(Disclaimer: I don't own Yugioh or any noticeable mythology in this story.)
A chained and shackled boy struggled against his confinements, all the while being dragged toward a room by three vampires. The boy resisted with all his might, but the vampires holding the ends of his chains were much stronger than he.
"Let, me go you monsters," the young boy yelled piercingly. "If you don't let me go this instant, as soon as Yami rescues I promise to hunt each of you down."
The vampires, annoyed at the tri-colored haired boy's continued ranting, breathed a sigh of relief as they threw Yugi upon the stone floor of a large barely lit room, shutting the large embroidered doors behind him.
Yugi took a quick look around the dark room; seeing no one he took a few hesitant steps further into the room, his chains causing a raucous clamor upon the cold and damp stone tiles.
A frosty voice reverberated through the room, startling its small occupant, causing Yugi to take a few steps backwards. "Ah, Yugi. We finally meet again, it's been so long."
Yugi finally mustered up the courage to respond. "Who.. Who are you?"
"I'm the person who has been searching for you, as well as your supposed lover Yami. I am also another being who prefers the truth to be known. I'm a vampire, an ancient vampire to be exact. I was once friends and companion to your dear Yami."
Yugi flinched as the creature spoke the word vampire, and started gazing everywhere, looking for the emitter of the voices. "What do you mean? Yami would never be friends with one of you killing monsters. He would never hide anything from me, he told me so himself."
(Yes, what a deluded person Yugi is)
The vampire raised his eyebrows slightly, and then let out of steel-scraping laugh, shivering Yugi to the cores of his bones. "Obviously then Yami hasn't been telling you anything about what he really is. Did you actually believe that Yami could be so skilled a fighter, yet be still human?"
Yugi tried to put up a brave face, but inside his heart flew into a turmoil of confusion, fear, and worry. "What are you getting at?"
The vampire grinned, "Let me tell you a little story about your friend."
Jounouchi lay with his head upon Ryou's hospital bed, his eyes shedding many a crystalline tear. Bakura at the sight of Ryou's bitten neck immediately bolted out of room, the white-haired vampire was currently believed to be walking alone in the surrounding forest.
Ryou himself was quite still; luckily however his chest still moved; indicating Ryou was still barely alive. Seto lengthily turned to Honda. "What happened to Ryou, Honda? How did he get bitten?"
Honda eyes were dull, his voice a tone of grief and gloom. "Here's what happened............"
"Ryou, lead the rest of the people out of here. There are still two werewolves who got past them, they're coming after us," Honda shouted at the chocolate-eyed boy. Ryou nodded and began to direct the caravan to run at a faster pace, while Honda turned to face two dark shapes coming toward him.
Honda slammed a pole into the first incoming werewolf, deterring it to face the brown-haired man. The other beast took no notice of him and bounded past the facing pair, still towards the helpless caravan.
Lighting a torch, Honda used the weapon to maintain a small distance between him and the werewolf. Malik soon came up the hillside, but Honda waved him on. "Malik, keep on going towards the convoy, one got past me."
As Malik ran past him, Honda sheathed a large can of aerosol spray. "Let's see this works like in the movies."
The werewolf lunged at him, to which Honda shot the aerosol right through the torch, creating a huge billowing flame effect. The werewolf yelled and scorched in pain, while Honda kept on burning it. Eventually nothing remained of the creature except a pile of burned ashes and cinders. "Well, guess you can learn something from those films."
Malik meanwhile had just managed to halt a werewolf from tearing apart an old archeologist, firing a bullet at it. The beast hissed in pain, but managed to jump upon Malik, eliciting a kick from the young Egyptian. The beast flinched, but opened his jaw, revealing hundreds of impossibly sharp teeth.
Just as the creature was about to begin his meal, a certain young English boy leapt upon the furry hide of the creature, amazingly knocking both himself and the beast ten-feet away. Malik scrambled back up, and retrieved his gun.
