Summary: (Takes place during the Waking The Dragons saga, after the train wreck). Yami is hurt after the train fell over the cliff, and is disillusioned with his purpose. Téa tries with all her might to make the disheartened Pharaoh see otherwise, but will she succeed?

Note: When Raphael calls Yami a 'dog', I know, he did not actually call him that in the series. It was just placed into my little story foryour entertainment. Sorry for the confusion!

Rated: T

Disclaimer: I do not own Yu-Gi-Oh!

A Bowl of Stars

The thunder rolled down from the mountains with a sound that pierced Téa's soul, who sat nearly cross-legged on the sand outside the tent, brushing the dust from her hair and listening to the fretful chorus that closed out the day and opened a chilly summer night. She realized somewhere along her third or fourth flinch, courtesy of the thunder that roared ravenously in the desert, that she had been chaste as a young lady, too timid for the rites of that boys seemed to need and, absent of a mother, too far outside the game to learn, let alone win.

But there was one male that wouldn't let her lose. A certain gentleman who inhabited the body of her longtime childhood friend and she couldn't understand why exactly, but…he made her feel like a woman, conscious of her curvature and statuesque figure with early morning sunlight that poured in through one of the many Domino High School classroom windows. The brunette could remember it like yesterday; the chloroform that unhinged her from both the world and her senses and left her sodden on the cold, tiled floors; the man, Kurkano, with his greasy, roughly formed hands, stained with lies and conceit, whom had placed her there.

And…

The man who had made his second stage debut in saving her, winning her heart over again. The crisp morning brought with it a fresh forecast of rain, and a pink sheet of autumn sky, in all its beautiful glory, bearing down on both of them –he, who stood away from her, covered in thick clothing by the darkness, and she, helpless on the floor. She marveled in the way the late moonlight spilled over him to reveal a darkly handsome phenomenon. Her heart ached when his long fingers, cool like a blast of winter frost, left her face, aching because she couldn't conjure up the physical strength to thank him; her eyes cried when he turned casually on his heels and exited through the classroom's door.

That was their strange dance: she, twirling herself into danger, and he, the partner that caught her at the grand finale. She reveled in (though not intentionally) keeping him all to herself; Joey, Tristan nor any of her seasonal friends knew about this darker, yet radiant entity. It kept her up nights, going to bed with him all over her mind and waking up even deeper in her pool of love for him than the night before. And though it caused her much grief to believe that not only did Yugi harbor feelings for her, and that her feelings were more suppressed in certain quarters of their relationship than his were, Téa had made up her mind to admire the Spirit thoroughly.

Téa dropped her head in shame. How could she not thank him? Even now, as he lay in the tent, offended in many physical areas of his body and bitterly gripes like a cat protectively licking its wounds, how could she not thank him? There was something about him that made the young aspiring dancer smitten with him. She thought, at first, it was his startling good looks and deep sensual voice that sent her heart pounding like a crush-stricken schoolgirl whenever he was within one hundred feet of her five senses. The aroma that he carried, salty cinnamon with a touch of coconut breathed life into her; his touch was enough to send her to Heaven; the sound of his voice poured itself down her spine like milk chocolate wrapped in a velvet scarf, his footsteps – soft and yet demanding – baffled her well-trained ear; his eyes made her his willing prisoner every time she looked into them.

She was certain that her crush on him, between their first unorthodox meeting and now, was evolving into deep love.

And that scared her.

He was a standoffish person, able to sear his eyes into you until it burned your very soul out of you like ectoplasm. His signature move, Mind Crush, was the graveyard for dark, corrupted hearts, though he hadn't employed it as of late. Come to think of it, her injured savior hadn't called upon any of his shadow power at all. It wasn't to say that he would send her into a dark abyss if she professed her love for him –he wouldn't– but his quiet rejection amounted to the same thing in her book.

And quite frankly, she preferred to be Mind Crush(ed) than heartedly rejected.

Sighing in defeat, Téa entered the tent with a cloth, newly damp with water from a nearby oasis. Her cerulean eyes looked up sheepishly at her crush, who laid several feet away from her. The sight of him now asleep before her made her feel both euphoric and deeply unsettled. Happy, because he let his guard down enough to rest; unsettled, because the expression he wore to sleep was one of self-hate, as if fighting off an incoming nightmare from the windows of his mind. His half-nakedness startled her, even, though she had seen him with his navy uniform jacket off quite a few times. Asleep in the late light, contracting the same sensation of the texture of the cool sheet against his skin, she felt as jarred as a butterfly wastefully from a dulled-colored cocoon and with no inkling where to fly. Looking at him in a state of vulnerability like this was enough to bring her to her knees.

