Chapter 2

Together Bakura and Sarah ran through the streets as they were being chased by a much feared duel monster. They had been trying to out run it for a while now and were beginning to feel exhausted when Bakura pulled both of them into an alley were they hid behind a dumpster. The two of them holding their breath watched as they saw the reaper of the cards past right by them.

"Why do things like this always happen to me?" Bakura said as he let out a sigh and slowly sank to the ground to rest and catch his breath. "I guess that I'm just full of bad luck."

"Quit complaining." Sarah laughed as she pulled him back up on to his feet. "You've got me now." she kissed him on the check. "Or am I part of your bad luck too?"

"No." Bakura said before Sarah had even finished her sentence. He didn't want her to ever think like that, as she had been one of the few good things that had happened to him over the past couple of years. He smiled as he gazed into her pretty face. "You do know that I would do anything for you." he told her.

"Then how about taking me home?" Sarah smiled back at him as they both held hands and began to set off for the bridge to cross so that she could return home.

The streets of Domino city where pretty much empty as Emma drove her way home. Many of the city's residents had chosen not to leave the safety of their homes when there were monsters about roaming the streets. They had also learnt that the monsters appeared more during the time that the auroras were present in the sky.

As Emma turned a tight corner through the streets she slammed on the brakes as she saw that the road was full of a small army of kuriboh. They all glared at her before they moved out of the way in what seemed like a hurry.

Even though she was tired and wanted to get home, Emma's curiosity got the better of her. She reached over on to the back seat of her car and grabbed her dueldisk before she followed after the kuriboh.

They were running again now and both of them were very exhausted. Bakura pulled Sarah down one of the alleys in an attempt to lose their chasers just like they had done before, only to find that he had led them in to an empty dead end alley.

"Bollocks!" Bakura muttered at the mistake that he had just made. "Oh well, at least it's only a couple of kuriboh, so we don't really have anything to fear."

"Ryou." Sarah tugged at his sleeve causing Bakura to turn around. "I wouldn't be too sure about that."

Bakura turned to see that the alley had filled up with a huge crowd of kuriboh, and that more were trying to enter in to the tightly packed space. He knew that on their own kuriboh were harmless creatures, but when they stuck together they could cause some serious damage to their target. He saw some of the closer ones to them bare small razor sharp fangs and made sure that he stood in front of Sarah just in case any of them tried to attack, then he would take the full force of it to ensure that she was okay.

Many more of the kuriboh were now baring their fangs and small growls and snarls were coming from them also. Bakura braced himself for an attack as he saw one of the kuriboh at the front get ready to pounce. He heard another growl come from the crowd but this time it wasn't a kuriboh. The growl became slightly louder as a small white lion cub flashed in and out of the sea of kuriboh before it finally stopped with its back turned to Bakura and Sarah, as it stood firm waiting for any one of the kuriboh to try and attack.

"Is that Kimba?" Sarah asked in amazement as she only knew one person who had the duel monster in her deck. She watched as the lion cub growled once more for the kuriboh to back away, but still they remained.

Suddenly one for the kuriboh sprang forward at Bakura but failed to reach him as Kimba struck it down from its attack. The kuriboh disappeared before their eyes as it had been destroyed by the cub, before it roared once more as a warning to anymore kuriboh that were thinking of harming the two humans.

Slowly the kuriboh backed out of the alley leaving it empty once more. Emma stood at the entrance and called Kimba back in to his card. "Are you guys alright?"

"We're fine." Bakura assured her. "But I seem to be attracting more monsters lately."

"You're just being paranoid. There are just a lot more of them about." Emma told him as they both joined her, but neither one of them seemed comforted by what she had said. She sighed deeply. "How about you come back to my place until the aurora disappears, and then I'll take you to where you need to go."

The three friends headed back towards Emma's car, with Emma explaining about her bad day at work, how Shadi had shown up and that she no longer had possession of the millennium key. Sarah seemed to lose herself in her own thoughts after the first twenty minutes, but Bakura listened to every word that had to be said.

One of the first things that Emma did when she had reached her apartment was to take a shower and change in to some more comfortable clothes. She had told Bakura and Sarah to just make themselves at home while she sorted herself out, and returned to find them both snuggled up on the sofa watching the television. She seated herself behind the kitchen bar so that she didn't interrupt the cosy scene that lay before her, but as she stared at Sarah who had her head resting against Bakura's chest she felt the bitter stab of jealously.

Emma tried to vanquish the feeling that had arisen, but it was no good. She stared at them both once more. She was jealous at the face that they both had someone who cared about them in a romantic way, and that she had no-one. It wasn't like she hadn't though about becoming involved in a relationship, but that she wasn't sure if the person she had feelings for felt the same way back, and she wasn't willing to risk losing the friendship that they had just to find out. But how much longer could she hide the feelings that she had for Kaiba?

"Is something wrong?" Bakura asked as he glanced over his shoulder towards Emma who was beginning to get lost in her own thoughts. He looked concerned at the way that his friend was staring at him.

"Nothing." Emma smiled shaking her head. "I was just thinking of asking someone out." She couldn't believe what she had just said, and tried to get herself out of the awkward situation as Sarah's attention was now drawn to her as well. "What I mean is erm………." She was failing badly and felt herself start to blush. It looked like she would just have to say what was on her mind. "Friends come and go right, but what if you only get one chance at love and you don't do anything about it?"

"You wouldn't happen to be talking about a guy whose initials are SK would you?" Sarah teased with that friendly smile she always wore.

Damn, why did female friends always seem to know what's on each others' minds? Emma felt herself begin to burn redder than she had ever done. "No." she said, knowing that Sarah wouldn't buy that for an instant, and was glad of the distraction that came from her beeping laptop.

She flipped open her laptop and started typing away to find the problem. It didn't take her long and she covered her face with both her hands to hide her expression. The screen flashed at her to tell her that over fifty-one percent of Kaiba Corp had been bought out by another buyer.

She had known that the company had begun to be bought out by a single buyer, but Kaiba had told her and his other employees that everything was under control and not to worry about it. Her first thought was of what his reaction to the situation would be. It wasn't uncommon to find that business men often committed suicide at times when things like this happened.

Emma picked up her cell phone and dialled his number. "Come on pick up!" she hissed at the phone which rang before cutting out on her.

"What's wrong?" both Bakura and Sarah asked together.

Not hearing them Emma dialled another number which was answered almost straight away. She didn't wait for the other person to speak as she began to talk; "Hi Roland, it's Emma. I can't get through to Seto, I think his phone's turned off, do you know where he is?"

"He's currently in flight, which would explain why his cell phone's off." Roland's voice came down from the other end of the phone line, and Emma felt her heart slow down as she knew that Kaiba hadn't done anything stupid. "Can I pass on a message for you?"

Emma hesitated for a moment as she wondered if Roland knew about the company finally being taken over. "It's happened, the company's gone."

"Oh, no!" came the cry from down the phone that told Emma that they hadn't heard yet. "I'll tell him as soon as I see him." Roland assured her as a faint bleeping sound came over their conversation. "I have to go, someone is trying to get through on the other line." The line went dead as Roland cut her off to answer the other call.

Emma cancelled the call on her phone too and for a moment just stared at it. What would happen now that the company was gone and just how would Kaiba react to the bad news?

"Are you okay?" Sarah asked, breaking the silence that had fallen upon them.

"Yeah." Emma replied. She gazed out of the window to see that the aurora had disappeared from the sky. "It doesn't seem so bad now, so I'll take you home."