(Authoress' note: Sorry I took so long to update. I've been too busy
writing poetry :P. Anyways, I've written this chapter about 50 different
ways and I like this version the best. heh. this is definitely going to be
a rather... *ahem*... interesting chapter. There are going to be flashbacks
and there are going to be wierd scenes that are likely OOC. Please bear
with me as I got 3 hours of sleep last night {it is currently 9:45 a.m.}. I
will probably fix this chapter once I have returned to my proper state of
mind, lol. Until then... welcome to the madness! bwahahahahaah... *evil
maniacal laughter fading into the distance*)
Alyz raised one eyebrow at Ray. "Oh, do tell," she prompted. Ray brought his hand up to his throat and withdrew a thin chain from inside his shirt. Dangling from the chain was a roughly cut ball of prismic bronze with the Millenium Eye enscribed on it in diamond. His portal was not smooth and symmetrical, like Alyz's, but was more of a polygonic shape with the sides chiselled roughly, so that it although it resembled a spherical shape, it was actually a multi-faceted polygon.
"It was my great uncle's most prized possesion. We never learned where it came from. He was crazy in his old age and insisted that a faery gave it to him in exchange for one of his pieces," Ray explained. Alyz looked confused.
"His 'pieces'?" she inquired.
"Yeah. He was a carpenter. He used to make beautiful intarsia of animals." Alyz nodded.
/Let me see the prism,/ Rinn demanded.
/It's not a prism. A prism is made of clear glass to divide white light into the seven colors of the spectrum,/ Alyz said. /That necklace is about as transluscent as my thumb./
/The bronze is merely a thin layer to cover the crystal underneath, to conceal it and what is trapped within it,/ explained Rinn.
/How do you know?/
Rinn hesitated. She did not know, herself, how she knew these things. But she definitely felt something radiating from the prism. It felt like somehow, there was another piece of her locked within it. Some part of herself that sat in there... just waiting to be freed. Rinn almost laughed upon reaching this conclusion. It wasn't a piece of herself... it was another piece of the portal.
Rinn swiftly took control of Alyz's body, reaching out to touch the pendant. "Let me see the prism," she said hastily to Ray. He nodded and lifted the chain over his head, then dropped it into Rinn's outstretched hands. Running her fingers over the coarse surface, she placed one finger gently over the pupil of the diamond eye and pressed, ever so gently. The circular piece of diamond sank under the pressure. Rinn smiled.
"It's definitely a portal," she announced, handing it back to Ray.
"What does that mean?" he asked. Rinn shrugged.
"We have two portals. That means there is only one more out there somewhere," she said. "I don't know what will happen whe we bring them all together, but I'm sure it has something to do with me."
Ray looked at her differently, trying to discern something. "There you go with that accent again, and don't tell me that you're practising for the play this time."
Rinn hesitated. /Should I tell him, Alyz?/ she asked.
/Why not? He's going to figure it out sooner or later. Besides, he has a portal of his own. I doubt it would phaze him too much.
"I am not Alyz. I was freed from the portal to live within her body," Rinn confessed. Ray's odd look didn't change.
"But I thought that the portals came from Egypt. Aren't you English?" he inquired.
Rinn smiled. "Yes, I am. It was interesting of you to take note of that. The portal was already centuries old when I was trapped within it." She cast a wary glance at Bakura before continuing, "I do not know the name of the dark spirit who posessed the body of my love, Barombe, but he indeed came from Egypt, hidden within the Millenium Ring. You see, that spirit has lived on in the bodies of many different people since the time he was banished by the Pharoh to the confines of the Ring. One of which was Barombe. His current host is Bakura."
Ryou flushed as all eyes looked his way. There was a moment of uncomfortable silence, then Ray spoke up again. "Does that mean there is another spirit inside of the prism?" he asked. Rinn was unable to answer his question.
"It's a possibility."
There were no more questions for the time being. Alyz retook her body and finished her coffee. "So," she said, "Where is everyone else today?"
"Joey and Yugi are participating in the Battle City tournament. Tea went to watch and Tristen is at the hospital with Serenity." Alyz remembered vaguely that Serenity was Joey's sister. "We can go watch them duel, if you'd like."
Alyz smiled. "Sure. That might help lighten the mood."
*****
Alyz cast her eyes over the huge crowd of people, searching for Joey and Yugi. Unfortunately, she was shorter than the majority of duelists there, who all seemed to be 6' males, so she mostly just saw a lot of shoulders. Ryou was only slightly taller than her, so Ray ended up being spotter.
"I can't see either of them," he said, standing on his toes. Alyz rolled her eyes.
"Just listen for Joey yelling at someone," she advised. "Or look for Yugi's hair. I'm surprised you haven't seen it yet."
