Don't hate me. I know that it's been so long sigh - I'm sorry. Thanks to all you beautiful people who reviewed it really means a lot to know that you like it and I love reader input!

Jerex: I'm glad that you liked it I was actually having some doubts about this story so it's really reassuring.

YamiIcepath: Yugi is a fun character. My biggest problem with him was in the prologue lol, I may rewrite that.

Kris Phantom: I'm sorry that it's been so long *prostrates* The idea of Yami loosing in *shivers* he is awesome! Anybody can over react when their in grief and Yami has an excuse, right? Right? Losing control is so Yami don't worry you don't have to risk you life… or that pink shirt of yours. Lol

misssun 1: I had to switch to the Minister of Magic (can't for the life of me remember his name right now) sending in the troops. And the fact that he didn't really want to have to deal with what was happening. That's all. Then we switch back in to our loveable pharaohs view. Sorry if that was complicated and thanks for telling me. I'll do my best to make things clearer. I really appreciate the fact that you told me there was a problem. ^_^

Ning Jun: Yugi must have powers! I mean he wasn't on hiatus for so long doing nothing. Don't worry were not going to get half way through and find out Harry Potter was a palace slave and Dumbledore was a priest of Ra back in ancient Egypt. Heh heh. Thank you for the review! I love re-reading it. Sorry it has taken me so long to review… I have no excuses.

Oh just so everyone knows, I switch between Yami and Atemu depending on who's talking and in what context. That is all.

The Darkest Magic

Tifa Strifeheart

Chapter Four

"Now you're going to tell me what the hell is going on with you?" Jounouchi looked up into Kaiba's ticked off face. He had stayed in the hospital for one night and had been released this morning. Kaiba had surprisingly been there personally to give him a ride home. He had thought that it was weird; the CEO had barely left his side since he had woken up. Looking at the determined set of his brow he now understood why. Jounouchi settled down on his bed with a sigh and gesture Kaiba to sit down. He didn't - as expected; instead the brunette just crossed his arms over his chest and leaned against the door frame. Jounouchi sighed again and dragged a hand through his shoulder length hair. "Well?" He leaned over with his elbows on his knees. There was no point in trying to lie, even he knew that.

"It's… difficult… to explain." There was an irritated sound above him. He didn't bother to look up.

"Try me." Jou looked up then Kaiba's eyes were unrelenting; with yet another sigh he stood up and began to pace, stuffing his hands into his pockets. He didn't really understand all that was happening to him. He understood what was happening with his memories but the pain of recalling them wasn't the only thing that was happening to him. At least, it couldn't explain all that was happening.

"I… Ever since I got the Millennium Scales I've been having these… flashbacks." He dragged a hand through his hair again in an attempt to ease some of the tension that was strumming through him. Kaiba didn't say anything. "They're-they're flashbacks of my past. I see myself but in a different place and time."

"If you dare say something about Egypt-" Jounouchi stopped and turned to face Kaiba.

"That's just it!" Both his hands ended up in his hair. "I see myself in all these places I've never been but seem so familiar! Having conversations with people that I have never met, talking about things that I didn't even know existed." It had been getting to him; all these memories and no idea what they were all supposed to mean. And there was no one left to talk to about what was happening to him and it was beginning to drive him up the wall. His grip in his hair tightened. "It wouldn't be so bad if it wasn't for the pain…"

"Pain? Is that what you call what happened in my office?" He didn't bother to look up.

"Usually, the memories come at night, while I sleep. They don't hurt then and their gone before I wake up. But sometimes, rarely, they come while I'm awake." He heard his voice getting smaller but the remembrance of the pain made the fact irrelevant. He pulled at his hair a little harder; it helped dim the memories. "In-in your office they hit me. Harder than usual; I've never passed out from them before. Not like this…"

"Stop that." Jounouchi ignored him.

