Her Sweetness: Hey, guys, I'm so sorry this is out so late. I got hit with the biggest case of writer's block! Bad timing, right? That's okay, though, I'm trying… kinda… haha, and it's terrible because I have ANOTHER vacation coming up next week!

I'll try to get more chapters out this weekend as well. Wish me luck!

Rascals R Wee

Chapter 13:

The tentacle towered above the now rampant sea, waves rolling back and forth from the disturbance of the now visible monster. Yami and Bakura were still in the barrel, hanging onto the side with their chubby, little hands as their vessel went swirling in the wave up to the tentacle. They both had lost sight of Marik but that was not really their main concern at the moment. At least not Bakura's.

Through the gallons of water that wash over him, Yami shouted to his white-haired companion, "'Kura! Ya see Mawik?"

"See Mawik? Get yer pwiorities in orda! We're about ta be fish-food!"

"But—"

"Move!" Bakura yelled as yet another suction-cupped appendage rose from the water and slammed down not five feet away from their tiny barrel. As the barrel popped clear out of the water again, the first, larger tentacle wrapped around them and held the barrel twenty feet out of the water.

Beneath them, the water parted as a grotesque face came up, the slick, tight skin of a giant squid. Its beady, black eyes opened wide as did its mouth and rows upon rows of sharp, seaweed covered teeth were revealed. It let out a loud, mind-shattering shriek into the dark of the night and the two chibis that hovered above it, held onto their ears and each other.

"D-Dis is de end!" Yami sobbed into Bakura's soaking wet shirt.

Bakura howled his sorrows as well and all seemed lost.

Little did the two chibis know, their third companion was at the base of the tentacle that they were attached to. Marik had paddled his way back to it and was now on the water's surface with his plank. Quickly, seeing his fellow yamis were in danger, he viciously bit off two large chunks of the wooden plank, causing a sharp point on one side. He grunted as he jabbed the plank into the tentacle, causing another shriek from the monster.

Marik used his tiny arms to lift himself out of the rushing waters and hopped onto the plank, taking the wood out promptly from under his feet and shoving it back into the thick skin a few feet higher, continuing in climbing upwards.

"D-Don' worry, you swissies," he panted through sheets of water being poured onto him as the monster's appendages shook with rage and pain. "I'm comin'!" he yelled and at first his tiny figure didn't register with the frightened Bakura and Yami but through their screams of terror, Yami opened his eyes and saw Marik making his way up the tentacle.

"Mawik! No, it's dangewous!" Yami called out to him.

By this time, Bakura had noticed the other boy's presence as well and he bonked Yami on the head. "Don' wisten to 'em," he yelled to Mawik. "Get yer butt ova here!"

Marik paid the two little attention and was now swinging faster and faster with his plank, leaving bloody gashes in his wake. He managed to make it up half way before the monster had figured out where that annoying pain was coming from and two more tentacles shot up from the grimy deep. The Egyptian chibis cried out in shock and alarm as one of them came ramming into the tentacle he was on, and barely missing him by a few feet.

He changed course a bit and shifted to the right, pulling the plank out and jamming it in again further up. The second tentacle came in this time and in order to dodge it, Marik stood at the edge of the plank, standing over the treacherous waters. He made a worried noise in the back of his throat and, when both tentacles came at him, he jumped off of the plank, grabbing it as he fell down and onto another of the monster's limbs.

There was a small thud as he fell onto it and the plank hit him in the face. He stood quickly, seeing that the tentacle he was now on rose higher and higher until he was at level with Yami and Bakura.

Marik raised his hand over his eyes and wiped away the moisture there. "Ra damn you two!" he said. "Dis is all yer fawlt!"

"Jus wat would you wike us to do 'bout it?" Bakura frowned and then joined the other two in a group shriek as the monster shook all of its tentacles wildly. Marik was shaken so hard that he went flying into the barrel about five feet away with the other two inside it. Without wasting any time, he yelled and jammed the point of the plank into the monster's limb and drove it all the way inside.

"GGGGGGGGGGRRRRRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAKKKKKKKKKKK!"

The tentacle jerked back violently and then lunged foreword, tossing the barrel and the chibis out of it's reach and a long, terrified cry followed the boys as they plopped into the dark water and the monster receded.

It was dark. Malik could see nothing but maybe that was because his eyes weren't open. He had the distinct feeling that if he moved, whatever happened to be broken in his body would fall apart and he would instantly die. Though that feeling mustn't have been too strong because he moved eventually, getting up on his elbows and opening his lavender eyes, blinking twice and still seeing nothing.

He coughed and held his head with one hand as he had a growing headache. "Urg… Y-Yugi?" He looked up and realized that his two friends didn't seem to be anywhere around. "Ryou? You guys?"

Starting to panic, he rose quickly and bumped his head on something hard, resulting in a metallic sounding thump and Malik back down on his knees, whining and howling.

"Malik?"

Malik looked up at hearing his name.

"Malik, you're awake? Come out here!" Suddenly a bit of light came into this dark place and Malik crawled toward it, coming out onto soft grass and being greeted by Ryou and Yugi's concerned faces.

"There you are," Ryou said to him as he crawled out of what was, incidentally, the upside down shuttle. "We were worried about you for a while there. But we didn't want to move you in case something was broken."

