Disclaimer : I don't own Yu-Gi-Oh!, the characters within, or any references mentioned. Shira is copyrighted by me, and remains my creation forevermore.

Chapter 52

Ryou's POV

I looked around at the others, who were well enough on their hands and knees, stable again in the downed helicopter. The gang kept close to one another, looking up at the cabin window that only permitted a blinding light of the desert sun's glare through. Seto was crouching by Anderson, who was shivering next to the sparking controls that flickered their given colours every few seconds. They all seemed to have ignored Shira's called, and she growled to herself, then sighed.

"Must I blow that hunk of junk to kingdom come before you do as I ask? Mind you, I would prefer all of you to be whole than in pieces."

All of them continued to stay where they were, so I decided to be the first. I struggled to my feet, with my wounded shoulder throbbing like made, and I approached the cabin door, still pouring in a burning ray of light through. "Ryou, no," Tea gasped, fearing for my safety, but I wished she didn't. How they distrusted Shira started to annoy me now.

I stood before the door and tried opening it, but it would not. I had noticed that there were places where it was malformed, but I did not suspect that it would interfere with the door's ability to open. My body tensed and my muscles tautened as I tried to pry the door open, but to no success. My next route would have been through the window, but my chances in going through something that resembles a gaping mouth of sharp, serrated, and crooked teeth unscathed seemed thin.

"Hold on, Ryou; the door's dented and jammed itself into the metal of the frame deep. Let me help you."

Suddenly Shira's face appeared on the other side of said window, having jumped up from the desert ground where she resided before. Her left hand came up and grasped the rim, digging her palm into the sharp-edged glass, but she minded not to grasp hard enough to make herself bleed. The absence of her right arms proved that the little stunt she pulled really put a number on her. Her dark wings were still present, allowing her some balance on where she stood on the helicopter. She looked at me, analyzed me a little, then her brows arched upwards slightly.

"You're hurt, Ryou..."

I looked at my shoulder, saw that some of the blood that didn't evaporate from the electricity burn stained my jacket, And the clothing that was supposed to have been there were burnt clean off, leaving behind black ashes and soot. I clutched it in a way to shield it from her view and I smiled at her reassuringly, countering the concern in her eyes. "It's nothing, really," I lied. "I can hardly feel it."

Regardless if I was now able to moderately fend for myself and voice my opinion, I must have been a terrible liar. She saw through my lie and sighed, gesturing me to step back a bit. I did, and she pushed her left arm through to grab onto the door's edge. "Now, Ryou is a shining example of whom all of you should be," she said loudly, addressing everyone behind me. She started tugging on the door gradually, testing the situation, then prepared herself. Before she did so, she closed her eyes and scoffed. "You should know by now that the only interest I hold right now is bringing Tenchi and Adare back. Your lives are none of my concern, but your deaths are. Tenchi wouldn't approve of me killing you all off. She'd kill me."

She yanked hard with a force she didn't appear to have possessed, but I was not surprised, after experiencing what she could do. The door burst open, the frame mauled from the crash and opening, and the sun burst in with a greater force. Shira seemed to have lost her balance a little when the door slid jerkedly open, and so I instinctively came forth and grabbed her arm to provide my support. Her wings that were flapping to regain balance again ceased, then lowered in ease. She laughed softly.

"Thanks, Ryou," she pulled her arm away from both myself and the inside of the helicopter and shuffled a little inside, to keep her footing firm. She smiled gently, then said, "Tenchi's going to cry with joy when we see her. She's lucky to have someone like you."

She jumped back and landed into the sand, which was a meter or two below the door. Shira reached a hand up to help me down, and I accepted it without much thought. I heard Yugi try to warn me, but that was, yet again, unnecessary. Shira got me on the ground safely and without trouble, and nodded her head to the helicopter at me. I understood what she wanted.

"Hey, guys!" I called out to them. "Everything's okay; you can come out now."

