Chapter Eight: My Immortal
It was only when the guards had managed to tie his wrists together that Ryou thought to wonder what they were planning to do to him.
"So, where are we going?" he asked. "The catacombs, right?"
The guards ignored him as they dragged him through deserted corridors. "He wants us to behead the kid, right?" one asked.
"No," the other man laughed. "Of course not! We're supposed to lock him up. Weren't you listening?"
"Lock...oh! Ha! That will be fun."
They paused at a store room and found a strip of cloth, which they used to gag Ryou. He didn't try to fight it; he was quite convinced that his yami wouldn't let him die.
Except...Yugi...
But believing that Yugi was dead would be awful, and Ryou wouldn't do it. Yami would save Yugi, and Bakura would save Ryou, and then they'd find a way to get home. Together.
* * *
Bakura couldn't fight back when the priests finally decided to throw him in the Nile. His head spun as soon as he tried to stand, and he nearly fainted from the pain.
~It's okay,~ he told himself. ~I've got a fairly good idea of what swimming entails. I won't drown.~
Never mind that he had never actually /tried/ to swim before. Never mind that the last time he'd been in a river, Mai, who had been injured, had been forced to drag him onto the bank. And never mind that these were not /stupid/ priests, and quite probably they would think to tie his hands together, at least.
He didn't bother to formulate an escape plan; he was quite positive that he couldn't run in his condition. He simply followed the priestess of Set, and tried not to annoy either of the priests, who had hold of his arms.
"I don't suppose," he said, when he noticed that they were getting alarmingly close to a door that led outside, "that you would consider being bribed?"
"Tempt us not!" the priestess cried.
"Gah, what's the use of a priesthood if you're not corrupt?"
"And what use," the Elite Priest said in the tone of one who is very amused and endeavoring not to show it, "is the second son of a pharaoh?"
"I'll have you know that I /could/ be the first son," Bakura said haughtily. "Not like anyone knows for sure."
"Oh," the priestess said suddenly. "We're going to tie him up, right?"
"Yes," the Elite Priest replied. "There should be a store room around here somewhere."
While the three priests engaged in opening random doors in search of rope, Bakura leaned against the wall. He felt rather dizzy, and also noticed something distressing.
For the short time he'd known Ryou, he had always /felt/ the presence of his other half, like a steady light in the back of his head. In time, he grew to no longer notice it.
But now - now he could feel it flickering, like a candle-flame blown by the wind. And when he concentrated - not an easy feat, with the pain in his head and other external factors - he could feel a growing sense of panic from his hikari.
He felt somehow certain that Ryou wasn't aware of that fear. Not now. Not yet.
But something was very much wrong.
And, in spite of the fact that Bakura himself was about ten minutes away from sinking to the bottom of the Nile, he was desperately afraid for Ryou's well-being, not his own.
He barely felt the priests bind his hands behind his back, barely heard their discussion of whether or not they should take the time to tie him to a big rock, just as an extra precaution.
~Ryou,~ he thought tentatively, wondering if his other half could hear him. ~Don't worry. It's all right.~
But he knew that it wasn't.
~~
Once they found the right room in the catacombs, the guards moved rapidly. It took both of them, their eyes on Ryou just in case he attempted to escape, to shove the lid off of a stone coffin.
Lock him up.
"That?" Ryou asked incredulously.
"Yes," one of them grunted. "Okay, that's a large enough opening. Just shove him in. We've got other things to do."
Ryou felt the panic that, unbeknownst to him, his yami had already noticed. "No," he wailed. "That's awful, why don't you just drown me?"
They laughed, and wrestled him into the coffin. "Good-bye, traitor," one called, as they shoved the lid back on.
Ryou felt a stinging pain in his wrist, and concentrated on that to quell his terror. After much debate, he concluded that he had landed on the watch, and the glass on the face had shattered and cut into his skin.
He tried to kick the top off of the coffin, and when that didn't work, went back to the problem of the broken watch. There was a large shard of glass sticking out of his arm; he could feel it.
~Ryou?~
Soft voice, quiet, but familiar.
"'Kura!" he yelped.
~Don't be afraid, Ryou...s'all right...~
Just the knowledge that somehow, his yami was there, gave him the courage he needed. It hurt, and he was convinced that he heard something snap, but he managed to rotate his wrists far enough that he could grasp the bit of glass between two fingers.
And he was /sure/ that something broke - and not the watch, either - when he got the glass into position and then pushed down, effectively crushing one hand into the bottom of the coffin as well as sawing into the rope that bound him.
He tried not to think about the fact that, even if he got his hands free, he was far too weak to get out.
