Ranko: Merry Christmas everyone!
Yuugi: Have a holly, jolly one!
Yami: And a happy new year!
Ranko: Because it is the holidays, this is going to be really short.
xChaoticDawnx: Don't worry, there will be plenty more puzzleshipping moments. And no, Ryou will not be in this Game, I'm sorry if I got your hopes up.
raindropdew: I know, I just love perverted Yami. Yuugi is so cute, and he knows it too! Thanks for the review, and I hope that you do well with the auditions for your school's musical; I'll be doing that soon too.
.3: Run, Yuugi, run! Hopefully Malik won't be taken, I'm not done tormenting him yet. Thanks for the review!
Doragon-chan: Then he wouldn't be the Yami we all know and love.
Epona1995: Thank you so much! Your review made me so happy!
SincerJoyy: Everyone hates it when I end a chapter with a cliffhanger, I only do it because I love you all (insert evil laugh here). Which is worse: flames of hell or JB fans? Hmm…anyway, I just love it when Yami is being a little creeper, I think that its funny. The poll wasn't for a Ranma ½ story, by the way, it was for Yu-Gi-Oh. Thanks for the review, and I watched that video, it was really funny!
hikari no senshi17: Yeah, the reason Yami called Malik Rapunzel was because in the last story in Anzu's nightmare, he was Rapunzel. I pinky promise that I won't kill anyone, just because you asked me to! That's how much I love my reviewers.
lilpopslash: I know, Yami is sometimes an ass. Thanks for the review!
SokiKuro: First let me just say, that I have been keeping up with your story, its awesome! Sorry I haven't had a chance to review! Okay, on with the review response. Life does suck sometimes but that's what makes it interesting. Yuugi has conflicting emotions and Yami doesn't know how to express his feelings (which makes me feel bad for him), what am I supposed to do with these two? I just decided "enough of this" and made Malik and Bakura make up. Your review made me feel so loved and it wasn't depressing! Please continue to review and you are not a cheesy idiot!
sea girl: Okay, your review just made my day! You made me feel so loved, thanks for the review!
Yami: Ranko twin owns nothing!
Ranko: Enjoy
All three: And have a Merry Christmas!
-/-
Malik screamed as the phantom wolf pounced on him, knocking him off his feet. He was pinned beneath the ghostly thing as it snarled in his face, its hot, steamy breath making him choke. It growled and snarled, spit flying from its jaws. It opened it mouth wide as if it were about to eat Malik whole.
"I told you I would find you, Malik-pretty."
The boy felt something similar to a warm, calloused hand run along his bare thigh, teasing him and making him cringe.
"Now we'll be together."
Malik clenched his eyes shut as the phantom above him howled one last time and then there was a yelp from the great beast above him. The weight was removed from his body and he no longer felt the sensation of someone touching him, though he didn't dare open his eyes.
He heard yelling and cursing that sounded vaguely familiar. Malik heard a noise similar to a vacuum being turned on and then everything abruptly stopped, leaving Malik in a deafening silence.
He felt a presence loom over him and he flinched away in fear of who it may be. Then a strong hand grasped his own and hefted the boy to his feet; Malik's eyes popped open in surprise.
Bakura stood before him; Malik let out a short cry of happiness that his friend was okay. Though, he looked worse for wear. His red coat was in shreds and soaked with blood that Malik hoped was the wolf's. In his hand he held a dagger, which was probably hidden under his coat the whole time, and was slicked with a sticky black substance. He was breathing hard and his hair was in a disarray.
"I'm so glad you're okay," Malik said breathily. He felt like he would collapse and grabbed Bakura's shoulders to keep him steady. He looked over his friends shoulders for any sign of Marik or the wolf. "Is it dead?"
Bakura shook his head. "No, it opened up another one of those black holes and jumped through it; it closed up immediately.
Malik thought of the vacuum like sound he heard earlier and wondered if that was what that noise was. Before he could question Bakura further, they heard a shout.
"Malik!"
Bakura and Malik both turned and saw Yuugi running towards them. The boy looked frantic and his voice sounded terrified when he shouted Malik's name. He was paler than usual, making the half-moons under his eyes stand out surprisingly.
As soon as the boy reached them, he dropped to his knees, panting and all of his limbs shaking; Malik and Bakura followed him down.
Yuugi's already wide eyes became saucers when he noticed Malik and Bakura. "Oh, God, are you alright? What happened?"
"The phantom wolf," Bakura said with resentment. "One of the Shadow Men's pets."
"Marik," Malik said, without missing a beat. Bakura and Yuugi both turned to the Egyptian boy in surprise; he was able to say the Shadow Man's name without flinching. "It was Marik's wolf."