As Ryou precariously held upon the werewolf's neck, Malik aimed another shot at the beast, but suddenly the claws upon the werewolf's feet lashed out, butting Malik's head and knocking him unconscious upon the ground.
The werewolf then flipped the hapless Ryou into the air and caught the teenager in a firm hold, sinking his largest fangs into the boy's fragile neck. Ryou's eyes widened as the werewolf bit, his face turning even whiter than it currently was. A torch suddenly appeared in the werewolf, causing it to pull out its teeth in pain.
Honda then ran up to the agonized werewolf and beheaded it swiftly, the head rolling upon the grasses of the field. Honda dropped his sword, and ran to the bitten Ryou. Blood spilled in large amounts from Ryou's wound, soaking the nearby ground with hues of crimson red. Ryou had also taken upon a dangerous fever, his eyes becoming glassy and unfocused..............
Seto shook his head. "Great, we have now two disappeared friends, another who is currently filled with werewolf toxins, and another of us is despondent."
Peering again at Ryou's blood-soaked wound, Seto glanced out the window. "I know of only one person who can heal Ryou: my younger brother."
"You have a younger brother?"
"Yes, his name is Mokuba," Seto replied. "He lives in the Italian land; Rome to be precise, the ancient city of civilization in the West."
"Shut up with the history lesson; is your brother a master healer or something?" Honda asked.
"He's an alchemist. One of the greatest potion makers in the Western world, but enough of that. My younger brother found a little while ago, the panacea, the remedy that is capable of curing any wound, disease, or malady. With the panacea, we can most certainly cure Ryou."
"But your brother's in freaking Rome! That's hundreds and hundreds of miles away, how do you expect we get there before Ryou dies or turns into a werewolf or something like that?"
Seto thought hard. He couldn't apparate all the way to Italy. Apparition was a skill that required a huge amount of energy, and could not be reliable over very long distances. Besides, Seto knew he had to find Yami and most of all, "the Impaler". His duty was here in Romania, not in the far west. But someone needed to get to Mokuba and get the panacea, and even more importantly the alkahest; the very few of all substances that could even touch his vampire enemy.
"Honda, this is what I want you to do. Grab two horses, get three weeks of dry provisions for two, get Malik, and ride to Rome with him. When you're there, talk to my brother, you'll find him at the St. Peter's Basilica. Get the panacea as well as the item alkahest, and ride back here as quickly as you can. Also, tell my brother to gather and deploy his magnetics and astrals."
(Astrals and magnetics are the code word for psychic vampires. Vampires who rather did not suck the blood out of your physical body; but instead stole the energy of your soul.)
"Well that was short notice Kaiba. Why do I have to be the rider, why not you or Jounouchi or something? I've never ridden a horse long distance before."
"Well, guess this is a great time to start," Seto muttered dryly.
"Listen, Kaiba! I'm not taking orders from you or any others."
Seto was exasperated at his companion's incessant whining. "Do for Ryou then! You know as well as I do Ryou will indeed go berserk from his werewolf bite or die if he is not treated by the next full moon. The panacea will save him, okay?"
Honda sighed heavily; then began slowly to walk out of the room. "Fine.... By the way; what's an astral and a magnetic?"
"Never mind, just ask him." Honda shook his head and rolled his eyes.
"Malik, where are you? We've got a new errand to run!"
Many days later...................................
Seto looked out the steel-pained window, still searching for his tri-colored haired companion. Seto had looked everywhere, from the inner wrenches of the forest, to the billowing snows of the nearby mountains. He had even checked underground. Yami was nowhere to be found in the entire region.
At least he had found Bakura; a gaunt and haggard figure after Seto found him five days after Bakura disappeared. Luckily, Bakura's personality had changed significantly since he had left them, Seto had found out. Seto's cold cobalt eyes gazed at the dimming sunset, recalling an earlier conversation with Bakura, soon after he had found the white-haired vampire.
