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Anzu woke warm and desperately comfortable.
Atem was holding her. She nearly screamed. He, Atem, a pharaoh, holding her like this! In his terms, she was a peasant!
A poor peasant.
She could see a bit of an eye from where she was, pressed against his chest. There was a dark look to it. Something was troubling him... She shivered. She knew what could happened to those that upset him. Maybe he didn't have the puzzle, but this was the shadow rea...
He looked at her, parting hazelnut lips. That angered look had hidden itself, and the look right now had melted her brain.
"You're awake."
"I-G-L-You-M-Deh-" She shut up.
He stood, still holding her. "So what happened to your ankle?"
She looked at his collarbone, blushing. "M-D-Nothing."
Something swirled around him, leaving him in the leather she remembered. The tan skin remained. She couldn't help noticing scars-thin lines tracing parts of his skin. Also, the area around his neck was almost flawless...
"Anzu. I don't like being lied to..."
A retort slid onto her tongue.
He chuckled. "Which makes me a hypocrite."
Oh gods. She really wanted to sink her teeth into that skin, just to see what it felt like...
He started walking. "So. What's changed since I left? Gramps fine? How has everyone been adapting? Anyone got a date?"
She had to count to ten before answering, so she wouldn't gasp or pant. She could feel every muscle working beneath his shirt.
"Not much has happened. Gramps is fine, just getting a little slower in the limbs. As for dates, Rebecca and were going to get set up by me and Jounochi, but this happened, so there goes that bl-"
That dark part in his eyes was gone. As soon as she mentioned Yugi and Rebec, he was calmer.
Also, there was a rather thick scar starting about the right side of his collarbone, slashing diagonally across his skin, disappearing under his shirt.
"Is something wrong?"
"I-What? No!"
He grimaced. "It's the scars, isn't it?"
"Wha-I-"
"It doesn't matter. Feel free to stare. It's fine. Everybody else does anyway."
Anzu looked at him shocked and slightly annoyed. That's it all he said is everyone looks at them; if he saw her staring he could at least tell her how he got them. But Anzu just shook it off 'If he wants to tell me,' she thought, 'then he will.'
"You think people had never seen scars." She reached out, touching it lightly. He flinched.
"Sorry."
"It's... Ok..."
There was silence for a while. To try to not notice Atem, she focused on her ankle, which she had twisted earlier.
"So what DID you do to your ankl-"
"Nothing. End of discussion."
Atem sighed, stopping. "I can't help if I don't know what's wrong."
"I just twisted it, ok? Not that..." He was looking at her.
Atem sat down. "Here." He placed a hand on her ankle, and it glowed a little. "That should help it."
It hurt though. Really desperately hurt...
"Speeding up healing can hurt. Don't worry. It'll be ok..." He hugged her.
She distracted herself with a question, going against earlier thought. "How'd you get-"
"This?" He fingered the slash. "This is what killed me the first time. It loops across my chest and down my side."
Anzu swallowed.
What was really scary was how casual he was about it. This had killed him, for gods sake!
"I want to go home." She whispered.
There was someone coming their way. Atem instantly shoved Anzu off his lap and sat next to her like nothing happened.
"Atem? Oh. Who's she?"
"Father." He gave a slight bow of the head. "This is Anzu."
He smiled, one that was familiar. "Ah, the famous Anzu. So how DID she get here?"
General shrugging. "Also, we're looking for the rest of the gang."
"So this Yugi, Jounochi and... Honda?"
Nodding.
"Let's look over here. The realm has a left obsession."
Atem carried Anzu again. This time piggyback. He seemed colder now...
She listened to them talk in a strange rough language, and tried not to shiver. It was scary...
At one point, she heard them say her name, but it was bent by their accent. Atem blushed and shouted something.
"You know things echo around here, right?" She leaned her forehead on his shoulder. "It's not helping anything..."
"Like."
"My headache."
Even his damn father was kinder, asking her questions to track it down to...The shadow realm.
"The magic here affects you this way. Sadly, cures do not exist."
"Not enough aspirin in the world, obviously." she muttered, upset that Atem hadn't done a thing. Instead, he was shaking slightly.
As the walking began again the silence began to thicken with building tension. It became so much that Atem's father distanced himself, slowly.
"Hey Atem?"
"Hm."
"Why is your dad 6'5 and you're barely 5'5?"
"Because."
"Because why?"
"You don't ask why Yugi's short. And for the record, I'm 5'6."
'What's the difference?' she thought. "Well Yugi has a short grandfather, and even his dad isn't very tall."
"I don't ca-"
"He was born a twin, the twin was born dead, and Atem was a runt."
"Father."
What was with these guys and dead-flat statements?
"Oh. So... Want a little brother? I'm trying to get rid of mine."
