Disclaimer – Series belongs to Kazuki Takahashi, not me. Though Amane mostly seems to belong to the fans…

Pairings – None.

Characters – Amane Bakura, Ryou Bakura.

Notes - I set my dA favourites to random and decided to write a drabble about whatever came up. A photo of an owl turned up. The story is based pre-YGO when the characters are younger and Ryou still lives with his family. That home is presumed to be in England for the story. The version of Amane used is based on the one used by Scribbler in her story – The Voice of the Past That Will Always Be.

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It was to be said that quaint little villages out in the middle of the countryside and cut off from civilisation were a thing of the past. It would be considered cliché to think of a village fitting that description to have an old, homely manor belonging to a wealthy family who had been there for generations. And even worse to imagine a rickety old church, loved by the people but decayed from age.

The thing about these quaint little villages was that they didn't change much with time. People may consider them to be mostly fictional but this was because they only heard about them in books, they didn't see them with their own eyes. However, Amane did see this village with her own eyes. She was a young girl and had never known anything other than this village. To her the manor was a home and the church was part of the scenery.

…Although not so much part of the scenery at the moment, but home to something that she considered to be very important. This something was an owl. She knew there was one there because she heard it hooting at night. It always made scary stories seem just that bit scarier.

Though she wasn't interested in the owl because of some tale of ghosts that children told. The reason she wanted to see the owl was much more practical.

Her class was doing a project to do with nature. She was barely out of the first year so around this time the teachers choose to give their students generic projects that would be easy for them to do and encourage them to go outside. Nature was a favourite topic of theirs, it meant that the students could collect leaves from the garden or draw pictures of fluffy animals – really not much work was expected of them.

But just doing what all the other children were doing did not satisfy Amane; she wanted to go that one step further. In her hands she held a large, clunky looking camera. It was her fathers and she had taken it without asking. She didn't know much about cameras but she thought she'd heard her dad refer to it as… a Polaroid, was it? She wasn't really sure. All she knew was that when he took photos with it a little frame with a black box would come out and after a while the picture would appear. She was very proud of it; no one else had a camera like that.

…She did want to get it back before she got into any trouble for taking it though.

After looking up at the church for a few moments she pushed the heavy door open and walked inside. It was empty, even the vicar wasn't around at this time of day. She walked inside, looking around from the tall ceiling to the colourfully decorated windows. Amane had always loved coming here; it was so unlike any of the other buildings in the village. Although the manor was probably a bit bigger than the church there was just something about the presence of being here that made her feel in awe of it.

However, she knew right now that what she should be looking at was the alter at the back. The ceiling was much lower there. She thought the owl would probably have made its nest higher up but if she was lucky she might just see it there.

The rafters were too tall for her to reach though, even back there. The only way up was to stand on the large cushion by the alter and pull herself onto a diagonal beam that connected to the rafters higher up. She didn't think to be scared of what she was doing, why was there any reason to be scared of such a place?

Someone, however, was scared for her. A girl who knew no fear needed an older brother who would fear on her behalf. Ryou Bakura was that older brother.

He was known for being a responsible boy despite his short years. Responsible boys tended to notice when their younger sisters went away for more than half an hour.

Ryou had trailed around the village for a while now and was getting more nervous by the moment. He'd called on several of the other children from her class but none of them had seen her. They all just answered the door with blank faces, handheld games consoles in their fists – the school project forgotten. Ryou blamed himself really. They were all so use to him being overprotective of Amane that they probably weren't taking him seriously anymore.

The church hadn't even crossed his mind until he was heading back out of the village. He looked at it from the gate for a moment then decided that he'd tried everywhere else so this place was worth a look too. Even though the church was open to the public he felt bad about entering it without asking.

Walking gingerly through into the main building he cupped his hands and called, "Amane?"

"I'm here big brother," She chimed in a singsong voice. But he couldn't see where the voice was coming from. The church echoed too much, it made her sound like a ghost.

Taking another step forward he uttered, "I can't see…" And had to stop that sentence before it was finished, because he had seen her now. She was crawling along the rafters by the alter, waving at him as she went. The thought of his sister being in such a high place almost froze his blood with fear.

"What are you doing here?" Was his new statement, as he ran over to where she was incase she fell.

"Taking photos of the owl," She informed, waving the camera at him. As she did this several Polaroid photos fluttered down from where she was. Ryou inwardly cringed to this, he knew how expensive those films were, and dad would be so cross…

Not nearly as cross as he would be if Amane got hurt because Ryou had been unable to look after her though.

"Can you… come down now…?" He asked, talking slowly to make sure she heard.

"But I didn't get any good photos of the owl!" She protested with a pout, "He's flown away now, but if I wait long enough he might come back."

"If you wait long enough it'll be dark," Ryou tried.

"I'm not scared of the dark," She insisted.

"Dad won't be happy with you," Was the second attempt. She actually considered this for a moment.

"Can't you just tell him I'm re… re-searchi-ing…" She said, having trouble sounding out the long word.

Shaking his head Ryou mumbled, "He'll want to know what sort of research you're doing in the church at night…"

"You're not going to go away until I come down are you?" She sighed.

"Of course not," Ryou answered, he was laughing now, "I could follow you to the ends of the earth to keep you from getting hurt."

"One day I'll be bigger, then I won't need you to look after me!" Amane shot back, standing up on the rafters to show how annoyed she was at his protective attitude.

As she stood a few more photos fell to the ground.

Then Amane fell with them.

People always said Ryou was responsible for his age, except for other kids his age who just thought he was clingy for following Amane around all the time. Ryou didn't know which he agreed with. As he caught his sister from her fall he didn't feel as if he was too clingy for following her around. But as he shivered, clutching her in his grip, he didn't feel responsible either. He just felt like a scared little boy who had almost lost his sister.

He looked down at her; she was probably shocked from the fall. The young girl was spouting tears like he'd never seen her before. She looked up at him; blink them back, and then pointed firmly up at the rafters. There were still photos up there.

It was a good thing Ryou had a large amount of patience. He placed his sister down softly and went up himself, retrieving every last picture he could find.

When he had returned she stood on her feet, sniffing back tears but otherwise not looking any worse for the experience. He held out his hand to her and she firmly took hold of it. Throughout the walk back home she didn't speak at all.

Ryou promised he wouldn't tell dad about what happened, but saying so put a huge weight on his chest. Amane was a brave girl but she was so full of misjudgement. She was too young to understand. That was why she needed a big brother to be there for her. As long as he could Ryou would always be there, watching over her, being the judgement that she lacked. He would not let harm come to his sister. Not ever.