It took a while, but they hesitantly emerged. First it was Joey; he looked around the scene with shielded eyes from the sun, then he looked down. Both Shira and I extended our left arms, for both our rights were wounded. Joey obviously reached down for mine first, but was wary as he looked at Shira's. He reached for it though, and the both of us helped him land on the ground. Shira allowed him to let go of her hand quickly, and she didn't look hurt by his haste. She only turned for the next one to drop, and that was Tristan.

The passengers came down, one by one. Tristan's behaviour was similar to Joey's, Tea was frightened of Shira and trembled under our touch, and Yugi was a little nervous but come through naturally. It was with Yami that Shira stepped away, offering Joey her place to help. Her face was grim, and she adverted her eyes away from the helicopter entirely as she headed away from the wreck. I then realized that my yami, Bakura, was flying toward us, looking rather clumsy as a dot in the sky.

I helped Yami down, and he thanked me under his breath. "Watch your surroundings," he added quietly. "I still feel the unease she provides."

My jaw tightened, but I nodded. I finally accepted that it was his problem whether or not he trusted Shira. It was his resolution, not mine.

Then came Anderson, and finally Seto. He glared at the form of Shira on the sand dune before them, muttering dark curses under his breath. I blocked them out, now directing my attention to Shira and the now-visible Bakura. My breath caught in my throat once I saw him... his image was absolutely what his soul was to me.

Up close, it was rather eerie to see him with wings; they were dark, demonic, flapping loudly to catch the air in the membranes. A genuine demon in the sands of the Sahara... His black trenchcoat added to the touch, and there was something about him that said... 'powerful'. Must have been the power that allowed him this ability to grow wings and fly.

His image was rather thwarted when he caught the air wrong close to the ground and plummeted to earth, out of my view and behind the sand dune Shira stood on. I saw the sand spew up from his collision, and I saw Shira double back with laughter, bending over and clutching her sides, with her wings spread wide and jerking with her body. My own mouth stretched into a smile, and I went to climb up the dune to join her and see what was going on. The gang sent me looks of warning when I passed them, but I nodded to them to show that I would be careful — regardless if I thought it was not needed. I heard Shira holler down to Bakura with mirth.

"I thought with the distance I left you with, you'd get a little practice flying!"

"You've never taught me how to land, idiot!" Bakura snarled back, seething, behind the sand dune. "And why the hell did you just shoot out like that? You didn't have to take down a whole helicopter manually! Look at your arm!"

"Of all the fake sincerities, was that concern I heard in your voice?" Shira reached for her useless arm and searched around. Then she concluded; "It's just dislocated, a minor injury this body can withstand. And of course I had to take that contraption down! It would have given us away to the enemy! Riknim is no different than us in terms of power, and if we were within his sensing range..."

"Alright, fine. But now what will we do with these useless—?" At that moment, Bakura surfaced over the sand dune, dusting himself of the sand that gotten everywhere. He lifted his face to glare at Shira, but his eyes flicked to see me standing not too far away, listening in on their conversation. His eyes darkened when he saw me, clearly not happy to see a 'weakling', perhaps.

"Fools?" He finished his question.

"I'll fix the helicopter back to normal," she said casually. She suddenly grabbed her arm and forced the bone back into place; a rather queer sight. She groaned with pleasure and tested her arm out, lifting it for the first time after she stopped the helicopter. Cracks ensued, then she addressed Bakura, still not showing her awareness of my presence. "Taking it down manually was an impulsive decision, a 'spur of the moment'. Once it's up and running again, they're going to go back to Cairo and wait."

"No, we're not!" I burst out. Shira looked at me over her shoulder, now staring at me with expressionless eyes. I continued to climb the dune to join them, and I addressed Shira respectively, where I ignored Bakura's scowl. I raised my hands out to her beseechingly. "I want to go to Tenchi, and help you save her! Please, I want to help you!"

"It's going to be too dangerous for a commoner like you," Shira put down upon him firmly. "What will Tenchi do when she discovers you died trying to save her?"

