Author's Note: Whoa...this took longer to finish than I thought. It was a tricky chapter, though...had to set up the plot and all that. (laughs) Hopefully this chapter won't confusing--it jumps around with a lot of different characters. All will be made clear soon enough, so if you have no idea what's going on, don't worry--that's exactly how the story is supposed to be right now! ...yeah, I'm gonna shut up before I dig my grave any deeper. Enjoy the chapter!

Chapter 2: Departures

Yuugi was only at a loss for a moment after realizing that the Millennium Puzzle was lost again. Then, an idea struck him. He didn't know where to search for the Puzzle himself; he needed advice. And as it so happened, he knew someone who owed him a favor...

"Yuugi...thank you."

"For what, Ko?"

"I was Lost even while I was within my own World...maybe I never really knew who I was. But...now that I know that I don't know, there's a chance that I can find out. For this, I am grateful. Someday, when you are alone and in need of help, call me by my name and I will come to aid you. This is my oath; I swear I shall fulfill it."

Yuugi wasn't sure if Ko could help him with this, but at least it was a start. "Ko," he called into the air, feeling a little silly. At least no one was around. "Ko, I need your help!"

Far away--or perhaps close by; time and space did not matter there--something stirred. A vast mind, ruler of an empty realm, guardian of those who could not know that they were guarded. The Eye of the Void...the Master of the Lost.

Who calls...?

"It is him," Ko said. "The one called Yuugi--the one who saved me. You said that you knew him..."

Ah...ah...it is him. He calls...he calls for aid. Go, bring him here.

"Isn't that dangerous?" Ko asked.

He will be safe. The one knows who he is now...and he will never forget it again.

Ko nodded, and left.

"Yuugi...come on. We have to go."

Yuugi spun around and saw Ko standing behind him. "Ko--you came! Thank you so much, I--"

"There's no time," Ko said. "Let's go!" He reached out and grabbed Yuugi's hand.

The world vanished.

Or at least that was how it felt to Yuugi. He opened his eyes slowly and got to his feet. Before was the nebulous void of the Realm of the Lost. But this region of it wasn't so empty--the Eye of the Void was here. Yuugi was careful not to look into it this time. He knew from painful experience that anyone who looked directly at the Eye of the Master of the Lost suffered strange and unpredictable consequences.

What is your need, One?

"Er...you can just call me Yuugi. And I'm...well, I'm looking for something," Yuugi said, feeling terribly awkward.

And you may call me... The Master paused. What could anyone call him? The Lost had no name for him, that was certain.

"Would it be okay if I called you Sir? I mean...you're obviously very old, so you deserve respect..."

If you wish, the Master said. Now...how did this thing become lost?

Yuugi explained the duel with Ryou in brief, not wanting to go into the complicated details of the Shadow Realm and Duel Monsters and ancient Egypt at the moment. He was in too much of a hurry for such a long story, and after all the story really was over three thousand years long. The Master was most interested in the end--the explosion, as it were.

This thing was scattered in the Outside...

"The outside of what?" Yuugi asked.

It is the Outside. The only Outside. The Master wasn't sure how to explain it. He understood the basic concept of the Multiverse's composition, but a detailed explanation was difficult. He had little practice in such things.

"My brother told me about that," Ko said softy. "It's almost a legend, really...but...they say that any time you go between Worlds, you don't go straight from one to the other. Instead, you pass through something else...the Outside. The...the...I don't know how to explain it. I never really understood it in the first place."

Yuugi nodded slowly. "So...so it's all of the space that's not the Worlds?"

"I guess so," Ko said, shrugging.

It is that which is not, the Master said. The Worlds are that which is.

"So how do I get there?" Yuugi asked at once.

No, the Master said. You need not go there. Things are lost there, but they cannot stay there. Instead, they fall into nearby Worlds...

"But that means the Puzzle pieces could be in tons of different Worlds!"

No, the Master said again. I...I remember it, nearly. Long ago, there was a World known as the Found. Things lost between Worlds fell into that World...and I am sure it still exists. It has a different name now. I shall give that name to you.

"...thank you so much," Yuugi said, smiling now. "I...thanks," he finally said again, unable to fully explain just how important this had been, and just how much they had done for him. But it didn't matter. The Master and Ko understood him anyway.

"Hurry, Yuugi," Ko said. "This thing is precious, right? So the longer it's lost, the more likely someone will take it. You must go right away."

Yuugi nodded, his eyes burning with determination. He thanked the two once more and then departed, with Ko's help.