Ray grinned. "Well even /with/ that huge hair, I doubt he would pass for five feet. I bet he still fits through the kiddie doors at McDonald's." Ray said with a wink.
Bakura laughed. "He can, I watched him do it last week."
Ray looked over the crowd once more. "Well, I don't think they're here. Maybe we should look--oh, wait, there's Joey's big blonde head. He's over there." Ray pointed left. They pushed through the swarms of people until they found Joey arguing with a punk twice his size.
"Hey, I beat you fair and square! You owe me that locator card!" Joey demanded. The punk was fuming.
"How about you shut the hell up and get lost before I beat /you/," he said in a gruff, husky voice.
"No way! We already duelled once and I won!" Joey protested. Alyz rolled her eyes as Joey doubled over, the punk's fist sunk firmly into his stomach.
"I never said I'd beat you in a /duel/,"he said with a chuckle. Alyz ran forward and hugged Joey protectively as the punk walked away.
"Asshole..." she said under her breath. Joey stood up, clutching his abdomen. His face was creased in pain but his eyes were dry. He groaned softly.
"Don't you just hate guys like that?" he asked. Alyz smiled and nodded, her eyes damp once more. She kissed his forehead, but stopped when she saw Ryou out of the corner of her eye. She blushed fiercely, taking a step back from Joey as images of that dark cave ran through her mind.
***** Flashback to chapter 8 *****
Joey crept forward, pulling Alyz close to him as they ventured further into the cave. "I know they're in here," he commented. "Tea wanted to go exploring here earlier. They must have decided to go now and just assumed that I'd follow them in." Alyz nodded absently, but didn't listen to a word. There was a loud bang, and a shower of pebbles dropped from the roof. Alyz shrieked and threw herself into Joey's arms.
They paused. There wasn't another bang, but neither was willing to let go of the other. Alyz lifted her head from his chest, looking around briefly. She sighed, about to step back, when she felt Joey's hot breath on her cheek. She flushed as he kissed her once, then brought his mouth closer to her ear and whispered, "You're so beautiful."
Alyz raised one eyebrow and giggled. "You can't even see me!" she protested. Joey laughed once.
"I don't have to." Then, without warning, Alyz felt his lips brush against hers gently, asking permission. She smiled and granted it to him, kissing him back deeply. She felt her back press against the wall of the cave as, for a moment, she lost almost all conscious thought, giving in to Joey's warm embrace. One hand slid slowly up her shirt, his thumb tracing delicate circles in the small of her back.
Suddenly, Alyz was jerked back to reality as Yugi's voice called out. "Joey?" A bright beam of a flashlight blinked against the wall a foot away from Alyz. Joey stumbled away from her sheepishly as they were both exposed in the light of the beam. "Are you guys alright?" Yugi asked. "I wasn't sure if you would be able to find us."
Joey wiped his mouth with his arm, a faint smear of Alyz's pink lip gloss visible on his skin. "Yeah. I was just looking for you, and Alyz appeared out of nowhere, so I thought she could help me find you guys," he said hastily. "You know, woman's intuition and all that." Tea, who was holding the flashlight, looked suspicious, but Yugi seemed to buy it.
"Sorry for leaving without you, Joey, but we figured you would be able to find us in here," Bakura said, stepping out from behind them. Alyz felt a huge surge of guilt sweep over her. How could she do this to him? She was cheating on her first boyfriend and they weren't even going out yet! Alyz resisted the urge to hang her head in shame. The worst part is that she didn't want to take it back. She had thoroughly enjoyed her passionate moment with Joey, which doubled the guilt she was already feeling.
"Um, you know what, I think I need to go back now," she said, her fingers wrapping around the sphere. "See you guys later," she said. Her eyes rested on Ryou's confused expression as she disappeared back through the portal to go back to sitting on the counter in the girl's washroom.
***** End Flashback *****
"Um," Alyz cleared her throat. "Congratulations on winning the duel..." she said, unable to find anything else appropriate to say at that time.
/Shit./ She said to herself. /Just be calm, be cool... There's three hot guys surrounding you right now, all of which seem strangely attracted to you, Alyz. Stay cool and don't mess up again or you'll really get fucked over./
/Nice choice of expression./ Rinn said, bemused.
Alyz scoffed. /Well sorry then, /excuse me/, I meant to say /screwed/ over,/
/Much better, thank you./
"So..." Alyz said aloud, still trying to make conversation before Joey said something stupid. "I wonder where Yugi and Tea are."
Joey shrugged. "Yugi hasn't really duelled much in this tournament, he's probably still checking the place out."