"I don't know what to do. I don't understand." Hands were suddenly on his squeezing them. Jounouchi's grip loosened and he looked up. Kaiba was giving him a stern look one he had seen him give Mokuba.

"Stop that." Kaiba pulled his hands down before letting go. "Why now? Why is it getting worse now?" Jounouchi shook his head.

"I don't know." He blinked, memories fading. "I've had the Rod for two years now. It was acting up today…" Kaiba's face darkened.

"Why the hell have you been hanging on to that thing?" It was too much, especially coming from this man.

"I've been holding on to it for you!" His shout erupted from it and with it all the energy that he had. Tiredly he slumped down onto the bed, just noting the surprise in his boss's eyes before putting his head in his hands. "I've hung on to it all this time because of you." He sighed and lifted his head with a humourless chuckle. "It's been tough. I don't know how Shadi was able to do it for all that time. Carrying around two items all that time… The resonance is terrible." Across the room Kaiba rolled his eyes.

"They got you spouting that voodoo garbage too, huh."Jounouchi gave him a dry look.

"After all you've seen you we both know we've made a believer outta you." He released a breath and sat up. For some reason Kaibas disbelief made him feel better; made him want to laugh. The laughter died when, out of the pocket of his trench coat, Kaiba pulled out the Millennium Rod. His blue eyes were so intense it seemed as if he wanted melt it with his gaze alone. Jounouchi stood up and walked over to him, the CEO seemed to be entranced by the item the anger in his eyes was clear. He stopped a few steps away from Kaiba. "You can feel it can't you?" Kaiba looked up and their eyes met. "You can feel it calling out to you can't you?"

"Take it." Jounouchi raised his hands in surrender and backed away.

"No way! Now that you have it, you've gotta keep it." He dropped his hands. "I have enough troubles without that thing as it is." Kaiba continued to stare at him and he couldn't help grinning his good mood returning. With renewed vigour he patted Kaiba on the back and grinned right into his glare. "Now that you got it I could give you some pointers you know. My first piece of advice, flashbacks are not only sudden, they're a bitch to deal with. Just pray that they come when you're asleep." Kaiba's eyes narrowed. His grin was trying to split his face in half. Finally the Rod was where it belonged.

Ryou couldn't say that he wasn't the type to get angry; in fact he got angry quite often to be truthful, just because he didn't show that he was angry didn't mean that he wasn't. Bakura was really the only one who could tell when he was really losing his temper, which was probably the reason why he kept glancing at him from where he stood by the room's only window. Ryou was sitting upright on the small living rooms only couch and on the other side of the small center table Malik Ishtar sat on the living room chair Marik draped over the chairs back. Almost identical pairs of violet eyes stared at him but for once he wasn't feeling nervous about it. He wasn't thinking straight enough for it to bother him. Bakura must have sensed that he wasn't about to speak anymore soon because he sighed and pushed off the wall coming back to the conversation at hand.

"When?" Both sets of Ishtar eyes turned away from him to look at his darker half.

"I don't know… four months after they disappeared, I think." Marik shrugged. "It wasn't as if they stayed long." Malik brushed a strand of hair out of his face.

"They took the scrolls and left. They were here a week tops-"

"That's not the point!" Ryous mouth clicked with the speed with which he closed it. Now all eyes in the room were on him. His hands clenched and unclenched in his lap. Both Yugi and Yami had come to Egypt and neither of the Ishtars had thought that it was important enough to let their friends know about it. All of them had been so lost when they had found out what had happened. It had been Kaiba that had pulled the group back into a semi-balance of normal. But, finding out that the Ishtars had known and hadn't said a word to any of them. "That's not the point…" Across the Table Malik sighed running a hand through his sandy hair.

