Alverna: Next Chapter is out!

Malik: You seem to be on top of this story.

Alverna: Just trying to avoid what happened when I wrote "The Sphinx King" at the same time as this one.

Marik: What happened with that one?

Bakura: She became obsessed with it.

Ryou: Bakura!

Alverna: It's okay Ryou. He's right. Now, could you do the disclaimer?

Ryou: Sure. Alverna does not own Yu-gi-oh. Enjoy the chapter.

Chapter 7: Revealed Past

"Ha!" the guard barked out. "You're lying."

"I am not." Mana shot back, her voice cracking like a whip. "And you probably are one of the men who took them from their home and put them in the dungeon."

"I did no such thing you lying snake in the grass." The guard snapped.

"Then I'm no better off than you." Mana said.

"What do you mean?" The guard questioned, his hangover starting to set in.

"You said they attacked you." Mana replied with an eye roll. "And that you didn't take them from their home. What you didn't notice was that High Priest Karim was judging your words with the Millennium Scale. The scale tilted, proving your words false."

The room was silent and the guards looked at each other in horror. They knew they had been caught. With a roar, the guard Mana confronted lunged at her.

"You little brat!" he screeched. A sudden thud was heard. The guard lay on the ground, and behind him, holding a staff Isis keeps to get stubborn people out of the healing chambers while she was treating people, was Yugi.

"You leave her alone." Yugi glared down at the man on the floor.

"Nice one Yug." Joey said as he picked himself up, holding his head.

"Thanks." Yugi said, then collapsed back onto his bed. Standing up had taken a lot of energy out of him.

Isis stepped forward as Karim, Shada, Mahad, and Aknadin grabbed the disloyal guards off the floor and dragged them outside of the room, calling for them to be put in a cell until they could be dealt with.

"Tell me what happened while I look you over." Isis commanded in a no-nonsense tone of voice as she began to look over Yugi.

"Well," Malik started as he sat down on his bed, "we were all soaking up some sun while waiting for someone to come and see us. You, High Priestess, or one of our new masters. Then those four burst into the room accusing us of winning pity and rating them out as the ones who would beat us. They then tried to attack us but didn't get too far. They ended up in the positions they were in when you came into the room, and you know what happened next."

"Talk much?" Joey asked as Isis looked at the lump on his head.

"They asked." Malik replied with a shrug.

"That they did." Mana agreed.

"When did you get here?" Bakura asked the magician in training.

"I saw everyone running down the hallway and I got curious." Mana replied with a shrug.

"Curiosity killed the cat." Marik pointed out to her.

"It's a good thing I'm not a cat then." Mana shot back.

"How do you know them Mana?" Atemu asked his younger friend.

"They saved my life." Mana said in a 'were you not listening again?' tone.

"Yes, we understand that." Mahad said patiently. "But how did they save you?"

"Oh." Mana uttered, feeling a little stupid. "Well, it was about a year ago…"

Flashback

The sun was setting, and in one of the courtyards of the palace, Mana was practicing her freezing spell on some of the fish in the pond.

"And, FREEZE!" Mana cried as a fish leapt out. A small bit of light flashed and the fish remained frozen in the air. "Alright! I did it!"

"Looks like the little magician is practicing her spells." A voice sneered.

"Who's there?" Mana yelled.

"Just, your worst nightmare." The speaker came from behind and pressed a cloth to Mana's mouth. In a few seconds, the teen had gone limp in his arms. "This is too easy."

When Mana woke up, the first thing she noticed was the noise. It was really loud. Sounded like a bunch of people cheering. Next was the smell. It smelled terrible, like everyone who was cheering needed a bath. Third, she was tied hand and foot to a wall.

"Looks like the little prize is awake." The same voice Mana had heard in the courtyard broke threw her brain fog.

"What do you want with me?" Mana snapped at the man, her angry green eyes focusing on the dirty and not shaved man, dress in a dirty tunic.

"Oh, this one has got spunk. There will be a lot of fighting for her."

Fighting? Oh no. This had to be one of the illegal underground battle arenas that the Pharaoh was currently trying to disband. Women and children were often taken captive and given away as prizes for sex or something else, like a slave.

"My master will find me." Mana said as she glared at her captor.

"A little too late for that missy." The man said with a grin that showed missing teeth. "The fights are already starting."

Two hours later, it was down to two people.

"Now you get to see who is going to take you home with him." Missing teeth said.

One of the men was a tanned skin man, really tall, about 6' 8", and well muscled. The other was about six feet tall, only a couple of inches shorter, with blond hair and pale, dirty, skin. Both wore masks and were know by stage names.

"Go Tormentor!" Some of the crowd cheered.

"Kick his ass Mad Dog!" Others shouted.

The Tormentor, Mr. Muscles as Mana dubbed him, grinned and looked towards Mana, who shuddered at the look of lust in his eyes.

Mad Dog however, looked over to Mana and gave her an encouraging look, as if telling her not to give up. Mana felt her head nod, and the blond haired teen turned his attention back to his opponent.

"Give it up Mad Dog." The Tormentor said. "You will just be pounded into the ground."

"Are you done yet Ushio?" Mad Dog replied. "Cause I'm getting a little board here."

