Few notes: I'm changing the summary so that I can actually get the pairing in there and so that it doesn't sound quite so much like a Mary-Sue-er.
Bonsa- I mean, Bonasi, apologies for the, ah- 'sweeping' generalization, it just happens to be my manner of speaking naturally. It gets on my nerves when people are so impossibly passive and open to absolutely everyone's opinion- including that little pink rabbit over there- that you can't argue with them. I do rather like arguing, actually. So I should change that to- "It pisses off any Kaiba/any prissy YGO! girl as well as all gay pairing fans, except Bonasi." I'd use the -san honorifics, only I really hate it when people use honorifics unless to represent Japanese culture in, say, a fanfiction.
And you're right about the Diabound thing- I was actually thinking of the ability to blend into its surroundings- that's the one he gets with the Ring. I'll change that, eventually.
Yes, Kisara IS canon. Ya'd think that anyone who knows about thief king Bakura would know about Kisara, the girl who's being stoned fairly early into the Egypt Arc. . . . Unfortunately, she went bye-bye near the end.
And, ah- fair warning. There is a fairly odd take on Diabound in this chapter.
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The sun had risen early that morning, its warm, golden rays spanning across the landscape and into the girl's bright, blue eyes.
She shielded them with her hand.
The wind had picked up a bit and it had blown out the fire, though the area around it was still warm. A few twigs crackled every once in a while, sparked with a tinge of flame, but it was not enough to start up the full thing again. Bakura had apparently gone out early that day as he was nowhere in sight, but his ka remained, snoozing peacefully in the corner. Snoring, at that. At least, the snake part was.
A thought struck her- what was she to do about food? Her stomach was beginning to hurt her, and she drew herself into a tight ball, fell sideways onto the floor, and stared rather blankly at the open desert. She knew that Bakura wasn't lying about just how dangerous it was out there- she knew this because she had attempted to escape first thing in the morning, and hadn't even gotten a few feet out of the shade when she saw a whole pack of bandits camping in the area.
She began to wish that she had wings.
Eventually she shifted, so that her gaze fell on Diabound. The creature's presence made her uneasy- she had seen it briefly in battle and how it had destroyed all those homes- but somehow she felt that she wasn't nearly as afraid as she should have been. She couldn't quite put her finger on it, but there was definitely something different about the creature, and it no longer seemed to bring the power of the devil upon her. Picking herself up very slowly- first pushing by her hands, hoisting herself onto her knees, then bringing up her torso, chest, head, and her hair, long and silky on the rough floor. She brushed a few loose twigs and rocks out of it, then gracefully approached the ka. It twitched slightly as she approached, stirring in its dream. The snake half of it muttered something barely comprehensible- something involving a fox hunt- and snapped its gigantic jaws. Kisara stood still for a while, watching it, but it didn't wake, and she came closer.
A slight curiosity overcame her as she entered within feet of it- she wanted to touch it. She had never touched a ka before- was it possible to touch it? If so, what did it feel like? She had always seen them as half-transparent spirits, but if a spirit like that could destroy villages, then surely it would be a tangible being . . . ? She reached out a quivering hand and stroked the arm of the humanoid part of Diabound. It grunted slightly, but remained asleep.
Its skin was eerily smooth and soft to her touch, like some angelic being, and its white skin seemed to emit a warm, pleasant glow. She kept her hand there for a long time.
From far off, she realized, it would be difficult to discern between her hand and the ka- her unusual, white skin was nearly identical to it. She shivered, and quickly moved away, but she ran into something in her retreat. That something was the snake head, which roused instantly. She screeched, jumped back as it lifted its mighty head and shook it groggily, lashing out its tongue a bit. It hadn't quite opened its eyes yet, it squinted into the daylight, then at her, waiting for its eyes to adjust. As they did, it blinked several times to better its vision, and seemed to see her for the first time.
It started very suddenly, lifting itself up very high and, inevitably, whacking the top of its head against the humanoid half, effectively waking it. This created a sickening cracking sort of noise, and Kisara winced.