Back in the Shadow World, Yuugi woke up lying in the grass. Ko was nowhere to be seen. Yuugi got up and ran for home as fast as he could.

"Grandpa!" he said as he burst through the door. "I've got to go to another World again, I don't know for how long, but don't be worried I'll be fine!"

Yuugi raced up the stairs to gather everything he would need, with Solomon trailing after him, stunned. "Wait--you what?"

"I have to go to another World to find something," Yuugi said as he threw things in his backpack. In a few minutes, he was ready. "I'll be back as soon as I can."

"But--Yuugi, you can't just go running off to another World!"

"Why not?" Yuugi asked. "It's the start of summer vacation, no one will notice."

"That's not the problem," Solomon replied. "It's just...you keep vanishing like this, and I never know what's happening to you. How can I know you'll be safe? That you'll back at all? If something happened to you, if you needed help, no one would know where to find you."

"...I know, grandpa. But...I have to do this," Yuugi said sadly. Then he thought of something. "Oh--here. I'll write down the gate coordinates for you...then you'll know where I am. If I don't come back, the gang will be able to reach me, they have a gater."

"But..."

"I have to go, grandpa. I can't explain it, but it's important. You have to trust me--please."

The two stood in silence for a moment, facing each other. Then Solomon sighed. "If you say you have to do this, I believe you. Just...be careful, Yuugi."

Yuugi nodded, smiling. "I'm always careful, grandpa!"

"Then be more careful than usual," Solomon said dryly.

Yuugi blushed. "Er...I'll try?" He took out his gating device and prepared to activate it.

"Meow."

Yuugi looked down as Alleybones, his cat, jumped onto his desk. She watched him very intently, and Yuugi had the strange feeling that she wanted him to notice something. She batted a paw at one of his desk drawers, meowing.

Mystified, Yuugi opened the draw and took out a small wooden box. Opening it, he suddenly realized what was in it--this was where he had stored the Key of Aramas, an ancient artifact that Yuugi and his friends had found after a long and difficult search.

"Alleybones, this is the Key. What am I supposed to do with this?"

Alleybones just nudged Yuugi's hand and watched him intently.

"All right, all right," Yuugi said, half-laughing. "I'll take it. Happy now?"
To his surprise, Alleybones nodded and jumped down, probably off to go eat something. Yuugi wasn't sure what that might mean, but he had no time to ponder it. Shoving the key in his pocket, Yuugi activated the gating device and vanished.

-o-o-o-o-o-

A few minutes later, Solomon heard the bell jingle as someone came into the shop. Looking up from his position behind the counter, he saw Joey, Tea, and Tristan walk in.

"Hiya, gramps! Where's Yuugi?" Joey said, waving genially.

Solomon didn't know what to say.

"Is something wrong?" Tea asked, frowning. "Grandpa...where is Yuugi?"

"He's...gone."
"What do you mean, gone?"

"He went to another World," Solomon said. "He went to another World, and he didn't tell me why. He just said it was important."

"What World!?" Joey said, slamming his hands on the counter. "C'mon, gramps--we gotta help him!"

Solomon took a deep breath. Yuugi would be better off if his friends were there to help him...but could Solomon really drag them into a potentially--make that probably--dangerous situation?

"Please, grandpa," Tea said, biting her lip. "We have to find him--he could be in danger!"

Looking into their eyes, Solomon realized that it wasn't his choice at all. They wouldn't give up until he told them how to get wherever Yuugi was. None of them would ever let the others go into danger alone...

Solomon handed over the paper Yuugi had written the gate coordinates on. Joey grabbed it and was about to punch them into his gating device when Tea grabbed his arm.

"Wait--what about Kaiba?"

"What about him?" Joey said.

"Shouldn't he come with us?"

Tristan snorted. "Even if he would agree to come with us, why would we want him to?"

"Because he can help us--he has magic too, strong magic! We might need him!"

"No way!" Joey said.

"No...she's right," Tristan said. "As much as I hate to say it...we need his help."

Joey sighed, but he followed his friends out the door and down the street.

They would find Kaiba. And when they did, they would make him come with them if they had to.

-o-o-o-o-o-

"No."

"But we really need your help! Please, Kaiba, just this once, can't you--"
"No."

Tea sighed. She had known all along that this would be a difficult sell, if they were successful at all. She had never met anyone as stubborn as Kaiba. He had listened to their story with a distinctly bored expression on his face, and had subsequently refused point-blank to have anything to do with it.