The Tormentor, now having been named Ushio, growled and lunged at Mad Dog, who merely step sided, stuck out his foot, and tripped Ushio, sending him flying out of the arena.

"Looks like I win." Mad Dog said.

"No you haven't!" Ushio shouted.

"Look Ushio," Mad Dog said in a tone that said 'how many time have I explained this?', "the rules say all I have to do is knock you out of the arena. How I do it, doesn't matter. I could use strength, or trip you. But the point is you're out of the arena, so I have won this fight."

The entire arena fell silent.

"Now," the teen turned towards missing teeth man, "will you cut the ropes from her legs or do I have to do it myself after knocking out another one of your teeth?"

Missing teeth guy gulped and cut the ropes holding Mana to the wall, and the ones around her legs. Mana scrambled to her feet and walked towards the winner, stopping before whirling around, and kicking her kidnapper in the groin.

"That was for kidnapping me," she hissed to the fallen man. She then walked to the edge of the arena and waited for her new, well, master, to join her.

"When I tell you, run after me as fast as you can." The dirty teen whispered to her as soon as he joined her.

"Why?" she whispered back.

"Please, just trust me."

Mana was silent. He said please. What kind of person who fought down here of all places said that?

"Now." He hissed, and grabbed Mana pulling her after him as they ran. Shouting was heard and Mana looked back. Smoke came after them as a fire raced threw the underground arena.

"I haven't had to run like that in ages." The blond haired fighter doubled over next to a, well, house if you could call it that, hand on his chest.

"What are you going to do to me?" Mana demanded, but a small bit of fear was heard in her voice.

"Who did you bring back this time?" a new voice said, making the girl teen jump. A –thwap— was heard, followed by a thud and an "OW!"

"What did I tell you about scaring people?" a third voice said, sounding really irritated.

"Will you guys stop? You're scaring our guest." A quiet child like voice spoke out of the darkness.

Guest? Oh great. These people were insane. The old treat them nice then hurt them trick. Well she wasn't going to fall for it.

"Let me go." Mana demanded.

"You sure talk a lot for someone who is tied up." The first new voice said. Mana couldn't see it, but she could sure hear him snickering.

"Don't tease her." The teen who brought her here spoke up, pushing himself up. "She can give a mean kick. Even with her hands tied."

"Oh." Was uttered. Mana could picture the speaker with a sheepish look.

"And to answer your question," a cloaked and hooded figure a few inches taller than her stepped out of what was the door way, "we are going to let you go."

"What?" Mana couldn't believe her ears. Why would they do that?

"We don't keep the 'prizes'." Another, shorter person stepped out, also cloaked and hooded, finger quote on the prizes part.

"Why not?" Mana demanded, her curiosity spiked.

"You already have a life right?" a third person stepped threw the doorway, cloaked and hooded, and rubbing the back of his head before turning to the first one who came outside. "That hurt."

"Your fault." Came the reply with a shoulder shrug.

"How is it my fault?"

"Start arguing and I will throw you in the Nile." The masked teen rubbed his forehead.

The smallest of the four stepped forwards.

"You'll need this," he said, and gave her a bag that he had hidden under his cloak. Mana took the bag, then noticed her wrist were untied. Glancing around she saw the one who did the fighting slide a dagger back into its sheath on his belt.

"Thank you." Mana whispered.

"You're welcome." They all said, and went back into the mud building in a hill, (A/N: It's a dugout).

End Flashback

"… And using the stars I easily found my way back into the city, then the palace." Mana wrapped up her story. "I just was scolded for missing dinner. And even thought they were wearing cloaks, I recognized their voices."

The tension that was in the room earlier that morning just multiplied ten times over. Most of it coming from Yugi, Ryou, Malik, and Joey.

"You fought in illegal underground battle arenas?" Seto asked as he turned and looked at Joey.

"I didn't have any choice." Joey shot back.

"There's always a choice." Seto argued.

"Well when you get rocks chucked at you when you try to buy food so your friends can eat, and have people refusing to buy what you make so you can get food, and you end up doing something like that so you can get food so your friends can survive, let me know." Joey seethed.

Seto blinked. He hadn't expected that.

"You sure you can handle him Seto?" Aknankanon asked with a smirk. "He appears to be quiet a handful."

"Yes." Seto replied, monotone before smirking. "I look forward to training the new mutt in the palace." Joey made no reply, but simply glared.

"I see no reason for these for not to be your new servants." Aknankanon said.

"Thank you Father." Atemu said with a small nod.

Yugi's eyes shot open. They had been judged and he didn't even know it.

"They will however rest for a week. Maybe more depending on injury severity."

"Yes my Pharaoh." Isis said with a bow. "Now, we should leave so they can rest after all of the commotion."

All of the court left the room. Mana was the last one out and she gave a cheerful wave to the patients before leaving, closing the door behind her.

"Well," Ryou broke the silence. "That went better than I thought it would."

"You can say that again." Joey agreed.

"Ditto." Was all Yugi and Malik could say.

Alverna: End of Chapter!

Atemu: No cliffhanger this time.

Alverna: Not this time. Two cliffies in a row would get angry readers and reviews. Which reminds me...

Bakura: REVIEW!

Next Chapter: Yugi meets Tea and Vivian for the first time.