**I'm so tired of being here
Suppressed by all my childish fears
And if you have to leave
I wish that you would just leave
Because your presence still lingers here
And it won't leave me alone**
"Funny," the priestess remarked. "I just thought that a murderer and conspirator would try to get away."
"No, the bribe was my best plan," Bakura told her.
The three priests had led him to a cliff overlooking the Nile. It was a very small cliff, and the water probably wasn't too deep here, but nevertheless, Bakura was not looking forward to this attempt on his life.
"Are you going to push me over?" he asked innocently. "Or are we going to stand here until it gets dark?"
"Good point," the priest of Osiris said, and shoved him hard.
To his everlasting shame, Bakura screamed as he fell.
The priests watched as the fragile shape of the outlaw prince vanished beneath the water, and did not resurface.
"Well," the priestess said finally. "That's good, then."
They turned to leave. None saw the golden-haired boy watching them from several yards away.
**These wounds won't seem to heal
This pain is just too real
There's just too much that time cannot erase
When you cried, I'd wipe away all of your tears
When you'd scream, I'd fight away all of your fears
And I've held your hand through all of these years
But you still have all of me**
Between the moment he hit the water and the time when he found that he could breathe again, Bakura remembered only a blur.
He sat up, coughing violently to rid his lungs of water.
"Bastards," Malik muttered, patting his friend awkwardly on the back.
"Well, they /are/ priests," Bakura managed. "You're all wet."
"So are you, idiot." Malik finished untying the ropes, and Bakura raised his hands to wipe water from his eyes.
"Malik, if ever you were my friend, you have to do something for me. Right now. No questions."
"Of course," Malik said immediately, and Bakura felt something tug on his heart. What /happened/ to change this utter trust into raving lunacy?
"I have a friend. Looks like me, except a slave. He's in danger - grave danger. Leave me here, go and find him."
The Millennium Ring did not exist, but even that had not broken the bond between Bakura and Ryou. However, Bakura was quite unable to locate his hikari. He tried tapping into Ryou's thoughts, and had to pull back.
darkness pain fear help me
"Somewhere dark," Bakura said finally.
Malik thought about that. "The catacombs?"
"Try."
"You'll tell me what this is about later, right?"
"I might."
"Sure you'll be all right?"
"Yes, now go."
Malik stood and ran toward the palace, leaving the half-drowned Bakura to wring out his hair and ponder again about what would go wrong.
~~
Ryou's hands had been unbound for several minutes before he realized that it was entirely possible he would bleed to death.
"Help?" he called, banging on the lid of the coffin. "Anyone out there? Of course not."
The darkness pressed in around him, and he shuddered. He wasn't claustrophobic, thankfully, but that didn't mean he /liked/ this. It was an awful way to die at the best of times.
The guards had neglected to fully close the coffin; there was a gap of about two inches near his head. He reached blindly for it and tried to get the leverage to push it open farther, but couldn't.
Light flared suddenly, and he yelped. "Hello?"
The word was echoed back, by a voice so familiar that the physical pain vanished, replaced by emotional panic.
"Malik!" Ryou cried. Oh, God, /no/. Anyone but /him/.
The light grew, and, squinting through the small opening, Ryou saw flame. A torch, probably. "Are you the person who looks like Bakura?" Malik asked. "Or are you one of us being punished?"
"I'm Ryou," the boy replied. "And I'm bleeding, and my hand is probably broken, and I'd really like to get out now."
A pause. "You /didn't/ answer the /question/."
Before Ryou could think up a suitable reply, there came a grinding noise, and the crack above his head widened. "Damn. Heavy," Malik said. It took him a minute to open the coffin enough, but eventually Ryou was able to wriggle out.
"Thanks," he said dubiously. Malik /looked/ sane, but Ryou knew better.
Malik stared at him. "He was right. You look just like him. Oh, you /are/ bleeding."
Ryou looked down at his arms. His wrists were all cut up from the broken glass, and Sathaugula had stopped working again. He was dimly aware of a sharp pain in his left hand, and suspected a broken bone there.
"I need a healer," he said. "Right away."
"Hang on." Malik had set the torch in a bracket before; now he picked it up and examined the walls. After a moment, he pried a stone out and began to pull out several jars, peering into each. "We use some of these rooms for storage," he explained. "Should be some...oh, good." He pulled some bandages out, carefully replaced everything else in the hole in the wall, and then turned to Ryou. "Hold out your arms."
Ryou did so, and allowed Malik to wrap the bandages around his bloody wrists, though he doubted it would do much good. "And Bakura sent you?"
"Well, yes. Bloody useless git. He barely gave me anything to go on. I was looking for ages before I heard you."