"Then let's go find him," Bakura said. His eyes bored into the side of her head but she refused to meet his gaze, afraid of what her eyes might betray of her.
(...Don't say I didn't warn you. Pretty disturbed, eh? *laugh laugh snort* EH, CANADA?! tee hee *settles down* yeah well, all canadianism aside... tell me what you think! REVIEW!)
Alyz raised one eyebrow at Ray. "Oh, do tell," she prompted. Ray brought his hand up to his throat and withdrew a thin chain from inside his shirt. Dangling from the chain was a roughly cut ball of prismic bronze with the Millenium Eye enscribed on it in diamond. His portal was not smooth and symmetrical, like Alyz's, but was more of a polygonic shape with the sides chiselled roughly, so that it although it resembled a spherical shape, it was actually a multi-faceted polygon.
"It was my great uncle's most prized possesion. We never learned where it came from. He was crazy in his old age and insisted that a faery gave it to him in exchange for one of his pieces," Ray explained. Alyz looked confused.
"His 'pieces'?" she inquired.
"Yeah. He was a carpenter. He used to make beautiful intarsia of animals." Alyz nodded.
/Let me see the prism,/ Rinn demanded.
/It's not a prism. A prism is made of clear glass to divide white light into the seven colors of the spectrum,/ Alyz said. /That necklace is about as transluscent as my thumb./
/The bronze is merely a thin layer to cover the crystal underneath, to conceal it and what is trapped within it,/ explained Rinn.
/How do you know?/
Rinn hesitated. She did not know, herself, how she knew these things. But she definitely felt something radiating from the prism. It felt like somehow, there was another piece of her locked within it. Some part of herself that sat in there... just waiting to be freed. Rinn almost laughed upon reaching this conclusion. It wasn't a piece of herself... it was another piece of the portal.
Rinn swiftly took control of Alyz's body, reaching out to touch the pendant. "Let me see the prism," she said hastily to Ray. He nodded and lifted the chain over his head, then dropped it into Rinn's outstretched hands. Running her fingers over the coarse surface, she placed one finger gently over the pupil of the diamond eye and pressed, ever so gently. The circular piece of diamond sank under the pressure. Rinn smiled.
"It's definitely a portal," she announced, handing it back to Ray.
"What does that mean?" he asked. Rinn shrugged.
"We have two portals. That means there is only one more out there somewhere," she said. "I don't know what will happen whe we bring them all together, but I'm sure it has something to do with me."
Ray looked at her differently, trying to discern something. "There you go with that accent again, and don't tell me that you're practising for the play this time."
Rinn hesitated. /Should I tell him, Alyz?/ she asked.
/Why not? He's going to figure it out sooner or later. Besides, he has a portal of his own. I doubt it would phaze him too much.
"I am not Alyz. I was freed from the portal to live within her body," Rinn confessed. Ray's odd look didn't change.
"But I thought that the portals came from Egypt. Aren't you English?" he inquired.
Rinn smiled. "Yes, I am. It was interesting of you to take note of that. The portal was already centuries old when I was trapped within it." She cast a wary glance at Bakura before continuing, "I do not know the name of the dark spirit who posessed the body of my love, Barombe, but he indeed came from Egypt, hidden within the Millenium Ring. You see, that spirit has lived on in the bodies of many different people since the time he was banished by the Pharoh to the confines of the Ring. One of which was Barombe. His current host is Bakura."
Ryou flushed as all eyes looked his way. There was a moment of uncomfortable silence, then Ray spoke up again. "Does that mean there is another spirit inside of the prism?" he asked. Rinn was unable to answer his question.
"It's a possibility."
There were no more questions for the time being. Alyz retook her body and finished her coffee. "So," she said, "Where is everyone else today?"
"Joey and Yugi are participating in the Battle City tournament. Tea went to watch and Tristen is at the hospital with Serenity." Alyz remembered vaguely that Serenity was Joey's sister. "We can go watch them duel, if you'd like."
Alyz smiled. "Sure. That might help lighten the mood."
*****
Alyz cast her eyes over the huge crowd of people, searching for Joey and Yugi. Unfortunately, she was shorter than the majority of duelists there, who all seemed to be 6' males, so she mostly just saw a lot of shoulders. Ryou was only slightly taller than her, so Ray ended up being spotter.
"I can't see either of them," he said, standing on his toes. Alyz rolled her eyes.
"Just listen for Joey yelling at someone," she advised. "Or look for Yugi's hair. I'm surprised you haven't seen it yet."
Ray grinned. "Well even /with/ that huge hair, I doubt he would pass for five feet. I bet he still fits through the kiddie doors at McDonald's." Ray said with a wink.
Bakura laughed. "He can, I watched him do it last week."
