Disclaimer: Not mine.
Warnings: YAOI, and a tiny lime that I doubt even counts as a lime
Notes: Personally, I enjoyed writing this a lot. I hope you like it too.
Please read and review.
#&#&#
To Be Chosen#&#&#
Well, here I am. Yugi Motou, champion of Duelist Kingdom and Battle City, Seto Kaiba's greatest rival, king of all games, wielder of the mighty Millennium Puzzle!
You'd never have thought Yugi'd have anything to be unhappy about, because Yugi has it all. He's kind, generous, courageous, strong, the perfect role model! I'm almost disgusted with myself.
For I am the 'chosen one,' the one destined to collect the Sennen Items and save the world! That's . I'm useless, clumsy, and a hindrance to all around me. Those titles were so superficial.
The media would collapse or explode if they ever saw the adjectives I wrote to describe myself now. Hurt, lonely, lost, selfish, worthless, unloved, wrathful.
They can never know how it feels to be me. No one can. I hate it. I hate it with every shred of my being.
Now that I've tired of entering tournaments, where are my fans? Now that I'm alone and in need, where are all those that claimed to love me?
The answer is simple. They've left this world
And after two hundred years, you can only expect them to have done so. My glory days are over, forgotten, swept away with the passage of time, and Duel Monsters has long faded.
What am I still doing in this Game Shop after two hundred years, you ask? I am immortal. It is my curse, my punishment for daring to love the darkness.
My yami? He's long gone. Gone back to Egypt, to where he always belonged with Bakura.
It was the Christmas that so many things changed. Our last Christmas together, about two centuries ago now.
On the Eve before, I had just gotten home from a party with my friends, when I saw Grandpa quietly walking upstairs, a faint smile on his face. I asked him what had happened, and he looked at me.
"I found it fit to smile, because two lost souls have finally found peace." And with that he disappeared into his bedroom, a small inclination of his head indicating the family room.
I walked inside, and never could have been prepared for the sight before me. In a way...it was beautiful, though I did not see it as so at the time.
Both my dark side and Ryou's lay naked on the carpet in front of the crackling fireplace, Bakura on top of Yami. I have never seen a greater expression of bliss than that which the spirit of the Puzzle wore, tears of pure happiness running down his cheeks as the thief thrust into him a final time before lowering down onto his chest and softly kissing him.
Yami's arms wrapped around Bakura as he kissed back with a content completeness that I have never felt for myself, and the Ring spirit's face held an expression I had never seen upon it before. Joy. And thus Pharaoh and Tomb Robber became practically one; a love inseparable through lust or anger, scorn or jealousy, death or immortality.
Both of them left us a few months later, together, and I cried.
How could I stop them? I had never told Yami that I was in love with him. And wasn't Bakura, a lowly thief who had loved a Pharaoh in vain for three thousand years, much more worthy than I?
On that dark night in Egypt, as the portal to the past was opening, I did the only thing I could to show my undying love. I offered to trade him a mortal life, so that he could live out his days and die in peace with Bakura at his side. I offered him my own happiness, in exchange for the promise that he wouldn't forget me.
I think Yami realized how I felt about him, before the end. Right before he disappeared, he kissed my lips and a tear slid down his cheek.
I know I'll never see him again.
That's little Yugi's pathetic tale of his one and only love, one that wouldn't even make the back page of the tabloids anymore.
I still have my cold copy of the Puzzle, and even now as I gaze out this window into the snow, it hangs around my neck. All the other Items...I am not aware of their whereabouts, but it doesn't matter. No one else can wield them.
The Domino City suburbs have severely declined in light of the past years, while the inner city has become the height of technological advances. Funny how that worked out. I guess the mayor simply forgot about us; is there even anything important to remember?
Yugi's reflection in the cracked glass looks strikingly similar to his reflection's appearance those many years ago, looking at this very same window.