Malik led Ryou out of the catacombs. The white-haired boy was quite lost by this time. The Malik he remembered was insane and murderous and /evil/. Very much so, however much Isis Ishtar wanted to believe that there was some good left in him. But /this/ Malik was perfectly sane, and seemed to be Bakura's friend.
Strange.
Well, really, this was /Yami/ Malik, wasn't it? And maybe five thousand years of imprisonment would make him crazy.
Maybe.
Somehow, though, Ryou didn't believe it.
**You used to captivate me
By your resonating light
Now I'm bound by the life you left behind
Your face, it haunts my once pleasant dreams
Your voice, it chased away all the sanity in me**
The two were nearly at one of the doors that led outside when Malik swore and stopped walking.
"What?" Ryou asked, looking up. All he saw was an Egyptian girl, her dark reddish-black hair held up with gold barrettes, moving swiftly toward them.
"It's Zahara," Malik snapped. "Augh, too late, she's seen us. Look, she's a priestess of Nephthys, and absolutely insane. So just - "
"Malik Ishtar," the priestess said dreamily, gliding up to them and stopping. "I thought you were still around here."
"Hi, Zara," the blond boy said half-heartedly.
Zahara's eyes, an odd shade of dark gold, fell on Ryou. "And who is your friend?"
Ryou tried to back away, and crashed into a wall. "Just an unimportant slave," he said. This priestess was seriously creeping him out. Nephthys...wasn't she the goddess of the dead?
Zahara moved past Malik and stared at Ryou. "Your eyes," she said. "They're very strange."
"The word is 'dilated,'" Malik said. "She's right, you know. Your pupils are really big."
Ryou shivered, though it wasn't cold at all. It must be Sathaugula, working its poison on him.
Zahara leaned forward, gazing deep into his eyes. She looked thoughtful. "Your hair is silver. You look like an angel."
"I'm not - "
"Angel-boy," she continued obliviously, "with your sick beautiful eyes. Too pretty to go mad or blind,and die from it." Her voice was liquid silver. "But die you will. It is long past stopping, now. Tell me, angel-boy, how long has it been since you last slept? Do you feel cold, when there is only warmth around you? Does your vision begin to blur?" She laid three slender fingers under his chin and tilted his face up. "How bad is the pain, angel- boy? Does it still seem normal to you? Not for long."
"How do you know?" he whispered.
"You are marked by my mistress," she said. Ryou lifted his arm and stared at Sathaugula, which protruded over the top of his bandages. "I see that you have tried, perhaps, to end it. I fear that you have only made it worse."
"Zara?" Malik's voice quavered. "What's happening? Is he dying?"
The priestess scrutinized Ryou's face a moment longer, then stepped back. "He is," she said. "I cannot interfere."
"Oh. Bakura's not going to like that."
Ryou realized that he was trembling, and then noticed that the blood was already soaking through his bandages. "I still need a healer."
"Oh, right. Excuse us, Zahara." Malik grabbed hold of Ryou's elbow and half- dragged the smaller boy away from the priestess, who watched them go with unreadable eyes. "Completely mad. Don't listen to her."
But Ryou was lost in thought.
~'Kura,~ he thought, wondering if his yami could hear him. ~I know you wouldn't have wanted this, but it's still your fault. Why would you need time-travel in the first place? I'm sorry it has to end this way.~
There was silence, just for a moment, then a quiet reply. Ryou wasn't even sure he actually heard it.
~Ryou-chan...you know I would die for you, if I could.~
~But you can't.~
* * *
When they found Bakura, he was lying on his back, staring up at the sky. It was late afternoon, and the dying sunlight touched his silvery hair with golden highlights, and made his eyes seem like dark pits.
"You're dying," he said, as soon as Ryou was within earshot.
Ryou nodded, and sat down beside his yami. "It's the demon watch. It's killing me, because I used it."
Malik sensed that this was an intensely private moment, and headed back for the castle, though he watched the two for as long as he could see them - so similar, so different. The one, a prince, a fallen angel; the other a slave, life slowly bleeding from him.
"Bakura," Ryou said finally. "There must be a way to - "
"To stop this?" Bakura asked. "There isn't. I'm sorry."
"You're just going to give up?"
"Ryou, be realistic. What do you think /I/ can do about it?"
"Talk to your demon friend, strike a bargain - "
"I haven't paid for the last bargain I made." Bakura sighed. "Be glad you are dying. Perhaps you will escape from this torment. Do you realize that I'm immortal now? I'm completely doomed. I have to go through the same five thousand year cycle, over and over again, for all eternity - because of that watch."
"Better to live forever with no memories of the past than to die at seventeen," Ryou snapped.
