Special thanks to BreakfastForLife, liron-aria, SB-129, SapphireTreewaterTheBlindOne, Evilkitten3, iHeartyaoi3, Lady's Secret, LadyKaiba27, Ninde, Ceeotu, Artemist1015, Zafiro, Reader, Queen of Yugioh, Gwee, Mals, The Reaper Grimm, Mara-kun, and the numerous guests who reviewed "Rock Bottom," because without all you fabulous~ people supporting me, I never would have continued this story, which would have been sad, because I already have detailed plans as far out as Season Four. :D Without further ado, I present to you Season Two!

Season Two: Card games on blimps.

Sixteen years ago...

"I love you, my children," the dying woman whispered as she lay on her death bed, a ghostly smile on her face. "Rishid, protect your brother and sister."

"I will," her adoptive son promised with a nod, trying not to cry. He could sense what was about to happen.

"Ishizu," she whispered, calling the attention of her dark-haired daughter. "Tell Marik that I love him."

"Is that the baby's name, Mother?" the little girl asked, but she didn't get an answer. "Mother? Mother?" Ishizu reached out to her mother's still-warm body, but Rishid grabbed her arm and pulled her away from the fresh corpse. As his sister started to cry, Rishid pulled her close and hushed her to no avail. He was crying too, and his tears were not at all assuaged when their father returned to the room, his newborn son cradled in his arms.

"She's gone, Father. She's gone." Rishid tried to speak steadily, but he was only a child witnessing death for the first time. Their patriarch shook his head disapprovingly, then turned to hand the wailing infant to a young woman standing behind him, his younger sister in law. He walked forward to pull the sheet covering his wife over her face to cover her completely. Meanwhile, Ishizu wept inconsolably with grief.

What was she supposed to do without a mother?

Ten years ago...

Ishizu waited for her father to leave the room before lifting her face from the floor. She wiped at her wet eyes with a dirty hand and started gathering the pieces of the crudely fashioned wax tablet she'd made for herself. She wanted to read and write, and if her father wasn't going to teach her, then she was going to teach herself.

That was still her desire, even though her father had destroyed her tool for doing so and instructed her to dissemble it and put its parts to a practical use. She wouldn't have made it if she'd known that he would be so angry. The broken shards were cradled in her arm as she used her other hand to grab the edge of her bed and pull herself to her feet.

He'd never punished her so harshly before.

As she sat on the edge of her hard bed, she winced. Just the act of sitting down hurt. What she didn't yet know was that her father's blows had been strong enough to bruise her rear.

She would obey him, of course. She always obeyed her father as best she could. Every now and then, she fell short of his expectations and he would discipline her as he saw fit, but she never tried to disappoint him or go behind is back. She had gotten curious about the images and symbols that her little brother was being taught to draw and understand, so she decided to pursue education on her own.

Now she understood that had been a mistake.

After hours spent (over the course of several days) siphoning off candle wax and scrounging together bits of wood just the right size and shape for the frame, then making wooden pegs and finding a piece of slate on which she could spread the wax, then finally piecing them all together with her limited skills—it felt like all of her hard work had gone to waste, which, functionally, was true. She wiped her dusty hands on the skirt of her tunic before using them to brush away the tears that threatened to fall. It wasn't enough, though, so she stopped fighting the urge to cry. She stood again and set the pieces in a shallow basket on the floor, one of the ones she'd woven that very day.

The men of their clan were the only ones allowed outside to roam the world above. They gathered food and materials while the women cooked the food they brought, tended to the children they fathered, and worked with the materials they provided.

She already did those things, to some degree, but she was dissatisfied with that. It was true that all of them contributed in some indirect way to the preservation of the pharaoh's legacy, but only the patriarch's family knew and carried the memories and secrets of the nameless pharaoh. Unfortunately for Marik, their father was that patriarch and he would inherit that role when their father passed away. Marik was kept cloistered away as he was being educated by their father with Rishid's protective presence at his back at all times. Ishizu loved her brothers, but she didn't get to see them nearly as much as she wished she could. She missed her mother. Maybe if her mother were still alive, she wouldn't feel so alone.

She resolved to follow out her father's orders tomorrow. It was late now, and she would be going to sleep soon, and there was no point in wasting candlelight to do it now. She needed to fetch fresh water for her room before she slept, though, so she couldn't go to sleep just yet.

She left her room with the water jug she kept beside her bed, creeping through empty halls. Someone had already gone through and snuffed out every other torch along the passageway. She passed the altar-room on her way there, still fighting tears as lonely thoughts chased each other in circles around her mind. She was just passing the holy room when she thought she heard someone call out her name. The voice was familiar and made her stop dead in her tracks.

"Mother?" Too afraid of looking foolish, she didn't dare to raise her voice above a whisper.