"That was embarrassing for the both of us," the snake muttered, its eyes scrunched up. The humanoid part grunted in reply, and the snake sighed. "Not the most articulate being on the planet." the snake explained apologetically. "Just be glad you're not stuck with him." Kisara wouldn't have blamed it for being unarticulate- she had presumed that kas couldn't talk at all.
The upper half of Diabound moaned again, pressing its hand to its stomach. The snake snorted. "Oh, shut up, ya pansy. Bakura'll be back with some food soon e-bloody-nough."
"Y-you. . . ." Kisara stuttered, still keeping her distance. "You eat? Kas need to eat?"
"Not really, love." the serpent said with a slight grin. "He just thinks he does- that bloke I'm attached to, I mean. All heart, that bastard, the brains all want to me. Sad, isn't it?"
Kisara nodded vigorously, not daring to disagree.
While she was attempting to deal with this dilemma, Set was dealing with his own problems, namely, her. Actually, he was just about to deal with it, as he had been invited (to be read as 'ordered') to attend a banquet for the entirety of the morning and had left that terribly fat, ugly bloke to take care of things.
And here he comes now, the midget beast- he finally gave in to the pressure of his master's finding out.
"So, let's try this again," Set hissed. "You secure the area in a perfectly airtight way and come back the next morning to see that You-Know-Who Number One has magically managed to escape- after you guaranteed that those cells were fool-proof- and not only to escape, but also run off with You-Know-Who Number Two!"
The man blinked. "Wait, now- who's who again? Are you talking about Bakura or Kisara here?" He received only a hushing sound from his superior. "Oh, right- Bakura's the one in the cell who you told everyone else you were going to kill but really were just going to use him in your rebellion! He's You-Know-Who Number One, right?"
Set stared at him for a moment in silence.
But then Karim interrupted. "Who are we talking about again?" he said cheerfully. "Oh, that bastard Bakura, you mean? Ah, terrible ordeal, but thank the gods above he's dead now, eh?"
Set grinned, but it was only really a well-disguised grimace.
Actually, Set had to smile a lot during that day, but Bakura didn't. Bakura was foraging for food, and had been for the bulk of the morning. He was only now returning, with a good three sacks gloriously filled, when he saw Kisara sitting cross-legged near the cave edge, her back turned to the exit. She was slightly slumped over, as though protecting something. Bakura considered this for a few moments, then scaled the length of the cliff in silence until he finally came to stand directly behind the girl.
"Hey," he said.
Kisara jumped to her feet, immediately recognizing the voice. "You're back," she said.
"Clearly," he drawled, setting the bags down, "or else I wouldn't be here. Now, what exactly were you doing while I was gone?"
The girl's eyes immediately locked onto her arm, if only for a fleeting moment, and she instinctively drew her arm nearer to herself. But she said, "Oh, no- nothing."
Bakura nodded affirmatively, then snatched her hand and held it aloft to see what she was hiding. Kisara winced as a new trail of blood trickled down a slash-like wound near her elbow, overriding older ones. "I see someone didn't listen to me when I told them that it was generally a bad idea to escape." he said, seemingly amused.
"I didn't try to escape," Kisara insisted, "I- I cut myself. While looking for something to eat."
"I'm sure you were. See here-" The thief held up her arm just a bit more so that he could indicate the cut with his free hand. "Judging by the shape of the gash, you found yourself a nice little desert outlaw, probably with one of those nice, new iron blades I keep hearing about from Kush. This one, though," He stopped to consider. "This one's pretty ragged for a blade like that. I'd say it was probably bent up a bit. A little chunk taken out. That'd do it. And I'm guessing by the amount of blood flow verses clotting that you got yourself this about- say, an hour and a half ago. I'm just taking a wild guess here, but I'd guess that this wasn't the first time you tried, either. You had to slowly bring up the courage to fully leave the cave, and by that time, they probably had a whole pack of bandits just waiting for you." He paused, as though for applause. "Well, how's that?"
