A/N: Written for the GX bingo, the non-flash version, #008 – fantasyshipping.
Childhood Fantasy
Once he'd grown up enough to recognise reality from fantasy, he'd thought he'd never actually meet the Black Magician Girl. Oh, he'd see a girl dressed up in that costume from time to time: some Duel Monsters tournament or the Spirit Festival or something similar, but not the real her.
Then there was the first year at Duel Academia, and the Spirit Festival. And he wasn't sure what he should really think about that because he didn't quite believe, yet, that Juudai saw Duel Monster spirits and not hallucinations or instincts taking physical form or something more explainable like that. And then there were the Seven Stars and Don Zaloog and his gang wound up being cards as well, and Manyjoume came out with the same ability that Juudai had, and he wondered if it really had been the Black Magician Girl that day. But it was too late to think about it, far too late. The Spirit Festival was long past.
Then there was now. Third year. Not very far in. Yubel. The other dimensions.
He hadn't been thinking at all about how he might bump into Dark Magician Girl in one of those dimensions. He was too busy with other things. Juudai. His friends. His life.
And then he runs ran Black Magician Girl with the resistance. With the duellists his brother and Edo rescue from the prison camps. Unsteady on her feet but strong and smiling and taking the food she was offered and going to stand by Queen's Knight near the gates, ready to fight again.
In the end, he didn't get to talk to her, face to face. He left the city when O'Brien goes to face Haou and he only stares at her before that. He's not even sure Black Magician Girl was aware of the gaze. She never looked his way, until he is flying overhead on Kiteroid and that's only because the pair of them mar the otherwise clear grey sky.
And then Black Magician Girl was a tiny speck, and then not even that. And there was only Haou's castle and Ryou and O'brien and Haou and Juudai…
And too many things to think about again.
And by the time he does have the time, when he sits under the sun of Duel Academia and holds his still unended vigil, the other worlds are all gone. Juudai and Ryou are gone as well. All he has is memories, and things to think about. And so he remembers that glimpse of Black Magician Girl. So he remembers the lost opportunity.
But that's okay, he thinks. He doesn't regret it. It can't. There were more important things that a childhood fantasy to chase after: his brother, his best friend, all those friends they'd manage to lose and then regain – and this was the end result. The two most important people in his life were gone. After all of that.
But he can still think it's a shame they never spoke, that he never put those childhood feelings to rest, that he now probably never will. Because lightning doesn't strike three times and he's seen her twice already. He probably won't meet her again.
He's grow up now anyway. Love isn't the image of the Black Magician Girl. Love is what he feels for his family, for his friends, for Ryou, for Juudai. Love is being able to stand next to them despite the blood on their hands and the dark stains on their souls – and the reciprocal is also true. They'll do the same for him. They would have done the same for him, but they're not here now. The Black Magician Girl has her own friends, her own lores: in that world and as a spirit in this one as well. Even as a card, there's the Black Magician, and the other spellcasters, and Mutou Yugi…
Still, he would have liked the chance to get to know her, if only to put that childhood fantasy to rest.