He heard a rustling nearby and soft sobs. Slowly he forced his eyes open and he sat up. The light from the fire had turned dim, but it gave off a well enough light for him to see the source of the crying. It was from across the cavern. For a moment he wondered why the redhead would be crying when he realized that the cell beside the young man was no longer vacant. Huddled against the bars was a girl a few years older than him. She had long dark brown hair that coiled down her back in a braid. Her face was hidden by her knees that were pulled up to her chest, and he could see that the girl was cradling her wrist.
Slowly he moved his gaze to the cell on his right. The girl beside him no longer was alone. A small figure was huddled beside her, it's features unknown. In the cell on his left was another girl, much older. Her short hair was a mix of dyed black and sun bleached blonde. What looked like an oval shape appeared to be burnt on the center of her throat.
"Hmm?" The sound came from the redhead's cell. He slowly sat up, taking in what Mokuba had already done. "What's this? More captives. Someone's been very busy."
"Will you be quiet?" The older girl on Mokuba's left hissed as she pressed a hand against her forehead. "I already have a horrible headache, and don't need someone making it worse."
"Well, sorry." The redhead muttered, then turned to the girl in the cell beside him. "Hey, are you alright?"
The crying girl looked up and gazed at the red haired man, who smiled warmly at her. She sniffed, then wiped tears from her eyes. Mokuba noticed that the skin on the wrist she had been cradling was burnt as well, only in an elegant pattern that resembled that of a bracelet..
"I-I just don't know where I am." She replied. It was obvious she was trying not to cry harder.
"Join the club." The man said, smiling. He then looked over to Mokuba. "Hey, you're finally awake. I woke up three times hoping to get a word in with you, but you just kept on snoozing."
Mokuba smiled a bit, glad to have someone to talk to. "You seem to sleep pretty deep yourself." The boy said, remembering waking up one time to hear loud snores.
"I'm Neil." He redhead continued, leaning against the wall of his enclosure. "I would shake your hand, but you're a bit far away." Already the dankness of the cavern was lifting, and Mokuba noticed that even the girl beside Neil was smiling now.
"I'm Mokuba."
"You're not Mokuba Kaiba, are you?" It was the negative blonde. She was looking at him with icy blue eyes that frightened Mokuba a bit.
"Yes…"
"So, we have all been collected…" The girl muttered.
Mokuba began to ask her what she meant, but Neil spoke out first. "Are you going to introduce yourself, or do we have to guess who you are?" Mokuba began to realize his voice carried a heavy Irish accent. "Or, we could just give you a name. What do you think about Tiffany?" The young man smiled brightly.
"My name is Medea." The girl snapped.
"Pretty." Neil noted, then turned to the girl beside him. "And you are?"
"Sundari."
Neil nodded, then looked over to Takoda and the lump beside her. "Does anyone know who those two are?"
"The girl's Takoda." Mokuba mumbled. "I don't know who the little one is, though."
Takoda stirred, then slowly sat up, the small figure with her. "Stop talking about me." She ordered as she sat up.
"Chayton?" It was the girl named Sundari who spoke out.
The boy in with Takoda spun and pressed his face against the bars. "Sundari!" He looked across from Mokuba and there was recognition in his eyes. "And Medea! H-how did we get here?"
"I don't know." Sundari admitted. "Last thing I remember was walking into the house with you and Ryou, then a bright light, and then I was here."
"I remember falling." Chayton mumbled. "And this great wave of blackness. When I woke up I was beside my sister."
"Sister?" Mokuba echoed. He looked at Takoda, then back at the boy. There was a resemblance in the two's dark hair and even darker eyes. "Takoda, isn't your brother a Gem Keeper?" The girl slowly nodded.
"We all are." It was Medea who spoke. He turned to her and saw her lightly rubbing the burn in her neck. "Except, perhaps, you, Takoda was it? You were taken by mistake."
"And my family!" Sundari cried. She turned to Neil. "Have you seen them?"
"I think I did." Mokuba piped, making the Indian girl turn to him. "I saw Antonio take away a man, a woman and a little girl."
"That's them! Where did they go?"
Mokuba pointed to the door that Antonio had taken them through. "There."
"I hope they're alright…" Sundari uttered, tears brimming in her eyes again.
Just then the door on the other side of the room creaked open and Chiquita appeared pushing a trolley with trays of food on them. Silently she went from cell to cell, pushing the trays of food through little slits on the bottom of the cell doors, just big enough for the trays to go in easy.