She kicked herself mentally for having awakened him, for as soon as she stepped into their tiny tent, those cerise orbs that matched the color of the oncoming sunset –that stole her heart ages ago, fluttered open and looked at her weakly before peering up at the rag ceiling.

It amazed Téa how quickly she could lose control. His presence filled the petite tent, she felt distracted trying to say anything to him. Stammering over her own thoughts, eyes ricocheting off every solid thing but him, she wasn't used to his company helpless before her. The cabin possessed only a single mat with thick brown carpets covering him, separating him from the sand beneath him. A pot of water boiled beside him, as Tea had prepared a fire for him earlier to keep him warm when the night with its cold friends and blistery attitude swept in and settled in uninvited.

"Hey, Pharaoh," the girl nervously pressed on, "how are you feeling?"

"Fine." He answered in his quiet way, avoiding her eyes and finding a particular interest in the tattered tent instead. Téa sat at his side, with her fluorescent smile tickling the corners of her lips. She waited a moment before brushing the golden bangs from his forehead and in its place, put the cloth upon his head. He wasn't ill –Téa knew that– but she did not the promise of it plaguing her Pharaoh. He had too much to deal with already; saving the world from Dartz, a universally misinformed king, the threat of Leviathan an oversized serpent, the Orichalos which resembled closely the Nazi symbol she saw in her history book at school, and getting Yugi back. Being ill was almost like an insult to his capabilities; it just didn't fit in with him and the entire situation they were in.

The Pharaoh pummeled her thoughts. The flesh of his forearm was touching hers, whispering secrets neither of them knew about. She was brought back hard into her body, almost like jumping back into own body and waking up from a dream before you realize your spirit's gone. Did he know that the touch of his naked flesh on her own stimulated the power of wild nature of the desert; it was that wildly distracting to her, primal. What caused human touch to be the cure? Was it being stuck in a remote desert after surviving a catastrophic accident that triggered it? She didn't know why, but Téa was becoming deeply attracted to his presence, his arm licking hers reassuringly. Well, at least she took it to be reassuring.

"It's raining," the Pharaoh spoke silently, and he said nothing more. His eyes watched the rainwater firing wet bullets at their tent. For the first time, Téa noticed it too.

"Yeah," Téa agreed softly, though she kept her gazing riveted on his beautifully sculptured face, watched how his dark eyelashes elegantly kissed the bone of his porcelain-like skin. Her body tingled with the anticipation of the rain evoking some new conversation between them and she was ready to keep it going. "It's so relaxing. I remember this one time when actually danced to the beat of the rain." She giggled a little, feeling the heat stretching along the tips of her ears, "I called it the 'rain dance'."

The Pharaoh was quiet, contemplating either the rain or her exposition of it –she did not know, but he wasn't answering her. Matter of fact, Téa hadn't been entirely sure if he even knew of her presence, co-existing with him in their tiny shelter these past few minutes that dragged by so slowly it felt as if time itself were slowing down. That saddened her, got her to rub her arm apprehensively and fiddle with the hem of her skirt a bit, too.

"Well, I should let you rest." Her tone was an octave sadder than when she greeted him. "We have a long walk ahead of us tomorrow." She stood up slowly then, looking outside at the light she could almost see gathering itself for the nighttime, the wind burgeoning between the damp sand. Téa was sad. Sad because their time alone produced a feeling as dry as ten day-old un-lotioned skin; sad because his reclusiveness only made her, for reasons unknown to even herself, love him all the more.

His voice gently called her back. "In our duel," he started, "he called me a dog." Téa abdominal muscles tensed. It was the hurt in it that made her want to clasp him close to her bosom without even knowing why. She turned around, sadness dripping from her eyes like a leak in the dark corners of the wine cellar. Their bodies glittered in the fire light the portable hearth provided. Tension was suspended in the air, like a man, strung by the neck.

"Who called you a dog?" Téa said disbelievingly, her heart on her tongue. She had taken her place beside him again, not believing someone had the audacity to compare her crush to a potentially ruthless animal.

