Wish You Were Here

Chapter 6:

It was the next morning. Quite the opposite from the dark and mysterious night, it was bright and clear. With rays of yellow sunshine fighting it's way through the leaves of the tall trees and down to the bottom, where the three yamis slept. Marik was the first to wake up. Surprised to find himself on the hard and dirty forest floor, rather than his blanket-less sleeping bag. Blanket-less. No blanket. That's when it hit Marik like a ton of bricks and he turned to Yami, who was snoring lightly right next to him.

"Yami! You worthless bag of ancient Egyptian bones! Get up!" He slammed his fist down, two inches away from Yami's face.

"Oh!" His eye's popped open and he sat up straight. "M-Marik…? What the-"

"You thought I'd forget, didn't you! I can't believe you tossed out my favorite blanket! Why don't I stomp on your stupid cell phone and then we'll see what happens to you!" He stood up and Yami backed away on all fours.

"Hold on, wait a sec! I-I can get it back for you!"

Marik grabbed Yami's shirt and lifted him about ten inches off the ground, "Just wait till Yugi calls back! I'm gonna tell him that-"

"Ah. My two annoying alarm clocks." Bakura was now awake and grinning at Marik and Yami, who was still quivering in fear. "What're you doing to each other now?"

"I'm trying to tell Marik, I'll get his blanket back!" Yami yelled, more to Marik than Bakura.

"And I'm trying to tell Yami, there's no way he can make a promise like that!"

"Where's your faith, Marik?" Yami managed to get Marik's hands off his shirt, "When I make a promise, I keep a promise. Even if it's a promise to you. I'll get your blanket back. I swear it."

Before Marik had a chance to say anything, Bakura stood up and said, "Okay, I think we should go now. We don't know if that Monkey-Man will be back again."

"What?" Marik asked skeptically and looked from Yami back to Bakura, "Monkey-Man? Is that some new television show?"

"No. You were asleep, Marik, when we got attacked by some big, hairy monster. He looked like some prehistoric monkey. Yelling and howling. We had to carry you out of there. You should be thanking us… we saved your skin!"

"Yeah, yeah… thank you." Marik fluffed his hair, "We're leaving today, right? I don't think I can stand another hour in this stupid forest."

"Me, too." Bakura agreed.

"We might have more than an hour left in this place, you guys." Yami said thoughtfully, "I mean, we don't know where we are. We could be miles away from civilization. Plus, our hikaris are on some cruise, so their too far away to come get us. And we don't know if there's anyone out here who could help us."

Bakura threw his arms in the air, "Oh, this is just great!"

"… W-Wait a minute! There is someone around here! The forest ranger's cabin is about five or four miles from here. Yugi's Grandpa told me before Bakura stabbed his car and Gramps bit the big one."

"Good ol' Grandpa…" Yami wiped away a tear.

"We're saved!" Bakura grinned and whirled around, "Let's get going… Hey, wait a minute! We don't know what direction we're going in. The ranger could be one way and, with our luck, we'd be going the other way."

"Anybody got a compass?"

"Blah. Modern day compasses are for sissies. I don't see how that would help, anyway." Marik proclaimed, "I say we use the ancient Egyptian way of navigating!"

Yami raised an eyebrow, "I don't right off remember there being a specific Egyptian way of navigation, Marik."

"Ah, what do you know? You're memory was wiped out. And that's beside the point. I think we should… ask for directions."

He blinked, "Oh! And just who should we ask? Hmm? A raccoon, perhaps? Or maybe a tree? That's the most ridiculous thing!"

"Like your idea was any better! 'Let's use a compass!'" Marik mimicked, "You might as well have said we should wait for the North Star! At least my idea would get results!"

While Marik and Yami argued and were on the verge of killing each other, Bakura looked at all the different directions that lay ahead of them. They happened to be right in a small clearing surrounded on all sides by tall trees. The entire scene was nothing but green and brown. It all looked the same. So easy to get lost… So, Bakura did what he thought was best for this type of hopeless situation…

He stretched out both his arms, closed his eyes, and spun around. One, two, three times, then stopped. His left arm was pointing in the direction beyond the two arguing, Marik and Yami.

Bakura nodded and smiled to himself. He walked past Marik and Yami, towards the previously mentioned path, "C'mon, you two. We're getting out of here."

Marik looked at him, "Bakura…?"

"Come on."

"Whatever." Marik shrugged and ran to catch up with him. He left Yami standing there, dumbfounded.

"Wait! You mean, just like that, you're going to follow Bakura into oblivion…? Just like that! He could be walking off to someplace dangerous! Marik! Bakura!"

"…" No response. They were too far away to hear him anyway.

"But… Oh, fine, then!" Yami sighed and followed them to wherever they were off to.

