Ranko: OMG! Guys, do you know how awesome you are?

Yuugi: How awesome are they?

Ranko: Everyone has been so supportive and nice in their reviews and it's about time I thank you guys for your awesomeness by posting the next chapter! Sorry I haven't posted in a while, blame school.

Yami: You've been talking about reviews so why don't we answer them already?

Ranko: Oh yeah! (holds up list) Let's see…

raindropdew: Thanks for the fav! Your review made me laugh, in a good way. I know what you mean, the phone call gave me chills when I was writing it. I love Seto! He's so sweet and I just want to squeeze Yuugi. And you never know, Yuugi's nightmare could be foreshadowing ;)

Shaliza's Scarab: Yeah, Soren is pretty cool, and thank you by the way; I was afraid I just shoved him into the story awkwardly. I know, the phone call crept me out! And I was the one who wrote it! Anyway, I think your right about Marik and Bakura.

hikari no senshi17: I know, I kind of wanted to make it obvious so the readers wouldn't start to hate Soren ^^". Thanks for the awesome review and yes, the Game does have to be played for the Shadow Men to be released, gives you something to think about ;)

Aqua girl 007: I loved your review! There will be more thiefshipping moments for you!

Pharaoh Silver: Fangirls unite!

Dinogirl: Lol, no problem. I'm not sure who it was calling Yuugi -.- haven't gotten that far yet. Thanks for the review!

Tyrant Dragon Knight: Oh, poor Yami, he's so abused, but that's why we love him ^^

Ranko: (points to Yami) Do the disclaimer, slave!

Yami: I am no one's slave! Ranko twin does not own the Forbidden Game series or anything to do with Yu-Gi-Oh.

Ranko: Enjoy!

-/-

The Domino City Police men were not very well known. The town they were supposedly "protecting" relatively stayed out of trouble. No one went above the speed limit, no ran any red lights, and no ever bullied another person…as far as they knew. Domino was a relatively safe town with friendly people, so they were never called upon to solve a crime or…really patrol at all.

All that was true until they got a phone call the other day from a hysterical woman saying her step-brothers were missing: Ryuzaki and Haga. Apparently, the two boys had gone out last weekend, Saturday morning to be exact, to go take care of some "business" for Ushio. "I never liked that boy," the sister had said. The sister said they were out all day and then all day Sunday, but she figured that the boys were staying at a friend's house "or something," she said.

But when it came around to Monday, the girl started to worry. She called all of Ryuzaki's and Haga's friends, which is very few and none of them had seen the boys. This is when she panicked and called the police, who were currently searching areas that the brothers liked to go to.

The police were slipping and sliding in the muddy slopes of the Domino Forest, which was actually just a part of the park, but the more woodsy area. This is where the boys would go after school so they wouldn't have to go home to their step-father, their step-sister's father. It was always muddy and dark, and there were fallen trees blocking the path. If one travelled far enough they would come across a dirty creek.

The police were searching the area fully; they had found a pair of footprints in the mud leading deeper into the forest where the boys usually traveled.

"Hey, guys!" one of the policemen called from the bottom of a slippery slope, leading down to the creek. "I…I think you might want to take a look at this."

The rest of the patrol team, which consisted of three other men and one woman, carefully slid down the slope, grappling onto trees that were still standing for support.

"What is it?" the woman in the group asked when she reached the bottom by the creek.

The officer's face was grim and he shook his head. His companions looked over the man's shoulder and all gasped simultaneously. The creek was dyed in red blood and black ink. And two bodies of certain teenage boys were sitting against the rocks in the creek as the stream pushed against their limp bodies. Their eyes stared lifelessly ahead and the clothes they were last seen in clung to their skin, highlighting their wounds.

The two boys looked like they had been poisoned; skin was bulging in certain places, their gums were black, and their fingernails a discerning shade of blue. They also looked like they had been attacked by some kind of beast for they had slash marks across their torso and back.

And sitting on the bed of the creek was a paper, Victorian style doll house with two small paper dolls that had an X drawn on their chest where their little paper hearts would be located.

The woman knelt down beside the paper house, trying to ignore the stench of dead bodies as one of her comrades called headquarters to report the situation.

The woman officer picked up one of the dolls. This one looked like Haga and the other one almost looked like Ryuzaki; the two boys were definitely not artists. She put the dolls in an evidence bag and fingered the tagboard of the paper doll house, it was crumpled and looked like it once had a shine but was now dirty.

It looked like a game of some sorts; she remembered her little niece had something like this, except it wasn't as gothic.

