Chapter 11:
Yami had stalked off down several hallways, not knowing which direction he was going in and not really caring, eventually stopping when he reached a large banquet hall with no other exits.
He stood in front of a large window, looking out over the rest of the island. Many dueling arenas could be seen all over the horizon, and the small figures of duelists could be seen playing against one another or being escorted off the island.
Yugi came up behind him, keeping quiet and inviting him to talk to her.
"... It wasn't your fault, you know," she whispered after a few minutes.
He shook his head. "I was old enough, and I spent enough time with my uncle, I really ought to have known what he was doing behind everyone's backs. I should have known... My father should have known. But... no one, not even's the man's own son, ever stopped to question his whereabouts.
"We shouldn't have ever trusted him! …. I shouldn't have trusted him."
Yugi stood quietly behind him, wondering what she could say or do to make her friend feel better. She hadn't been in this situation before, so she didn't know the right words to say to him, and she didn't know him well enough to just waltz over and hug him.
Yugi loved helping her friends out, but, in this case, she was at a loss for what to do.
"I just... I don't deal with it very well," Yami admitted after so much silence. "And neither does Malik. It's just so hard to take in, that one of your best friends was hurt so badly and so personally by one of your family members, by one of the elders that you were supposed to respect and obey at all times!"
He chuckled dryly. "If anything, Bakura deals with it better than the both of us do. I mean, he's the one that actually got hurt and he got over it a long time ago, but here I am, in all essence an innocent bystander, and I'm the one getting all worked up about it!"
Now that he was a little calmer, seeming more sad and embarrassed than angry, Yugi gathered enough courage to step closer, walking until she was standing by his side, staring out the window over the island.
"Like I said, it wasn't your fault. You had nothing to do with it. You said it yourself, you were only an 'innocent bystander.'"
Smiling gently, Yugi reached out to take his hand, her fingers twining around his in a timid fashion. "It's not easy to see your friends and family get hurt, especially by someone else you're close to. But... You've already done as much as possible for your friend."
The Egyptian turned to look at her almost quizzically.
"You befriended Bakura, you gave him a new home, and a new family." She shrugged as she turned her gaze to look at the floor. "You won't ever be able to really replace any of his own friends and family, but you've offered to share yours with him. …. I think that counts for something."
Yami said nothing, and both fell into complete silence.
He couldn't help but notice that when Yugi was around, it was almost difficult to stay depressed. She was so youthful and cute, and she had such a pretty smile...
He began to wonder if Bakura and Malik were right, and that he had fallen for the girl.
Seth and Mahado watched closely from behind several potted plants as their Pharaoh stood with the girl. They wanted to make certain that their king was safe at all times, and what better way than to spy on him from behind a hibiscus?
"Oh Ra, Atemu's right," Seth muttered, just loud enough for Mahado to hear. "I am paranoid."
"Don't be ridiculous, my priest," Mahado answered. "If you were truly paranoid, you would be coercing someone else into helping you spy on your cousin from behind a flowering plant while said cousin is talking with a small child and is clearly in no danger... Oh Ra, you are paranoid!"
The priest turned to glare at the royal magician, who only answered with the tiniest of smiles.
"Mahado, I think you have more of a sense of humor than you let on."
"Whatever you say, my priest."
Seth rolled his eyes and growled lowly, but then turned back to the task at hand: watching Atemu.
At the moment, the Pharaoh seemed be in a snitty sort of mood, and the young girl was trying to make him feel better. The priest and the magician couldn't hear what was being said from their distance, but it seemed that the girl was lifting Atemu's spirits.
"You see the look on our king's face, Mahado?" Seth asked.
The other nodded. "He and the girl both have the same looks on their faces that you and Kisara often have when you are conversing."
"You don't suppose..."
"No, it couldn't be, my priest! After all these years, he couldn't have..."
"TACKLE-HUG!"
Their thoughts were left uncompleted, for they were both suddenly tackled from behind.