"You're sixteen. And it's better to die than to be kept awake night after night, dreaming - "
"I don't care!" Ryou cried, despair lending his mild voice an edge that made his yami sit up and stare at him in shock. "I'm already kept awake! My hand is broken and the bleeding won't /stop/ and it /hurts/ and I don't want to die yet!"
Bakura finally noticed the bandages. "Oh. What happened?"
Ryou wordlessly showed his yami the shattered face of the watch.
"Well, come on. Let's go find Mokuba."
**These wounds won't seem to heal
This pain is just too real
There's just too much that time cannot erase
When you cried, I'd wipe away all of your tears
When you'd scream, I'd fight away all of your fears
And I've held your hand through all of these years
But you still have all of me**
Malik strode along the corridors in the catacombs. He was very unhappy.
Damn, he hadn't meant for Zahara to see him. She wouldn't /tell/ anyone, of course, but she would probably continue to seek him out. She was completely /mad/, without a doubt.
But not so mad as Shizu.
Speaking of Shizu...
The blonde Egyptian stepped out of a room to block his pathway. "Malik Ishtar," she purred. "Just the boy I was looking for. Come in, come in. I have a proposition for you..."
Probably she was going to try to kill him again.
But what choice did he have? She was one of the leaders of the rebellion, and to disobey her meant death /anyway/...
He followed.
* * *
When they finally found Kaiba's room, Bakura was nearly murdered by the dark-haired boy just for suggesting that Mokuba heal Ryou.
"He fainted last time!" Kaiba yelled. "He still hasn't recovered."
"Seto," Mokuba whined, trying to push past his brother, who was blocking the doorway. "Ryou needs help."
"There are /other/ healer-mages around!"
"Besides," Bakura added helpfully, "Yugi was dead. Ryou's not. Ever think that /that/ had something to do with it?"
"Good point," Mokuba said, ducking into the hallway before Kaiba could stop him. "C'mere, Ryou."
It was the work of a minute to stop the bleeding and repair the broken bone in Ryou's hand. Meanwhile, Kaiba glared at Bakura.
"How did you know Yugi was dead?" he demanded. "You haven't been around here since it happened."
"I...er...read it on the Internet?"
"You," Kaiba said decisively, "are a dangerous, lying, evil little demon person."
Bakura grinned brightly. "I know."
Yami appeared behind Kaiba, looking exhausted and disheveled. "Hey, tomb robber," he said quietly. "We have to talk."
**I've tried so hard to tell myself that you're gone
But though you're still with me
I've been alone all along
When you cried, I'd wipe away all of your tears
When you'd scream, I'd fight away all of your fears
And I've held your hand through all of these years
But you still have all of me**
It was midnight, and the castle was silent.
Rana padded softly through the catacombs, checking up on those she had come to think of as /her/ humans.
The Girl was up late, practicing moves with a sword. Rana knew from experience that Those Sharp Things really hurt, and chose not to enter the room. Strangely, The Master, who was generally with The Girl, wasn't here.
Well, then, he would be with The Boy.
Malik Ishtar, however, was quite alone when the cat found him. He was leaning against the wall as if it was all that held him up, and had a hopeless, lost look in his eyes.
"Rana," he said, holding his arms out. The cat leapt into them, and he cuddled her. "Oh, Rana. I don't know what to do. I don't /want/ to betray Akil - but I don't have any choice, do I?"
Rana's luminous eyes glowed, and she snapped her head around to stare into the corridor. They were /back/.
Malik couldn't sense them, though. He tilted his head back, banged it half- heartedly against the stone wall.
"It was supposed to be so easy," he said, apropos of apparently nothing.
Rana hissed and dug her claws into his arm. She didn't understand this complaining from The Boy. Far more dangerous was the fact that /they/ were back. The minions of Nephthys. The demons.
But why?
~~
A/N: Well, wasn't that nice? Please note that thus far, this story is already about as long as "Let Go" was...and we're not even close to the ending. Not by any means. Seven chapters remain.
Oh, by the way: Zahara is /not/ an OC. She is a character from the show whose name I have changed just for fun. Guess who she is, win absolutely nothing.
This chapter was /so hard/ to write. /So/ hard. I had writer's block. I still think this chapter was awful. Perhaps someday I will rewrite it. And the next chapter will probably take awhile because my friends are going to kill me if I don't work on my original story. Next Chapter: Bring Me To Life. Can best be summarized by this: "Angst angst angst." But if you really want to know specifics...Ryou is still dying, we find out what Shizu wants from Malik, there are disturbing rumors from Upper Egypt, everyone hates or at least distrusts Bakura, and there is no snogging whatsoever. *forlorn* Where art thou gone, good days of romantic fluff?