"I'm not going to die," I countered. "Nothing's going to stop me in reaching her. Nothing. She's just too important to me to pass up, and dying will just make matters worse, for both her and myself. I don't want to leave her in pain, so I'm not going to let some bastards either kill me or her! And I'm not going to let Adare die, either!"

Shira's eyes showed a flicker of interest, perhaps no doubt either surprised or impressed by my new behaviour. "As I've said," Shira repeated nevertheless, "you're a commoner, Ryou. In contrast, Bakura and I are summoners... or Bakura a substitute one, anyway." Here, Bakura growled at the word, 'substitute'. Perhaps he didn't like the idea of submitting and losing this new power he held. "Bakura and I can take care of everything. We'll rescue Tenchi and Adare, get out, and meet you in Japan, if not Cairo."

I had no idea on what to say to oppose this, and it was a little quiet. I stared at the sandy ground for a moment, then looked up at her, appealing. It just did not feel right to me; I felt like I was abandoning Tenchi and Adare by not coming to help. "I want to help," I whispered with desperation.

Shira's head tilted, considering, while Bakura's head jerked, rolling his eyes. "Give it a rest, you love-sick brat," he snapped, stepping forward menacingly. "There's no need for a worthless, weak fool like you to accompany us."

"... not worthless, nor weak," Shira mused, earning a fiery leer from the white-haired demon. "Neither is he a fool. I suppose... he can come with us."

I knew my face brightened, as it did so with my mood and spirit. She smiled at my expression, a complete contrast with Bakura's expression of anger.

"Why?" he asked, taking another step toward me, but more so closer to Shira. He threw his arm up and pointed to me in a disregarding manner. "Look at him! What's he got to offer?"

"Help."

"And what good is that help to us?"

"Listen, Bakura, just lay off him," Shira barked at him, turning her smile into a teeth-bearing snarl. She glared at him darkly, and stepped away from him. " If we leave him behind, he'll just try to follow, and Ra-Knows-What will happen in response. Let the boy chase after the one he loves. You would do the same if your lover was in trouble. Then again... you have none."

"Now give me my knife."

Bakura's expression turned murderous after Shira's grave warning, but his brows rose a little at her demand. "Your knife?"

"Yeah, the one that you picked up after I dropped it at the hotel. Hasani's knife, or the hijacker's knife, or whichever one it was. Give it to me."

"What for?" Bakura said elusively.

"Ryou's wounded," Shira said, staring at my shoulder. My mind puzzled at why she needed a knife, but I didn't dare question. "I need the knife for this."

My yami halted, but took it from his coat. He dropped it hilt-wise into Shira's open palm promptly, and her long fingers curled around it as she walked toward me. "Uncover your shoulder and show me your wound," she ordered of me.

I slowly obeyed, wincing ever so slightly as I tried maneuvering and unveiling my right shoulder. It burned with a strong irritation that I couldn't hide, and when I looked at it, my stomach churned uneasily. From the pictures I had seen in Biology class, my shoulder was incased by a third-degree burn, the worst of cases. I had small hollows of webbed tissue, which explained the blood the seeped out and stained my shirt and jacket. The colours made me sick, ranging from a putrid yellow to a sick green, where the edges of the burn were an irritating red, orange, and black. No wonder the pain was unspeakable, and I was surprised I was still alive. However, I was fatigued, and this only meant that I was beginning to suffer for the wound.

Shira's brows furrowed, and I was surprised to see that she didn't shudder from the look of it. When I expected that she would use the knife somehow on me, I did not expect her to do something upon herself.

With the knife she acquired from Bakura, she grabbed the sharp edge of the blade with her other hand and sliced her palm, devastating her tendons. Her face twisted in pain, a natural reaction, but she did not let that control her. My mouth gaped in shock, and I stood still as she reached with her injured hand — one with a deep, agonizing-looking line that bled profusely — to touch my severe burn. At contact, everything burst into a dazzling, light-blue flame, licking our flesh. The fire had no heat, and it felt delightful and soothing. At first I wanted to step away out of the flames, but Shira held me firm with a hand that should have been ineffective in gripping so strongly. As suddenly as it lit ablaze, it died in dwindling sparks, leaving nothing behind.