I have never aged, on the outside anyway. My clothes have changed their style, my face is worn and gaunt, and my hair is more jagged, but I'm still the same Yugi Motou everyone knew and, supposedly, loved. But now I cannot keep personal relationships with anyone for more than a few years.
I know that they'll die anyway, eventually, and leave me behind, alone once again. Just like everyone else did.
I remember when Jou died. The funeral was so sad, and everyone's tears were pouring down their faces in grief. He had only been twenty-eight, and still in his prime, but then his father escaped from jail and found him...it was awful. The small, dark church was completely quiet and remorseful...until the bearers started to close the coffin lid.
The very moment that Honda moved to place his hand on it, none other than Seto Kaiba burst through the doors at the back of the church. I was shocked when he sprinted past me, pale as a ghost, and slapped Hiroto's hand away.
He took a look inside the coffin and a strangled cry escaped his lips. I had never seen Kaiba so much as shed a tear before, but he just out of nowhere broke down and hefted Jonouchi's torso into his arms. I remember him clutching Katsuya to himself and crying his eyes out.
The next day, the CEO of Kaiba Corporation committed suicide and left a note to request that we lay him next to 'his one and only puppy,' side by side in the coffin. I never knew he loved Jou, but then again...somehow, I always did.
We wept for them both.
And thus the years went by, steadily worsening life as Kaiba Corporation declined and pulled funding out of schools and government. Mokuba tried his best to get the company back on his feet, but didn't succeed. I missed him a lot when he passed away naturally...his gravestone is right next to his brother's and Jou's in this very backyard (Katsuya always said that if he could stay somewhere forever, it would be at my house), which also contains many other graves.
My story was never a happy one.
The Duel Monsters manufacturing companies closed and were bulldozed to make room for more apartments, and Otogi moved into the empty, glorious Kaiba Corp. building when Dungeon Dice Monsters became the next big hit.
Without Kaiba's company to aid its marketing, Industrial Illusions collapsed. I wasn't surprised when I heard Pegasus give a speech on National TV, ceding his fortune to Egyptian archaeological expeditions and announcing that he was putting himself to sleep and having his body frozen, just for fun.
I was glad for him. He got to see his wife again.
It was around that time that I, the 'great' Yugi Motou, lost my interest in games.
My life had become a chain reaction of tragedies. A few years after DDM reached its height, Otogi was poisoned by a fanatic who had a problem with his orientation. That was the day before he was scheduled to get married to Honda. Hiroto was suffocated by the same maniac the day after.
I bet you never expected me to be saying this; any of it. I bet you thought I lived in a perfect world, with exciting adventures and vast fame and fortune all the day through. Only in my dreams.
After Dungeon Dice Monsters cleared out, a new computer and weapons company moved in, making the inner city as futuristic as possible. I loathe it all.
I don't know what became of Ryou after Bakura left and he got kicked out of his apartment, but I know the Ishtar family moved back to Egypt. They got a place in a tough neighborhood where Malik was raped to death, Marik was arrested and gassed for ruthlessly murdering the rapist, Isis was killed in a drive-by shooting, and Rishid drugged himself up in despair and had a cancer attack.
So much pain...when no wrong had been committed. I don't think any one of my friends died a peaceful death except for Shizuka and Grandpa, Kami-sama bless his soul. Shizuka remained safe with her mother for many years before moving to America and becoming a successful pediatrician. Grandpa passed away when he was ninety, serenely, here in this game shop.
Who am I leaving out in this wonderfully brutal account of my life? Well, there's Anzu...she never became a dancer. Her plane to New York crashed into the ocean because of a malfunctioning turbine. And Mai...Mai bled to death after her wrist was sliced on the movie set of a horror film in India. She had just become an actress and someone switched the knives...oh Ra, the pictures were so horrible...
It hurts to relive this, damnit, but someone has to know.
So I was left, alone and lonely, to live out the rest of Earth's days. Surely you must understand why I'm furious at myself! If only I wasn't weak enough to fall in love with him, this never would have happened...and now I'm crying again.
