Chapter 18

*Yesterday at Noon*

Ryou's head pounded and his stomach turned. He rolled off his back and emptied out whatever he had snacked on before going to find Melissa. He looked down at the ground and realized that it wasn't the same ground that Melissa had thrown him to about seven times in the confrontation. The ground that his face hit was grassy and soft, as soft as the ground could be, and the ground he looked down at was dusty and reminded him of a desert plain. He looked up and came face to face with an old wild west setup with some unrecognizable writing on the sign. Where the hell did he end up? It unfortunately wasn't new to him, waking up in strange places, usually with a blasting headache. At least that part didn't change, only difference was he didn't remember him getting possessed this time around.

*Currently*

"Wait!" Electra interrupted, ruining the view of the setting. Dark Link had the same question, these people were strange indeed. "You were possessed before? Like by a demon or something like in Paranormal Activity?"

"More like an evil, deranged, ancient, demonic fused spirit." Roo explained not explaining farther to Dark Link's distaste. "Now, back to the story…"

*Back at the same location and time*

He looked around and saw Yugi lying not far from him unconscious. Ryou stoop up and got a head rush immediately, but ignored it as he went to his fallen comrade. He shook him and Yugi stirred for a moment only to slipped back again.

"Yugi…" He urged and this time, his friend awoke.

"Bakura?" The teenager groaned as he sat up. "I feel like I'm going to be sick."

"I already was." Ryou told him reassuringly.

A small smile formed before he sighed. "Where are we?"

"I don't know."

"Where's Regan?"

Ryou blinked remembering that she had been shot. He looked around finding no one but them in the open. "We must have been separated."

"Regan!" Yugi called out standing up.

*Hold it, this was too cliché to continue*

"Awe, you're boyfriend cares for your wellbeing." Dark Link mocked turning to Regan. "Or does he? Roo could just be adding it to his story."

Regan turned a page in her book. "Ryou is actually really good at portraying exactly what was said."

"Doesn't mean he could be lying."

"Still sounds like Yugi nonetheless."

"Not even a doubt?"

"Nope."

"You're a fool." Dark Link sighed and a smirk formed on her lips.

"You should try being a fool, its fun."

"He doesn't have to try; he's already an idiot. Any more encouragement and he might forget how to breath." Electra replied.

Dark Link growled, he wasn't in the mood for her sharp jabs, not right now or on the current subject. "Like you even know me, Lightning Bug."

The room went silent as Electra glared and he glared back. Perhaps, in their messed-up relationship, his jab at her would indicate that maybe she was playing on a thin ice and maybe back off a bit. He knew he made a million mistakes, but he wasn't an idiot as he learned from them. Either way, the shrimp's words were not as simple as that.

Roo cleared his throat. "Should I continue?"

No one said anything as Electra searched his face as he hoped that she would understand why he might be a bit sensitive. Electra backed down from his glare and he looked away from her, there were just somethings that couldn't be said, and in their relationship, words weren't needed all the time. This was one of those times. Now he just hoped that she would allow him to figure things out, on his own and he'd fill her in, maybe. Roo sighed jumping into the story.

*Out of the stupid library…*

They looked around in the visible area and quickly realized that they were alone besides the empty village. Ryou started walking towards the village when Yugi placed a hand on his shoulder. He turned to him.

"What is it?"

"We shouldn't just walk in there, who knows where we are."

"Well, we won't find anyone standing here." Ryou replied sharply, a little more than he wanted to portray, but he was a little scared. "Besides, if someone wanted us dead, they would have seen us and done it by now."

"You… you have a point."

Ryou turned back to the village. "And with that said, I think this village is abandoned."

"Or they know better than to be outside now, its kinda warm."

"Or we scared them by appearing here."

"Maybe." Yugi thought about it before sighing. "Fine, maybe Regan, or any of the others, are in there."

"And give them a piece of our minds for leaving us out here?"

"That, that I think I will do."

They walked into the village and no noise went through the village besides the wind and their quiet footsteps in the dirt. The porches were covered in dust and the some of the windows were broken making Ryou feel on edge. Maybe it was a ghost town. He had an occult deck, maybe they would be kind to them. Suddenly, something loud crashed in the ally just in front of them and they both screamed moving away from the alley. A barrel rolled out from the alley and stopped in the middle of the road in front of them. Growling echoed from where the barrel had come from.

"Yugi…"

"Bakura…?"

"Should we summon a monster?"

"I don't know…" He replied. "But I don't think it would be a good idea considering."

Ryou swallowed, he had a bad feeling Yugi would say what he was thinking. The fears of a large, scary creature disappeared as a cat rolled out of the alleyway and came to an ungraceful thump. They relaxed, sighing loudly. A bloody cat almost made them need a new pair of drawers.

*WAIT! WHAT?! …What the hell kind of story was this?*

"Drawers? What the hell are you doing with a set of drawers?" Dark Link asked agitated. "That has nothing to do with the story. You didn't even say you had drawers to begin with."