Ray looked over the crowd once more. "Well, I don't think they're here. Maybe we should look--oh, wait, there's Joey's big blonde head. He's over there." Ray pointed left. They pushed through the swarms of people until they found Joey arguing with a punk twice his size.
"Hey, I beat you fair and square! You owe me that locator card!" Joey demanded. The punk was fuming.
"How about you shut the hell up and get lost before I beat /you/," he said in a gruff, husky voice.
"No way! We already duelled once and I won!" Joey protested. Alyz rolled her eyes as Joey doubled over, the punk's fist sunk firmly into his stomach.
"I never said I'd beat you in a /duel/,"he said with a chuckle. Alyz ran forward and hugged Joey protectively as the punk walked away.
"Asshole..." she said under her breath. Joey stood up, clutching his abdomen. His face was creased in pain but his eyes were dry. He groaned softly.
"Don't you just hate guys like that?" he asked. Alyz smiled and nodded, her eyes damp once more. She kissed his forehead, but stopped when she saw Ryou out of the corner of her eye. She blushed fiercely, taking a step back from Joey as images of that dark cave ran through her mind.
***** Flashback to chapter 8 *****
Joey crept forward, pulling Alyz close to him as they ventured further into the cave. "I know they're in here," he commented. "Tea wanted to go exploring here earlier. They must have decided to go now and just assumed that I'd follow them in." Alyz nodded absently, but didn't listen to a word. There was a loud bang, and a shower of pebbles dropped from the roof. Alyz shrieked and threw herself into Joey's arms.
They paused. There wasn't another bang, but neither was willing to let go of the other. Alyz lifted her head from his chest, looking around briefly. She sighed, about to step back, when she felt Joey's hot breath on her cheek. She flushed as he kissed her once, then brought his mouth closer to her ear and whispered, "You're so beautiful."
Alyz raised one eyebrow and giggled. "You can't even see me!" she protested. Joey laughed once.
"I don't have to." Then, without warning, Alyz felt his lips brush against hers gently, asking permission. She smiled and granted it to him, kissing him back deeply. She felt her back press against the wall of the cave as, for a moment, she lost almost all conscious thought, giving in to Joey's warm embrace. One hand slid slowly up her shirt, his thumb tracing delicate circles in the small of her back.
Suddenly, Alyz was jerked back to reality as Yugi's voice called out. "Joey?" A bright beam of a flashlight blinked against the wall a foot away from Alyz. Joey stumbled away from her sheepishly as they were both exposed in the light of the beam. "Are you guys alright?" Yugi asked. "I wasn't sure if you would be able to find us."
Joey wiped his mouth with his arm, a faint smear of Alyz's pink lip gloss visible on his skin. "Yeah. I was just looking for you, and Alyz appeared out of nowhere, so I thought she could help me find you guys," he said hastily. "You know, woman's intuition and all that." Tea, who was holding the flashlight, looked suspicious, but Yugi seemed to buy it.
"Sorry for leaving without you, Joey, but we figured you would be able to find us in here," Bakura said, stepping out from behind them. Alyz felt a huge surge of guilt sweep over her. How could she do this to him? She was cheating on her first boyfriend and they weren't even going out yet! Alyz resisted the urge to hang her head in shame. The worst part is that she didn't want to take it back. She had thoroughly enjoyed her passionate moment with Joey, which doubled the guilt she was already feeling.
"Um, you know what, I think I need to go back now," she said, her fingers wrapping around the sphere. "See you guys later," she said. Her eyes rested on Ryou's confused expression as she disappeared back through the portal to go back to sitting on the counter in the girl's washroom.
***** End Flashback *****
"Um," Alyz cleared her throat. "Congratulations on winning the duel..." she said, unable to find anything else appropriate to say at that time.
/Shit./ She said to herself. /Just be calm, be cool... There's three hot guys surrounding you right now, all of which seem strangely attracted to you, Alyz. Stay cool and don't mess up again or you'll really get fucked over./
/Nice choice of expression./ Rinn said, bemused.
Alyz scoffed. /Well sorry then, /excuse me/, I meant to say /screwed/ over,/
/Much better, thank you./
"So..." Alyz said aloud, still trying to make conversation before Joey said something stupid. "I wonder where Yugi and Tea are."
Joey shrugged. "Yugi hasn't really duelled much in this tournament, he's probably still checking the place out."
"Then let's go find him," Bakura said. His eyes bored into the side of her head but she refused to meet his gaze, afraid of what her eyes might betray of her.
(...Don't say I didn't warn you. Pretty disturbed, eh? *laugh laugh snort* EH, CANADA?! tee hee *settles down* yeah well, all canadianism aside... tell me what you think! REVIEW!)