"Raphael." He spoke almost as if the words erupted pain within him. Téa stroked him with her eyes, taking in his injured form.

"Why?" Téa asked with equal disbelief as her last question.

"I was callous towards my monsters in our duel," he explained quietly, supported by the light from the fire. "Instead of being loyal to them, I was ruthless…I obeyed the darkness of the Orichalcos. Like a dog, I bit at its hold over me at first" his eyes narrowed at the darkness, "but then I let its dark aura pet me, until I yielded…like a dog would."

Téa could imagine such verbal carelessness. She was speechless, still shocked by his comparison to a dog. Coming back from someplace he had been mentally, he moved his crimson eyes to her face for the first time. "Téa, do you think I am…a dog?"

"Pharaoh, no," she said reproachfully, leaning in, "of course I don't." She studied a drop of water that hung from his earlobe (probably from the damp cloth). "I don't know who this Raphael person is, but he doesn't know you at all."

"But I was ruthless, Téa." The pharaoh protested submissively, as if he knew the reason he failed some test. "I bore fangs at my monsters, and I paid for it with Yugi's soul." Speaking aloud of Yugi had brought him into their tent. Their eyes dropped from each other's, knowing well the weight that named carried with it.

"I say you're not a dog, Pharaoh." She flashed him her fieriest smile. "I mean it."

The Spirit looked away from her then, bringing his hand up to observe it in wonder. "I just thought that…perhaps, I had become evil –"

"No, don't say that, Pharaoh." The brunette subconsciously brought her hand up to his, pressing them together. The thought of his association with the word frightened her. "Please? I know…you can be ruthless, Pharaoh, with you being Yugi's darker half and all…and having shadow power, but that doesn't mean that you're a ruthless person." The Spirit eyes widened for a moment and a half before regarding her with still eyes.

"I'm…not?" He asked timidly, afraid to hear the answer.

The girl shook her head feverishly. "You're the kindest man I know! You're so caring, and concerned even when others don't want you to be. You risk your life for everyone; over and over again…You're…"

He tilted his head at her, following the trail a rising blush left across her face. He felt her hand intertwine with his own. "I'm what?" He inquired simply. What he saw next made the hairs on the back of his neck stand straight in allegiance.

For Téa had smiled. It was a smile that melted the steel wall around him, a smile that only she could give without looking contemptuous and spiteful. She poured her heart into her smiles and gave it lovingly to her friends to drink up every time. That made something inside him grow warm all over. That, he appreciated. "You're awesome." He couldn't understand why she was blushing. Was she ill?

He looked at their connected fingers, studying them as if they had been an ancient artifact. He felt the moistness coming from her hand. Placing his weight on his free hand, the Pharaoh propped himself up, bringing his face close to her own. Téa's blush only darkened.

"Are you all right, Téa? You look flushed." The pharaoh examined further, trying to determine if her sudden rosiness was merely a trick of the light. "Perhaps you should lie do-"

Téa laughed off her anxiety, and gently pushed him back down into the blankets. "No, no, I'm fine, really. I just think…you don't know what you mean to everyone…what you mean to me." she trailed off, looking down sadly.

The pharaoh looked at her curiously. "What did you say, Téa? I couldn't hear you over the rain." Again, she smiled, shaking her head.

"I said, you should lie back down. That duel with Weevil, and the train wreck. I know that took a lot of you. Rest now, o.k.?"

He silently nodded, transfixed on her face. "Tea, remember when I told you that I was 'fine' when you asked me how I was feeling earlier?"

"Yes," Téa answered, slightly confused about the question's origins.

"Well…I'm afraid I wasn't being honest with you. I was feeling lost, as if I been fooling myself into believing that I had been good instead of being evil, forever chained to the darkness in my heart." He looked at her, the first buddings of a smile blossoming in his lips. "But you told me that I was good; that it was I who had the darkness chained inside me, not the other way around. And for that, I am forever grateful to you."

The blush that consumed Téa's face was enough to make her cry. The Spirit had never open with his thoughts and feelings around anyone –even Yugi- and here he was, telling her how he felt. Téa was touched enough to feel like crying.

She flashed him a friendly wink. "I didn't tell you anything you didn't already know, Pharaoh. I only reminded you."

