Notes: Yes, the beginning and the end of that chapter was Ryou's dream, but you don't know who's in the dream . . . How perfectly evil, no? Thank you all for your reviews.

Warning: 'blah' = thinking. blah = someone talking to another through thoughts. Parts may be confusing. It helps to think of it this way. Since at the beginning of the chapter Ryou is unconscious, the scene's either about Yugi and Joey, or it's the dream. Ok, either that helped, or I've confused you guys more. Review and I shall be eternally happy.



Sleeping Demons and Crying Angels - Fire



"And to finish my turn, I play Panther Warrior, in attack mode," Joey said triumphantly, placing down the card.

"Good move Joey, but I'm afraid your Panther Warrior is no match for my . . . Dark Magician! Go, Dark Magic ATAAAAAAACK!" Yugi cried out, sparkly bubbles appearing.

"Oh no," Joey said, "Your Dark Magicians attack points are 2500 and my panther warrior is only 2000!"

Yugi grinned, "Which means that your life points get attacked for 500 points of damage making me the winner!" He jumped up and down in happiness, even more sparkly bubbles appearing. Suddenly he paused, "Hey, shouldn't Ryou be here by now? His house isn't that far away from here, I don't think."

"Yah, I think you're right," Joey said, as they put their decks away and moved over to the side so they could talk easier. "He said he'd be right over, but he isn't over yet."

Yugi paced back and forth a little. "Come to think of it, his hands were all bruised up today. He said he dropped a pan on them, but I don't think he was telling the truth now! C'mon Joey, we have to go see what's up with him."

That being said, the two of them grabbed their coats and started running to Ryou's house as fast as they could.

-=-=-=-=-=-

'No wonder it's so cold . . .' he thought, noticing for the first time that his clothes were all ripped and torn. What had once been a pair of pants and a short sleeved shirt were now merely torn rags, not even fit to be called rags. He curled up even tighter, knowing that there was nothing to save him from this cold and the pain. 'Save me . . . anyone. . .'

So you don't like the cold, do you?

He flinched at the sound of the voice, which went directly into his head, and seemed to bore into him like it was being hammered in. He didn't bother to think anything. Just . . . 'I want to die. . .'

You can't die. Never.

The sound of laughter accompanied that voice this time, and suddenly there was a flash of light. He could see another person now, standing over him. 'Go away,' he thought, 'Just leave me alone.'

The person grinned maliciously, and replied, "Even if I left you for the dead, you would never die. You see, you can't die. Ever."

"That . . . can't be . . . true," he whispered back. It took all of his strength just to say that, but he still didn't pass out or anything.

"See, you prove it yourself. Any NORMAL person would be DEAD by now," the person standing over him taunted. "You'll want to forget, but you'll always remember." The person pulled out a thin, but long, knife. "No matter how much pain I inflict on your body, no matter how much you suffer, you'll never die until you're awake."

And stabbed him with the knife.

-=-=-=-=-=-

"Ryou! Ryou! Are you in there?" Joey called out, peering inside the house. The door was open, so Ryou must have made it home, but no lights were on. Did he go upstairs?

"Joey, be careful!" Yugi suddenly said as Joey was about to go inside the house. Joey looked down and saw that he had just been about to step on Ryou's body.

For a moment they both stared in shock at Ryou who was lying on the ground, face down, and twitching madly. His breath was coming out in short gasps, and every so often he would cry. And then, to their absolute horror, he suddenly just quite simply started to bleed.

"That's not right," Joey said, eyes wide, "There's something wrong with him! Yug, can you tell what's wrong?"

Yugi shook his head, but he dropped to his knees and flipped Ryou over, shaking him to wake him up. "Get some cold water and put it in a cup," He instructed Joey, "And get some bandaids, or gauze, or anything to put on this wound." Joey nodded and he went inside. Yugi pulled Ryou's body out of the doorway and closed the door, and turned on a light so he could see the full extent of the wound.

It was hard to pinpoint the exact location; Ryou seemed to be bleeding from several spots. Hastily unbuttoning Ryou's shirt and then pulling it off, Yugi gasped. Up and down Ryou's left side, from shoulder to just about his hips, was a series of deep gashes. They looked totally random, yet were in a straight line, and each gash seemed to be perfectly measured.

Blood was pouring freely, and Joey hadn't came back yet, so Yugi took Ryou's shirt, and pressed it to his chest, hoping to stop the bleeding a little. "Wake up, Ryou, wake up!" he cried. "Oh, you're so cold . . . I can hardly feel your pulse . . ." he said, getting worried. "But it's pretty warm out . . . there's no way you can be that cold . . ."

Suddenly, Ryou blinked and looked up at Yugi. "Hello," he said, blinking at Yugi, "What are you - ouch!" He glanced down and his eyes widened in horror as he saw he cuts on his body. "What happened? One minute I was getting my cards, the next minute I'm all cut up!"