Less than a mile away, there was a wounded old creature in the middle of a clearing. Sometime during the hectic night, he'd fallen and he felt that his plastic hip was broken. He tried to move, but every time he got up, his legs failed him and he plopped back down.

Using a stick, he managed to prop himself up with the trunk of an old pine tree. Of course, as luck would have it, a fox came and took the stick away, so he was abandoned and lonely at the foot of the large tree.

"Oh, boy…" He sighed, "I guess they didn't recognize me. I mean, who would, with this thing on top of me…?"

By now, he'd realized that, instead of a wild beast trying to eat him, it was just a sheet with an dead carcass stuck to it. Giving him the appearance of some kind of mad animal.

"I-I'd better try and catch up with them…" He put on the work gloves he had in his pocket and lay down on his stomach, using his hands to claw himself forward, in the direction he'd last seen the three scurry off to.

Meanwhile, in the Massage Therapy Room on the Rain-Shine Cruise Line, Malik, Ryou, and Yugi were laying on their stomachs, getting a deep-tissue massage. Correction. Actually, Malik and Yugi were getting the deep-tissue and Ryou was getting the Swedish massage.

Ryou had fallen asleep and was snoring soundly. Malik was well on his way into dream land, but Yugi was still wide awake. He'd hoped that getting a massage along with Malik and Ryou would help him stop worrying so much, but it wasn't helping as much as he'd thought.

The fact that his Grandfather still hadn't checked in was another reason for him to worry. Just about twenty-four hours he's been gone. It was tearing Yugi up because, besides Yami, Grandpa was the only family he had.

"Hmm…" Yugi sighed out loud. He didn't pay any attention to the volume of his voice, but apparently it was enough to wake Malik.

"What's wrong…?" He asked, eyes still closed, still half into his dream.

Yugi looked over at him, "Oh, I'm sorry, Malik. Did I wake you?"

"It's okay. I was having that Jeopardy dream again anyway. You know, the one where Alex Trebec keeps asking me to juggle chainsaws in the form of a question. I think I was actually gonna do it this time."

"Heh heh." Yugi smiled half-heartedly.

"… Oh, for Ra's sake, Yugi. Are you still hung up on Yami and your Grandpa?"

"It's that obvious? Well, yeah, I am. Grandpa's been missing for a whole day now. Yami hasn't told me anything… Twenty-four hours… it's been enough time to file a missing persons report, hasn't it?"

"Yugi!" Marik groaned and unknowingly awoke Ryou. He shot them an agitated look and sighed.

"I was having a very pleasant dream." He said matter-of-factly.

Malik buried his face into his arms, "You deal with it, Ryou." He mumbled, "I'm tired of all this Grandpa drama."

Yugi smirked and reached down, grabbing hold of the cell phone that was laying on top of his duffle bag. He flipped it open and dialed the number of Yami's cell phone.

Ryou watched him, "Yugi, you aren't really going to file a missing persons report are you?"

"No… not just yet. I'm going to force Yami to tell me what's going on over there. I know he's hiding something from me, I can feel it." He held the phone to his ear and heard it ringing…

"Cell phone, is this Yugi?" Came Yami puzzled and out of breath voice.

"Yami, I wanna know something, and don't you dare hang up on me! I can't relax unless I know about Grandpa and you. I know I'm driving Malik and Ryou up the wall with all my worrying-"

"Sure are." Malik and Ryou's voices rang together.

"Thank you, very much." Yugi rolled his eyes then turned his attention back to the phone, "Yami, where's Grandpa?"

"…" There was a silence, but Yugi could faintly hear Marik and Bakura yelling at Yami in the distance. He tried hard to make out what they were saying. The muffled conversation he heard went something along the lines of this:

"Tell him, you dolt!" Someone, probably Marik, told his yami.

Yami sounded scared, "I can't, I'm supposed to be responsible!"

"Then be responsible and tell him what kind of a mess we're in!"

"Yami!" Yugi called over all the screaming, "Yami, listen to me! I won't be mad if you just tell me what's going on! Tell me what's going on!"

Yugi was shushed by the three masseuses that were working on them and other guests who were trying to relax. They all pointed to the sign that said, 'No loud talking'. Yugi lowered his voice and repeated Yami's name till he was back on line with him.

"Y-Yes, Yugi?"

"Tell me what's happening. Where's Grandpa? And where are you?"

Suddenly, Yami's protest could be heard from a little distance and, from what Yugi could tell, Bakura was holding Yami down and Marik had the phone in hand.

"Marik…?"

"Yugi, listen to me! Tell Malik to get his Egyptian butt down here and rescue me! We're lost, looking for some ranger's house and we were just attacked by some kind of prehistoric monkey! My blanket is missing, and your Grandpa died when we got here! He rolled off a cliff somewh-"

Yugi almost dropped the phone, "Wha… WHAT!"