"Look Ryou it's not like that. Yugi and Yami came to collect the sacred scriptures. We asked them what was going on but they refused to tell us anything. The pharaoh told us not to say anything to any of you." Ryou looked up from his hands at this. Malik nodded at the obvious confusion on his face. "'Don't let them know that we were here. It will do no good for them to come after us.' His words exactly. Neither of them would tell us where they were going though. There were gone a few days later." Bakura crossed the room and plopped down on the seat next to him. Without much thought Ryou rested his head on Bakuras shoulder and closed his eyes. Why wouldn't Yami and Yugi want them to follow them? What could they possibly be running from that took them so far away from the people who loved them? Wouldn't they, above all others, understand their grief over Sugoroku? Then why didn't he turn to them after what they had all been through together? He sighed quietly opening his eyes. The others were just staring all seemed to be lost in their thoughts the way that Ryou himself was. Who would have ever thought that thinking of Yugi would have ever been so depressing. He blinked and the world froze.

He wasn't the only one; across the room he saw Maliks eyes widened in shock as the feeling crashed into Ryou. Above Malik, Marik's eyes narrowed and beside him, he felt Bakura stiffen as the feeling within him changed. He frowned, dimly surprised that his face hadn't frozen right along with everything else. He didn't recognize what he was feeling; the only way he could have described it was when a person stretched a rubber band to the breaking point and it suddenly snapped between their fingers. With a gasp he was on his feet not even realizing that he had moved. He felt it, inside he felt him. Yugi, there was something wrong with Yugi. His legs couldn't hold him up any more. Yugi was hurt.

Suddenly the feeling was gone and the world sped back up to speed. Bakura was suddenly by his side trying to calm him down and it was only then that he realised that he was sobbing. "What the hell was that?" Maliks voice was sounded as shaken up and he felt. "It felt-" There was a sound of someone swallowing. "It felt like Yugi…" There was a snort.

"It was Yugi alright." Ryou looked up and Marik just nodded his head harshly. "Something must have happened if the puzzle called out to the other items like that; something serious."

"The-the items can do that?" Marik nodded.

"Yeah but I'm no expert on the items." He nodded towards Bakura. "You should ask him." Ryou turned to his yami. Bakura was staring at the wall his eyes unfocused.

"Can-can they do that?" Bakura shook his hair.

"Yes. Stupid Pharaoh." Ryou stared at him.

"They've done it before, haven't they? Haven't they?" Bakura nodded.

"When I killed the priest for The Ring. That was how the Pharaohs' priests knew so quickly." Ryou hung his head.

"So you mean he's-"

"I don't know." There was a long silence. After what felt like days Ryou sighed.

"What do we do?" Bakura stood up and held a hand out to him. Without hesitating he took the offered hand brushing away the stray tears on his face. He turned to look at the two blondes brushing at his knees "What are we going to do?" Malik sighed and stood up.

"Well we're going to stay here and find out what exactly it was that the pharaoh and his light came for. Maybe that will tell us why." Ryou opened his mouth to protest but Bakura cut him off.

"You do that. We caught of trace of them in Europe a few weeks back."

"And you didn't tell us?"

"But the trail went cold before we could even begin to track it." Bakura pointed stared at Malik who just grinned back apologetically. Bakura turned to Ryou. "Just hope that useless Pharaoh didn't do something stupid." Ryou nodded silently praying that his friends were alright.

He didn't know where he was. He didn't know who he was! If he had a body he would have cried out. But he didn't have a body. He didn't even know why he would need a body. What use would a body be in a world full of nothing? Nothing. Not even a blackness to stare at. There was nothing around him. There was nothing in him. Nothing at all… nothing but a glimmer. A glimmer that he latched onto with everything that he was; with everything that he could ever be. It was a single word: Yami… He wanted to scream it. Scream it and pray that it could banish the nothingness. So that's what he did.