When Chiquita was pushing his tray through the slit Mokuba reached out and grabbed her arm, forcing the girl to look at him.
"Chiquita, where did all these people come from?" He asked.
She remained silent for a moment, then said quietly, "Essie sent them. Essie says the time is nearing, so the other Gem Keepers have been brought to the Holding Ground. Essie will be arriving soon, once the Lapis Lazuli is found." She then pulled her arm away and left, pushing her now empty trolley before her.
" 'Beware of Essie'." Medea echoed, then cursed, hitting her forehead. "Of course! How could I have been so stupid!"
"What is it?" Chayton asked, worry on his face. "You didn't know this 'Essie' person was going to take us."
"That's just it, I did!" Medea uttered, her face fallen. "Somebody named Essie didn't bring us here. Ugh, I should've seen it before!"
Chayton frowned. "But, that girl just said-"
"I know what she said." Medea snapped. "But 'Essie' isn't their name! It's the person's initials, S.E." She almost growled. "Sanders Euphemia. My stepfather…" Mokuba heard Sundari gasp across the room.
"N-no way." Chayton stammered, shaking his head vigorously. "Sanders is too nice of a guy, he would never turn us over to some crazy guy."
"But he didn't…" Mokuba mumbled, thinking back on a conversation with Chiquita. "Antonio was working for him… This Sanders guy was the one who planned everything, it was only Antonio's job to fetch the other Gem Keepers for him…"
The room fell silent, everyone thinking their own thoughts.
He took off the cloth that had been on her forehead, a bit content with the color that had returned to her face. Gently he brushed aside a few strands of hair that clung to the damp surface of her forehead. A part of him was still wondering if all this was just a dream, but for the first time in a long time everything felt real.
The door opened and a smaller version of himself entered. The boy crossed over from the doorway and sat down on the opposite side of the bed, his eyes on the sleeping girl.
"We haven't found them." Yugi whispered, his eyes still intent on Nina. "I don't think we will. They were taken while we were all knocked out."
"Don't give up so easily, Yugi." Yami advised. He leaned over and patted the small boy's shoulder. "They may be gone for now, but we'll find them all."
Yugi sighed. "What I don't understand is why they took Sanders. I understand that they took Medea, Sundari and Chayton because they're the Gem Keepers. But why Sanders? Why was he taken?"
"He wasn't taken…" A voice whispered. Both Yugi and Yami looked down at Nina. Her eyes were opened a little bit, and she was looking at them. Slowly she tried to sit up, but only managed to with Yami's help.
"I don't understand." Yugi admitted.
"Take me down to the others." Nina ordered, though her voice wavered a bit. "I'll explain everything."
Yugi nodded, as Yami helped Nina to her feet. She wobbled a bit, not yet use to being solid again, but by the time the small group made it down to the main floor she was starting to get the hang of it.
They went into the sitting room opposite of the dinning room, which was still a wreck. The others sat on the chairs and sofas, their conversations dying when they noticed the two boys and the pale girl. Yami helped Nina over to a chair, then went and sat on an empty sofa with Yugi beside him.
"I know you are all confused." Nina said. It sounded like a whisper, though she was actually speaking loudly. "And I've tried to warn you all before, but I failed. I couldn't stop him from taking them…"
"Who?" Bree asked. She moved to the edge of the sofa she shared with Kaiba.
Nina looked down at her hands, guilt crossing her face. "Sanders…" Everyone sat still, stunned by the girl's words.
"That's a lie." Ishizu uttered. She gripped the arm of her chair tightly. "Why would Sanders do that?"
"Because he's been working towards it for so long…" Nina told her. Her small hands balled into fists on her lap. "Sanders first learned about the Chaos when we were younger. Yami, you were correct when you asked me if I was the Turquoise's previous Keeper. But, the Gem was also the reason I died.
"See, the seven Shadow Gems are powerful items, but they require someone stronger to use them. Each time you use a Gem, it drains a little bit of the user's life as a sort of price to use the Gem's gift. Sanders kept on forcing me to use the Turquoise so he could find out more about this "Chaos" that I often spoke of while in the Turquoise's trance. The Gem kept draining me and draining me until I became sick and weak.
"Eventually, the Turquoise's hold completely took me. I could no longer choose whether it spoke through me or not. And Sanders found a way to get the Gem to answer his questions, which he eventually used on Medea. But the Gem kept feeding off of me, until there was nothing left to feed off. I died.
