Disclaimer: I do not own Yu-Gi-Oh, and all people, places, and events from the original Yu-Gi-Oh! were written and are the rightful property of Kazuki Takahashi (as it should be; if any of us fanfiction writers get our little hands on it... well, then it wouldn't be Yu-Gi-Oh!).

Author's Note: Wow, that last entry must have really been a surprise for everybody, eh? Ha, glad I made some of you go wide-eyed over there- that was the main purpose.

This will be very short since I really don't have much to say as of today… wow that's a rarity now isn't it… anyway just read this chappie!

#2 Author's Note: All thoughts are in italics.

Revival of the Heart

By: Angel's Nocturne

Chapter 36: Arrows Shot True….

"What you don't remember can no longer hurt you."

Anzu awoke with a start; she opened her eyes and kept them open for a long period of time before finally allowing herself to close them tight for a second. She was denying it all, denying what she had seen… but had she really seen it?

Anzu realized that she was lying down on the plush sand like a bed, her body turned on its side so that her back was facing something that warmed her back. She was staring out into the dark desert landscape, and since what she could see was the jeep in the far distance she could assume that she was in front of the cave entrance, sleeping beside the fire. She slowly lifted herself up so that she now sat on the sand, and she gently turned her head to see the cozy little fire still burning bright- and Bakura was sitting next to it.

What! Bakura! Anzu blushed and was about to gasp when she discovered upon closer inspection that it was really Ryou who sat near the fire, not Bakura. The brunette sighed, but then remembered why she had blushed so madly. She had just been in the desert, with Bakura, where he became pained by something and then… kissed her. Just kissed her, as if that was something to be expected, and natural. Her cerulean eyes went wide as she remembered how he had done it, how he had simply placed his lips on hers… she desired to scream over and over again as the images played like a broken tape recorder in her head.

No! This can't be real! she thought desperately as her mind reeled in panic. She liked Atemu, that was who she had a crush on all this time… and now Bakura had intercepted her life. Why had he done such a thing? Why did he kiss her? Did Bakura even love, even care? Anzu had always considered Bakura to be a heartless fiend who felt nothing and people were only pawns in his plan to torture the Pharaoh and extract his revenge. But how could she be so sure of that now, after the kiss she had just endured?

But wait, why…? Anzu became conscious of the fact, if she had been with Bakura, how did she end up back by the cave entrance, and asleep too? This was the exact same spot where she had been sitting just before she had seen Ryou, or rather Bakura, walk out into the desert- had she actually fallen asleep and dreamt the whole thing? Had the kiss not really happen, instead being a figment of Anzu's thoughts that had become a dream?

Anzu shook her head forcefully. No, she could never have dreamt that, that image that now haunted her thoughts and made havoc on her senses. If she had imagined the whole thing, then that would mean that these were her thoughts, and her ideas, and she really wanted Bakura to kiss her-

NO! She refused to accept that idea; she liked the Pharaoh, she loved Atemu, not Bakura… never the thief that had always tried to kill Yugi and the rest of the gang, trying to get his greedy hands upon the Millennium Puzzle so that he could one day release Zorc the Dark One. But then why was she just waking from sleep, from the same spot from which she was watching the stars just a little earlier? It had to have been a dream… but it was too real to be a dream…then why was I sleeping just a second ago? Anzu felt like all her emotions were now swirling about in a figurative washing machine, tossing and turning to the point that she wanted to cry and pull her hair out at the same time. She was so confused, so disembodied from her heart and soul that everything felt too surreal and vague now, like a faded form of her former self. She wanted to know what the truth was, where it was, and if it meant that Bakura actually liked her, or if it was she who was really in love-

"Anzu, are you feeling well?" The brunette's eyes shot up, scared at the mention of her name. She could see Ryou looking over at, his brown eyes filled with genuine worry and caring as he stood up and sat beside her. Anzu felt her heart thump harder now, remembering how Bakura had sat next to her in just the same way, just before the moment that he winced in pain… she decided not to think of that as the white-haired teen placed a hand to her forehead and held it there for several moments. "You don't seem to have a fever, but you look quite flushed and you're acting a bit fidgety…."

"Ryou, what have you been doing lately?" The question caught Ryou by surprise, but he smiled as his chocolate orbs wandered as Anzu assumed he was trying to collect his thoughts.