The shadows swelled at the sound of their Other Masters call. It was a summon that they could not answer yet could not ignore. As a united mind of frayed and jagged parts the shadows swelled against the boundaries of reality using the body of their Other Master as a conductor to their power. Slowly they tore through the cracks in the fragile dimension and into the body of their master. They pooled their energy into that body and forced themselves to form into something physical, something that could be of what little use they could afford. This would surly destroy the Master if done for too long, their Master's bodies were always fragile, but they were to fulfill their Master's wish and this was their Master's wish. Once all could do had been done they slipped away back into the corners of their realm leaving behind them a single consciousness that could pull through the cracks. As soon as they had come they had gone and in their wake they left a silent dripping of a substance that looked a lot like ink; that is to say if ink could suck the color out of the immediate place around him.

Only when the ink had pooled completely on to the floor and it could no longer feel the others of itself did it finally pull itself together and into its true physical form. It had been a long while since it had been in this realm in this way; with no outside aid or link to a Master's mind. It took a while to for it to finally solidify and when it did he blinked with a tiny 'kweh.' With large yellow eyes he looked around himself sensing both with his eyes and with his consciousness the strange magic that surrounded him. He blinked again and shook off the unusual magic his brown, shaggy fur shivering at the movement. In his effort to rid himself of the uncomfortable feeling he spotted his master. With a surprised kewh he jumped up on its yellow clawed green legs, off the floor and onto the bed that his master was laid upon. He had always considered this one to be his Master. He knew that few of the other agreed with him as well and that would not change. He had bonded to this master. He could barely feel the spark of life from his Master; it was burning but… there was something wrong. It was as if something was trying, and failing, to snuff it out. Whatever it was trying to do it wasn't doing it; but at the same time it wasn't leaving. With his senses he bushed in deeper. Something was wrong with the link. His Light Master was not properly connected to his Dark Master and that what was keeping this Master from expelling the foreign power. He straightened. He had to find his Dark Master. His Dark Master had to come here. Sadly he looked at his unconscious Master and with a final Kewh and a light cuddle to the side of his Masters neck he jumped off the bed and moved away from the bed to seek help for his Master.

It took a while for him to trace the dark powers that were a part of his Dark Master. It took a while because they were so weak. His must have been the power that he had felt in the realm and due to the sheer amount that had been used it explained why it had taken so long to find. As quickly as he could he moved down the narrow hall he had found the trace in. Three halls and four closed doors later he found his quarry. With an excited kewh he jumped into the hard table that his Dark Master was on.

His Dark master had a number of dark marks over his skin that he knew must be places where harm was done. On top of that there was some sort of contraption holding his master down and his eyes had been covered. He could feel the life in this Master, a dark light that had only grown darker so now that he was separated from his lighter half. With a saddened kewh he focused what little power he had on one of the band surrounding his Masters hand. It was a long shot but he would do what he could. Exhausted he sat back on his haunches and prodded his Master with his meagre power. His Master mind had begun to stir when he heard a sound. He turned in time to see the net come around him. With fearful eyes Kuriboh looked up at his red haired capture as the human stared down at him with interest behind the shining contraptions on his face.

Yeah sorry. So like it is two am so forgive me for any mistakes. I mean I promise I'll review… someday. I just really don't like review.. lol I don't even review exams – once through and I'm done lol. On that note I'm looking for a BETA for my YGO fics so if anyone's interested drop me a line.

So how soon did you guess that it was Kuriboh? I always consider that to be Yugi's monster lol so cute! I had such a hard time between he and it. At first I thought it was it, but then realised that Kuriboh is a he and Kuribon is the female version so… I would write a paragraph and realize that I had used 'it' all throughout then would have to go back and change all the 'it's' that specified Kuriboh and changed it to 'he' sigh. God it was annoying lol. I figured that Kuriboh wouldn't know what human things were lol. Any guess what the 'shining contraption' on the humans face are? Lol on that note; Cookies for any who can tell me what they are and who that human is.

School starts for me tomorrow. I hope you all had a Merry Christmas – or Merry whatever it is that you celebrate – and I wish you a Happy New Year.