Yuugi hugged his friend tightly but loosened his grip, refusing to let go, when Malik hissed in pain; when the wolf tackled him, he landed in a heap of garbage. Bakura awkwardly patted his friend's shoulder; he was never that good with affectionate moments, except with…
Yuugi pulled away and looked into Malik's lavender eyes. "So what happened to you?"
"The wolf…that phantom thing, tried to chase me into this black hole with fire and…" Malik shook his head and shuddered at the memory of it. "I don't know why, it just wanted me to fall into it."
Yuugi looked near tears. "Oh, God, it's all my fault," he whispered.
Malik shook his head. "Stop saying that, it's not your fault; its not like you sent to wolf after me."
Yuugi gulped and looked away in shame. "Actually, in some way…I did."
Malik and Bakura both exchanged confused looks. "What? How?" Malik asked, still a bit confused.
"I…I saw Yami at the dance and…the new Game has begun…because of me. I agreed to play the new Game."
A long silence settled over all three of the friends. Yuugi's head hung down in shame. Bakura began to feel wary with all the shadows of the night surrounding them. He rose to his feet and gesture Malik and Yuugi to follow him; Malik helped Yuugi to his feet.
"We need to get everyone together and talk so you can explain, Yuugi," Bakura said. "We also need to call everyone's parents and explain to them why they won't be home tonight." Malik and Yuugi both game the white haired man a look; Bakura rolled his eyes at them. "We don't do anything dangerous, all of us just need to talk and it will be a lot safer if we're all together."
Malik shrugged. "We've been living in Yuugi's apartment for the past, what, two days? If anyone calls just tell them that we're having a study group over there or we're all working on a big project together that will take a couple days."
They nodded in agreement and ran back to the school gym to gather everyone. It was hard to locate them through the crowd of students. They dragged them all away back to Yuugi's apartment, questions flying left and right. When they realized none of them would be answered and received a harsh glare from Bakura they all ceased talk.
It was nearly one-thirty in the morning by the time they made it back to Yuugi's apartment.
"Caffeine," Jounouchi mumbled tiredly, leaning back on the plush sofa.
Seto sat next to him. "Stunts your growth; makes you blind." Jounouchi was too tired to even glare at Kaiba so he just decided to nudge his leg with his knee.
"There is no food," Honda called from the kitchen, looking through the refrigerator. He came back to the living room and leaned against the wall. "And can someone please tell me what's going on? I was having a good time at the dance."
"I was nearly killed," Malik said from the loveseat across the room.
"So what I'm hearing is that you didn't have a good time?" Honda asked smartly; Malik threw him a look that told the brunet he was no amused. Everyone hadn't even bothered changing out of their Halloween costumes, except Mai, who had just reemerged from her bedroom wearing flannel sweat pants and a baggy white shirt.
"What's this I hear about someone almost getting killed?" she asked.
"Is someone going to explain what happened?" Seto asked, beginning to get annoyed; Jounouchi put a hand on the man's shoulder to calm him down.
"Malik can go first," Yuugi said quickly, drawing his legs up to his chest and hugging them close.
Malik took a deep breath and began to describe what had happened to him, taking small pauses here and there to compose himself.
"What's up with the hole?" Honda asked after the explanation. "Pardon my asking, by why didn't the wolf just kill you?"
"Because it's a Game," Yuugi said, speaking up. "A new Game."
Everyone's attention switched to Yuugi who curled up into a tighter ball with everyone's attention on him. He opened his mouth to speak and then shook his head, hiding his face in his knees.
"You've seen Yami."
Everyone's heads swiveled around the stare at Mai, who had said that statement without hesitation. Yuugi nodded silently and nearly everyone's eyes widened at once. Jounouchi's shoulders tensed; Seto stared at him with an inscrutable expression, and Honda whistled.
"Now, explain," Bakura commanded.
Yuugi told them everything. Well, not everything, only the essence of the whole conversation. The matters of importance to them…like the new Game. He left out bits that no one really needed to no about. Like the kissing.
"He said that he'd give me a chance to get free of my promise," Yuugi finished. "That he was going to play a new Game with us, and that we were all the players. And at the end he said that the new Game was lambs and monsters."
Mai, who had been listening attentively the whole time, sat up with interest at this, surprise covering her features. "You mean that thing the kids were playing?"
Bakura scratched his head in confusion. "What lambs and monsters?" he asked. "I never heard of it."
"It's like cops and robbers," Malik explained. "Its starts like hide-and-seek—if you're a monster, you count while the lambs hide. Then we find a lamb, you chase it—and if you tag it, it's caught. Then you bring it back to your base and keep it as a prisoner until somebody else sneaks up to let it free."
"Or until all the lambs are caught and get eaten," Mai said grimly.
Seto crossed his arms and leaned back. "Cute game."
"If we're playing, we'd better find out the rules," Bakura said; Malik nodded in agreement.
Yuugi looked around the living room and saw all of his friends faces when they played the first Game. They were terrified, in pain. Ryou's pleading eyes flashed in his mind for the briefest moment. He couldn't put them through that again. "We may not have to play," he said quietly.