"But even in death Sanders would not let me go. Using the Turquoise he was able to bind me to this house, so that whenever he need something answered he could just call upon me. He knew what the Gem was capable of, so he would rather use me as a translator than risk become the Gem's Keeper himself. For years he used my spirit. Until Medea came along.
"When he married Medea's mother, he finally took the risk of becoming the Turquoise's Keeper. But just long enough so he could pass the Gem to Medea, making her its Keeper. He had no need for me anymore, and thought that my spirit had passed on. But I was still trapped in this house, unable to control my own actions. Only recently have I broken free of the Turquoise and acted upon my own free will. When Sanders realized that my spirit still inhabited this house, he tried his best to stop me from warning you and revealing what he planned."
Nina sat silently, tears brimming in her eyes at the memories of all she had seen. The others were quiet, too, thinking of what the girl had just told them about the man they thought they knew.
"But why now?" Ryou questioned finally. "If he knew about the Shadow Gems for so long, why did he wait until now to act upon it?"
"Because he learned something new." Nina explained, her eyes still intent on her hands. "The first thing that the Gem spoke of through Medea was of a different power. The seven Millennium Items. For a time Sanders sought after these." Her eyes finally arose and landed on Ishizu. "That's how he met you. He had gone to Egypt to find out more about the Items.
"But Sanders then came to the conclusion that the power of the seven Items was inferior to that of the Shadow Gems, and once again he began to asked the Turquoise about the Chaos. Though the Turquoise has a habit of answering in riddles, Sanders pieced things together, and made a plan."
"That's how he was able to find the other Keepers." Marik muttered, more to himself than to the others. "Medea told me that the Turquoise is connected to the Chaos itself, that's its gift. And each of the other Gems is part of the Chaos, so he just had to ask where each Gem was and the Turquoise would track it down for him." Nina didn't answer, just nodded in response.
"But why did he wait here?" Ishizu asked. "Why agree to bring us into his home?"
"The Gem told him of your arrival long before you even knew you were coming." Nina told her in a hushed voice.
Yugi's eyes widened as he caught on. "And Sanders knew that it would take much time to gather each Keeper one by one. Why waste the time finding the Keepers himself when he knew we would just deliver them to him?"
"And he knew you would bring the book." Nina whispered. "He still didn't know where the last Gem was, the Turquoise would not tell him."
"He needed the book to know where it was." Ishizu muttered, a look of slight horror on her face. Slowly she reached out to the coffee table before her and picked up the worn book with the black stones on the cover. "And we brought it to him."
"But how could Sanders just "force" the Turquoise to tell him everything?" Bree asked. "It seems too powerful to be ordered about."
"The Gems have a weakness." Nina told her. "They're power is derived from the negative forces around them." She reached out to Ishizu and took the book from her, running her fingers over the ebony stones. "And according to legend, onyx as the power to rid one of negative forces."
Kaiba leaned forwards a bit. "Onyx? I thought those gems on the book were obsidian."
Nina shook her head, her eyes still intent on the stones. "People confuse obsidian with black onyx because they look the same. But no, these are black onyx set into the book. That's what allows it from being tampered with by those who have the powers of the Shadow Realm or the Chaos itself."
"In Sander's study the desk has plenty of onyx on it." Yugi quickly said, remembering finding the black stones hidden among the papers littering the desk's surface.
The pale girl nodded. "That's how he got the Turquoise to obey him. As long as he held just a piece of onyx the Gem would submit to him."
"And Medea realized that when she saw the book." Marik added. "She had already pieced together that Sanders was doing something to her."
"But she didn't know exactly what until it was too late." Nina finished.
"You seem to have all the answers." Bakura mumbled. The room turned to him. "Do you know then how we somehow have been brought onto the physical plain from the astral one?"
Nina nodded. "It's because of the Gems. They're powers intermingled when they got close enough together."
"Now that I think about it, Medea and Sundari never were in the same place before this." Yugi said as if saying his thoughts aloud. "Medea and Marik were already gone from the house when Sundari arrived."
"Medea already felt the approach of the Iolite long before Sundari was near the house." Nina continued. "I tried to warn her to get out, but she didn't listen to me."
"But Sundari didn't sense anything." Ryou noted.
"That's because Medea has used the Turquoise on several occasions." The girl explained. "Sundari has never used the Iolite, so she would not be so attuned to it that she would sense the presence of other Gems."