"Well, I was in the cave a small while ago, just drifting about. Quite boring, to tell you the truth- I kind of fazed out from the boredom for a bit, because my memory isn't all that good after that. You were sitting by the fire before that time, and the next thing I remember, you were curled up fast asleep. You must have been really worn out to get knocked out so quickly." He smiled his warm, gentle smile that usually graced his pale face every other time Anzu saw him. "Anyway I just decided to sit over here by the fire- to look at the stars since you can't really see them as good over in Japan- and then you woke up. That's about it, I think."

Now Anzu could be sure that it was a dream- it didn't seem that Bakura had possessed Ryou in any of that time. She could feel the tears well up in her eyes, but they were too small to fall from there and she didn't have the strength to cry now. She was more shocked and appalled at her own desires, her own thoughts and feelings, these ones that told her that she liked Bakura now, because the dream showed her as much. One dream was all it took, and now Anzu couldn't trust her own heart to tell her who she loved. Bakura, the snow-haired teen who had made Ryou's life and on some occasions her own a living hell, was now on her mind to the point that Anzu wanted to just die, since now she had no idea what thoughts were her own, and what feelings were truly hers….

"Anzu, you might need to sleep more. You look terribly ill" Ryou said to Anzu, and as he did so Anzu suddenly felt a wave of tiredness swept over her, and she realized that she did need to get more rest- all the previous events of the day had taken a toll on her mind and body. She had food now, and shelter as well, so tonight she could sleep easy with the knowledge that she had survived another day.

"Yeah… you might be right Ryou…" Anzu whispered, and then she could see her vision grow fuzzy as she drifted out of consciousness again, her eyes closing gradually so that the last thing she saw was the starry night sky above her head….

Ryou watched her go from alert to out cold in less than a few minutes, absent-minded to all that was around him as he quietly admired the glorious night and the silence that enveloped his thoughts. Little did he realize there was a light glow of gold coming from his chest, from the Millennium Ring, and before he could grasp what had happened Bakura had taken over again, the snow-white hair of the teen becoming wilder, and his eyes becoming instantly narrow and sharp like eyes. Though this night, they were a bit softer than before, and showing all of the feelings that he had instead of his cold-hearted persona.

He glanced over at the sleeping form next to him, and when he saw that it was Anzu he hissed to himself and looked away quickly. He refused to look at her, not wanting to remember what had just occurred back out by the dunes, in the dark, shadowed desert… he had made Anzu forget what she had seen, making her think it to all be a dream, but Bakura knew of how real the event truly was, and the danger that he now faced because of it. He looked up to the stars, and he glared at them as he saw Samira's image on the navy-blue canvas.

Damn you, Samira... damn you to hell!

---

The princess continued to gaze at her crystal orb as the scene that presently held her focus was the kiss between Bakura and Anzu. She cackled menacingly at the displeasure and hurt that she could feel in Bakura's heart, something that she knew he hadn't felt himself for more than five millennia.

"Heh heh, poor Akefia, do you now remember that you have a soul? You wouldn't though, especially not since that day-"

"My Queen? Are you here?" Samira turned in a half circle to see her loyal servant approaching from her throne room, entering cautiously through the small passage way that marked the start of her dark secret lair. He moved slowly, looking about the cylindrical space in both awe and terror as he drew closer to his mistress, and in his hands he held the weapon that she had regarded so highly of.

"Aah, my servant… you have brought me the weapon, I presume?"

"Indeed my Queen- is this what you speak of?" He placed before the Egyptian princess what he carried- a bow and a case full of arrows, to which he showed to her in the most delicate matter from which he could muster since this was an item of mass importance to his mistress's operations. The bow was about three feet or so in height, and was made from a strong wood of some sort, but the servant hadn't the slightest clue as to the maker or the source from which it had been obtained. It had been leafed in gold, and decorating its surface were several lines of hieroglyphs that were painted on with the most precise perfection. The string that was also a part of the bow was like the hair of a unicorn, as it shone like a needle of silver in the faint purple light of the mystic orb; it was indeed tightly wounded around the bow, and was strong enough to propel the arrow it launched with accuracy beyond any mortal man's ability.

The arrows that accompanied the beautiful bow had to be of the same exquisite features, and so they were as the servant observed. Each one was topped with a sharp spearhead made of a shiny metal that the servant could not identify, but nonetheless all of the arrowheads had been sharpened so that their tips could pierce the sharpest metal, leaving flesh to be an easy surface to puncture and tear apart. The wooden part was exactly like that of the bow, leafed in gold and covered in hieroglyphs, and the ends had feathers that were white- almost silver- and shone like stars in the amethyst light.

