12. Reviews. Thank you all so much! This chapter is dedicated to my newest reviewers Gardevoir-Mages, the amazing new writer RedEyesBlackDragonLady, and of course, Leona Saclat.

Disclaimer: Yu-Gi-Oh I do not own.

Chapter 5- Childhood's End

Dear Diary,

i cant get those picturs out of mi head. i wake up at nite, screaming. but Bakura says we hav to be quiet. but i no he wakes up screaming to. now Kul Elna is gone, we stay at a building in the palace town. i thought that we'd get caught that way and i told him but Bakura said they think everyones dead. as long as we hide our scars we're ok.

the building is a little dirty but its ok. Bakura says it's a tavern but i've heard pple call it a bar. when u go in theres this big space with tables and chairs. The tables and chairs are little so theres a lot of them, but there almost always full.

Bakura and me live upstairs. During the day we work at the bar cleaning up and serving pple. Its hard espiacilly when the pple begin to go all weird and act the way my Father did around me. I get scared a lot, but not so much when Bakura is there.

At night, Bakura and me steal. Its what we were made to do, so we get a lot of stuff from it. We live on it.

Finally we learned to steal from tombs. They're those triangle shaped statues that rich pple bury there stuff in. I heard they're special and shouldn't be touched, but we did anyway. It was easy to find though. You can just follow the Nile.

Selket stood gawking at the pyramid in front of her. Bakura had said it was much larger up close, but…

"Come on!" came Bakura's hurried whisper. He grabbed Selket's arm and dragged her to the back of the tomb.

Bakura suddenly let go and she fell backward into the sand. "Don't stand there like that, you'll get us caught! And this time, we won't be able to get away if you mess up again!" Bakura shouted quietly, the top of his nose scrunching up in a scowl that he always did when he got mad.

Selket looked down to hide her eyes, which were welling up with tears.

Bakura let out an exasperated sigh, and his expression softened. "Well…I guess its all right. No harm done, right?"

Selket sniffled once and got up.

"Come on, Selket."

With that, Bakura turned back towards the pyramid. Selket followed behind him soundlessly.

Bakura didn't stop until he was at the very base of the tomb. Then he knelt down and began to dig in the sand. A few minutes later the sand gave way on its own and revealed a large hole.

"Do you have the torch?" he asked Selket. Selket nodded and handed the wood to Bakura. He took it and scraped it against the pyramid's wall, sparks flying everywhere. A flame slowly grew from the sparks.

With the torch in hand, Bakura led the way into the hole, the secret passage into the pyramid.

It was extremely cold and dark in the tomb. The only thing visible was what was in front of the torch light.

Selket couldn't help but shiver. It wasn't only the cold that made her squirm, but fear. She knew well what often happened to tomb robbers; there was reason thieving was a terminal job. But Bakura seemed to know where he was going…

They came to a large, empty room. On the other side was a single door with an elaborately decorated stone canopy above it. "There it is…The burial room," said Bakura.

The two began to cross the room. Suddenly Selket tripped over something. She fell forward and knocked into Bakura. "Ah! I'm sorry, B-Bakura," she stammered, regaining her balance. He grunted and turned towards Selket, effectively illuminating her- as well as what made her trip.

A yellowing skull with an arrow in its forehead grinned at Bakura.

Selket covered her mouth (to avoid screaming for dear life) and jumped back. Bakura only narrowed his eyes and held the torch out farther.

All along the walls were skeletons, some yellowed, some still decaying, lining the walls. Each, however, seemed to have met the same fate: each one was covered in arrows. The skeleton's heads were aways from the bodies, taken off cleanly.

Bakura and Selket backed away slowly.

There was a clicking sound.

"Cli-?"

"DUCK!"

The two hit the floor as arrows shot from the walls. The arrows barely missed them as they passed overhead.

Soon the arrows stopped. Even so, Bakura and Selket remained on the floor for a few more moments. At last, Selket got up.

"That was close…but how?-" There was another click as Bakura threw himself on top of Selket, followed by a crack as pain shot up her arm.

Fwap! Something flew across the room that was too fast for their eyes. But when Bakura got up, the part of his hair that had been sticking up was chopped off.

"A death trap under a death trap, eh? Clever, very clever…idiot aristocrats," he muttered.

"Uh…ah… Bakura? Ow," came a pained voice. Bakura turned around and looked at Selket. Her wrist was bent awkwardly, and her breath came a bit too quickly and harshly.

They both groaned.

Later that night at their upstairs room…

Bakura was wrapping Selket's broken wrist, Selket sniffling.

"I-I'm so sorry! Sorry, sorry, sso SORRY!" she was whimpering

Bakura finished the wrapping. "Selket, be quiet, that's the hundredth time you've said that- and for the hundredth time IT'S FINE!"

Selket quieted down immediately, but still protested. "But Bakura, if we got killed, it would have been my fault-"

"But we didn't, did we?"

"T-that's true…but if I hadn't broken my wrist, we could have gotten more treasure…"

"Come on, 'Ket! We got plenty. Besides, I was the one who broke your wrist in the first place."

Selket had nothing to say to that.

"You know what, 'Ket? Make me a promise. Promise me you'll never say you're sorry unless you absolutely have to. Got it?"

Selket nodded.

Bakura left her side to stand by the window. It was almost dawn, at least. A single shooting star flew across the brightening sky.

"Hey, 'Ket?"

"Yeah?"

"Did you know that you can make a wish on a shooting star?" Bakura asked.

No response.