Everyone turned to him in shock.
"What do mean?" Mai asked, looking at her cousin warily.
Yuugi shrugged. "Well, maybe I should just stop it right now."
Time stood still for a moment, everyone was quiet, and then they all broke out in protest.
"No!" Malik nearly shrieked, rising to his feet. "You can't give into that bastard! You can't! Never!"
"We're going to fight him," Jounouchi said, getting to his feet and putting a supportive hand on his friend's shoulder.
"We have to fight him," Mai said. "You know that, Yuugi."
"Well," one voice piped in. Everyone turned to look at Bakura. "It would save us a lot of time and trouble…" he said, trailing off. Everyone stared at him, wide eyes and mouths agape.
Malik smacked him. "No way!"
"Ouch, I was kidding," Bakura said, chuckling. He them turned to Yuugi, his rust colored eyes serious. "You'd better not give into them."
"We won't let you," Seto said, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees.
"Yeah," Honda agreed full heartedly. "It's our problem too."
Yuugi felt strangely loved, but also guilty. They didn't understand what it meant to be in the position Yuugi was in. They didn't know that he'd almost surrendered of his own free will.
Jounouchi squeezed down on his friend's shoulder, as if sensing what Yuugi was feeling. "He's evil, Yuugi, you can't just let evil win because of us; you can't."
Mai's dry voice cut through the impassioned atmosphere. "I don't think that there's much point in arguing about it. Because of what Yuugi said before, it sounded like he agreed to the new Game."
Yuugi felt a new wave of guilt sweep over him. "I did; I don't know…when I agreed I thought he'd leave the rest of you alone. I didn't think any of you would be involved, I swear!" the boy said desperately.
Malik sunk to the floor and leaned against the couch. "And he said that the Game had started, which means there's nothing he can do to change it now, even if Yuugi wanted to."
Bakura smirked, his canine teeth glinting in the low light; his mischievous eyes glowed like a demon's. "Like I said from the beginning, we better figure out the rules if we're going to play."
They all looked at one another. They were all together again to play another crazy Game.
"So what do we do to win?" Honda asked, coming back from the kitchen with a Coke; he popped the tab open and took a few gulps before lowering the can and wiping his lips with the back of his hand.
"Avoid getting caught?" Jounouchi said, more as a joke.
"It's not as simple as that," Mai said, a look of deep concentration on her face. She began to pace the floor. "The first Game, the one in the paper house, was the like a race game. In a race game the point is to get from the start to the goal in a certain amount of time, or before anybody else does."
"Kind of like Chutes and Ladders," Honda said; everyone gave him a look, the same look they gave him when he was being ridiculous. "No, I'm serious! We went up the stairs in the Game and then fell down the chute back to the first floor."
"Oh, yeah!" Jounouchi said, slapping his fist in his palm. "I had a game like that when I was a kid, except it was called Snakes and Ladders."
Mai sighed. "We get it; a lot of games are race games."
"But then there are hunting games, too," Malik said from where he was sitting on the floor. "Those are actually the oldest games of all. Like hide-and-seek, that started out as practice for stalking wild animals."
Bakura gave him best friend a surprised look. "How do you know that?"
Malik craned his neck back to look at his friend. "Ishizu told me. And tag is like capturing domestic animals. The new game Yami is playing is like a hunting and capturing game."
Honda shrugged, taking a sip of his Coke. "So he's planning to hunt us down and capture us like animals?"
"Not quite, sweetheart," Mai said grimly. "It's more like where you catch each of the animals and put them in a big pen to wait for the slaughter."
Honda choked on his Coke.
"Well, it's true," Mai said. "He didn't say he was going to kiss us one by one. He said he was going to capture us until the free ones find his base."
Wiping the Coke from his chin, Honda said, "Let's just find the base and avoid the Game."
"But that's the point," Mai said. "How do we find it?"
"How can we find it?" Seto asked. "It's hopeless."
"Didn't he tell you anything about it, Yuugi?" Malik asked. "You know, Yami's base?"
Yuugi shook his head helplessly. "No, its just supposed to be this place to keep us before he takes us to the Shadow Realm."
"Which mean's its not the Shadow Realm itself?" Honda asked, wondering back to the kitchen for some Cracker Jack. He came back, munching away. "Thank God," he muttered with his mouth full.
Malik paled slightly. "But wherever it is, we have to get there by passing through those holes," he said, shuddering. "I'll pass, thank you."
Mai put a finger to her chin in thought. "Now, these holes, they make me think of something. There's a story by Ambrose Bierce, he wrote this trilogy about weird disappearances, and there was this one story about a sixteen year old boy. I can't think of his name right now but one night after it snowed he went out to the spring to get water. Well, he went out the door and he never came back. His family went outside to see what happened and they saw his tracks in the snow. The tracks were halfway to the spring and just stopped dead. Nobody ever saw him again."