It was only when the guards had managed to tie his wrists together that Ryou thought to wonder what they were planning to do to him.
"So, where are we going?" he asked. "The catacombs, right?"
The guards ignored him as they dragged him through deserted corridors. "He wants us to behead the kid, right?" one asked.
"No," the other man laughed. "Of course not! We're supposed to lock him up. Weren't you listening?"
"Lock...oh! Ha! That will be fun."
They paused at a store room and found a strip of cloth, which they used to gag Ryou. He didn't try to fight it; he was quite convinced that his yami wouldn't let him die.
Except...Yugi...
But believing that Yugi was dead would be awful, and Ryou wouldn't do it. Yami would save Yugi, and Bakura would save Ryou, and then they'd find a way to get home. Together.
* * *
Bakura couldn't fight back when the priests finally decided to throw him in the Nile. His head spun as soon as he tried to stand, and he nearly fainted from the pain.
~It's okay,~ he told himself. ~I've got a fairly good idea of what swimming entails. I won't drown.~
Never mind that he had never actually /tried/ to swim before. Never mind that the last time he'd been in a river, Mai, who had been injured, had been forced to drag him onto the bank. And never mind that these were not /stupid/ priests, and quite probably they would think to tie his hands together, at least.
He didn't bother to formulate an escape plan; he was quite positive that he couldn't run in his condition. He simply followed the priestess of Set, and tried not to annoy either of the priests, who had hold of his arms.
"I don't suppose," he said, when he noticed that they were getting alarmingly close to a door that led outside, "that you would consider being bribed?"
"Tempt us not!" the priestess cried.
"Gah, what's the use of a priesthood if you're not corrupt?"
"And what use," the Elite Priest said in the tone of one who is very amused and endeavoring not to show it, "is the second son of a pharaoh?"
"I'll have you know that I /could/ be the first son," Bakura said haughtily. "Not like anyone knows for sure."
"Oh," the priestess said suddenly. "We're going to tie him up, right?"
"Yes," the Elite Priest replied. "There should be a store room around here somewhere."
While the three priests engaged in opening random doors in search of rope, Bakura leaned against the wall. He felt rather dizzy, and also noticed something distressing.
For the short time he'd known Ryou, he had always /felt/ the presence of his other half, like a steady light in the back of his head. In time, he grew to no longer notice it.
But now - now he could feel it flickering, like a candle-flame blown by the wind. And when he concentrated - not an easy feat, with the pain in his head and other external factors - he could feel a growing sense of panic from his hikari.
He felt somehow certain that Ryou wasn't aware of that fear. Not now. Not yet.
But something was very much wrong.
And, in spite of the fact that Bakura himself was about ten minutes away from sinking to the bottom of the Nile, he was desperately afraid for Ryou's well-being, not his own.
He barely felt the priests bind his hands behind his back, barely heard their discussion of whether or not they should take the time to tie him to a big rock, just as an extra precaution.
~Ryou,~ he thought tentatively, wondering if his other half could hear him. ~Don't worry. It's all right.~
But he knew that it wasn't.
~~
Once they found the right room in the catacombs, the guards moved rapidly. It took both of them, their eyes on Ryou just in case he attempted to escape, to shove the lid off of a stone coffin.
Lock him up.
"That?" Ryou asked incredulously.
"Yes," one of them grunted. "Okay, that's a large enough opening. Just shove him in. We've got other things to do."
Ryou felt the panic that, unbeknownst to him, his yami had already noticed. "No," he wailed. "That's awful, why don't you just drown me?"
They laughed, and wrestled him into the coffin. "Good-bye, traitor," one called, as they shoved the lid back on.
Ryou felt a stinging pain in his wrist, and concentrated on that to quell his terror. After much debate, he concluded that he had landed on the watch, and the glass on the face had shattered and cut into his skin.
He tried to kick the top off of the coffin, and when that didn't work, went back to the problem of the broken watch. There was a large shard of glass sticking out of his arm; he could feel it.
~Ryou?~
Soft voice, quiet, but familiar.
"'Kura!" he yelped.
~Don't be afraid, Ryou...s'all right...~
Just the knowledge that somehow, his yami was there, gave him the courage he needed. It hurt, and he was convinced that he heard something snap, but he managed to rotate his wrists far enough that he could grasp the bit of glass between two fingers.
And he was /sure/ that something broke - and not the watch, either - when he got the glass into position and then pushed down, effectively crushing one hand into the bottom of the coffin as well as sawing into the rope that bound him.
He tried not to think about the fact that, even if he got his hands free, he was far too weak to get out.
