Finally Home

A Yu-Gi-Oh! Arc V one-shot

Summary: After spending several months in prison, Crow is finally free – only thanks to the generosity of the higher-ups, that is. But, he's free . . . and he gets to come home. Third person. Pre-events of Arc V.

Detention Centre – Commons side

The young orange-haired man yawned as the prison guard barked "Let's go, Prisoner 04593."

"Where ya takin' me this time? More outside manual labor? Cleaning duty?" he said, almost mockingly, as he rubbed his eyes. He couldn't sleep well last night, and he was paying for it. He was screwed if they had him do anything other than sit in his cell and occasionally get food.
The prison guard in his freshly-pressed uniform – a guard who looked about to be in his late 30s – coughed and stopped, as if thinking of a cocky retort to say in response to the orange-haired man. Out of all the prisoners in this godforsaken facility, he hated dealing with the orange-haired man with the three criminal marks the most. The blatant disrespect irked him. All the other prisoners pretended to treat him with respect, but not this guy. Maybe it was good that he was delivering the news he had to deliver, but at the same time, he hated the thought of this guy roaming around.
"You're not doing any of the sort today," the guard finally decided to say. "Consider yourself lucky, scum."

The man inside the cell raised an eyebrow at the insult, but he gave no response. It wasn't worth it. He'd been called worse by other guards, anyway. Sighing, he tried to fix his expression in a way to encourage the guard to explain. After his third stint in the Detention Centre, he's learned one thing: you better talk as little as you can and ask questions even less.

This guard, fortunately, was good with nonverbal cues. "You're free to go. Higher-ups decided you've been a good boy, so you get to leave early."

The man still didn't budge nor change expression.

The guard sighed. "I'm not tricking you or anything. Come on, get going! Move!"

With those orders, the man slowly got up from his rock-hard bed and made his way to the entrance of his cell. The guard unlocked it and motioned for him to get behind him, and the man followed him past the rest of the over-crowded cells, full of Commons folk just like him. He immediately looked straight ahead. If he saw any more of them in cells, he would lose his composure and go on a rampage. It wouldn't be the first time.

Both stopped at the heavy metal double doors. The guard scanned the man's face - specifically his markers - with a device, and stopped. He opened his mouth as if to ask something, the inmate noticed, but he thought against it. Instead, he inputted what appeared to be the date and the time. Then, the guard pushed open the doors.

"Crow Hogan of Commons - Section A-45, you're a free man."

It had been his third stint at the Detention Centre, but being thrusted outside after being inside more than fifteen hours for several months never got any easier. The pain of the sun searing through his eyelids, causing his eyeballs to throb – it was always way too much, stepping outside.

This time was no different. But, dammit, he was free. As free as one from Commons could get, anyway.

Crow walked slowly, fighting to see what was in front of him by opening and closing his eyes slowly several times. Rubbing them would make it worse – he learned that last time – so he used all his willpower to send signals to his right arm not to come up. At any rate, he hoped he'd adjust before he accidentally walked onto any roadways and get himself run over. That would be just his luck, wouldn't it?

Within minutes, his eyes managed to adjust, but only inasmuch as he could see blurs. One of the blurs he saw looked a lot like a man with blue, yellow, brown, and gray clothing, sitting on his D-Wheel. The orange-haired man gasped. He came after all!

"Shinji!" he yelled, catching the attention of the blurred figure, who turned and waved. Crow ran up to him, his arm muscles aching to reach out. But, he willed them to stay by his side.

The slightly older man looked up and down at Crow and remarked, "For someone who was in prison for a few months, you sure don't look as much of a mess as I thought you'd be."

"You adjust after a while," Crow shrugged.

Shinji looked at the other man in the face. "And I see they didn't add any new markers to your face."

Crow sighed. "Yeah. Not to my face, anyway."

Shinji let the meaning – or what he thought was the meaning – of his words sink in, and he let out a horrified gasp.

"Wait, don't tell me they started putting criminal markers down there..."

"If by down there, you mean stomach, then they've been doing that forever."

Shinji nervously laughed, causing the newly released inmate to raise an eyebrow.

"What's the deal?"

"It's nothing, nothing at all," he said. Then, he gestured toward his D-Wheel. "Get on. You're going home."

Crow's Residence – Commons

Crow dismounted Shinji's D-Wheel first, holding onto Shinji's shoulders for balance, and stood in front of the entrance of the house. The curtain seemed a little more torn, but everything else looked exactly the same. The toys sprawled to the side, the torn-up, dirty blanket that Crow never got around to washing. Everything was exactly where it was.

He was home. Well, almost.

"Shinji," Crow said as he made his way to the entrance, "the kids okay?"

His companion sighed, getting off his D-Wheel. "All three of them kept asking when you'd be back, even though I kept explaining to them it'd be a while. I tried to keep them occupied with other things, but . . ."

Crow bit his bottom lip, wanting to go inside more than ever to check on them – to see them again. It wasn't like they weren't ever honest with their feelings. After all, they're more honest with their feelings than he ever was. But, he couldn't help but worry about his adopted basically kids, a sense of worry he never had before he met them.

He pushed aside the curtain covering the entrance, immediately hit with and taken over by a wave of nostalgia. The faint smell of tuna mixed in with stale odor of the house instantly set him at ease. He was so taken in by the familiarity that he hadn't noticed Shinji had joined him.

"Home sweet home, huh?" Shinji asked, causing Crow to jump a little.

"Shinji!" he hissed, his response to being startled. Shinji only laughed, throwing an arm around Crow's shoulders, causing Crow to pout. The pout was replaced with a tired smile.

Shinji cupped his free hand, as if he were making a makeshift megaphone, and announced, "Guys, I'm back!"