Both the priest and the magician went down to the floor, landing hard on their faces, the smaller form of a girl on top of both of them.
"Mahna!" Mahado cried out, trying his best to keep his voice low.
The younger of the two magicians smiled and nodded. She opened her mouth as wide as it could go, intending to say something, but she was cut off by all four hands of the two men covering her lips and keeping them shut.
"Do not speak, Mahna," Seth hissed. "Do not even breathe!"
"You would not interrupt the Pharaoh while he is having a moment with a friend of his, would you?"
Mahna cocked an eyebrow, clearly interested in that little bit of information. When they released her, she turned to follow their gazes, her large eyes landing on the forms of two spiky-haired duelists. Her eyes lit up when she saw her big brother, but they clouded in confusion and slight jealousy when they landed on the girl at his side.
"Who is she? And why is Atemu back at the castle already, anyway?"
"A new friend that Atemu has made in the past few days," Seth told her. "Apparently, he, Malik, and Bakura befriended this group of teenaged duelists from Japan, and she is one of the members of the group."
Mahado nodded. "As to your second question, Mahna, your brother has come back to the castle because both Bakura and one of the other children from Japan were both hurt very badly and needed medical attention."
Mahna's large eyes grew even larger when she heard this. "... Bakura was hurt? What happened?"
Mahado ran his hand through his hair awkwardly, but High Priest Seth had no qualms about stating what had happened.
"The Japanese girl was attacked by a man who tried to rape her and Bakura defended her." The priest shrugged. "I can understand why, considering how many times Bakura was raped as a child."
The magician girl shuddered and turned away; she had only been a very small girl at the time, but the whole ordeal between Bakura and Akunadin was terribly nightmarish.
Mahado noticed the frightened look on his fiance's face and set a comforting hand on her shoulder. "Tell you what, Mahna. Perhaps tonight or tomorrow night we can go visit the sick room ourselves and see how Bakura is doing. You can even put flowers in the sick room."
"But... where will I get the flowers?"
He smiled gently at her. "I can show you how to conjure them out of the air later today."
Spending more time with Mahado and learning magic tricks to help make a friend feel better? Mahna was all over it, and she beamed up at the older magician.
"Thank you, Mahado!"
Rolling her eyes and trying really, really hard not to show her great annoyance, Anzu took a seat on the floor near Kaiba and Mokuba.
After popping in to say 'hi' to Ryou and Bakura, the group had wondered between themselves whether they should go looking for Yugi and Yami or for a vending machine.
Mokuba had immediately begun to complain about how hungry he was (and Jounouchi, Honda, and Otogi had all become hungry at the mere mention of food) and Kaiba had pointed out that it wasn't like Yugi and Yami were going to get lost or anything anyway, so they might as well get something to eat.
So, Ryou was in the sick room with Bakura, Yugi had wandered off after the unhappy Yami, and Mariku was busy talking with Malik back in the 'waiting room.'
That left only Jounouchi, Honda, Otogi, Anzu, Kaiba, and Mokuba, and they were all eagerly scavenging for snacks.
It hadn't been too difficult to find the one vending machine in Pegasus's castle (he had one imported just for the tournament to amuse his island guests) so now the whole gang was sitting around the rectangular junk food distributor and had been for the past half an hour or so.
And it just so happened that Honda and Otogi, probably out of boredom, had spent almost the entire time fighting with each other over a candy bar. They were hurling insults at one another and throwing punches at one another and being rather loud about the whole thing.
It was getting very old, very fast.
Anzu turned to exchange a look with Kaiba, who had a twitching eyebrow that told of his own annoyance.
"How do you ever put up with these idiots?" he asked her, his voice low enough that only she would hear him.
She shrugged good-naturedly. "Lots of practice, I guess."
It felt strange to be the only person besides Mokuba who could sit this close to Kaiba Seto without him snarling at her. Usually he'd punch anyone who'd dare come within a five foot radius. But, somehow, Mazaki Anzu always managed.