**I'm so tired of being here
Suppressed by all my childish fears
And if you have to leave
I wish that you would just leave
Because your presence still lingers here
And it won't leave me alone**
"Funny," the priestess remarked. "I just thought that a murderer and conspirator would try to get away."
"No, the bribe was my best plan," Bakura told her.
The three priests had led him to a cliff overlooking the Nile. It was a very small cliff, and the water probably wasn't too deep here, but nevertheless, Bakura was not looking forward to this attempt on his life.
"Are you going to push me over?" he asked innocently. "Or are we going to stand here until it gets dark?"
"Good point," the priest of Osiris said, and shoved him hard.
To his everlasting shame, Bakura screamed as he fell.
The priests watched as the fragile shape of the outlaw prince vanished beneath the water, and did not resurface.
"Well," the priestess said finally. "That's good, then."
They turned to leave. None saw the golden-haired boy watching them from several yards away.
**These wounds won't seem to heal
This pain is just too real
There's just too much that time cannot erase
When you cried, I'd wipe away all of your tears
When you'd scream, I'd fight away all of your fears
And I've held your hand through all of these years
But you still have all of me**
Between the moment he hit the water and the time when he found that he could breathe again, Bakura remembered only a blur.
He sat up, coughing violently to rid his lungs of water.
"Bastards," Malik muttered, patting his friend awkwardly on the back.
"Well, they /are/ priests," Bakura managed. "You're all wet."
"So are you, idiot." Malik finished untying the ropes, and Bakura raised his hands to wipe water from his eyes.
"Malik, if ever you were my friend, you have to do something for me. Right now. No questions."
"Of course," Malik said immediately, and Bakura felt something tug on his heart. What /happened/ to change this utter trust into raving lunacy?
"I have a friend. Looks like me, except a slave. He's in danger - grave danger. Leave me here, go and find him."
The Millennium Ring did not exist, but even that had not broken the bond between Bakura and Ryou. However, Bakura was quite unable to locate his hikari. He tried tapping into Ryou's thoughts, and had to pull back.
darkness pain fear help me
"Somewhere dark," Bakura said finally.
Malik thought about that. "The catacombs?"
"Try."
"You'll tell me what this is about later, right?"
"I might."
"Sure you'll be all right?"
"Yes, now go."
Malik stood and ran toward the palace, leaving the half-drowned Bakura to wring out his hair and ponder again about what would go wrong.
~~
Ryou's hands had been unbound for several minutes before he realized that it was entirely possible he would bleed to death.
"Help?" he called, banging on the lid of the coffin. "Anyone out there? Of course not."
The darkness pressed in around him, and he shuddered. He wasn't claustrophobic, thankfully, but that didn't mean he /liked/ this. It was an awful way to die at the best of times.
The guards had neglected to fully close the coffin; there was a gap of about two inches near his head. He reached blindly for it and tried to get the leverage to push it open farther, but couldn't.
Light flared suddenly, and he yelped. "Hello?"
The word was echoed back, by a voice so familiar that the physical pain vanished, replaced by emotional panic.
"Malik!" Ryou cried. Oh, God, /no/. Anyone but /him/.
The light grew, and, squinting through the small opening, Ryou saw flame. A torch, probably. "Are you the person who looks like Bakura?" Malik asked. "Or are you one of us being punished?"
"I'm Ryou," the boy replied. "And I'm bleeding, and my hand is probably broken, and I'd really like to get out now."
A pause. "You /didn't/ answer the /question/."
Before Ryou could think up a suitable reply, there came a grinding noise, and the crack above his head widened. "Damn. Heavy," Malik said. It took him a minute to open the coffin enough, but eventually Ryou was able to wriggle out.
"Thanks," he said dubiously. Malik /looked/ sane, but Ryou knew better.
Malik stared at him. "He was right. You look just like him. Oh, you /are/ bleeding."
Ryou looked down at his arms. His wrists were all cut up from the broken glass, and Sathaugula had stopped working again. He was dimly aware of a sharp pain in his left hand, and suspected a broken bone there.
"I need a healer," he said. "Right away."
"Hang on." Malik had set the torch in a bracket before; now he picked it up and examined the walls. After a moment, he pried a stone out and began to pull out several jars, peering into each. "We use some of these rooms for storage," he explained. "Should be some...oh, good." He pulled some bandages out, carefully replaced everything else in the hole in the wall, and then turned to Ryou. "Hold out your arms."
Ryou did so, and allowed Malik to wrap the bandages around his bloody wrists, though he doubted it would do much good. "And Bakura sent you?"
"Well, yes. Bloody useless git. He barely gave me anything to go on. I was looking for ages before I heard you."