"No. I've got enough half-siblings."
His dad winced.
Out of things to say, and with her head pounding, she leaned her head on Atem's shoulder and pretended to sleep. Maybe it would work, she would wake up and it would be like Dorothy in that weird American movie they watched in English class.
It didn't, but she got to listen in to a very interesting conversation.
"Atem."
"Hm."
"You like her, don't you?"
"Father! She might be listening..."
"She looks asleep to me. Stop worrying."
To be more convincing, she snuggled down, muttering a half-intelligeble version of the words "teddy bear."
"See?"
"Still don't like her."
"Such blatant lies. You used to be such a good boy. What happened?"
"I don't-"
"Could you say that under spell?"
Silence.
Anzu could've cried. He liked her! He did!
Now to get him to admit it...
Now she really did sleep.
She woke up later. Atem's father was gone, and she was using his thigh as a pillow.
Atem was leaning on his other leg, knee an arm rest.
Anzu sat up, and regretted it. Blood rushed around her head.
"Ugh..."
"You ok?"
"Fine."
"M." He nodded.
Dammit! Care already!
Alright then. Now how go around this...
"Hey Atem?"
"What?"
"Let's say you like someone..."
His gaze darkened slightly. "And?"
"I mean really like. And you think they like you. But you're not entirely sure! And you think it's possible they like someone else!"
Things died under looks like that.
"What do you do? What do you say?"
He looked away so she couldn't see his face, but it was probably glaring. Yes! That had to mean something!
"Just say it. If you can't bring yourself to, actions speak louder than words." Then he stood. "Come on. Your ankle should be fine now."
He refused to glance or stand within three feet of her.
It's hard to tell how time passes in the shadow realm. Her watch got depressed and it'd worked, she'd been here two whole days. Two days, and now she was sure it'd been nearly a week. A week of Atem avoiding her, finding downright nothing but creepy voices, a fit of depression without her meds, and an ever-rising sexual tension.
Oh yeah, and waking up from naps to find Atem very, very close to her. As in inches.
He looked so gentle in his sleep, when all the tenseness went south.
She was also quite sure he kissed while she was asleep once, because she woke up with her lips tingling and feeling the warmth of his body as he whispered something she couldn't hear.
She just couldn't take it!
"Atem." She grabbed his arm.
He shrugged her off. "What?"
'Look at me.' "You know how I asked you... About..."
"You like someone. Who's it again?"
"It-" She stared at his back. All her emotional stress began surface, and she teared up. "It's..."
He was listening now as he turned to look at her. His eyes were dark. "You don't need to tell me. It's doesn't matter."
"Yes it does! Atem! It's..." She gulped, whispering, "It's you."
She couldn't look at him now. She could be wrong. They could've been talking about something else...
His arms wrapped around her, and he tilted her head up.
Lips collided. Her brain fuzzed over and any semblance to a ground disappeared under her, taking a chunk of the tension with it.
"Hey gu-Woah."
They broke apart. There was Jounochi, staring bug-eyed.
"What are you-"
"Curing her depression?"
"Hey Honda! Yug! You guys missed it! 'Tem an Anz were-"
"Were what?"
He looked down at Yugi. "Makin-"
"We were not!" Anzu screeched.
"Alright. Fine. Just kissing. Whatever."
And enter the silence. The dead awkward silence.
"So. Can we try to get out of here no-" Ruu jumped on Jounochi's head, looked at him and hissed something. "Wait, we should wha- Ok... No really... Uhhh...Ruu. You can't. You're a girl."
Silence. "Gender-confused cat."
"I was told she was.." Atem coughed. "Neutered."
"She also says we need to head that way, cause there's something with teeth coming our way."
"Jounochi Katsuya. Cat-translator." Honda said.
Then they ran.
"We-Still-Need-To-Get-Out!" Anzu panted.
They had no idea where they were going, something big with teeth was running after them and Jounochi was listening to a cat.
"This way!"
It took forever to duck and dodge their way out of this one. When they finally stopped, it was a collapse, not a stop. Everybody lying on the ground or sitting, about to.
"Ok... Now.. Let's... Try... To leave..."
Anzu looked at him. "I thought... You said... we couldn't...?"
"We've...gotten lucky be...before."
A while of quiet.
"Ruu would know! Remember?"
"Yeah..."
"So Ruu. How do we get out?"
Ruu purred, and started walking.
Here they were. Following a cat.
Seeing as they all probably just ran a couple miles, Anzu was surprised to find that she could actually walk at all, and probably walked several more miles till they all just fell over to sleep.
And Anzu discovered she suddenly was scared of sleeping without something warm next to her, so she snuggled up to Atem.
"Wha-Oh."
Knock out.
Wonder of wonders, miracle of miracles...
What do you people think?