"Great," Seto said unenthusiastically. "But what does this have to do with things?"
Mai threw the man a look. "Well, the story is supposed to be fictional. But there was this one part in the book, where this German doctor had a theory about how people disappeared. He said that 'in the visible world there are void places.'"
"Like holes in Swiss cheese?" Honda asked, stilling eater Cracker Jack.
"And that guy fell in one?" Yuugi asked with interest.
Mai shrugged. "Fell…or was dragged. Like I said, the story was supposed to be fiction. But what if there are really voids like that? And what if Yami can control them?"
"Well, there's a nasty idea," Bakura said with distaste.
"Are you saying that all of these people who disappear fall into the Shadow Realm?" Malik asked.
Mai shrugged again. "Maybe not all of them, but some of them. And maybe not all the way, just partway. In the story, the kid's mother went by the place where he disappeared the next, she could hear his voice. She heard it fainter and fainter every day, until it just faded away completely."
"A halfway place," Yuugi said thoughtfully. "Like the game store where I met Yami for the first time. Some place to keep us until he takes us to the Shadow Realm."
"Did it look like vortex, Malik?" Honda asked.
Malik gave him a look. "It was big and black," he said shortly. "I don't think it can look more like a vortex than that."
Honda shrugged and began to play with his prize from the Cracker Jack box.
"But that doesn't help us find the base," Yuugi said. "Unless we jump into one of those voids, and then I don't think we're coming back."
"It closed up completely," Bakura said. "After the wolf jumped in it, it just disappeared. I don't even think I could find the place again."
"Anyway, I bet he can move them around," Honda said, and then he finally looked down at his toy. "What the hell is this?"
Mai snatched it out his hand and inspected it.
"What is it?" Yuugi asked.
"It's a book of poetry." It was a very small book, on cheap paper with large print. One sentence per page. But it was a very strange poem for a Cracker Jack prize. Mai read, "In the midst of the word he was trying to say,/ In the midst of his laughter and glee,/ He had softly and suddenly vanished away—/ For the Snark was a Boojum, you see."
There was dead silence in the room.
Seto shrugged. "It could be a coincidence."
Mai shook her head. "But that doesn't make any sense, what would a poem like this be doing as a prize in a Cracker Jack box?"
"What do you mean, Mai?" Yuugi asked.
"This poem is about these guys going out to hunt these imaginary animals—Snarks. Only some of the Snarks are Boojums and those hunt you. So one of them finds a Snark only it turns out to be a Boojum."
"It's from Yami," Yuugi said immediately. "But is it about what has happened tonight or what's going to happen."
"You think he's giving us clues in advance?" Jounouchi asked.
"I guess it would be sporting," Seto said tiredly.
"He gave me a clue like that just before the Game began. He said that he'd be going after 'Rapunzel' next. And in Anzu's nightmare, Malik was Rapunzel," Yuugi said.
"That means we might have a chance," Mai said thoughtfully, giving the book of poetry back to Honda, who looked at it, shrugged and went back to the kitchen to get something more to eat. "If we can figure out the clues before hand and crowd that person…" Mai continued.
"I know we can do it!" Jounouchi said excitedly.
"It might actually work," Seto said optimistically.
"Of course it will work!" Malik shouted with joy, hopping to his feet. "We're going to beat that son of a bitch!" Malik said more to Bakura than anyone else.
Yuugi got caught up in the fervor himself. "It's not going to be easy…"
"But we'll do it," Mai said, putting a hand on her cousin's shoulder. "Because we have to." Yuugi nodded determinedly.
"We'd better start with the clue we have now," Seto said, sitting back. "Where'd the clue go?"
Mai looked around. "I gave it to Honda."
Seto raised an eyebrow. "Well, where'd Honda go?"
Mai sighed. "I don't know, to the kitchen for more food? Honda!" she called. "Honda, we need you, get out here!"
There was no response. Everyone exchanged confused looks.
"Honda?" Yuugi tried this time. There was no sound of cupboards or refrigerator doors opening. No popping of popcorn or opening of soda cans. It was all dead quiet. "Honda?" Yuugi called warily this time. "Honda?"
Jounouchi looked panic and he dashed to the kitchen, everyone else hot on his heels as raw panic began to settle into the guts of everyone in the group.
Yuugi looked around the kitchen corner and saw that it was completely empty.
"No! No! Oh, God, no!"
-/-
Ranko: You know, I was going to post this Christmas day, so it will be a special treat and make you guys wait longer, but why make me suffer as well? I love it when you guys review!
Yami: So, we hope to get out the first chapter for the new story soon so be patient.
Yuugi: Please review!
Yami: That will be your Christmas present to Ranko twin if you don't want to buy her anything!