I stared at my shoulder, totally bewildered. It was clean, bare, healed when Shira took her hand away. The only reminder of which the burn existed were the dried blood splotches and scorched holes in my clothing. I glimpsed her palm to see it pale and purified, not a trace of the wound that ravaged her tendons left behind. In hurting herself, she healed both of us.

"Was that truly necessary?" Bakura said, arms crossed, but undoubtably surprised. Shira cleaned the knife with a torn rag she had in her jeans pocket, seeming unfazed and oblivious.

"I can't heal another person other than myself, sadly," she sighed regretfully. "Serpentine's bond with me only allowed so, after I learned to heal on my own. The only way I can distribute the flames if I self-inflict my own flesh for another."

"And he's worth the pain, I presume?" my yami accused coldly, staring me down. I rolled my clothing over my shoulder again and tried my best to withstand his fierce gaze. Shira finished cleaning the knife, held it so the blade pressed against her wrist and forearm, and said cooly;

"More so than you."

This certainly pissed Bakura off, since his knuckles burned white as he clenched his hands around his inner elbows and his whole body tautened as his eyes darkened in hate. He glowered at Shira's back as Shira approached me, placed her hand on my back, and guided me down the sand dune toward the others.

I looked up at her as we walked down, and she smiled at me warmly. "Th-Thank you," I voiced gratefully. "I... I don't know how I could ever repay you."

"No charge for my hikari's sweetheart, I assure you," she chuckled. "I still remember the times Tenchi and I had spent with you."

Upon hearing that, I realized at last that I must had been showing my affection for Tenchi to Shira some of the time, and it made me feel a little disloyal. She saw my expression, and shook her head.

"The fault of disloyalty is not yours, but mine. And the fault of disloyalty with Tenchi and the presence of Bakura is not hers, but his. That, however, is in the past. Here," she handed the knife to me, hilt pointed at me, and continued, "You'll need this to protect yourself, Tenchi and Adare when Bakura and I aren't around."

I aversely took the knife — the one that I saw, with my own eyes, slice Shira's hand and bring forth scarlet —, and slid it into the loop of my pants. Then we came down to the temporary camp, where everyone watched Shira with watchful eyes.

"Anyone have injuries that need looking at?" I inquired, taking on as Shira's representative, since I knew she needed it. When no one answered, I believed them, and nodded to Shira. She nodded in turn, thanking me softly, and she stepped forward.

"Does anyone want to guess as to why I almost killed all of you?" Shira encouraged, folding her hands behind her back comfortably. "Any reason besides the one that questions my sanity?"

"That's the only reason that goes through my mind," Seto snapped, leering. "I'm sure it's the only reason."

"Don't test me, Seth," Shira warned unkindly. "Just one look at you makes me want to prove that reason true. But it isn't. The reason is because I wanted to stop you from doing something absolutely stupid."

No one responded, so she continued on, "Bakura and I heard you ever-so-clearly, even from the distance behind you took as a precaution. With that logic, Riknim would have heard you at the enemy's base when you would still be at a great distance from him, and by the time you arrive, he would have reinforcements and kill every single one of you without mercy, nor consideration. What then of Tenchi and Adare, if you all failed in rescuing them?"

The gang looked amongst each other, and Anderson looked up at his boss for any input. Seto continued to watch Shira with his icy eyes.

"If you came, you would foil my efforts in saving them. Then Zorc will win, and the whole world will fall to his might."

She then advanced toward the helicopter's wreck and entered it with a jump which covered the more than accessible height. She briefly looked behind her, then she disappeared in the shadows of the wreck.

"What does she think she's doing?" Seto muttered, brows taking on a skeptical arch. "What can she possibly—?"

The door they had exited, the one that had clearly been mauled in the crash, closed smoothly, steel shining as if untouched.