"You were right about the rain, before." The Pharaoh returned to his reclusive disposition. "The music it makes is enchanting. I feel…better." He looked down amazingly at himself. Téa smiled in agreement, loving the expression on his face, wanting to hold him close to her as he fell asleep from the notes of the rain. "I think I would like to see your 'rain dance', Téa." He said thoughtfully.

The teen blushed deeply, and smiled. Blushing, laughing, smiling –were these the children of love between two people? "Sure. But you won't be seeing anything for a while but the back of your eyelids, young man." Téa playfully scorned with a smirk on her lips. "You need to sleep. And just so you do that," she said, getting up, missing the complete childlike look on her Pharaoh's face, "I'm going to leave you alone."

"Into the rain?" The Pharaoh asked confusedly.

"Don't worry. Chris' tent is just a few feet over. I'll be back over to check on you later." She hated herself for having to leave him, but she knew he wouldn't sleep with her presence flooding the tent. His protective spirit and intuitive instincts wouldn't allow him, too. Being with him wouldn't give him the rest he so badly needed…and deserved.

She began to move outside the tent when she stopped dead in her tracks. There was something tugging at her heart, refusing her from walking out the door. It was something she was so overdue for, if it had been a library book, she would have had a fine as large as a continent. Téa brought herself to face her secret love once more who bore a perplexed look on his own face. He said he was grateful to me...she thought, Perhaps I could...

She didn't know what was overcoming her. Maybe it was his helpless that pried at her sympathy; perhaps it was his large, intense eyes, overwhelmingly beautiful before her that pricked her heart; or maybe it was the glaringly obvious fact that they, male and female, were alone in a desert -save for Chris and Ironheart and Sky. Nothing but the walls of the tent was paying them exclusive attention.

"Pharaoh," the girl started surprised more than usual by her timidity towards him. "I was wondering…if I could…if-if- you would let me…" she looked up at his blasted handsome face marked up with concern for her. "…kiss you goodnight."

There was a silence that stunned them both in the midst of a summer night, plugged with rainfall and nervousness and teen anxiety. A kiss? What in the world was she thinking? Here she was, taking full advantage of his current conditions, his emotions as vulnerable a newborn baby. His mind was caught up in the throes of saving the world and his partner; not in the throes of passion.

It was quite obvious. She had not been thinking at all.

The Pharaoh was looking at her mysteriously, his face, as usual, unable to be read in any language. But his slight nod baffled her. Did he just say yes? He was alarmingly quiet around her, now, and Téa knew it was her own fault. She caused this…this barrier between them, again, the one she clobbered so hard to bring down. And know she was stuck with his eccentric permission to kiss him.

She approached him, trying to offer him a pleasant smile in apology for the awkward request. She hovered over him, perched on one hand while the other occupied his cheek. Taking care not to harm him further, she leaned in and touched his soft, full lips with her own. She had thought about the act over and over in her mind, practiced it even, but she never thought they would be sharing it right now, in the solace of the rain and desert sand. She was partly discouraged, given his position and Yugi's own feelings for her. But she was thirsty for his love.

The Pharaoh kept his eyes open as she kissed him, slipping a gasp of surprise when her sensitive lips met his. He wasn't aware a kiss goodnight meant direct contact of the lips. He, himself, had been thinking the cheek or perhaps the forehead. Watching her pour her soul into this sacred human act was nearly as painful as losing Yugi to the Orichalcos. He knew of the feelings Yugi had for Téa, but there was nothing he could do about it now as he had tried to discourage her before. From his peripheral vision he thought he saw Chris peek her head inside to check in on them, but blushingly shut the moonlight out once she saw their sacred and forbidden act. There was a tremble in her lips; shuddering on his own. Her eyes portrayed her crying. Was she scared that he hadn't been returning her kiss?

But he did kiss back.

Craning his neck forward ever so slightly, he maneuvered his lips to fully fit hers. This time, it was Téa's turn to gasp and a blush was climbing the smooth, white slope of her neck. They let each other in for these long moments in time, kissing each other's sorrows and pains away. A strand of Téa hair let itself between their lips, and the Pharaoh let his finger casually pull it away and neatly pressing it behind her ear. They kissed for a long time. "Don't love me, Téa" he said firmly into her mouth as they kissed, the words sticking funnily in his throat, who gave a soft womanly moan when he reconnected their lips again. "You can't do it."

The rain cried, begging them to stop this irrational passion. This silly appetite for love was merely a stimulant of the lonely impulse, it protested, beating louder on their tent.