Malik led Ryou out of the catacombs. The white-haired boy was quite lost by this time. The Malik he remembered was insane and murderous and /evil/. Very much so, however much Isis Ishtar wanted to believe that there was some good left in him. But /this/ Malik was perfectly sane, and seemed to be Bakura's friend.
Strange.
Well, really, this was /Yami/ Malik, wasn't it? And maybe five thousand years of imprisonment would make him crazy.
Maybe.
Somehow, though, Ryou didn't believe it.
**You used to captivate me
By your resonating light
Now I'm bound by the life you left behind
Your face, it haunts my once pleasant dreams
Your voice, it chased away all the sanity in me**
The two were nearly at one of the doors that led outside when Malik swore and stopped walking.
"What?" Ryou asked, looking up. All he saw was an Egyptian girl, her dark reddish-black hair held up with gold barrettes, moving swiftly toward them.
"It's Zahara," Malik snapped. "Augh, too late, she's seen us. Look, she's a priestess of Nephthys, and absolutely insane. So just - "
"Malik Ishtar," the priestess said dreamily, gliding up to them and stopping. "I thought you were still around here."
"Hi, Zara," the blond boy said half-heartedly.
Zahara's eyes, an odd shade of dark gold, fell on Ryou. "And who is your friend?"
Ryou tried to back away, and crashed into a wall. "Just an unimportant slave," he said. This priestess was seriously creeping him out. Nephthys...wasn't she the goddess of the dead?
Zahara moved past Malik and stared at Ryou. "Your eyes," she said. "They're very strange."
"The word is 'dilated,'" Malik said. "She's right, you know. Your pupils are really big."
Ryou shivered, though it wasn't cold at all. It must be Sathaugula, working its poison on him.
Zahara leaned forward, gazing deep into his eyes. She looked thoughtful. "Your hair is silver. You look like an angel."
"I'm not - "
"Angel-boy," she continued obliviously, "with your sick beautiful eyes. Too pretty to go mad or blind,and die from it." Her voice was liquid silver. "But die you will. It is long past stopping, now. Tell me, angel-boy, how long has it been since you last slept? Do you feel cold, when there is only warmth around you? Does your vision begin to blur?" She laid three slender fingers under his chin and tilted his face up. "How bad is the pain, angel- boy? Does it still seem normal to you? Not for long."
"How do you know?" he whispered.
"You are marked by my mistress," she said. Ryou lifted his arm and stared at Sathaugula, which protruded over the top of his bandages. "I see that you have tried, perhaps, to end it. I fear that you have only made it worse."
"Zara?" Malik's voice quavered. "What's happening? Is he dying?"
The priestess scrutinized Ryou's face a moment longer, then stepped back. "He is," she said. "I cannot interfere."
"Oh. Bakura's not going to like that."
Ryou realized that he was trembling, and then noticed that the blood was already soaking through his bandages. "I still need a healer."
"Oh, right. Excuse us, Zahara." Malik grabbed hold of Ryou's elbow and half- dragged the smaller boy away from the priestess, who watched them go with unreadable eyes. "Completely mad. Don't listen to her."
But Ryou was lost in thought.
~'Kura,~ he thought, wondering if his yami could hear him. ~I know you wouldn't have wanted this, but it's still your fault. Why would you need time-travel in the first place? I'm sorry it has to end this way.~
There was silence, just for a moment, then a quiet reply. Ryou wasn't even sure he actually heard it.
~Ryou-chan...you know I would die for you, if I could.~
~But you can't.~
* * *
When they found Bakura, he was lying on his back, staring up at the sky. It was late afternoon, and the dying sunlight touched his silvery hair with golden highlights, and made his eyes seem like dark pits.
"You're dying," he said, as soon as Ryou was within earshot.
Ryou nodded, and sat down beside his yami. "It's the demon watch. It's killing me, because I used it."
Malik sensed that this was an intensely private moment, and headed back for the castle, though he watched the two for as long as he could see them - so similar, so different. The one, a prince, a fallen angel; the other a slave, life slowly bleeding from him.
"Bakura," Ryou said finally. "There must be a way to - "
"To stop this?" Bakura asked. "There isn't. I'm sorry."
"You're just going to give up?"
"Ryou, be realistic. What do you think /I/ can do about it?"
"Talk to your demon friend, strike a bargain - "
"I haven't paid for the last bargain I made." Bakura sighed. "Be glad you are dying. Perhaps you will escape from this torment. Do you realize that I'm immortal now? I'm completely doomed. I have to go through the same five thousand year cycle, over and over again, for all eternity - because of that watch."
"Better to live forever with no memories of the past than to die at seventeen," Ryou snapped.