"I wondered what happened here…" she wondered.

At that moment the shadows of the trees stirred and flicked, getting taller and forming a human shape. The only thing visible was white teeth flashing a smirk and then in the next moment the shape disappeared in a snap, blending and molding into the other shadows.

The woman police officer gulped and with shaky hands reached for her cell phone. She quickly dialed a familiar number and listened to the constant ringing until someone picked up and a soft voice answered.

"Hello?"

The woman licked her dry lips. "Hey, Mai? It's me, Miho, are you free this afternoon?" Miho paused as she listened to Mai's response and looked over her shoulder to the trees behind her. "Yeah, I think that something strange is going on."

Elsewhere ~

Yuugi wondered around campus looking for his friends. He first went to the bench they were all sitting around before all the chaos had started that day. Seto and Jounouchi still sat there, having a relatively civilized conversation, due to the large gap in the two boys' vocabulary.

When they saw Yuugi approach they shot up to sit up straight and Jou waved Yuugi over. "Hey Yuugi, what's up? How's that Soren kid?"

Yuugi stiffly shrugged, trying to look casual but failed. "He's fine, where's everyone else?"

Jounouchi waved his hand in a dismissing manner. "They just wondered off." Then the blond noticed how freaked Yuugi looked. His eyes were looking around frantically and his fingers curled and uncurled tensely. "Why? Yuugi, is everything all right?"

Yuugi gulped and shook his head. "I'm not sure, we need to gather everyone though; we need to talk."

Jounouchi heard the urgency in Yuugi's voice and stood, Seto following. "Alright, let's go."

They first found Anzu; she was in the workout room running on a treadmill. She was plugged into her music and was huffing as she ran to the beat of a song. Her arms were swinging at her side and the muscles in her long, slender legs flexed. She noticed her friends approaching before they made themselves known to her.

She slowly turned off the treadmill and pulled the earphones out of her ears, stepping off the exercising machine. "Hey, what's up?"

"Get cleaned up," Jou said, tossing the girl a towel. "Meet us in the courtyard, usual spot when your done; we need to talk."

Anzu wiped sweat from her forehead and nodded, noting the seriousness in Jou's tone.

Next they went looking for Honda, which wasn't very hard. This was his free period and he usually spent his time at the school's auto shop, working on cars and fixing up his own motorcycle. The head of the department, Ryuji Otogi, spent most of his time ogling Honda instead of actually working. Every time Otogi asked Honda out, the brunet would constantly remind the flirt of his sexuality.

In fact, this is how the two boys introduced themselves when they first met:

Otogi held out his hand to shake. "Hey, I'm Ryuji Otogi, I'm gay."

Honda awkwardly accepted the hand and shook it. "Hi, I'm Honda Hiroto, I'm not."

They found Honda working on the engine of an old car, his school uniform replaced with greasy, dirty overalls. He was bending over the hood and Otogi's eyes were glued to the boy's ass as he asked Honda, "So do you want to—?"

"No."

"Can you—?"

"No."

"Are you free—?"

"No."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes."

"Honda?" Yuugi asked, getting to boy's attention. Honda and Otogi looked up at the same time and Yuugi awkwardly cleared his throat. "When you're done with…whatever you're doing, meet us at the usual place in the courtyard. We have to talk."

Honda nodded and reached for the rag in his back pocket to clean his face with.

After Honda's group of friends left, Otogi came up behind him and hugged the man's shoulders. "So…can I come?"

Honda gave Otogi a look and threw his hands off of him. "No!" He then proceeded to go back to work on the car and Otogi pouted for the rest of the day.

Finding Bakura and Marik was harder. They knew the two boys were together; Malik had run off to find Bakura and Malik was too stubborn to not leave Bakura's side.

But something Yuugi was not expecting for the two boys to find them.

The two of them were walking closer to each other then usual but at the same time tried to put as much distance between each other as possible. Malik had a far away look in his eyes and Bakura was looking anywhere but at his best friend.

Seto raised a skeptical eyebrow at the two friends; Yuugi also noticed the tension between the boys. Jounouchi was the only one who remained oblivious. "Hey, guys! Where did you disappear to?"

"N-no where."

Jounouchi blinked once, then twice and shrugged his shoulders. "Whatever; anyway, we all need to talk, come on."

Bakura nodded and followed his friends out to the courtyard, Malik following a step behind him. When the group of friends got to the courtyard and made it to their usual bench, Anzu and Honda were already there; both cleaned up and dressed in their school uniforms.