Joey had arrived now with the bandaids and water, so Yugi got to work on bandaging up Ryou's wounds. "You didn't show up, so Joey and I came over to see if anything was wrong," Yugi said, cleaning them with the water. "Oh, these gashes are so deep! How in the world could this have happened?"

"I don't know," Ryou muttered, his eyes watering with pain, "But it really hurts a lot . . ." He started coughing, and Yugi, who had wrapped up the last wound, brought him to the couch. There wasn't much he could do to stop the coughing, and suddenly Ryou passed out again.

-=-=-=-=-=-

"Do you see what I mean?" The person laughed, "You can't die." He forced the other to stand up.

"I can't . . . stand . . ." he said, wincing in pain. His lungs felt like they were on fire. Surely he would die of blood loss soon, right? His eyes flashed violently and rolled into the back of his head, but he didn't pass out.

'Yes. You can. Stupid boy." The first suddenly barked out, "You annoy me! You're weak, wishing you could die. Well, you know what? You CAN'T, so get used to it." He threw the knife on the ground and pulled out a long sword. It glinted in the light. "You annoy me." With that being said, he walked up to the other.

Both of them stood, glaring at each other, although it was obvious that the second one, the one with the brown eyes, was very weak. Then, suddenly, the first darted forward and held the brown-eyed boy in what appeared to be a hug.

They stood in a semblance of an embrace until the first whispered into the seconds' ear, "You annoy me."

And he plunged the sword through his body.

-=-=-=-=-=-

Ryou awoke suddenly, crying out in pain. He wasn't able to talk now; there was too much blood in his mouth and he was becoming weak from lack of oxygen.

"Ryou, what's wrong?" Yugi asked, eyes widening as Ryou pointed down at his body. Just to the left of the middle of his chest was a huge gaping wound, as if he had been run through. That wound hadn't been there when he bandaged the other wounds, Yugi knew that much. So where had it come from?

"It . . . hurts . . ." Ryou whispered, trying in vain to stay awake. It just felt important to him to not fall unconscious, no matter what.

"Hang on, Ryou," Yugi said, "We're going to get you to the hospital." Yugi turned to Joey who was standing next to them, "Joey, quickly, call for an ambulance. Now!"

Joey didn't need to be told twice. He sprinted off into the kitchen, and within two minutes, came back to assure them an ambulance was on the way.

"Ok, Ryou, just take deep breaths," Yugi said, "You're going to be alright and the doctors will figure out what's wrong. I'm sure everything will turn out fine." His hand felt wet and when he lifted it to look at it, he realized it was wet. With blood. Ryou was bleeding worse that he thought. "Just hang in there," he added, not knowing exactly what to say to the half- dead boy. He attempted to use his and Joey's jackets to stop the blood flow, but they just got soaked.

Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, but was only five minutes, the ambulance arrived. Their eyes widened at the sight of Ryou; it didn't take an idiot to realize that he was about ten minutes away from death.

"Ok, let us handle this," one man said, while two others picked Ryou up swiftly but gently, placing him on a stretcher and bringing him outside. Yugi and Joey were allowed to ride in the ambulance, so they sat in the back, looking at Ryou. A doctor on board was peeling off Ryou's bandages and applying new ones, cleaning out the wounds, and setting him up with an oxygen mask.

"It's going to be hard to say whether he will live or not," the doctor explained, taking a pulse and shaking his head, "He's lost immense amounts of blood and can barely breathe on his own. Do you two have any clue what happened?"

Joey shook his head, explaining, "We were supposed to meet up after school and when he didn't show up, we went to his house to look for him, and we found him lying on the ground, all battered up."

Yugi stayed silent. Would the doctor believe him if said that one of the wounds just simply APPEARED out of nowhere? He decided not to say anything yet; there was always a slight chance that he had missed it, even though that was a totally irrational thought.

"Room A291 is open," one person was saying, "But he'll have to share."

"He needs all the equipment."

"He'll get most of it. The other patient is the special case."

"Ok then."

Joey and Yugi followed silently, worrying for their friend. Inside room A291 were two small beds and what seemed like a million different machines. The doctors wasted no time in hooking Ryou up to them, and Yugi took a look at the person in the other bed.

The person in the other bed was a teenage boy, probably no older than 17. He had long white hair and tan skin. It was impossible to see what color his eyes were, since they were closed. He looked to be dead. Yugi frowned slightly and asked, "I don't mean to pry, but, umm, is he dead?"

A doctor who was supervising the machines glanced over. "No, he's not dead. He's somewhere in between being asleep and being in a coma. He's been here for the past day and a half and hasn't woken up or anything. The doctors are going to work on him tonight. You might not want to stick around, no matter how much you're worried about your friend.

Yugi thanked the doctor and turned back to Ryou. 'This just doesn't make any sense.' Suddenly it felt like someone had hit him with a sledgehammer, and he keeled forward, blacking out next to Ryou.

