Sirenes

Hello again. This is a first-time stab at a series, since I'm trying to break away from my habit of one-shots or really short stories...

For those of you who might not know, the Sirenes were Woman-Bird hybrids ( Harpies; in some version they are half fish ) who dwelled on a rocky crag in the middle of the sea. Unwary sailors would hear their beautiful singing voices and filled with lust as they watched their mesmerising dance ( in some versions they see the crag as their homeland ). As the sailors set to moor on the island, their ships would be thrown on the rocks and wrecked; lucky were the sparse few who survived the encounter.

I don't own Yuugiou.

Read on -

First thou shalt arrive where the enchanter Sirenes dwell,

they who seduce men.

The imprudent man who draws near them never returns,

for the Sirens, lying in the flower-strewn fields,

will charm him with sweet song; but around them

the bodies of their victims lie in heaps.

- the Warning of Circe

Fssssss...st.

The subway car hissed to a stop. One of the three remaining passengers, a crow-headed boy of about 26 or so, seemed in quite a haste to evacuate the steel skeleton; he was twitching nervously for six blocks, pale and sweaty from the bristling presence of his former carmates.

They were both seemed completely - almost too - oblivious of the other's presence as the train ground up to speed once more. Even the jostling motion and dim clanging from beneath the car was not enough to dissolve the silence the duo held; one could have cut it with a knife. Though the two were on opposite sides of the car, they may as well have been on opposite ends of the universe for all they ackowledged the other.

One sat with crossed legs, dripping with an aura of confident mastery, a rather composed expression seeming to find a permanent berth in his features. Dark blue and black leather gleamed with windowlight all along his willowy frame, along with the sun-hued pendant that hung about his neck. Golden bangs were accompanied by a shock of ink and blood that reeded amount his face, sharp features boldened by needle-keen lavender eyes. He gazed idly at the fleeting scenery, arms folded in his lap, unconcerned.

The other passenger was an entirely different matter. Long, black denim-clad legs were stretched, one booted foot resting on the seat opposite. He was more or less laying down, almost feline features pointing heavenward. Ivorn locks fell to his back, twining about his throat and shoulders, branching out over dark, mahogony optics. He was rather panther-like, with a lean elasticity about him. Even the movements of the cigarette to his mouth were strangely fluid, wisps of smoke curling upwards until they disappeared near the car ceiling.

Fssssss... st.

The mechanic doors heaved open. The lavender-eyed teen rose, his lithe form striding tall as he approached the steel-strewn exit. He stopped halfway through the threshold, not turning around.

"That's a terrible habit, Graverobber. You shouldn't have started." he parted with his advice given, hands pocketed as the doors closed again.

The languid form exhaled and closed his eyes slowly, the corners of his lips turning up minutely as wafts drifted lazily upward. '...You of all people should know, pharaoh...' a sliver of mahogony; warm as Everest and soft as grainte. 'I've always blown smoke.'

It wasn't an obligation of any sort. Not some duty he felt, some revenge he must execute. No imposition.

The guard fell with a dying gurgle, the dagger that had seemingly sprouted from his throat receding as it was extracted. The White-Haired Devil licked the stiletto, ecstacy painting itself on his sleek features, scarlet on his lips and primordial canines. Dark brown eyes burned alight with an almost infernous vigor. The dim, blackened-gold of dying suns.

In fact, he could not even be considered a burden, because he never really thought of it as a task. It just came naturally.

Cries and commands echoed as they bounced about the voluminous stone corridors, reaching the thief's ears as he stepped carelessly over the forever-still guard. Melting into his torchlit shadow, the figure practically became a part of the wall as he flitted down the stone-paved passage.