"Come, Ishizu." The voice was soft and warm and maternal, and it came from within a room that she was almost never allowed to enter. Ishizu paused, but the pull of the command was too strong for her to disobey. With slow movements, she slipped the flats off her feet, set the water jug on the floor by her shoes, and entered the holy room. Torches and incense were burning in this room at all times, making the air thick and fragrant and smoky. This was also the only room with an opening in the ceiling—to let the excess smoke out. A pair of torches flanked the altar at the front of the room where the two Millennium Items rested, awaiting the return of the pharaohs. The Millennium Necklace and the Millennium Rod, made of solid gold, glistened even in the half-light of the dim room. The absence of any person inside the room surprised Ishizu more than anything else.

She was starting to feel embarrassed, as if she'd been tricked by her own mind, and was about to turn back when the smoke curling into the air from the burning incense started to shimmer and take a human shape.

Ishizu gasped, eyes wide, as the faint spirit of a smiling woman with kind eyes appeared in spirit form, beckoning to the child with one hand.

"Come, Ishizu," she called again, and the ever obedient Ishizu, in a daze, did as she was told. She approached the altar slowly, hardly able to believe her own eyes and ears. She hesitated at the base of the raised dais that elevated the altar, looking down at the floor. This was holy ground. She wasn't supposed to be here at all. She wasn't worthy.

"Ishizu, it is time that you know your inheritance."

The only Ishtar daughter looked from her feet to the phantom and hesitantly stepped forward, ever closer to the glittering eyes of the two Millennium Items her family had protected for millennia.

"What is your name?" Ishizu whispered, lifting her eyes to those of the woman who floated before her.

"Isis."

Her smile was warm, and while she wasn't her mother, Ishizu found herself wishing that the woman were alive and here to act as one. Ishizu stood directly in front of the altar now, the powerful artifacts jut within her reach.

"Touch the necklace, Ishizu, so I can share something with you," Isis murmured.

Ishizu lifted one hand, then looked over her shoulder, suddenly frightened of being caught. She didn't want to be in even more trouble than she already was.

"Nothing bad will happen, my daughter. I promise."

Ishizu turned back to Isis, hesitated only a moment more, then reached out and touched it.

In an instant, years flashed before her eyes and in her mind. Frozen, she stared into space as people's lives flashed before her eyes. She saw a little boy with brown hair and blue eyes crying out as his mother died. She saw him caring for his little brother; growing up; working to provide for him; fighting with his father; bleeding, bruised, broken.

She saw him with the Millennium Rod, and knew that it was meant to be.

She saw Marik and Rishid and herself, older, later in life, and they were free.

Startled and disconcerted by what she was seeing, she tore her hand away from the item as if she'd been burned. Isis was gone. She'd disappeared while Ishizu was caught up in the vision, but Ishizu wished that she had stayed. She'd seen far too much for her to absorb and understand all of it. She did understand one thing, though.

Ishizu tipped her head back and looked up at the stars for the first time in her life.

She understood that someone was waiting for her on the outside.

Knowing that, she didn't feel quite so alone anymore.

Six years ago...

Fourteen-year-old Ishizu pulled the blankets more tightly around herself as her new husband snored beside her in bed.

Husband.

The word made her want to cry, but she stifled the urge and pressed her face into the pillow instead.

Nobody had warned her just how much her wedding night would hurt.

It was nothing, though, compared to the pain Marik would be enduring tomorrow, she reminded herself, trying not to become fixated on her own misery. Due to the ceremonies of the day, during which she'd worn her mother's jewelry for the first time, she hadn't had the chance to speak with her younger brother or to assuage his fears about the ritual that would officially initiate him into the order of tomb-keepers. She wanted to visit him now, but she was afraid of leaving this room. What if Ahkmenes awoke and found her gone?

She didn't know her husband well, since her father had chosen him for her, but she knew him well enough to fear him.

During the day, she did as she was told, playing the role of a perfect wife: obedient, quiet, industrious. She only did what she was told, only spoke when spoken to, and worked hard to make her husband's life comfortable.

The pain kept recurring after the first night, and she took no pleasure in the act that seemed to bring her husband so much satisfaction. After the first week of lying there and enduring his attentions, he started getting rougher with her, probably out of frustration.

Rishid watched her from a distance, watching the way she moved and seeing every wince and ache. He never asked her about the occasional bruise that she couldn't hide with her apparel, but whenever her eyes met his, she could see that he was angry and that he understood more than she'd ever be willing to tell him.

Ahkmenes died when he was bitten by a venomous snake while working. At the memorial, Ishizu stood beside her elder brother, her hair loose and unkempt, her knees caked with dirt, and her eyes red and puffy from crying. She'd wept with relief as soon as she heard the news, and everyone assumed that she was grieving. She wouldn't correct them.