-=-=-=-=-=-

The brown eyed teen was back on the ground again, panting, and weeping as his life slid out of him slowly, but not leaving him fully. The person standing over him, with blonde hair and wild purple eyes was grinning, and licking blood off of his sword. "You just continue to annoy me, you know? Grow up, and get stronger, boy."

"I'm not young . . . like I used to be," muttered the teen, rubbing his silver hair out of his eyes. "Go away. Let me die."

"You CAN'T die, how many times do I need to tell you?"

And now a third pair of eyes stood watching the scene, a pair of crimson eyes, narrowed. He ran forward, saying, "Stop it! He CAN die! You can kill his body and then only his soul will remain! Don't do this."

"What do YOU care?"

"Leave him alone. It isn't right."

"You want to die too? Oh, wait, you can't either. You two are both immortal!" The blonde laughed and laughed, as if he thought this was the most amusing thing ever. "And, I too, am immortal, so you can't stop me from torturing you, and once I have gotten past your spirit, I can finally be free again."

"What do you mean?" demanded the crimson eyed teen. "We're stuck here for eternity."

"Not if our host awakens."

"No . . . the hosts . . . they'll never wake up. Never."

"Ahhh, but there you are wrong, I'm afraid." The blonde stabbed the silver haired teen on the ground for emphasis. "You see, once I'm done with him, I can release your hosts' soul, and then mine."

"You'll end up killing yourself! It's impossible. We're doomed to stay here."

"Not any longer. Already, our hosts move about, asleep, unaware. Once enough damage is done to them. . . . we will be free. . ." Insane laughed accompanied this.

"Why are you doing this? Why are you trying to free us too, then?"

"Well, my dear friend, don't you know? You are immortal until you enter your host. And then, I am free to kill you two for good. After what you did to me . . . I would kill you right now but I can't!" thundered the blonde, swiping his sword across the crimson eyed teen's chest, causing a deep gash.

-=-=-=-=-=-

"Yugi! Yugi! Wake up!" Joey was saying, shaking Yugi. Yugi blinked slowly, the world coming into focus. He was aware of dull pain across his chest, and he could already feel blood rushing out of the wound.

"Are you alright?" a doctor asked, coming over to Yugi.

Yugi's eyes were wide at the scene he had just witnessed in his dream. He blindly shook his head. "I'm fine," he whispered, standing up slowly, and hoping the blood wouldn't soak through. There would be no possible way to explain to the doctors how he suddenly got a large cut across his chest and to be frank, he didn't know either.

"Yugi?" came a soft voice. Ryou was awake, but barely. "Yugi, I saw you . . ."

"I saw you too," muttered Yugi. 'And the other person, I saw him too. But it didn't seem to be them, exactly. I'm so confused . . .'

"Yugi, don't let me fall asleep," Ryou muttered sleepily.

Yugi nodded weakly, and crawled onto the bed as well, starting to feel lightheaded from blood loss.

"Yug! You're hurt! You should have told me!" Joey's worried voice came and Yugi looked up at him, blinking. It took him a moment to realize, and then he nodded briefly.

"I guess when I . . . feel on the bed I opened up a cut that had . . . almost healed . . . but . . I'm sure I'll . . . be fine . . . " He looked over at Ryou, having nothing else to say.

"I feel . . . better now," Ryou said.

The doctors suddenly turned to the other bed. It appeared that the other patient had woken up as well.

-=-=-=-=-=-

Ryou and Yugi had to stay overnight at the hospital, so they would miss school, but Joey promised to explain to the teachers why they were absent. And then he had to go because his sister, Serenity would be waiting for him, and he didn't want her to think he was in trouble. However, the next day, both Yugi and Ryou were allowed to go before school was out, so they did, hoping they could run into Joey later.

"I don't get it, do you Yugi?" Ryou asked for probably the 100th time.

Yugi shrugged again. "Not a clue. I sure wish I knew." He sighed. "It was so surreal. I saw you on the ground, only you had brown eyes . . . and there was this other person in the hospital who was there too. The only beating you up."

"Maybe this is all just a nightmarish nightmare?" Ryou suggested, joking, to lighten the mood. Yugi smiled.

"Sadly enough," Yugi grinned, "I'm afraid I'm going to have to insist it's not a dream because I can feel that wound on my chest and it's real enough."

"Yeah, same here," Ryou sighed. "Hey, is your grandfather expecting you? If not, we can stop by my house, get something to drink, go meet up with Joey and then go over to your house. What do you say? We can duel to take our minds off of this."

"Works for me. I called my grandfather this morning," Yugi said. That being settled, they went to Ryou's house, and got some nice warm hot chocolate, even though it WAS spring. It tasted really good, though, and Ryou confided that he used a special ingredient.

"Well, let's go catch up with Joey so he doesn't go bursting into the hospital wondering where we are," Yugi said as they sipped the last of their hot drinks.

Ryou nodded and the two of them silently set out towards the school.

They were being watched.