"Dammit, Kaiba, you're just askin' to have your scrawny face smashed in!"

"Joey, calm down!" Tristan said, grabbing his friend's arm. "That's not gonna do us any good!"

Kaiba just smirked. "Will you three clowns get out? I have work to do."

"What's going on, big brother?"

Mokuba walked into Seto's office and boosted himself onto his brother's desk chair. He looked curiously at Tea, Joey, and Tristan, who were all glaring at his brother. "What are you guys doing here?"

"Right now, they're annoying me," Seto said sourly.

Tea shot him a dirty look and turned to Mokuba. "We came to ask your brother for help--"

"To beg at my doorstep--" Kaiba interrupted.

"Finding our friend Yuugi," Tea continued more loudly, "because he went to another World and we think he may be in danger."

"Yuugi's in trouble?" Mokuba said, his eyes wide. "Seto, you've gotta help them!"

"What!?"

Mokuba hopped off the chair and ran over to stand next to his brother. "Yuugi's helped us out so many times--he's our friend! There's no way they can do this without you, big brother!"

"Wait a second," Joey said. "We can do it just fine without him!"

Tristan elbowed him in the ribs. "Shut up, man!" he muttered to Joey.

"You heard the mutt," Seto said. "They don't need me."

Mokuba shook his head, fists clenched in fierce devotion. "Of course they need you, Seto! You're the best duelist ever, and you can always figure out a plan. I know you guys will find Yuugi and you'll all be okay as long as you're with them, big brother."

Seto took a deep breath, grimacing. He couldn't refuse those eyes... "...fine. I'll do it. Happy now?"

Mokuba nodded, beaming. Tea gave Joey and Tristan the thumbs-up. "We did it!" she whispered.

"Great," Joey muttered. "Just great."

Tea pulled the gating device out of her pocket. "All right--the coordinates are in. Ready?"

The other three nodded. They all clasped hands, and Tea activated the device.

There was a flash of light, and they were gone.

Alone in the office, Mokuba nodded in satisfaction. "Soon they'll find Yuugi, and do whatever it is they were gonna do, and then they'll come home."

With this reassurance, he dashed off to find his friends and start enjoying the beginning of summer vacation.

-o-o-o-o-o-

It was cold without the suns.

Vice should have been pleased--Darklings were creatures of the night. He was stronger in the darkness, his vision better, his body felt light and easy. The sun beat down on a Darkling like a hammer on a nail, and all too often, the nail bent.

But now Vice wished he could have seen even one of the five suns of Thraael. It was a world with no night, and darkness was abhorrent to it. But darkness reigned now, as it had for far too long.

"How did it get like this?" Matt said, looking up at the overcast skies. They were always so thickly shrouded in smog that the light of the suns couldn't get through.

Vice shrugged. There was no time to tell Matt of the coming of outWorlders, the introduction of new and more efficient farming methods, the rise of industry...the rise of the factories. It had happened in plenty of Worlds, and in plenty of Worlds it had been successful enough. But here no one had ever demanded that the factories become cleaner, healthier, less damaging. Here no one had ever protested pollution. Here no one had demanded laws against child labor, unsafe conditions, long hours.

No one had cared much about the smog at first. What did it matter if there was some grit in the air? It was all to the good. But when the sky is a littler grayer one day, and just a little grayer after that, over and over again...

People don't notice a tree growing. Oh, when it first sprouts they see it shoot right up. But as the years pass, it seems to them that the tree is always the same height. When they realize it has grown larger, it is a surprise. The growth was too slow for them to notice.

It seemed to Vice that smog could be like that too.

"So what's the plan?" Matt asked, jolting Vice out of his thoughts. Vice had asked Matt to accompany him on this mission. They were trying to stop one of the Overlord's agents from destroying Thraael.

"In Thraael, this desert is known as the Heart of Light. In the center, they say there is a great jewel, massive--the Sunstone. Supposedly it contains the essence of the sun, which continues to give Thraael light in spite of the condition of the atmosphere. They're not far wrong--there is a jewel in this desert, of a kind unique to Thraael, that absorbed light from the suns for centuries...it's been radiating that light for a long time."

"But it won't last much longer?" Matt guessed.

Vice nodded. "They're going to destroy it." He smiled bitterly. "We tried to stop them from taking this World long ago. My arochi Kaltan and I...we fought a great battle here. But in the end, it was for nothing...this is a last stand. If we fail now, they have won."

Matt gripped Vice's shoulder, his face set. "Then we won't fail."