"Well, I'd wish that we could just dig a whole right under the tombs and get to the treasure right away! O-or better yet, I wish we could go right through stone!"

Selket laughed. "That's impossible! Really, Bakura, you try too hard!"

"Well, what would you wish for?" he retorted.

"I can't," Selket replied.

Bakura snorted, "Why not?"

Selket shook her head, "Someone once told me…when there's a shooting star, someone is dying..."

They were interrupted by a shout from downstairs.

"HEY! Get up you two! There's a customer! You take care of 'im while I go to bed."

Bakura blinked. "A customer? This late?"

Selket shook her head. "Let's just go, Bakura."

"What? No way in Ra you're going! They'll wonder how you got that wrist, and besides, you should rest. Let me handle this."

Before Selket could protest, Bakura had gone, leaving Selket to stare at his back once more.

"…Ket, Selket, get up!"

"Mmmmph?"

Selket had done as Bakura said and had went to bed. But now he was waking her up?

"Waz a matter, Kura?" she said groggily.

Bakura stopped pushing her and went to their gold stash. He rummaged through it until he had a golden statue of Bastet, one of the more expensive pieces of their horde.

"Bakura, what are you doing!" Selket yelled.

"Come see!" he yelled back.

Bakura made his way downstairs, Selket following closely behind. Once there, he ran over to a man sitting at one of the tables.

Selket took a good look at the man. He was nothing special that Selket could see, just the usual kilt and men's robes…but his sandstorm headdress had fallen off, revealing three all-too familiar scars…

Realization dawned. "He's from Kul Elna, isn't he?"

Bakura grinned. "Yep. And he says he knows why the village was destroyed…"

"Damn right I do (hic)!" the man said. "Now, (hic) do you have my payment?"

Bakura handed him the statue.

The man smiled and looked at Bakura and Selket, who had taken seats in front of the man.

"Eh? This isn't no bedtime story, kiddies. (hic) Get the girl outta here."

Selket began to get up, but Bakura scowled at him angrily. "She saw they whole thing, just like I did. She has to listen this, too."

The man snorted. "Have it your way, then," he said, "Firsly, have you heard the tale of the Millennium Items?"

They hadn't.

He continued, "Anyway, there was the Pharoah Akhenamkhanen, right? He wanted a new 'millennium' of peace for his country. So, (hic) 'to stamp out all evil, to purge all sinners, he left us seven holy items imbued with the power of justice and righteousness'."

"But the truth behind it is that they were made from black magic from an evil book!"

Selket's eyes widened. Bakura frowned, "But what does this have to do with Kul Elna?"

The man started, "Hush, boy, I ain't done yet! Anyway, according to the book, with the items you could make a contract with the dark spirits of the afterworld. You could rule the world with the shadow powers of the evil god Zorc!"

"The way you do tha' is you put all the Millenium items together. Now a days there's a shrine in Kul Elna that has a tablet in it. All ya need to do is put the items in it and BOOM! You're all set."

"And ya want to know why the shrine's in Kul Elna? It's because the creation of the items required a blood sacrifice. 99 people sacrificed, (hic) to be exact. You boiled their blood an' said some words and that's how the Millennium Items were created."

Selket looked shocked, but Bakura got to his feet and yelled.

"So let me get this straight. The Pharoah, whatever his name was, killed 99 people, OUR people, just for power?"

"Yessir. (hic) Just to get more power fer himself."

Bakura sat back down, head down, scowling.

Selket was just as angry. To kill so many for greed… /I hate him…I hate the Pharoah, I hate that book…my book./

Slam! The tavern door opened with a bang.

"You there! Thief!" Four guards now stood in the doorway, glaring at the man.

The man, however, had passed out. Unable to defend himself, the four guards dragged him out of the bar.

We never did see him again. Feh, I remember that night so clearly, even eight years later. Eight years. Eight years since then, eight years of being reduced to this…Are you happy now, Pharaoh? You better be, because we're going to shake you out of your greedy little wonderland. We've got a plan, Bakura and I, and we're gonna take you down. We'll take all you have, your dreams, and even the power you killed are people for. You know, revenge is only sweet.

That was my longest chapter yet! It gets longer now that we're out of Selket's childhood.

I have a favor to ask of the reviewers; my summary for this story has been bugging the hell out of me (I'm bad at summaries --;). Would you be so kind as to give me an idea for writing a new one? And now, I give the following people my thanks.

Gardevoir-Mages- Firstly, thank you all for the helpful reviews. Secondly, I'd like to answer them.

1. I was wondering what the original name was; Akunadin. However, in the version I got the name from (found in Shonen Jump) is Akenaden.

2. Sorry, I should have made the ages clear. I should warn you, my ages might be different from the actual ones, because no more then 8 years could pass from the childhood time to present time. Also, looks can be deceiving; did you know that Pegasus was in his twenties, Isis was 20, and Rishid was only about 26? Its scary. And I meant to put Mahaado in with the trio. Don't worry, he will be in the story soon…Thank you once again for pointing those things out.

Ages Key: First begining age, then the current age.

Selket: 10, 18

Bakura: 13, 21

Akenaden: 34, 42

Shada: 16, 24

Seto: 10, 18

Atemu: 9, 17

Mahaado: 16, 24

And more as characters are revealed…

RedEyesBlackDragonLady- Thank you! I'm glad you remembered this story. You reviewed in the earlier chapters before, did you not? Anyway, thanks again and congrats on your first (and great) story!

Leona Saclat- Thank you so much. You're my first loyal fan…I take to heart what you said. You're awesome, you know that?