Target: Destiny
Chapter Nine
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Bakura paused and supported himself against the wall. Though he hung his head to hide it, Malik could see the rapid rise and fall of Bakura's chest due to his labored breathing. "You should be in bed."
Bakura looked up then. "If I die before I get to kill Seto Kaiba, I swear I will make the devil so miserable, he will be dying to kick me out of hell." He pushed himself away from the wall, a new determination in his step. Malik smiled to himself and followed a few steps behind his cousin in the direction of a tele-comm-ready meeting room.
They would contact the Lasyupians and ask for aid against Ascenia. Jounouchi had teleported back to Earth, apparently to try and soothe things over with the prince. Bakura didn't care. Yuugi could take a flying jump off the highest cliff. While Earth had the best air force in the BA, there were other planets allied with planet Bakura which still had good air forces.
Bakura had told Careen and Mai to go back to the royal quarters with the prince and princess and stay there until further notice. Of course, both women had objected. Malik smiled as he remembered the conversation.
"Take Baku and Ryoko back to their rooms and stay there with them until we come back, both of you," Bakura commanded gently.
"No! We're staying with you two!" Careen replied forcefully. Malik shook his head sternly.
"No, you are not. Besides, we're going blow up a planet. You don't want to see that, do you?"
Mai gasped. "You can't do that!"
"Won't it be pretty though," Malik commented casually. His cousin grinned.
"You're going to hell," Careen told Malik disapprovingly.
He looked over at Bakura with a frown. "I'm going to hell."
The king nodded sympathetically. "Yeah, well, you did your best."
Malik smirked to himself. He had only been messing with her; they had no intention of blowing up the planet now. Anger caused rash decisions, but they had both calmed enough to go to plan B: get Anzu and beat the hell out of Kaiba; anyone who died in the process would be caused by their own stupidity of getting in the way. After all, shoot first, talk later, so to speak, was not exactly a fool-proof plan.
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"Please, Prime Minister, may I have her?" the little insect-like man hissed pleadingly, eyeing Anzu hungrily. "Just once. I promise not to break her." He trailed a spindly finger down Anzu's arm, leaving a trail of goosebumps. Chisara provided her best growl in the man's direction, but the kitten obviously wasn't daunting anymore. He adjusted his big bug-eye glasses with his other hand, waiting for Seto's reply.
"No, Haga, you may not," Seto snapped irritably, batting the small man's hand away.
"Yeah, you may not," Anzu added forcefully, spitting on the shorter man. He looked as if he wanted to retaliate, but Seto's mocking laughter was apparently not encouraging, so he merely slithered out of the room.
"So, Seto, have you decided yet when you're going to release me?" Anzu asked casually. The Prime Minister shrugged, examining his nails.
"Actually, I figured I would release you in 2730."
"You're going to release me when I'm nearly ninety. That's cute," she said flatly. He smirked at her. After a moment of studying her, he left the room through his ever-handy vortex portal. Who needs doors anyway.
Mere seconds after Seto Kaiba had left Anzu and Chisara alone, another portal vortex opened up. "Yes, you forgot to take off my collar. So glad you remembered," she said, not expecting him to remove the collar in the very least.
After a moment, a figure stepped through the void whom she had never seen before. She stared at the young boy curiously. He looked around for a few seconds before focusing his attention on her. "If you are looking for Seto Kaiba, he has left," she informed the boy. He didn't respond, merely stared at her.
"Who are you?" he finally asked quietly, glancing down at Chisara.
"I'm Anzu. And you?"
He straightened his back. "I am Apprentice Minister Mokuba Kaiba of Ascenia, direct descendent of god Chi-shun, younger brother to Prime Minister Seto Kaiba."
Anzu smiled slightly. "That's quite a long name you've got there. Mind if I just call you Mokuba?"
He nodded curtly. "That will be acceptable. Don't you have a title?" he asked, somewhat condescendingly.
Anzu nodded her head to the other side, her frustrated attempt at a shrug since her shoulders were still rendered useless by the collar. "I suppose I do, if you think it is necessary to hear."
The boy, whom appeared to be around twelve or thirteen, tossed his long, black hair over his shoulder. "I do, so that I can determine whether to be polite or rude to you."
Anzu laughed at that, merely because he seemed quite serious. "Well then, I guess my title would be Former Lady Anzu Mazaki of Earth, daughter of Lord and Lady Mazaki, Count and Countess of Rhu, current Queen of Bakura."
Mokuba's chin dropped slightly. "You're a queen?" he repeated. She nodded. "Why are you chained up then?"
"Your brother just likes me."
He lifted a brow. "I don't believe my big brother would chain a woman up when she is pregnant."
Anzu could tell that the boy obviously looked up to his brother, so she did not say anything else. No matter her predicament, she didn't want to ruin the boy's false illusion of his brother. It wasn't like the child could help her anyway. After another moment of Mokuba eyeing the chain Anzu was hanging from, he awkwardly turned to leave through the portal he had come through.
"Mokuba," she called after him. "Do you think you could bring my cat something to eat?"
"I..." he paused, wondering if he should assist her in any way. "Yes, I will." Anzu smiled, and he left.
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"Well, if you weren't such an idiot, we'd be there in half a second!" Bakura yelled, holding his hand against his forehead to still the throbbing his injury was bestowing upon him.
"Don't blame it on me! You're the one who passed out before finishing your damn sentence!" Malik fired back defensively.
"Okay, okay," Bakura conceded, holding his hands up. "Let's just think for a minute."
Aisu, a frozen planet in the same solar system as Bakura, could, of course, be on Bakura within mere hours to head to Ascenia at the same time. Unfortunately, it would take the Lasyupians, two week's distance from Bakura, a week to reach Ascenia, not including the day they would need to perform their religious rituals which were required before going into battle.