Kisara blinked. She had no idea how Bakura could have assumed all that from a silly little cut. It didn't look all that significant to her. Just an ordinary gash was all. "How did you-"
"I happen to know a good deal about knife wounds." he said nonchalantly, "Just had a good lot of encounters with them." He paused, seemed to remember something for a moment, but brushed it off by changing the subject. "Right. So, if I were you, I wouldn't go trying to run off again like that. Or, at least, try to make it a little less obvious. Now, let's get that all bandaged up, and then we can eat."
Kisara's ears pricked up at the prospect of food. She hadn't had food all day- in fact, hunger had been what motivated her to attempt to escape the second time. If it hadn't been for Diabound plucking her out of trouble, she would certainly have been dead. Then again, Bakura wouldn't so casually have let his hostage die, so naturally his ka would have come to her rescue.
The thief tore off some of the cloth of the sacks, wrapping them roughly around Kisara's arm like a makeshift bandage. She tensed up as he did this- naturally, she was uncomfortable being so close to her captor- but couldn't escape a relieved sigh when the bandage protected her wound from the tear of the wind. So as to seem polite and therefore remain on Bakura's good side, she murmured a quiet thank you.
"Ya, ya," he muttered, not wasting any time on her show of courtesy. He then went to preparing the meal for the both of them- plenty of bread, a good deal of food that had been salted a bit for preservation, plenty of chicken, some fruits that appeared foreign to Egypt, and- she cringed as this was brought out- beer. He handed her a decent share of the food, with something that went basically like, "Here. Food. Eat. All right?"
They ate in a rather embarrassed silence. At least, it was embarrassing for Kisara. It didn't appear to her that Bakura was troubled by the quiet at all, but she had to keep glancing over at him warily just in case- well, she wasn't sure what quite was the case, but it had something to do with the beer. The thief seemed to down his first cupful of it, but that was about it.
But finally Bakura seemed to sense her gaze. "Oh, I suppose you'll be wanting some beer as well?" he said sarcastically, holding up a bottle. "Excuse me for taking you for a dainty little girl, then. Though," he added thoughtfully, "I don't imagine the stuff's all that good for one's ka- at least, it doesn't do it any good. So, regardless, I'm not going to give anything to you. All right?"
In the corner, the upper half of Diabound was watching the two eat with a grim look on his face. The snake half sighed and told him to stop being such a pansy.
"Actually," Kisara murmured, "No, I was just- Do you drink often?"
"Fairly often," Bakura estimated. "Though I'm not much for hangovers, really, so I don't drink a particularly large amount at any one time. I just always like to have a stash of it in case I need to reason with someone. Drunks are considerably easier to convince than those sober, you know. Now-" He stood up and began cleaning up the leftover chicken legs. "I hope you're satisfied with what you got because it's all you're getting for tonight. I spent the whole bleeding day looking for all this and I don't want to go out again anytime soon, so you are entirely at my mercy in that aspect. If I don't find us food, you starve."
Kisara admitted to not feeling particularly threatened by that fact. He couldn't let her die. He needed her ka. She swallowed hard, feeling suddenly ill. All that food she had stuffed herself with was only helping Bakura. As soon as he found a way to collect her ka, she would be lying, dead, in the desert before she could so much as blink. She winced a little at the thought.
The sun set over the vast desert, its last rays seeming to engulf the far-off city, as though smothering it with blood. Bakura settled down into his hammock but didn't seem to quite want to fall asleep yet. Kisara tried to stay awake as long as he did, in case he were to stab her in her sleep (even though common sense reminded her that she was his meal ticket), but fatigue finally claimed her, and she fell asleep.
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That chapter ended a lot like the last one. Hmm. I'm unhappy.
Hmph. Thief Bakura will be considerably less generous to Kisara from now on. I bet he's getting tired of trying to gain her trust.