The whole display was like a work of art, too beautiful for blood to be shed through using it. Samira tenderly held the weapon in her tan-skinned hands, her crimson eyes looking over it maliciously as the servant felt his Queen's emotions become excited and fired with the desire for destruction. She licked her lips, and then turned away from her slave as she brought the bow and arrows close to the crystal orb, the lavender light of it paling the gold leafing and making the weapon appear stark and dismal.

"Uh, my Queen?" the servant asked meekly.

"Yes?"

"I hate to bother you at this time, but I am curious- what is the overall importance of this bow and the arrows? They seem to be plain objects with no special meaning- what is it that makes it so essential to your take-over?" The servant was afraid that he might have stepped out of his place when he questioned his mistress, because he could see her glare at him with dark red eyes and he could also sense her wrath swarm in the air like an apprehensive mist fluttering through his soul. He was about to ask for her absolute forgiveness for his unnecessary inquisition of her motives, when he noticed that the corner of her lips curled upward and she narrowed her eyes at him.

"Hm, I see that free-will makes my slaves a bit antsy, doesn't it?" She moved like water as she wheeled around to look at him, her stance brimming with superiority over her quivering slave, his eyes wide as he watched her shadow over him. "Well, since I am in such a joyous mood, I will tell you of the meaning behind these normal tools of war." She grasped them in her hands, displaying them to him as she spoke. "They are quite ordinary, as you can plainly see. However, once I chant the spell that I 'extracted' from Shadi's mind over these objects they will have abilities that will extent farther than even the gods could hope to achieve!"

"And what is that, my Queen?" She paused as she took a moment to think about how to respond to her slave's question.

"To put it simply for you, my trusted servant, the arrows will be enchanted so that, when launched by the charmed bow, will not shoot forth a regular arrow. Instead, the arrow will become an energy, an enchantment of its own. They have an affect upon the soul, you see, for the energy- once shot into a body- freezes the heart and all emotions within it, making it impossible to live. The person will die once the magic as seeped through their system." She admired the intricate designs on the wooden bow, and fingered its smooth surface. "When a soulless body is hit with this magic, the vessel will become too cold and heartless to contain a soul, thus leaving the body to remain in a coma until it eventually dies from lack of nutrition and such.

"This is the weapon" she whispered, "that I shall use to keep Atemu in limbo- forever. I have to enchant it soon though, before little Anzu figures out how to return his spirit to this world, but once I do there will be on one to ruin any of my plans!"

"But, my Queen, what are the effects of this weapon on a living person? Does it affect them as well?" the servant questioned, and Samira simply smirked.

"It does, but that is not its purpose this time around. For now, I must be left alone to make this bow and these arrows into the death of the young Pharaoh. Leave me now, for this is something that, if done before your eyes, would leave you blinder than a bat in sunlight. Go, now!" The evil princess gestured sharply to the entrance, and the slave disappeared into the shadows before she had need to finish her sentence. The room was silent again, and as the quiet became forceful upon her ears Samira turned around to face the crystal sphere, which now had a twisting mass of colored smoke crammed inside of it, swirling about like a coiled snake ready to strike. She grinned as she held the bow and arrows in her hands, and as she showed them to the orb it glowed of amethyst so much so that the room became engulfed in its brilliance, and the princess chortled evilly.

"And now the time has come, for darkness to fill this dreaded world once more!"

---

Anzu awoke in the morning, the sunlight warming her cool face and telling her that it was time to arise from slumber. She yawned as she stretched her arms to the sky, and she caught a glimpse of her surroundings just before she closed her eyes- the sand a pale gold, the sky a cobalt blue with streaks of snow-white clouds, and all appeared peaceful and just for a dawn in Egypt. The breeze was gentle and cool as it graced her gingerly and all was quiet save the sounds of the morning, and Anzu was satisfied as she glanced around with sleepy eyes….

But then she remembered the haunting memory of the previous night, of the kiss and the feelings and the despair… her heart ached several times over as she recalled it, and as she did so she realized that she felt an uneasiness inside her, like something was wrong with her….

And then it occurred to her the predicament.

She had not done something that she had grown so used to, and had been expected each and every night she slept….

She had not dreamt of Atemu last night.

---

Author's Note: Now we are drawing closer… don't let the Bakura and Anzu drama fool ya… and thanks for reviewing me, readers! You are wonderful, you know that? Maybe I haven't said that enough… yes you guys are awesome!

See ya next update!