"But what exactly happened here when the two Gems were together?" Bree asked.
"Their powers exploded." Was the matter-of-fact answer.
Bakura almost snorted. "Exploded is an understatement."
Nina ignored his statement. "The gifts of each Gem collided, then irrupted against their Keeper's will. That's what happens when two Gems come together, unless they have some kind of guard against it. Most likely a magical or some kind of casing made of onyx would be used to contain them. And because Sanders held the book, that had onyx in the cover, he was spared from the power of the blast."
"But that still doesn't explain how we are here." Bakura told her.
To this Nina shook her head. "As I've said before, each Gem has a gift of its own." She began turning the pages of the book. Finally she stopped and turned the pages towards them, showing a depiction of the Iolite. "The Iolite's gift is to "rearrange one's perception of reality", in other words, bring creatures from one plain of existence into another one. It brought us from the world of the dead into the world of the living. And, let's face it, going from dead to living completely changes one's idea of reality."
Bakura finally nodded, sitting back in his chair in a content way.
"And the voice that spoke out before we were all knocked out, it was Medea wasn't it?" Marik asked.
Again Nina nodded. "Yes. The Turquoise's power is to know all bad things that go on in the world. But, just because it's a piece of jewelry doesn't mean it's not intelligent. It can foretell things from time to time if it sees a pattern in what happens in the world around it."
"The Iolite brought you three back," Yugi uttered, looking from Nina to Yami and then to Bakura. "And the Turquoise said what it guessed what was going to happen."
"It did not guess." Nina told him sternly. "When the Turquoise states something in reference to future events, it doesn't guess. It knows that what is says will come true."
"But what does "The seven stones will be joined in the Earth once more" mean?" Joey asked.
"The seven stones obviously refers to the seven Shadow Gems." Yami explained.
"But joined in the Earth?" Ryou uttered, rubbing the back of his neck as he did. "What does that refer to?" The group fell silent, thinking of the riddle placed before them.
Nina suddenly gasped. "The Chaos Gate." Everyone blinked in her direction questioningly, silently asked her to continue. "When Sanders was looking through the book I read over his shoulder. What the Turquoise said was "Joined in the Earth once more". I think it's hinting to the Chaos Gate, where the Gems were created, seeing as that was the last place they were all together."
"It might also be implying about what it is we're looking for." Ishizu added, her solemn eyes on the girl. "It said "in" the Earth, not "on". Maybe this Chaos Gate is underground?"
"So, we're looking for a place that's underground, cold and barren." Bree whispered, more to herself than to the others. Slowly she looked up and took the group in. "Where can we find a place like that?"
"I don't know." Nina admitted. "But we still have the book. I'll look through it some more, and piece together what Sanders didn't tell us."
"So, we have to wait some more?" Kaiba asked, his tone dark.
"It's unavoidable, Kaiba." Nina explained to him gently. "We can't just go off without being prepared."
"But Sanders already has all the Gem Keepers." Was the low reply. "While we're sitting around here doing nothing he could already be doing what he needs with the people he took."
Nina's eyes took on a sympathetic look. "I know how you feel, but there isn't really anything we can-"
Kaiba cut her off, standing abruptly. "I refuse to believe that. I will not stand around while my brother is god-knows-where." With that he stormed from the room. Silently Bree stood and went after him.
"Well, that was a bit melodramatic." Joey muttered, still staring where the two figures had disappeared to.
"Don't start Joey." Ishizu told him. "We are all under a lot of pressure now." She turned back to Nina. "Please, try to figure out what we're looking for as quickly as possible."
The pale girl nodded, standing with the book in her hands. "I'll start right now."
"I'll help you." Yami said, arising from his seat as well. Nina smiled, then led the way to the backyard.
Ryou stood as well, motioning to Yugi, Marik and Joey. "Come on, we might as well tidy up the dinning room and kitchen." At this Joey groaned, but followed still as the other boys left the room.
"I suppose there are things that I should do as well." Ishizu muttered. Slowly she got up from he seat, then looked over at Bakura who still sat with his arms crossed. "What do you plan on doing in this time of waiting?"
"I have my own agenda." Bakura replied, not showing any notion of moving.
"Alright then." The woman said, then slowly left the room as well, leaving the thief alone.
Bakura sat where he was for a few moments longer, then slowly stood and went out the front door, heading down to the town.