He didn't know if she had heeded his words, or if she was even coherent enough to hear them, but he could sense that she wanted a little more from him. Placing a shaky hand on his hard chest, it politely brought his head back down to the pillows, her lips chasing after his tender flesh as she pushed him down; she moaned again when his lips smacked hers involuntarily. Téa's hair swept across his face as she caressed him with her lips, trying her best to kill his words that still sat in her mouth. The Pharaoh, though much less convincing to them both, raised his hand and placed it awkwardly on her shoulder and tried to get them to stop.

But between the long walk tomorrow, and the heart-wrenching events that devastated them in the past, they needed this.

The Pharaoh tried his tactic of talking into her mouth, again, every time he tried, she pecked his lips and clasped her hands on both sides of his face tenderly, trying to get him to shut up. Kissing him harder, each time successfully eliciting a small rumble from his throat that sent shivers down her spine. She wanted him to know that it was okay to feel scared, lost, vulnerable…like a failure. She wanted him to know that she loved him every time he told her not to; she would make him believe that before she was through.

Kissing him was like eating a bowl of stars, each conversation the lips had was like she was swallowing stars; warm but making her stomach explode and drop lower in her abdomen. Eventually, his hand slipped from her shoulder and fell back down to the sand, causing the fire to cackle a bit. She felt him smile a bit against her lips, admitting his defeat.

Against her deepest wishes, Téa pulled slowly away from him, and looked at him darkly from behind her bangs. She had won the battle between them. Now, though breathing heavily, she towered triumphantly over the only man she would ever be in love with and watched affectionately at how he panted deeply, placing a slender hand over his chest, his eyes closed. Seeing him like that only made her want to conquer him all over again. The cloth had slid from his forehead, feeling embarrassed that it had intruded on their time alone.

Téa brushed his luscious bangs from his face, rubbing the tender flesh under them. Somehow, his touched soothed his breathing. His eyes averted from hers, looking sideways at the pot of water. Neither of them knew what to say to each other in the thickened twilight. Téa sat looking at the exquisite planes of his face and wondered what mixtures of hate and anger and sorrow resided within him, in what dimensions. She was apparently untroubled by her own recovering heart.

"Téa," the Pharaoh began quietly, afraid to cause the fire to anger again, "we should not have done that."

"I know." The girl replied, softly smiling.

"So why did we do it?" His voice grew a shade deeper, his eyes looking questioningly at the fire.

"Because we needed it, Yami." She tried the name on her tongue, and savored it. It was the first she had used it since their first "date".

"Doing this to me," the pharaoh said, touching his lips and secretly he sighed blissfully, "isn't going to bring Yugi back."

"I was hoping it would bring you back to me." Téa answered hurtfully, clutching her heart and looking away in agony. What have I done? He hates me now…

The pharaoh looked at her, sensing the terror she was going through. His rugged individualism, his beauty, his voice –what was it that made her so…crazy about him? It was almost like a sickness.

"I can't hurt Yugi, Téa…" this time, he shredded some of that harshness off his voice. He could never be angry with Téa. In truth, he cared for her far too much. "This…feeling that you have towards me…you must bury it."

He knew, now. No point in hiding it anymore.

"No." She whispered dejectedly. "I won't do it."

Their eyes locked, the pharaoh's looking weary and hurt. "You have to." He gave a raspy cough, then. The pharaoh's eyes bucked lolled around in his head. Téa looked down worriedly at the love of her life, and picked up her water bottle. She propped herself behind him, and placed his head on her bosom, and fed him the water. Surprisingly, he drank it all, giving a soft sigh and something close to a yawn that Téa found absolutely adorable on him as he tucked his head into her breast, causing her to blush yet again.

"This game we played," he spoke to her with a faraway gaze in his crimson eyes, looking peaceful in the solace of her arms. "How did you win, Téa?"

The music of the rain had long put him to sleep before Téa could answer. But she smiled, pulling blankets up around them, and rocking them back and forth slowly. The game of love, Téa had called it many times. There was only one rule to defeating the King of Games who was now asleep on her bosom, letting out a warm shudder. His hot breath tickled her neck a little.

To win the game of love,

You had to be female.

That is it! I hope you enjoyed it! If you didn't like it, no flames please. It has been a while since I have written….I sort of forgotten how to write a little. :P

R&R!