Without much further ado, I present the next chappy for you all!
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Disclaimer: I do not own Yugioh
Claimer: I own made-up stuff
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"I dunno what dat guy though was 'exciting' bout dis. Half of it don't make no sense, and den dere's dat crazy riddle dere too!"
"Ooh, I love riddles! I used to be the reigning world champ on riddles…until Seto beat me, of course," Mokuba admitted sheepishly.
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"Oh really? Old Jou ain't too bad with riddles himself. Ask me anything," Jou declared.
"Okay…what has four legs in the morning, two legs at noon, and three legs in the evening?"
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"Uh…hold on a sec, I got it…don't tell me…it's…17!"
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Mokuba nearly fell over.
"Jou, that's the riddle of the Sphinx - EVERYBODY knows that one!"
"Well, ya see, Mokuba…," Jou turned bright red in embarrassment while his explanation fizzled.
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Kaiba, who was doing work on his laptop at the nearby table in the room, rolled his eyes and smirked without pausing. Yuugi was on the balcony, watching as Kikki stretched his wings and thinking about what had been written on the tablet.
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'So, a really long time ago, there were tons and tons of Ban-Ile, just like Yami…seven whole tribes of them! But now…they're almost all gone, thanks to the demons. And when that super-demon 'Ulgoth' tried to take over the world, the Ban-Ile and seven human sorcerers banded together and sealed Ulgoth away.
'So then Ulgoth ordered the demons to kill the ones hiding the seven mystical artifacts, so he could use them and become free again. And the pendant Yami gave me is somehow connected to at least one of the artifacts…probably the one his tribe was guarding…but the other tribes might be wiped out by now, so who knows what happened to the other six artifacts.
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'It looks like finding Yami is going to be a lot harder then I thought it would…and there's still so much I don't know.'
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((What you think about?))
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Kikki's voice startled Yuugi from his reverie. The bird was perched upon the balcony railing, and had its head cocked in curiosity. Knowing for a fact that the others were inside, Yuugi responded.
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(((I was thinking…about the Ban-Ile. What do you suppose happened to them all?)))
((Me no 'pose, me know. All flyer know bout Scratchies.))
(((Scratchies…you mean…all the birds in the world know about the Ban-Ile? So you already know where those seven artifacts are?!)))
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((You is beaking!)) was the shrill trill of a reply as Kikki hopped to the side.
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((No flyer know bout dat! Flyers mostly know bout nearby things, like where dirts live. You is beaking, you think one flyer knows everything in the world!))
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While Kikki's first few words sent Yuugi's hopes sinking, they rose again when he realized exactly what Kikki was telling him. No one bird would ever know everything about the world, but if you went to a place and wanted to find something there, the birds living in the area would have all the information you needed.
And then Yuugi realized that Kikki was glaring at him, and looked kind of annoyed.
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(((Kikki…I'm really sorry for snapping at you,))) Yuugi apologized, (((But now I have a question. If we went somewhere else, would you be able to talk to the other birds there and help us find what we're looking for? Is that possible?)))
((Course it is, flyer tongue is what everybody with brains is talking,)) Kikki chirped, ((And no 'pal-jize. It not problem. Ways flyer argue, most loudest one is always being most right! That never be problem!))
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-For the first while, he wasn't certain where he was. Or how he had gotten there. Was there something he was supposed to be doing? That certainly sounded right… So why couldn't he seem to move?
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"Phagh. You can take that worthless worm back to his cage. I'm bored with trying not to kill him," came a voice.
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Who was that? That voice…it wasn't a good voice…something grabbed him, started dragging him. Fire erupted all over his body, the onset of new pain jarring more information back into his aching head.
He'd been…captured, yes he remembered that now.
And - a Hive-Queen! One of the Hive-Queens had been there.
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So, this was how it felt like to survive their torture. Funny, Yami had always thought that would feel like a good thing.
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Even though his eyes were still closed and his head was still aching - which also thankfully blurred his memory of what exactly had happened to him - and his body still wouldn't respond when he tried to move it, Yami could focus enough now to think. Before, he had been more concerned that he'd finally been caught to think about planning ahead.
There was something, some trump card he had - and it came back to him instantly in the memory image of a mute human child. Yuugi. And the shining pendant he had thrust into the child's hands.
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Yes, that was it! The pendant - which was what the Hive-Queen had interrogated him about - that he'd given to Yuugi right before Anzu - the name brought a surge of anger with it - had finally gotten him. As long as the demons didn't know a human had the pendant, it would still be safe.