"Drawers is another word for pants." Roo explained. "Its more accustomed to my upbringing."

"Which they use drawers for pants?"

"It's a British term." Regan explained off to the side. "They have strange words, but beautiful insults. Just go with it."

Dark Link opened his mouth, but nothing came out and he sighed. There was nothing he could come up with that could create an argument for drawers as pants, that was one of the things that just flew over his head. "Fine."

Electra rose an eyebrow at him but he ignored her and she didn't say anything.

*With a cat and their unsoiled… drawers… What a strange fucking culture.*

Meowing followed and suddenly, they were surround by cats. Ryou almost panicked thinking that they were man eating cats. It made sense on why the village was empty if the cats had attacked and eaten all the people. The awful thoughts disappeared as the cats either sat in front of them or rubbed against their legs. One stood up on its hind legs and leaned against his leg. He picked it up and it immediately started purring. He relaxed even more as the stress disappeared, ignoring the fact that this could be a ploy and they were getting ready to attack. Its fur was so soft, and it comforted him a little. These weren't man-eating cats. The other cats started meowing more and he looked over at Yugi.

"I think I made them jealous."

"You might have." He replied sheepily. "These cats seemed to be extremely friendly. Phoenix isn't like this most of the time…"

"Cats are like people, Phoenix is a cuddly asshole and these cats seem more like lovable attention hoggers."

Yugi seemed like he was about to say something when the far building door opened with a loud creak.

An old lady came out looking around before narrowing in on them. "Oh, we have guests."

Ryou looked over at Yugi and they silently agreed to go over to the woman. If she did try anything suspicious or attacked, they might not have been in the position to summon monsters safely, but they could if they needed to.

*Real time and place with uninvited story interrupters.*

The library door opened loudly stopping Roo's story from continuing. Dark Link turned to it to see Nile and Zelda come in through the door. Not who he thought it was going to be, so not too uninvited, another distraction is what he was looking for. Maybe he could get a break from watch duty.

"Hello." Regan greeted looking up from her book with a smile and Roo visibly relaxed, confusing the hell out of him, but he didn't question it. "Whaddup?"

"Her Majesty wanted to accompany me to make sure you stayed stable." Nile answered glancing over at Roo direction. "Did we interrupt something?"

"Just Roo's story on what happened with your flock yesterday." Dark Link sighed before anyone else could answer.

"You guys interrupted me like a million times, what's another one?" Roo asked and he shook his head.

"That's different, they weren't even here to hear about what happened after meeting the old hag."

"Oh, you were getting to the part where she was tending to me by putting a limiter on my ability until I met up with Regan." Nile stated. "Then we left towards the castle on the woman's instructions and came across that serpent creature."

He face-planted the table, though he wished he judged the table's distance first. It was a lot closer than he thought it was and it wasn't a soft landing. A small mutter of ow left his lips before he could say what he wanted to say. "Way to ruin the ending."

She laughed slightly. "Sorry for ruining your break."

"It's alright," Roo replied. "Everything going well with the training?"

"The training isn't the problem, the soldiers can fight, it's their cowardly nature that is difficult to break."

"Good luck on that impossible task." Dark Link commented. The knights were cowards to the bone as far as he could tell.

"We should have a decent army ready to go by night fall."

Dark Link snapped his attention at her as he raised his head. "Say what?"

"Yes..." Zelda started. "It's not the most easing way, but at least it's safe."

"What are you guys doing to get them to man up so quickly?" Electra asked and Dark Link heard Regan gasp and she turned to her. "What?"

Regan didn't look at Electra as she narrowed her eyes at Nile. "You didn't."

"I might have taken the idea you proposed last night." Nile told her.

"But that's-"

"A bit reckless, but no one gets seriously injured or killed to reach their full potential."

"You're not supposed to follow the ideas of a tired teenager!"

"What the hell are you guys talking about?" The blonde interrupted and Dark Link agreed with his partner. Whatever they were arguing about made no fucking sense without context. "We should be toning down the recklessness of any situation when possible."

"It's not that reckless." Nile disagreed and Regan scoffed.

"You might as well shoot some fireworks telling everyone in the country of our secret weapons."

"You summoned some monsters to train the soldiers." Roo analyzed and Nile nodded. "Are you sure that was a wise decision?"

"We didn't summon any heavy ones, just some light, and possibly scary looking ones." she answered turning back to Regan. "I took into consideration that someone might be spying so I didn't think about summoning any powerful monsters."

"What about the possibility of the damage done when we got here?" Regan hissed. "Spirits don't get bodies from nothing. It might have been the same power that was used for Atem, but that wasn't caused by us, who knows what our-"

"I'm feeling fine, Regan. And so is everyone else from what I can tell. There might be consequences, but for now, there are none."

"Still..."