"You're sixteen. And it's better to die than to be kept awake night after night, dreaming - "
"I don't care!" Ryou cried, despair lending his mild voice an edge that made his yami sit up and stare at him in shock. "I'm already kept awake! My hand is broken and the bleeding won't /stop/ and it /hurts/ and I don't want to die yet!"
Bakura finally noticed the bandages. "Oh. What happened?"
Ryou wordlessly showed his yami the shattered face of the watch.
"Well, come on. Let's go find Mokuba."
**These wounds won't seem to heal
This pain is just too real
There's just too much that time cannot erase
When you cried, I'd wipe away all of your tears
When you'd scream, I'd fight away all of your fears
And I've held your hand through all of these years
But you still have all of me**
Malik strode along the corridors in the catacombs. He was very unhappy.
Damn, he hadn't meant for Zahara to see him. She wouldn't /tell/ anyone, of course, but she would probably continue to seek him out. She was completely /mad/, without a doubt.
But not so mad as Shizu.
Speaking of Shizu...
The blonde Egyptian stepped out of a room to block his pathway. "Malik Ishtar," she purred. "Just the boy I was looking for. Come in, come in. I have a proposition for you..."
Probably she was going to try to kill him again.
But what choice did he have? She was one of the leaders of the rebellion, and to disobey her meant death /anyway/...
He followed.
* * *
When they finally found Kaiba's room, Bakura was nearly murdered by the dark-haired boy just for suggesting that Mokuba heal Ryou.
"He fainted last time!" Kaiba yelled. "He still hasn't recovered."
"Seto," Mokuba whined, trying to push past his brother, who was blocking the doorway. "Ryou needs help."
"There are /other/ healer-mages around!"
"Besides," Bakura added helpfully, "Yugi was dead. Ryou's not. Ever think that /that/ had something to do with it?"
"Good point," Mokuba said, ducking into the hallway before Kaiba could stop him. "C'mere, Ryou."
It was the work of a minute to stop the bleeding and repair the broken bone in Ryou's hand. Meanwhile, Kaiba glared at Bakura.
"How did you know Yugi was dead?" he demanded. "You haven't been around here since it happened."
"I...er...read it on the Internet?"
"You," Kaiba said decisively, "are a dangerous, lying, evil little demon person."
Bakura grinned brightly. "I know."
Yami appeared behind Kaiba, looking exhausted and disheveled. "Hey, tomb robber," he said quietly. "We have to talk."
**I've tried so hard to tell myself that you're gone
But though you're still with me
I've been alone all along
When you cried, I'd wipe away all of your tears
When you'd scream, I'd fight away all of your fears
And I've held your hand through all of these years
But you still have all of me**
It was midnight, and the castle was silent.
Rana padded softly through the catacombs, checking up on those she had come to think of as /her/ humans.
The Girl was up late, practicing moves with a sword. Rana knew from experience that Those Sharp Things really hurt, and chose not to enter the room. Strangely, The Master, who was generally with The Girl, wasn't here.
Well, then, he would be with The Boy.
Malik Ishtar, however, was quite alone when the cat found him. He was leaning against the wall as if it was all that held him up, and had a hopeless, lost look in his eyes.
"Rana," he said, holding his arms out. The cat leapt into them, and he cuddled her. "Oh, Rana. I don't know what to do. I don't /want/ to betray Akil - but I don't have any choice, do I?"
Rana's luminous eyes glowed, and she snapped her head around to stare into the corridor. They were /back/.
Malik couldn't sense them, though. He tilted his head back, banged it half- heartedly against the stone wall.
"It was supposed to be so easy," he said, apropos of apparently nothing.
Rana hissed and dug her claws into his arm. She didn't understand this complaining from The Boy. Far more dangerous was the fact that /they/ were back. The minions of Nephthys. The demons.
But why?
~~
A/N: Well, wasn't that nice? Please note that thus far, this story is already about as long as "Let Go" was...and we're not even close to the ending. Not by any means. Seven chapters remain.
Oh, by the way: Zahara is /not/ an OC. She is a character from the show whose name I have changed just for fun. Guess who she is, win absolutely nothing.
This chapter was /so hard/ to write. /So/ hard. I had writer's block. I still think this chapter was awful. Perhaps someday I will rewrite it. And the next chapter will probably take awhile because my friends are going to kill me if I don't work on my original story. Next Chapter: Bring Me To Life. Can best be summarized by this: "Angst angst angst." But if you really want to know specifics...Ryou is still dying, we find out what Shizu wants from Malik, there are disturbing rumors from Upper Egypt, everyone hates or at least distrusts Bakura, and there is no snogging whatsoever. *forlorn* Where art thou gone, good days of romantic fluff?