Before their eyes, the helicopter assembled, like a puzzle; pieces that were lost in the crash sought out the foundation from the surrounding sands, and everything seemed to fit in as it should. The sand itself flew up, grain by grain, and glazed together to replace the glass that shattered to oblivion not too long ago. Even the main propeller returned like a wheel, and with a shot of electricity upon impact, it spun on its axis at the top of the helicopter. Finally, there stood their ticket out of that sea of fire, almost unaffected.

"Almost like something straight out of Transformers," Joey whistled to Tristan, in awe. Tristan nodded with an audible gulp. The dust the helicopter picked up shifted through the area they stood in airborne, and soon it settled as the propeller died calmly. The door opened and Shira stumbled out, almost landing flat on her face if not catching her balance before touching the ground. She swayed a little, eyes a little distant, but she shook it off and her eyes resumed their fiery focus.

"Now then," she coughed and scratched her throat. "You will not follow. I just restored your means of transportation so you may return back, not to follow. Understood? I don't want to have to break you."

"Break us?" Seto snorted, clearly ignoring the performance. Either he had memory loss and had missed the example of 'magic', or he was not impressed, which was a little improbable.

"Dear Priest, you can't expect me to be merciful a second, can you?"

He glared, and she simply walked past, heading over to me and beckoning me to follow her to Bakura. "We will see you in Cairo!" she bid farewell.

"Wait, what are you doing? Where's Ryou going?" Atemu interjected, surprised at the scene of me leaving. Before he could continue, I gave him a look that I hoped showed my thoughts. Leave it be. I'm going with them. I'll be fine.

Though, that is a complex thing to put entirely in one look, but it had seemed that Atemu got my message, and backed down. Shira walked on as if she didn't hear him in the first place, and at last we came to Bakura, who was staring off into the desert grimly. His eyes turned darkly upon Shira.

"Have fun with K'NEX?" he asked casually. Shira ignored the childish reference and nodded her head in my direction in indication.

"Will you be able to carry him?"

Bakura's nostrils flared, and Shira seemed to have second thoughts.

"I be beggin' yer pardon, sir. I admit, a stupid question. Not only are you inexperienced, but I would think you'd drop him. Alright, you go on and start leading the way, and I'll be right behind you soon."

He wordlessly glared at me, fire burning in those cold brown eyes that he stole and manipulated from me, and he jumped powerfully into the air as he brought his dark wings down, propelling him into the air and further. He was certainly getting good, but he was still a little ungraceful. Shira looked to me and smiled, a mischievous light entering her eyes.

"He's just jealous."

He faltered in the air and looked over his shoulder, leering at her threateningly. She waved her hand with a forced smile on her lips, then it wasn't forced anymore when she turned to me. She tilted her head in silent contemplation, eyes sizing me up.

"Now, how to carry you...?"

I stood still as she walked around me, searching for some sort of solution. It didn't take long, for I felt her arms encircle my chest from behind, one hand clutching her other wrist in a lock. I didn't notice, but she was hovering when she did so, and she lifted me off the ground, making my stomach make a flip. "Will you last like this?" she whispered in my ear. I nodded when I didn't feel any ache against gravity, and she grunted with approval. She turned me to face the others down the dune, and I waved, trying to counter each of their worried and annoyed expressions --- Seto's was obviously the annoyed one --- with my own reassuring one, and then Shira set out with me into the desert sun, closing in on where Bakura was flying. His path would lead to wherever Tenchi and Adare were.

I felt the anxiety, and as we flew, I gripped the dagger Shira had given me. Don't worry Tenchi, Adare; I'm coming, too. You will be safe.

Tenchi...

End of Chapter

Vixen: For the life of me, how long has this update been in my Document Manager?.

Shira: Who knows?

Bakura: You were just too damn-lazy to update!

Vixen: I'm sorry! ;.;

Star: She really is. XD Well, I hope she is (

Vixen: I AAAAAAAAAAAAAAM!

Shira: Than she is X3 Well, please review; she would greatly appreciate it, I think.

Vixen: When do I don't? 3 Just tell me what you think~ And hopefully the next chapter won't take me long!