And even if they did, as long as the pendant's holder had no idea what the pendant's true purpose was, not even the powerful Hive-Queens could locate it or its holder. It was a fail-safe spell that had never made sense to Yami before - since he and any of his fellow Ban-Ile would know what such a pendant was used for - but now it was going to come in very handy.
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Unless, of course, the Hive-Queen was able to torture the knowledge of Yuugi's existence out of Yami first.
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His internal musings were interrupted when the guard demon threw him. Judging from the smallness of the space Yami landed in, and how it continued to lurch back and forth afterwards, he was back in the cage. The demon's footsteps faded away, and for a while there was just a lot of deathly quiet.
Then came a peculiar noise, like something swinging back and forth on the end of a chain. Yami tried to guess what that could be, but he hadn't thought of any answers before the cage shook. Something had grabbed it maybe…
"Bastard, you better still be breathing," a new voice muttered, right by his head.
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When a questing hand touched him on the forehead - checking his spiritual signature the way another Ban-Ile would - Yami remembered something else he'd nearly forgotten and forced himself to open his eyes.
One eye, pressed against the cage floor, didn't even twitch. The other one felt like it had been cast in lead, and it was only through supreme effort that Yami got it open enough to see through it at all, but he managed it.
The shape was blurred, but the distinctive crowning mass of nearly-silver whiteness was unmistakable. Yami briefly wondered if Bakura actually looked worried or not - that recluse had always been touchy about showing his true feelings - when the exhaustion he'd been fighting the whole time won out and Yami slipped into the relief of unconsciousness.
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Or rather, it would have been such, had he not still somehow had the energy to dream. Dreams of the past…
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/…He soared gracefully amongst the low cloud cover. It was a lot more fun going flying than sitting through one of Elder Nadda's stupid lectures. Ancient history was way too boring! Especially when there was a whole human city nearby to go spying on! Yami could even hear what Old Nadda's response to his idea of entertainment would be.
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'Being one of our race means being above petty desires, as the clouds are above the soil,' he mouthed as he conjured Nadda's creaky, squeaking voice from memory, 'And furthermore, contact with humans is utterly forbidden! When will you realize I'm telling you these things to help you, young fledgling, not because I enjoy listening to the sound of my own voice!'
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Hah! Who in their right mind would enjoy the sound of Old Nadda's voice? And it wasn't like Yami was missing anything important. If it really had been a lecture that would end up saving his life someday, 'Kura would have shown up. 'Kura always showed up if the topic was going to be something ultimately useful…Yami didn't really think of the white-haired one as a friend, actually he was more like a rival, but there was something very real to the other's ability to predict things.
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Actually, Old Nadda always seemed displeased whenever 'Kura chose to come by. 'Kura came to learn, but he was never anyone's respectful little student. Unlike that half-human girl Mai. Mai was dangerously obsessed with things like ancient Ban-Ile history. Probably because she had been a human once, altered by that mage's spell a hundred years ago, and was now part of their tribe.
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Weird obsessions seemed to be a hallmark of human thinking, though, so Yami hadn't cared much when Mai had confronted him on being a better student. So what if he was only three hundred and twenty years old, a mere one hundred and eighty years too young to be considered a full adult Ban-Ile by Nadda and the rest of the Elders? As far as Yami was concerned, the rest of the tribe could go stuff itself. Yami liked his life just the way it was.
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Caught up in these thoughts, Yami neglected to keep an eye on his altitude, and was still soaring in the low clouds. When he passed through the one in front of him, a tall tree appeared out of thin air and grabbed at his left wing. Totally caught off-guard, Yami dropped another dozen feet while he tried to compensate for the impact - and crashing into another tree. Then it was a wonderfully pain-filled ride of bouncing down a billion tree branches until he finally hit the dirt - head first, of course.
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While waiting for the spinning in his head to clear, Yami had time to think of a thousand terrible things he wanted to do to every last tree in the world before he was able to sit up. His left wing still throbbed - it had been whacked pretty hard. And it did have to be the densest damn forest ever, didn't it?! Looking up revealed nothing but an intimidating lattice of tree branches. And there was no way to climb up these smooth-barked trees…dammit! Old Nadda would be laughing his head off at the sight of his lesson-skipping student stuck in this situation. There was no other options but to walk to the nearest edge of the forest and find a clear spot to take off from…he'd passed a tree-free cliff on his way over, it shouldn't be too far -
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A noise caught his attention, and as he whirled towards it Yami suddenly realized the birds were completely silent. Birds were almost never silent when they were around a Ban-Ile. But they did go silent when that Ban-Ile was hanging around dangerous things and there was something hiding behind one of the nearby trees. As Yami finished his turn he caught a good look at whatever thing that was spying on him -
It was a human female!/
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