and so they return from their mission empty-handed.