Through the shimmering waves of heat that rose from the sands, they saw a massive structure. The Temple of the Sun...it had been built in some past age to house the Sunstone. The gem was visible within it; it was an open structure, more like a great stone garden than a true building.

Before it rose a strange and massive figure. It towered up, over even Matt's head, seven, eight, who knew how many feet. It was impossible to describe its shape; it changed every moment. The thing seemed to be made of some substance as black as tar and as flowing as honey. A smell that was simultaneously sickly sweet and rancid came from it, and everything it touched began to rot and decay. Where it had come from, neither Matt nor Vice knew. If it had a name, it told no one; if it had a home, it never went there.

"That's him," Vice said. "He must not touch the Sunstone."

Matt and Vice ran forward, already drawing weapons. Vice's knives flashed in the light of the Sunstone, Matt's armor materialized around him. The thing turned. It had no face that either of them could recognize, but it apparently could see them well enough. Or smell them. Sense them.

Whatever, Matt thought. It didn't matter--they would stop it.

The thing didn't even try to move as Vice flung his hands out and his knives plunged into its body. They began to crumble at once, consumed in a few minutes by the rest of decades. Matt fired from his armor's custom weapons; the bullets merely disintegrated as Vice's knives had. Vice threw bolts of silver-colored magic at it; they were absorbed.

"How the hell do we stop this thing!?" Matt said, desperately searching for something--anything--that might harm the creature.

It was drawing closer, steadily, without hurry. It oozed toward them, the sand blackening as it passed. Vice and Matt continued to strike at it with their ranged weapons, but it just absorbed them all. Vice was beginning to suspect that neither of them had anything that could kill this creature. He simply didn't know enough about it to figure out its weaknesses.

It was before them. Suddenly, without warning, an appendage shot out from it. The thing had formed a sort of blunt 'arm' from its body, and slammed it into Matt's head.

Matt screamed in pain as his mind boiled as though dipped in acid. He was burning, consumed by fire, melting, being torn apart, he was beyond pain entirely...

"Matt--Matt!"

A voice was calling him. The voice seemed familiar...or did it? It was a stranger's voice. But that was only to be expected--he didn't know anyone called Matt.

Vice caught Matt as he collapsed and frantically tried to wake him. But even the magic of the Last of Ancients wasn't enough.

The creature, meanwhile, turned its attention back to the Sunstone. Entering the temple, it reached out almost lovingly to caress the shining surface of the gem. With a gurgling sigh, the tower of sludge fell onto the polished facets.

Vice heard a sharp crack as the stone shattered. Tears fell from his face as he gathered all his energy for one last spell. He wasn't normally given to showing much emotion, like most Darklings, but these were dire times. Another defeat...another loss to the Overlord. Every day more Worlds fell, and every day there were less people left to fight.

The shards of the Sunstone exploded outwards, flying with lethal force into the desert that had so long housed them. Vice grasped Matt's arm and activated the gating device, fleeing from the destruction. There was nothing more he could do. He had failed.

Behind them, the gate closed on darkness. Night had come to Thraael at last...a night that had no end.

-o-o-o-o-o-

Deep in the fortress of the Overlord, First Lieutenant Gashiru knelt before the great Portal to the realm of his master. He rose and left the room, having paid his respects. It was time to fulfill the orders he had just received.

"Off again, Lieutenant?"

The title was pure mockery when spoken by the Oracle, and Gash knew why; he had allowed the One, the child of the prophecy, to escape. A slave rebellion had happened under his very nose, and he had failed to squelch it before many of the slaves escaped.

And yet he was not in disgrace. So feared and respected was Gash that the blame slid automatically onto others in the minds of the Chaos Soldiers. It seemed impossible that their Lieutenant, their mighty general, could fail.

The Oracle knew better, of course. He had always felt Gash to be weak. But the Overlord still trusted Gash with a most vital task, and naturally the Oracle, the other highest-ranking officer of the Army, was bitter.

"Yes, Oracle," Gash replied stiffly. "New intelligence reports indicate that it may have been located at last...and our master has sent me to find it."

"I hope this task will be a success," the demon said with every appearance of courtesy. But Gash heard the unspoken message--that his last task had been a failure. He was right, and Gash knew it, but he also knew better than to rise to the bait.

"Indeed," was all Gash said. Without another word, he gated out.

He would find it. He would find it, and the Overlord's victory would be assured. That was what he wanted, what he had worked for all along. That was what he had sacrificed everything for...

...wasn't it?