The Bakurians were not a very religious peoples--only a handful of temples existed on the planet, and they all belonged to foreign gods. Anzu was adamant about going to the Earth God's temple once per week with Ryoko and Baku. Bakura joined her, but wasn't very active about it. The Lasyupians, on the other hand, performed very exact rituals which had to be perfect before they would 'accept their gods' blessings for battle.'
The extra week for the Lasyupians was not even the bad news, however. From Bakura, it would take the Bakurians and Aisulings three full weeks to reach Ascenia, and that was if no problems occured in transit. King Bakura was not pleased.
"Damnit, I wish we had access to Earth's IT devices," Bakura mused, clenching his hand into a fist on the table.
"King Bakura," the Aisuling president began, "our air force will leave immediately and reach Bakura by nightfall." Bakura nodded in consent, and the snow-skinned, icy blue-eyed man disappeared from his screen.
"Is there no faster way?" the Lasyupian king asked, concerned for his wife's friend, Queen Anzu. He pushed his long, black hair behind his equally-dark shoulder.
Bakura shook his head, clearly distraught. "No."
"We will meet you in Ascenia's southern atmosphere in three weeks time then," the king said, saluting. Bakura returned the salute before swinging around in his chair to stare broodily at the wall.
"It's all right, Bakura," Malik consoled. "We'll get to her, and Seto Kaiba will pay for what he's done."
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"Thank you, Mokuba," Anzu said as the boy set a bowl of meat down in front of Chisara. The kitten pawed at the meat, assuring herself it was dead, before taking a bite.
"My brother said you're tied up because you refused to marry him."
Anzu stared at the ebony-haired boy momentarily. "I refused to marry him because I'm already married."
"You are?" he asked, confused. Apparently, Seto had conveniently forgotten to divulge that addition of information.
"Yes, and I have children," Anzu replied.
"Children you had yourself?" he asked. He looked as if he were in awe of the notion. Anzu laughed slightly.
"Yes, children I had myself. Just like your parents had you and your brother."
He shrugged. "I don't have parents. I was created by my brother six years ago."
Anzu's eyes widened. "Created?" she stuttered out finally.
"Yep!" he replied, bending down to pet Chisara as she gnawed on her meat arrayment.
"How did he do that? Why? You certainly look older than six," she marveled.
"I was already six when he made me 'cause he didn't want to potty-train me or anything," he told her, laughing when the kitten turned her gnawing to his hand. "When the Prime Minister died, my brother wanted an advisor he could trust. So, he made me, and that's it!"
"So, he's not your real brother then?" she inquired, still in shock.
"Yes, he is!" Mokuba replied forcefully.
"Of course, he is," Anzu quickly apologized, not wanting to hurt the young boy's feelings. She silently wondered if he was a human, and how Seto Kaiba had created him. With magic, no doubt.
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Later that night, the Bakurians and Aisulings sat in the courtyard, watching Ryoko and Baku beat each other up and discussing the upcoming war. Ryoko had discovered earlier that afternoon that Chisara was missing and has been hysterical with grief at the prospect of losing her mother and pet. Bakura had assured his daughter that the cat was simply wandering around the palace and had brought Ryoko and Baku out to play to help get their minds off of the most recent crisis. In actuality, he could not imagine where the panther could be. It was just one more problem to add to the list. Anzu would be just as hysterical as Ryoko when she found out her beloved pet was missing. Bakura sighed. The only good event of the day was that he was feeling much better as far as injuries went.
"Thank you for harboring my daughters during the war. I am sure the battle itself will not take long once we arrive, but since my wife's passing, I do not like to leave my daughters alone on Aisu," the Aisuling president told Bakura.
"It is our pleasure to harbor your three daughters," Malik assured the president diplomatically. The three daughters were, in fact, triplets; there were no visible differences in their long, sky blue hair and eyes, and stark-white skin. They were slightly on the plump side, and their coloring was extreme even compared to the pale-colored Bakurians, but they were still remotely decent-looking. Although they were seemingly innocent, their carriage changed drastically as soon as their father stood to fetch himself a drink from a servant at the other side of the courtyard.
"It is so hot on this planet though," one of them said, eyeing Malik seductively. "I wish our clothing did not cover us as much."
Careen rolled her eyes. "Sweetie, if your clothing covered you any less, you would not be wearing any."
Mai snorted, silently agreeing and eyeing the three girls with disdain. One of the other Aisuling daughters turned a predatory gaze on Careen before looking away and commenting to her sister, "Of course, she would say that considering her prude-ish dress."
Careen glanced down at her long-sleeved dress for a moment before looking back up at the girls. "This is the style on Bakura," she informed them curtly. "Unfortunately for you, Aisu's fashion cannot do much to hide the fact that you apparently were kicked in the face by a cow before you ate it."
Mai burst into laughter, not even trying to hide it from the three daughters whose mouths were agape in shock. "How dare you!" one of them sputtered.
Bakura leaned toward Malik. "Congratulations. Your woman is capable of a good burn." Careen turned furiously toward the two men.
"He doesn't have women, only whores!" she snapped before stalking off. Mai glared at Bakura and Malik disapprovingly.
"Why is she mad at me when I didn't do anything?" Malik wondered before standing to go after Careen.
Bakura tilted his head back and stared at the dimming sky, wondering if fate was still punishing him for his criminal past.
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Finals week. I've been busy. I haven't studied very much, but I felt I needed to get this chapter up since it's been two weeks. Wah, everyone pray for me this week because things aren't looking too good. XD