"It was an unfortunate accident," Rishid murmured under his breath. Ishizu glanced up at her brother's expression of quiet rage, her breath sticking in her throat. He turned his head to look at her, and something in his eyes sent a shiver down Ishizu's spine.

"Yes, an accident," she whispered back, nodding slightly.

She would keep his secret.

Marik, standing on her other side, drew her attention when his smaller hand slipped into hers. Ishizu held his hand tightly to reassure him, since this was Marik's first encounter with death.

Seven months ago...

It had only been a few days since her sixteen-week pregnancy had miscarried, and Ishizu still felt the loss like a fresh wound. Even if she hated her husband, she loved her child, and Ishizu still wept on behalf of that little life she would never get to know.

If her husband had supported her emotionally, she might have been able to handle her grief. Ahmed had actually been kind to her at first. Then it had become clear that she was pregnant by her previous husband, Nassim (who'd been mauled to death by a hippopotamus while he was fishing), and Ahmed had become cold to her. He still provided for her, but there was so much that she had to do for herself that she wished someone had helped her with.

Ishizu had hoped that Ahmed might see the child when it was born and still claim it as his own, despite the fact that they'd only been married three months and she was halfway to term. He'd just been starting to come around to the idea of having a child, even though he hadn't fathered it. It meant that he wouldn't have to wait as long for one of his own, which he saw as an advantage.

Ishizu had been filled with happiness, anxiety, and anticipation ever since she found out, and while she couldn't share those things with Ahmed, she could share those things with her brothers, who'd been happy for her, happy enough that she could stay positive too.

Then, the miscarriage. The cramps had been paralyzingly painful, and when she'd started to bleed, she'd called for Rishid. She relied on him more than anyone else. He was her big brother, the one who'd always looked out for her, even with the distance that had been forced between them for so long, even though her father treated him like a slave.

When she'd panicked at the sudden flow of blood, Rishid had let her squeeze his hand and carried her to the midwife for aid. When the loss of the baby was confirmed, Rishid had held Ishizu as she cried. While she was still distraught and unable to think, he had drawn a bath for her and then guarded the doorway so she could bathe privately.

A few days had passed since then, and Ishizu still felt awful. As if she didn't already feel terrible enough, Ahmed and her father had both been angry when they found out. Ahmed had blamed her for the miscarriage, accused her of causing it on purpose, which Ishizu denied frantically, but to no avail.

Curled up in her lonely bed with her grief and her pain, feeling alienated even from her own altered, battered body, Ishizu was struggling to cling to her hope that this would come to an end one day. She didn't just hope, she knew it would happen, she reminded herself. The Millennium Necklace had shown her, and she trusted it. She trusted Isis.

She wasn't the only one suffering, she reminded herself. Even now, he was being beaten too. He was being raped too. Some day, for both of them, the pain would end, she reminded herself. It would end. Then she would no longer have to look into Marik's innocent eyes and tell him lies about how kind her husbands were and how well she felt and how happy she was.

As she was lost in her own mind, trying to find some sort of inner peace, a spirit appeared in her room. One moment she was alone, then she blinked, and a transparent robed man stood in the center of her room, his cloudy blue eyes fixed on her with a steady gaze.

She sat up quickly, feeling apprehensive. She wasn't sure what she ought to say, so she was relieved when he spoke first.

"Hello, my name is Shadi. You are the chosen bearer of the Millennium Necklace. Your time to claim it has not yet come, but you have been chosen for more than that."

"What do you mean?"

"I will lead a man to you," Shadi continued calmly. "A man named Pegasus. He has created tablets for the Egyptian gods of ancient times. They are far too powerful, far too dangerous to be released into the world. You must guard them. It is your duty to protect them from those who would misuse them."

"I can't be caught," Ishizu murmured anxiously, and Shadi nodded in understanding.

"Fear not. I have already arranged the meeting on your behalf and no one from your clan will know."

"Thank you. I won't disappoint you."

"Be on your guard. I will return soon to lead you." With those parting words, Shadi vanished. Ishizu was grateful for the apparition's appearance; it gave her a new sense of purpose now that motherhood was no longer on the horizon.

Author Notes: Every reference to time ("Twelve years ago," etc.) is in relation to the current place in time in the story, which is almost a week from where we left off in S1.

As far as Ishizu's life (and all the Ishtars) goes, I incorporated a lot of sad-but-true things about both modern and ancient Egypt to make it both realistic and angsty.

Hippos kill more humans in Africa per year than any other mammal. They may be vegetarians, but, oxymoronically enough, they're aggressive vegetarians.

Please review and follow if you want to see what happens next! I will post the next chapter when I get 4 REVIEWS, and it's already finished, so review now because I want to post it!