"Hey Yuugi," Anzu greeted. "So what's up?"

"Yeah, what's happening?" Malik asked.

Yuugi sighed and fell down onto the bench seat. "The other night, I had a nightmare. It's a reoccurring nightmare I've had since we defeated the Game. In this dream, I'm back in the Game and Yami is free, he's saying something to me and his red eyes glow. And then…I'm running, running away from something or someone, all I see is green…green eyes, a-and then I see Ryou…" Yuugi gulped.

Bakura stiffened and leaned in to listen more closely.

"He's in this freakish amusement park and he's dressed in white, but…there's so much blood, he's just standing in a pool of blood and he's smiling at me. And he's crying blood, but he's smiling, and then he, says something…" Yuugi closed his eyes and shook his head to try and get the picture out of his head. "But that's when I usually wake up, before I can find out what he's going to say to me."

Jounouchi sat down next to his friend and patted his shoulder.

Yuugi continued. "But that isn't what I wanted to tell you guys. Something strange is going on. When I was in the infirmary with Soren…"

Bakura growled and Malik put a hand on his shoulder. "Calm down, Bakura," he ordered.

"No, I won't! You heard what Tiu said about Ryou! I hate that bastard, not to mention something is off about him. I don't trust him." With that said, Bakura crossed his arms and turned away.

"Anyway," Yuugi said, ignoring Bakura's outburst. "When I was in the infirmary, I was talking with him about what he said earlier today and he says he doesn't remember anything, like it never happened. And then when I was leaving, the phone in the nurse's office rang and when I answered it, it was just some strange whispering and shushing noise; I know that it was talking not just nonsense and I thought I recognized the mumbling but it was so…strange. I hung up and ran to find you guys as fast as I could."

"And?" Bakura asked, obviously irritable and in a bad mood.

"Something strange is going on and I have bad feeling that something is going to happen," Yuugi explained. At that moment, Yuugi's cellphone rang. He pulled out the phone from his pants pocket and checked the caller I.D. "It's Mai…" he declared before pressing talk.

"Hello?" he answered.

"Hey Yuugi, are you still at school?"

Yuugi furrowed his eyebrows in confusion. "Yeah, sixth period is about start."

"I need you to come to the police station right now," Mai said urgently. "Are you with your friends?"

Now Yuugi was getting worried. "Yeah, there here with me. Mai, are you okay? Why do you need us at the police station?"

"Good, I need all of your friends here. Please hurry; I'll explain when you get here."

And then Mai hung up.

Yuugi stared at his cellphone for a moment in astonishment, like it would do a trick if he stared at it long enough. After a moment, he shook his head and stuffed his phone back in the pocket of his school uniform.

"What was that all about?" Honda asked.

"Mai wants us all at the police station right away, it sounds like it's really important," Yuugi said.

"But sixth period is about to start," Anzu argued.

"It wouldn't be the first time we've skipped class," Malik reasoned.

"Good point," Jounouchi said before the group of friends ran out the school gates and downtown to the police station.

None of them noticed a pair of luminescent green eyes watching them. The narrow eyes became slits and a red tinge glowed in the emerald eyes.

"It's time to put you to good use, Soren Tiu; you will be a very important piece in this Game."

Elsewhere ~

When they got to police station down town, they found Mai pacing back and forth in the lobby as men and women in blue uniforms went about their daily business. When she saw Yuugi enter with his group of friends she rushed towards them. She scooped her smaller cousin up in a hug. "Hey Yuugi, I'm so happy to see you!" She set Yuugi back down on his feet and greeted the rest of his friends. "I'm so happy to see all of you. You will never believe what one of my friends found this morning when they were—!"

Suddenly a female police officer with blue hair tied up with a yellow ribbon came up behind Mai and slapped a delicate calloused hand over her mouth. "That's enough, Mai! You can't just go yelling out information like that; it's all confidential." The women released Mai and smiled at the teens. "Hello, I'm Miho Nosaka, pleased to meet you all."

She received miscellaneous replies and greetings back.

"If all of you will just follow me to my office and I will explain why I requested your audience," the sweet women said before turning around and leading the group deeper into the station.

Honda sighed dreamily as he followed the women. "I think I'm in love."

Jounouchi sighed and shook his head, elbowing Honda in the gut.

They soon reached a small room with a desk piled high with paper work and an old computer sitting on the corner. There was a book shelf against one of the walls filled with documents and books, and a few personnel items such as pictures and knick knacks. A few chairs were sitting in front of the desk and one lumpy sofa.

