(A/N: Here's the second chapter. No, I don't own Yu-Gi-Oh. Yes, I do own the woman introduced. Thanks to darkmetaldragonfangs for the review! I'm pretty sure my chapters will stay generally the same length, but they might fluxuate once in while. Watch for language in this one, Bakura makes his entrance...)

Chapter 2: Twenty-Four Degrees North, Thirty-Three Degrees East

A warm breath of wind passed above him, half-lifting something with soft 'shhh' sound. He could tell it was only half-lifted because the other half was raining down gently upon him; it felt warm and cool and dry all at once. It was a familiar feeling, this sort of grit pressing against his bare arms and through his shirt into his back. The taste of that air was familiar too; thick and tepid and almost baked or rusted. Sweat beaded on his forehead and trickled down one side of his face, though it couldn't have been too late in the day and he didn't feel excessively hot. That was something that had happened before too.

Malik slowly opened his eyes, and was confronted with the sight of a giant red coin floating in the sky above him. He blinked once, trying to make sense of that... and then he blinked once more, and then again. That was no coin, no, it was the sun. And he knew of only one place where the sun glowed that feisty shade of red at noon.

"Egypt." He murmured softly to himself, sitting up and gazing about, "My homeland."

Dusky red-brown dunes flowed in every direction, he himself seated upon one. Wind snaked past every few moments, causing his gold-blonde hair to flick into his face. He ignored it, reveling in the feeling of finally –finally!- being back home. No clouds marred the sky, no imperfection presented itself in the eternal desert. It was like he'd never left.

Malik rose to his feet, still looking around. It felt so unreal. How had he gotten here? Where exactly was he? What city was he near? He could hear city noises, camels calling loudly, people shouting, the thousand bangles of a thousand women jingling, wheels creaking, blocks of sand and boxes of anything thumping to the ground and any other noise that could be attributed to an Egyptian day. But these noises didn't feel quite close, and he could be more than half imagining them. Who knew how long he'd lain in the sun? Who was to say he didn't have sun stroke and was suffering some strange phantom memory sounds?

Malik shook his head gently, crouching down to take up a handful of sand and then let it drain back to Earth through his fingers. This was real. The heat was real, the sweat proved that. The grit on his body was real. It was real. He really was in Egypt again.

Now the question was where.

Interlude 2.1 Fifty-Six Degrees North, Thirty-Five Degrees East

The air reeked of cigarette smoke, gasoline and discarded alcohol. There was noise clamouring all around, a constant sort of hum and bustle, but none of it seemed particularly nearby. Why hadn't he woken before? This noise and stench was enough to turn the dead in their grave.

But the instant Bakura opened his eyes, he felt the sharp heel of a boot press into his throat and a fierce mutter in a dialect he didn't know: "Don't move."

Startled, angry and confused all at once, the former tomb robber looked up at the person who'd spoken. It was a woman, clad all in black and glaring down at him with such a vicious air that he was rendered temporarily speechless. Upon a quick recovery, he snarled, "Let me go, bitch!"

The woman's grey eyes grew even more steely and cold, and she put more weight on his neck. Bakura choked. Apparently satisfied that he wasn't about to do anything more, the woman spoke brokenly, "I say not move. You owe me life."

Bakura's tongue clove to the roof of his mouth as he was once again rendered entirely speechless. That had been twice, more than he could remember ever happening any time before. A hate for this woman erupted deep in his chest, simply because she could do such a thing to him. When he finally made his tongue work once again, his tone was dark and suspicious, "Why do I owe you my life?"

She shrugged, her reply as sarcastic as they come, "I only drag you out of middle of street." As something of an afterthought, she added cruelly, "Lousy place for nap."

Bakura's eyes narrowed. Still, he needed information. "Where am I?"

"Alleyway."

He really was hating this woman now, wholly and fully. She was doing this just to aggravate him, he knew it, and he didn't like it one bit. "What city, bitch? Where?"

"You no call me bitch. You in Tver, in Russia."

Russia? How in the name of Ra had he gotten here? "How did you bring me here?"

"I tell you, I find you in street!" The woman protested, then paused, "You lost?"

"No!" Bakura snarled, trying to get up, "I'm not lost, bitch!"

She pushed her foot down on his windpipe, effectively cutting off his air and halting his attempts at movement.

How... dare... she... He was just about ready to kill her; he had his information, he needed nothing more from her. She was just a nuisance now. But somehow... he felt that something just wasn't right. He shifted a bit, trying to free himself.

"You stop move and not call me bitch, or I kill you." Said the woman severely.

That was it! He'd had it! Bakura snapped, and readied himself to banish her forever to the dark realms of shadow... shit, that was what was wrong! The Ring was gone! He felt no power inside of himself; without the Ring, he had no control over others and their fates. Where was it? He needed that Ring! She'd taken it, hadn't she? Filthy bitch!

With a roar, he seized her leg and wrenched it to one side with a strength born of pure rage. She stumbled, off-balance, and fell to the ground, and he took that opportunity to scramble to his feet. But as he did, he was overcome by a debilitating wave of nausea and turned away to be violently sick. In the few short moments it took for him to purge his stomach of nothing but acid, the woman leapt to her feet and pulled a knife from her bag. Then she stood, poised and ready, for whenever he should turn.

Bakura leaned against the dirtied brick wall, one hand wiping the sick from his chin while his mind positively raced. What in the world was going on? The Ring was missing, he'd just been sick, he had a body... He had a body? Why hadn't he realized this earlier? This could be quite excellent! He didn't need the Ring, he'd kill this girl with his own two hands!

But as he whirled around to face her again, the ground gave a powerful lurch and he nearly keeled over. Ah, damn. She'd take this opportunity. He was dead already. He could feel the blow.

The girl didn't attack. After all, he wasn't a threat to her if he couldn't stand straight.

Location: Aswãn

He didn't know how long he'd plodded amongst the sand dunes. It felt like ages. The soles of his feet were scorched and aching; somehow, he'd lost his shoes. He was still in shock at being here, in Egypt again, and often forced himself to wonder why.

What had the power to send him here in mere moments?

How had he been sent? Had he just appeared out of thin air?

He supposed he'd never know just how he'd gotten here, or how he'd appeared. It would take much more luck than he had to find someone who had been in that portion of the desert at the exact time he had 'arrived'.

But he knew what had the power to send him here, and it scared him.

The Millenium Rod.

And it was gone.

He had checked for it soon after he'd awoken, but discovered it missing. He had felt a kind of jubilation at that, a freedom he hadn't felt in a terribly long while. For the first time since he'd had the Pharaoh's secret carved into his back, he'd felt like he was his own person, like he had no obligations to anyone but himself, and nothing to worry about.

That feeling had soon faded.

He'd decided that he was actually hearing sounds of a city, but how far it was he had no idea whatsoever. Thus, he'd listened carefully, schooled his footsteps in what he dearly hoped was the right direction, and started walking. Behind him was a toiling line of prints in the sand, before him bleak desert. It may well take days to get to the city he was hearing; sound travelled well in the flat openness of the sand-plains. The nothingness stretched for eons.

No wait, there in the distance. Was that water?

'Mirages,' Malik reminded himself sternly, rubbing his fist across his eyes and looking again, 'Mirages are common-place to the sands.'

But this was no mirage. He saw a river, and what's more, he saw people crossing the river on barges, and if he lifted his eyes further, he saw the city across the way. He'd made it.

'That must be the Nile.' Malik decided after a moment of reflection, and he started walking once again, towards the river, 'And so this city... it must be Aswãn.'