"You know Seto, I've thought for a long time why I've treated Ryou so badly, and now I know the answer. My definition of strong is one of physical strength, and how hard a person can punch. So I've always thought of Ryou as a weakling who needed to be toughened up; I just didn't want Ryou to be taken advantage of when he entered a harsher world. However Ryou's best strength lies within his spirit, and I never realized that sometimes that could be one of the greatest strengths to have."
"I know, Ryou has one of the strongest spirits I've seen a long while," Seto responded. "How else could he stand being your lover?"
Bakura tried to give a grin, but then slowly lowered and shook his head. "I can't believe I've treated him so badly. Ryou may be weak in stature and strength, but those are the characteristics of Ryou, and I can't change that. He'll never forgive me, and now he'll never be able to."
"What happened to Ryou was not of your doing Bakura; he'll never blame you for that. Forgiving you is a decision that is up to him, isn't it? It is not for us to make the decision, but for Ryou. There is hope for Ryou, you do know that. Don't worry; I'm sure Ryou will pull through this."
Bakura slowly raised his head. "Thank you, Seto. I only hope Ryou can find it in his heart to forgive me."
Seto's frosted eyes flickered again. Now that Bakura had been found, Kaiba was now ready to start. The cobalt-eyed vampire had previously found a slip of paper which spoke of his enemy holding up Yugi, and of a time for bargaining for the young boy. He was positive that Yami had previously seen the same letter and would go to the ancient cemetery, and so would Seto and Bakura. Jounouchi meanwhile would stay in Khurkvan and tend to Ryou. Together, they would go to the Khurkvan cemetery, rescue Yugi, and defeat "him". Even "he" couldn't stand against the might of three legendary vampires, each gifted with his own magical powers.
Currently Honda and Malik were riding west to Rome to gather up Mokuba's forces, to rescue Averon when the inevitable attack of his enemy's army occurred. Honda had not realized his reason of sending Malik to Rome with him. Seto's enemy and Malik bore an unnatural resemblance to each other; if the two were together something might occur that would be harmful to their cause.
Each part of his plan had to fit together, or else everything and everyone would fall. Unfortunately the odds were not on Seto's side, his enemy had far more resources at his disposal, and who knows what he could have done to Yugi? Yami as well as Bakura had emotional weaknesses for their lovers, rendering them helpless in some situations. Luckily Seto was not their predicament, having to worry consistently about a human.
Averon needed to suit up for war, as battle was soon to be upon them. Over tens of thousands of civilians had fled there for safety, so Averon had many soldiers defending the bastion. Unfortunately all those defenders were merely mortal human, not ideal or helpful for facing the might of a vampire army.
Vampires were not the only creatures that the enemy had at his disposal. Zombies, undead skeletons, and ghosts swarmed in huge numbers among the opposing army. Werewolves also marshaled at "his" banner, many a legion of those fell creatures swelled the ranks of the enemy. The leader of the werewolves, Otogi Ryuuji, would most certainly lead the attack. However Seto was quite certain that Otogi would be at Khurkvan, so it was a necessity to finish off Otogi there. Besides, they had a four hundred year old score to settle.
Two days, that was all the time that Seto and Bakura had to prepare for the Khurkvan meeting. "He" would be there, one of the mightiest vampire forces ever to walk the soil of this Earth. With the ancient werewolf Ryuuji on his side; they would sure need a hell of a lot of luck to defeat them.
Yugi was also a major factor in all this. Seto had a small hunch that Yugi was still human and quite alive, but what had "he" done to the poor boy. His enemy could have played many tricks upon Yugi's mind, perhaps even inclining Yugi to fight against their side. Or Seto's feeling could be wrong, "he" could have already drained Yugi, who this time had no hope for resurrection. What had their enemy done to Yugi?
Two days......................................All they had............
PLZ REVIEW PLEASE!!!! Next chapter will feature the meeting of Khurkvan, and the fate of Yugi.