"This is my office," Miho stated, sitting in her desk chair. "Please, make yourself comfortable."

Everyone sat down, either in a stiff back chair or on the itchy sofa; Seto decided to stand.

Honda noticed a photo of Miho and another man sitting on her desk. "Who's that?" he asked.

"Oh," Miho exclaimed, picking up the small frame. "This is my fiancé."

Honda's head hung in dejection; Jounouchi patted his friend on the back.

Miho laced her fingers together and rested her chin on her laced fingers. "All of you are probably wondering what you are doing here." Miho received head nods. "Well, a few days ago we received a missing person's alert of two boys; I'm sure you know Haga and Ryuzaki?"

Yuugi gasped; the two boys who were following him the day he purchased the Game, the ones that were going to join Ushio's gang.

"Well, their step-sister called us and told us that the two boys went missing on Saturday; no one knew of their whereabouts until this morning." Miho closed her eyes and massaged the bridge of her nose. She slid one of her desk drawers open and laid down a number of photos displaying the scene where the two boys were found and multiple pictures of the boys.

Yuugi had to look away.

"When we found them, we also found something that might be of interest to you; the reason we called you over. Yuugi, your cousin Mai explained to me what happened in the Game," Miho said softly.

"Mai?" Yuugi asked, turning towards his cousin who simply nodded her head.

"I've known Mai since high school and, lets just say that I know a good deal of information about your family heritage, Yuugi," Miho explained.

"Can you get to the point?" Bakura snapped.

Miho cleared her throat and nodded. "Certainly; you see, when we found Haga and Ryuzaki, we also found something I believe they stole from you Sunday morning."

Miho reached behind her desk and gently lifted the Victorian style paper doll house.

There was a collective gasp in the room as the teens stared at the Game like it would disappear any second, like it wasn't real.

Miho didn't wait for the teens to recover before she pulled out the two paper dolls. "With it, we also found these," she said, displaying paper doll-Haga and paper doll-Ryuzaki on her desk.

Jounouchi stared wide eyed at the dolls. "Yuugi? You don't think that they…?"

Yuugi shook his head and put his head in his hands. "I don't know, I don't know…"

"They have the same X on their chest that Ryou's nightmare had after he…couldn't defeat it," Seto observed. He studied the pictures of Haga and Ryuzaki's dead bodies again and Yuugi could have sworn he saw Seto turn a surprising shade of green. "Do you think they died in the Game?"

Malik was shaking and despite his tan skin tone, the boy was turning pale. He knew he saw Marik's cape fluttering in the hallway earlier. He burst out of his seat in outrage. "Who cares about that?" he screamed. "What matters is that the Shadow Men are running free and they're dangerous and angry!"

Yuugi gulped; he didn't think of that.

"And they're going to find us and—and…I don't even know what they're going to do! Oh my, God! Oh my, God!" He rubbed the shoulder that Marik cut with a knife; that psychopath was running around free and looking for him. "What the hell are we going to do?" Malik cried.

Miho rose to her feet. "Please sir, calm down."

"Why should I calm down? Would you calm down if you were in our situation? Give me one good reason to calm down!" Malik snapped. Then everyone heard sobbing and all heads swiveled in Yuugi's direction.

The small boy was curled up in a ball in the corner of the couch, his small body shaking from the sobs that wracked his body. He understood why Malik was so hysterical; he had good reason to be. Marik was free and looking for the boy. And Yami…Yami was free, he was angry, and he was probably looking for Yuugi for revenge.

It scared the hell out of him.

The nightmares…the nightmares were coming true. They were coming to life, just like the Game all over again.

Yuugi had always thought, 'If Yami got out, he would find me. He'd hunt me down and take his revenge.'

Mai quickly ran over to her cousin and hugged him. She rocked the boy back and forth and made soothing sounds in his ear while smoothing down his wild hair. "Shh, Yuugi, it's okay, shh."

Yuugi's eyes were dry; now he was just staring at the paper doll house in horror. He remembered the night he and his friends put it together, and then the next morning he destroyed it. He crushed it and smashed it until it was flat. How foolish he was being; how careless.

He should have burned it.

-/-

Ranko: And that's the end of chapter two! Again, sorry for getting it up so late! My Wi-Fi isn't working on my laptop and school has been a real bitch lately.

Yami: We hope you enjoyed this chapter! As you can tell, Ranko is trying a new style by writing scenes in different perspectives, as you saw in the beginning of the chapter.

Yuugi: Review if you want to see more to stalker Yami!