It didn't take long after Shinji's announcement before Crow saw three smaller figures appear in the doorway past the living room and the kitchen areas. He squinted, his eyesight haven't fully adjusted to the inside lighting yet, but he knew it was them.

He let a soft smile escape and bent down to their level. "I'm home," he said. The three figures immediately sprinted toward him while shouting "Crow!" and rammed into him, almost knocking him to the ground, sobbing. Pulling them closer to him so his chin was resting on the smallest child's shoulder, he let a tear or two escape from his own eyes. Letting go, he looked at the three.

"Have you three been good?" he asked, to which all three of them nodded.

"I finally learned how to make a decent tuna sandwich!" the only girl of the group interjected. "And-and I think I've gotten better at making clothes? But I'm definitely good at making sandwiches now."

Crow reached out and touched the girl's curly red hair, gently smoothing it. "That's great, Amanda. Maybe you can make some for us for dinner tonight," he suggested, but he noticed the other two boys nodding their heads no.

"Oi, Frank, Tanner. Are you guys trying to give Amanda a hard time?"

The smaller of the two boys spoke up. "We're not being mean! Shinji told us we weren't having tuna tonight, so that's why..."

Crow stood up to face him who had taken a few steps back. "Shinji, we – you can't give them sweets as meals every day. We've gone over this -"

"Crow." Shinji interrupted, his voice having dropped.

"What?!"

The light blue and purple-haired man scratched the side of his head. "Just listen for a sec."

Crow crossed his arms. "Oh, I'm all ears, Shinji."

Shinji sighed, motioning with his head towards the three kids who had slowly backed up to the doorway the moment Crow decided to raise his voice. "Look, today's your birthday, isn't it?"

That question broke down all of Crow's defenses. "Eh?"

"Frank and Tanner were in town a few weeks ago – right, guys?" Shinji glanced at the two who nodded. "Happened to pass by the facility you grew up. Frank, why don't you tell Crow the rest?"

Frank took a giant step forward, his hands resting on his hips in a superhero pose. "It's true! We heard some lady talking about you as she was sweeping in front of the entrance, so we decided to talk to her! Well, I decided to talk to her. Tanner was too shy -"

"Fraaaaank!" Tanner cried.

" - so I went up to her and introduced ourselves like you told us. Told her you took care of us. And she was reaaaaally surprised, but she told us she was just thinking that your birthday was in three weeks and was wondering how you were doing. Oh! And she said to tell you hi and to stop by sometime!" Frank continued.

Crow opened his mouth to say something, but the shock of such an event taking place while he was in prison overwhelmed him. So Shinji took the opportunity to jump in.

"I know you don't like anyone making a fuss over you, but the kids and I . . . we didn't want to let today pass without doing something," he explained. "I mean, it's your birthday, for crying out loud. Something we can actually celebrate around here."

"You guys . . ." Crow whispered. The last time anyone really cared about his birthday was back in the facility. He remembered everyone getting together and playing all sorts of games, and everyone had cake, which was definitely a luxury, as sweets were hard to come by. He was one of the few whose birthdays were celebrated because, unlike most in the facility, there were records of his birth, including his birthday.

But, then he aged out of the facility. And outside the facility, no one cared when your birthday was. So he decided his birthday wasn't a big deal. It's just one year closer to death, he decided. That's not worth celebrating.

At least, that's what he thought.

Shinji once again put an arm around Crow, who was trying to swallow a lump in his throat. "Come on, we got a birthday to celebrate."

Shinji, Crow, and the kids all walked to the kitchen area. Shinji asked for the kids help in setting up the dinner, which they eagerly agreed to do. Crow, feeling uncomfortable with all this attention, tried to help out, but Shinji pushed him back in the chair.

"It's your birthday. And you just got out of prison. You're not allowed to work today," Shinji reprimanded him. Crow raised an eyebrow and pouted, causing him to laugh as he went back to preparing food.

In the end, the dinner was composed of just some fruit, bread, beans, half of a chicken Shinji found at some bootleg market, and some sweets like chocolate and bite-size cookies – but, to Crow and the rest, it was a feast they usually couldn't afford to have. As they ate, Crow immediately thought of all the times at the facility when his birthday was celebrated. Those were definitely some of the lights in his dark childhood, if not the best moments of his life.

But, looking up at Frank, Amanda, Tanner, and Shinji, Crow couldn't help but be emotional – a rarity for him. They really were his family and he really cared for them and it's taken him all this time to notice. Before he knew it, he was rubbing his eyes furiously, trying to hide his tears before they noticed. But, it was all for naught – Shinji was the first to notice.

"Crow . . . are you actually . . . crying?" he asked, surprise evident in his voice.

"S-Shut up," the birthday man replied, turning his head.

"It looks like he is, Shinji!" the red-head child exclaimed, standing up in her chair.

"Huh, you're right," Frank and Tanner chimed in, causing Crow's face to feel hot. He was so embarrassed.

"Okay, okay! That's enough," Crow finally spoke up, his eyes still watering. "You guys! This is why I don't like being the center of attention."

The three kids grinned while Shinji got up and walked to where Crow was sitting. The occupant gasped, recognizing the set-up as just like it was in the facility – with the caretaker - "sensei" standing by the birthday child – and everyone else gathered around to sing "happy birthday". He never did quite figure out what it was he was supposed to do as they were singing besides just awkwardly sit there. And even then, in the present, he still didn't know.

The only – and biggest – difference being that in the facility, Crow didn't have a family. But here, he did.

He was finally home.

"Happy birthday to you,

Happy birthday to you,

Happy birthday, Crooooooow,

Happy birthday to you!"