She and Yugi were the only other students at school who he ever spoke to in a friendly fashion. He had been impressed by Yugi's gaming skills, and had challenged her to more than one game of Duel Monsters over the years. And, since Yugi's friends were always around her, he'd become familiar with all of them.
Kaiba had quickly decided that, out of all of Yugi's friends, Anzu was the only one with a brain. So, she was allowed to speak with him without being called a filthy name or anything like the others were.
Of course, another difference between her and the others was that she was a very attractive girl. That was something that she had that Honda, Jounouchi, and Otogi didn't have.
Anzu was shaken out of her thoughts when two bronze-skinned figures suddenly ran through, the larger of the two slamming the palm of his hand fiercely against the front of the vending machine, nearly knocking the thing over.
"Looks like I win, kitten!" Malik shouted loudly, jeering down at Mariku. "You have to buy me a bag of Doritos!"
Mariku pouted up at him. "No fair, bastard! Your legs are longer than mine!"
"It was a perfectly fair competition, pretty hellcat," the older man returned. He paused though, rubbing his chin thoughtfully. "But, what would you give me if I bought both of our treats? Would you give me a... 'treat' of your own?"
She slapped him. "Buy your own #$%-ing chips, #$% it!"
Anzu couldn't help but grin to herself at this little interchange. It was fairly clear that Malik, as odd as he may have seemed at first, did not intend Mariku any harm; for her part, it was equally obvious that Mariku didn't hate Malik as much as she let on. If anything, she seemed to enjoy bickering with him.
Anzu found the whole thing somewhat amusing, as bizarre as the entire ordeal was.
"What are you smiling about over there?" a suspicious voice interrupted her.
She turned to face Kaiba beside her, unable to hide her generally happiness. "I just think it's so wonderful that Mariku has finally found a guy she likes! And of course, Yugi has definitely fallen for Yami, and it's just so cute the way she idolizes him and looks up to him with that little smile on her face! And have you seen the way Ryou always looks at Bakura? It's just too adorable for words!"
Kaiba, as stoic as he was, just sat there, listening to her gushing. His facial expression never altered, but he did seem to be paying attention, and that was enough.
"Seriously," Anzu continued. "It's like suddenly all the girls have found their Prince Charmings!"
Kaiba frowned at her. "You left out a girl, Anzu. Don't you have a 'Prince Charming?'"
Now it was Anzu's turn to frown, as she thought long and hard. "Well, I do like Yami, but... I'm not going to butt in where I'm not wanted. Yugi adores him, and he seems to like her, and I don't want to hurt my friend by going after her man."
She thought for a moment. "The only other men I've met so far are Malik and Bakura, but I don't really want to deal with either of them and they're not that good-looking anyway... There was Weevil Underwood, but... Ew. And there was Bandit Keith and his posse, but you know how that went down. Besides, there's no way I'd date a man whose scream was that high-pitched!"
Kaiba actually chuckled at that memory. "You know, your Mr. Perfect doesn't have to be someone you just met. It could be someone you've known for years. It could even be... Honda."
"Too boring. And we both know too many dirty secrets about each other."
In a very out-of-character moment, Kaiba reached over and put his hand on her shoulder. "Don't worry, Mazaki. You're a good-looking, talented, intelligent, kind-hearted girl, so I have no doubt that the man of your dreams will show up, sooner or later."
Before Anzu could say anything, they were both distracted by a sudden outcry from Honda.
Turning, they could both plainly see Honda and Otogi looking around in confusion. Mokuba was sitting beside them and eating the candy bar that they'd both just been fighting over, and Malik and Mariku were sitting nearby, sharing a bag of chips.
Honda spoke again, now that he had everyone's attention, asking a simple question.
"Where's Jounouchi?"
Yes, I'm leaving it at a bit of a cliff hanger. Sorry.