"Um. But. I…" Malik looked around and surveyed the area in a swooping glance. The stars and moon were shining brightly out in the almost black sky and the trees that surrounded them were green and luscious. There was an obviously horrid area behind their shuttle that seemed to once be full of vegetation but was destroyed in the crash. A long, dirt-covered and broken-tree scattered trail was left.

Yugi shook his head, his fist planted on his hips. "Yep," he said. "I just knew that Jupiter thing wasn't going to work. We're back on Earth, thank goodness."

"Thank goodness?" Malik asked. "Don't you want our yamis back?"

"They were never on Jupiter!"

"You don't know that," Malik huffed.

Ryou frowned at the two of them. "Alright, that's enough, you two. No fighting is necessary, we're all after one common goal. No need to act like our yamis."

Despite the obvious common sense in what Ryou said, the two teens seemed to ignore him and carry on into what was sure to not end well.

"And now," Yugi continued, "we don't even know where the heck we are! We probably couldn't be further from our yamis!"

"At least I had an idea!" Malik shot back. "All you ever did was whine about your stupid skunk-attack!"

"You're just like your yami, Malik, everything you touch turns to suck!"

"Take that back, you midget!"

"Make me, four-eyes!"

There was a long pause.

Ryou looked at Yugi. "Four-eyes? Where'd that come from?"

"Sorry," Yugi shrugged. "I was so caught up in the moment, I just called him anything that came to mind. Kinda new at this."

Ryou and Malik nodded. "We can tell."

"Anyways," Yugi insisted, trying to chance the course of their conversation. "Arguing would get us no where. We need to find out where we are. We didn't wake up too much earlier than you did, Malik, and we didn't want you to wake up and be alone so we have secured a perimeter."

"Look whose gone all CIA."

"Aw, come on, what do you want me to say? Scout the area? Nothing's going to sound good under these conditions."

Malik shrugged. "You think we're anywhere near Domino?"

"Doubt it," Ryou shook his head. "Everywhere around Domino is all urbanized. We're definitely somewhere in the boonies."

They all looked around again and, finally, group-sighed. "Fabulous."

The next morning dawned as a blue and silver line of light over the beach's horizon. The waters were calm and delivered white foam to the shores and the small legs of an ex-thief. The water was cold and the tiny chibi jerked awake.

He got to his feet and looked to his left. A few yards away was Yami who had a clump of seaweed on his head. Bakura looked around some more before getting up and walking over the Pharaoh.

"Yami," he said and nudged him with his foot. "Get up!"

"Wuh… huh…? 'Kura?" Yami lifted his head and shook the seaweed off. Unfortunately, seaweed was not the only thing atop the boy's head. There was also a rather large sand crab as well which happened to scare the crap out of Yami.

"WAH!" the young prince screamed and hopped around on the beach, his arms outstretched and his legs moving as fast as they could.

Bakura watched this spectacle for a moment and then called to him, "Stwop pwayin', Yami! Wat happened ta Mawik? I dun see him no wheres."

"I GOTS A CWAB ON MAH HEAD!" Yami wailed.

"Yami! Yami, dwamn it, cawm down!" Bakura walked over to him, with intentions of helping. "Howd still!"

Yami was too frantic to realize what Bakura was trying to do and so he flailed all over the white-haired thief and ended up bonking him on the head multiple times.

"Ah! Stwop! Stwop!"

Suddenly, out of no where, a chunk of wood came whizzing from the clumps of trees just beyond the sands of the beach and clonked Yami right in the head. He fell down and the crab crawled off of him and went away.

Bakura blinked and looked around. "God? Was dat you?"

Yami gripped his head. "Dat hurt… it hurt a lot!"

"Dun worry, yer okay," came Marik's voice from somewhere in the vicinity.

"Dat's not for you ta say!" Yami yelled, looking up and seeing the tiny Marik sitting in a tree, grinning from ear to ear.

"Mawik!" Bakura yelled and ran over to the base of the tree. "Whaddya doin' up dere?"

"I got t'rown here last night when dat monster t'rew us. You guys ended up on da beach. I been waitin' for you guys at get up so someone could hewp me get down fwom here."

Bakura held out his arms and closed his eyes tightly, knowing this would probably result in an owie. Marik jumped and, yes, there was pain.

By the time Bakura and Marik had popped their spines back into place, Yami had made his way over to them. "Ey, tanks for rescuin' us wast night, Mawik," he said bashfully.

Marik nodded and patted Yami on the head. "S'okay. Afta all, dats wat a weader is for. Rescuin' his swissified twoops fwom pewil."

Yami gaped. "Swissified—?"

"Weader?" Bakura asked, disgusted.

"Anyways," Marik said before an argument could break out amongst his "troops", "we made it ta New Zeawand. Dis is wat ya wanted, wight, Yami? So wats next?"

Yami's amethyst eyes widened a bit and he smiled. "We are here," he said softly, "an' soon we'll be back ta big." He turned around and reached into his big-boy pull-up pampers and pulled out the book 'Classic Children's Tales,' flipping it open to the story of The Magic Wish.

Marik and Bakura looked at it each other and then backed up a step, careful not to touch the book.

"Mmkay… well, da book says dat if we find da spwing wid wemur pee in it, da Wizard will show up an' grant us our wish. So wets find dat spwing!"

The other two nodded their understanding and the three of them started into the forest. None of them noticed the dark figure in the brush watching as they ventured foreword.

TBC…

Her Sweetness: Review, please, I promise to get the next chapter out soon!