The scarce lighting made his features awkward to decipher... his was a rough, leather-brown complexion, causing his already eye-catching mane to stand out. Lean sinew was unadequately covered by his red linen cloak, dark-scarred chest exposed, the gold-bordered hems flowing back with the wind of his motion. Upon his back he held a large beige sack, filled to the brim with valuable scrolls; ceremonies, spells, medicine, charts, records... dire information for scribes and healers, to name but two. Hands and arms swathed in gold complimented the tone of his skin; spoils from past raids, no doubt. Of course, one who would hunt for the Demon King would not probe and search the streets or dark alleys for one with such features, but one with the pronged-tail of some long-given wound, protruding from his right eye. A blind reminder.

His bare feet padded along the smooth stone floor, the only other sound the swish of the cloak on his skin. He was enthralled; this was what he lived for. The slight difficulty in breathing for his heart's being lodged in his throat, the pins-and-needles exhiliration that bathed the back of his neck... it never seemed a burden to him, the task he was given. No... it was something else.

Not unlike water that dwindles stone, eroding it slowly, little by little, he was wearing away their demeanour and self-confidence. As a tiger would worry its prey for days at a time, fraying its confidence and composure, giving it not a chance for rest or food and charging towards it should it stop, the sabeteur took a bit here - a bit there - planted the seeds of dissent around... and would wait until the sun when he would be rid of his yoke, his task.

An angry shaft flitted just past his elbow, its barbed head coming to rest in the torchholder near him. Casting a brief glance over his shoulder, the thief could vaguely make out the silhouettes of tailing guards. Another messenger of steel hissed a hairsbreadth from his ear, clattering earthward as it collided with the blunt stonewall ahead.

A cry was heard from one of the approaching guards, spears and bows alike at the ready. The ejacualtion was not without reason - the graverobber had hit a dead end, narrow window slits yards above the paved floor the only means of escape. The thief seized up the situation with an astute glance, halting at the wall near the only torch in the corridor, sack still slung calmly to over one shoulder. He had only brought a stiletto for means of protection; a thief laden with cumbersome livery is a dead one before the next sunrise.

The guards encircled him, spearpoints bristling, archers' shafts at the ready lest the thief scale the ample windows.

"Surrender, Thief Bakura!" the foremost spearman cried, supposedly the captain. "Resist and you shall know Anubis in an instant!"

The amberesque eyes stared levelly as he responded, seemingly deaf to the captain's order. "Any of you who do not wish to die should turn back now."

"Hah!" one of the archers barked. "Who are you to threaten the Royal Guard? It is over a half-dozen baldes at your throat; you have but a small knife! I pray that you may fight back, as I myself would enjoy killing you for the heinous crime committed!"

The pale-haired young man shrugged as if in defeat. "Then it shall be." He began to turn to face the dead-end wall, as if to accept his arrest in an execution manner. But this was not so.

As he began to outstretch his hands, the sack sagging only slightly from his back, the archers lowered their bows, thinking accomplishment as theirs. But as two of the confident spearmen off-stanced in order to seize the elusive thief, the ivorn-haired man grabbed the lone torch in the corridor, and flung it out of a night-darkened windowslit.

The faintest of glows coming from the stars outside, the corridor was thrown into a chaos. The unmistakable hiss of released bowstrings rang forth, the archers firing in the general direction Bakura had been. But when the deathcry came instead from the of the spearmen, they sawin horror the futility in such an act.

'As the river comes to a mountain which it cannot scale, it flows around it, eventually under and through it.'

The ruckus was finally heard by another nearby search party, torches held high by the apprehensive troupe as they came upon the gruesome scene. A macabre of bodies adorned the once unused and bland corridor, wet crimson giving off a dull sheen as light brushed against it. Spears seemed to be growing fom the midriffs of the spearmen, whereas jagged scarlet grins were worn on the throats of others. The Thief, scrolls and all, was not in sight.

One of the torches clattered to the stone floor. The captain at the head of the small regimend took a step back.

"We must rid ourselves of this place." he murumured in a low voice, terror-ridden eyes riveted on the grotesque scene before him. "A Demon has been here."

-

Thanks for reading. It may get slightly AU later on, since I am not completely fluent in the Egyptian backstory, but I'll do as best I can to get the overall look of it right. (sweatdrop) Thanks again!