Of course, Yugi wasn't stupid enough to stay here. No, I have traveled the world in my friends' absence. For decades I went abroad, to Britain, Australia, Mexico, Canada, trying to escape my memories, never able to get up the courage to visit Egypt again.
What would the use be? It had been two hundred years. Yami was dead. There was no point to my life anymore...but because of my damned heart, I still had to linger and live it.
I spent long in America, where looking young for over thirty years is a coveted talent, but I couldn't feel at peace. Everything reminded me of my past; every flick of a dancer's hips, every flash of blonde hair, every trenchcoat billowing in the wind, even every roll of a pair of dice.
I knew I had to go back. It wasn't till about a century after the death of my grandpa that I dared to set foot in Japan again, and I was very surprised when I found the Kame Game Shop still standing.
The neighborhood had changed dramatically; what once was a bright streetlight was a broken, crackling bulb, where once was Domino High School there stood a grungy, abandoned building, decaying with a century of graffiti and lack of upkeep. My entire street was dark and gloomy, the homeless infested alleyways, and murmuring thieves seemed to lurk behind every overflowing trash bin, following me with their merciless, squinted eyes as I walked.
I didn't know what kept them away from the shop when I finally arrived, its sign cracked and sputtering on the dusty roof, creased with stray leaves. The shutters hung crookedly on the moldy plaster walls, and there were several bullet holes in the glass, but I was blind to it all.
Yugi Motou was home.
The front door was locked so I went around the back, and setting my eyes upon the gravestones of my life, however weather-worn and eroded, made my eyes water. There they were. Sixteen in two rows, five marking occupied coffins, the other eleven in loving memory.
There lay Grandpa, his rotting remains no doubt still in overalls and a bandana, then Jou and Kaiba, cold flesh locked forever in the embrace they never got to experience while alive. Then came Mokuba, and Honda and Otogi. The rest were only stone in the ground, but I reverenced them as if the bodies of my dearest friends were indeed beneath my feet. Anzu, Malik, Marik, Isis, Rishid, Mai, Ryou, Shizuka, Pegasus, Bakura, and...Yami...
A sad smile twisted my lips, and I brushed his stone with my fingers for a moment...before shaking myself and turning to the backdoor. It was locked, but I had a key.
Yes, I had carried my house key for two centuries. I guess I was fated to for the very purpose of getting in right then, but I would have broken in anyway.
The house was extremely dark, but I knew my way around by heart. Cobwebs crusted the corners and dust muffled my footsteps, the door creaked behind me labouredly as it swung shut. In the front shop, with the low, distorted light coming in, I could only make out that it was almost completely empty; no doubt looted decades ago. Some random, broken game pieces lay scattered on the floor, and a few monster cards rested haphazardly on the shelves.
I walked over to the front desk and lifted one up, gently blowing the dust off of it. It was a weak card, so no one wanted it. Kuriboh. Closing my eyes, I left and ran up the steps without another word, running into my room and shutting the door. My bed was still there, quilt faded and frayed, pillow lumpy. I threw myself down upon it and let my emotions run free...
And that brings us to where I am now; staring out my skylight window an hour later.
I'm not stupid. I know that this place won't last forever like I will, and that eventually I'll have to leave for good. Why am I still living in the past?! And I'm not saying I regret my decision about Yami, but...gods, I want it back. I want it all back.
Yugi let out a soft wail as bitter tears welled up for the umpteenth time within him, but then he suddenly heard a creak in the hallway. The creak of a footstep.
Sucking in his breath sharply and roughly wiping his eyes, Yugi grabbed his Puzzle in his hands like a ball-and-chain flail, nervously ducking behind his desk. When did someone else come in? Surely he would have heard the door open or the windows shatter...
"Who's there?" A low, threatening voice came from the hallway, the being that it belonged to approaching closer to the door. Yugi scowled. Couldn't he ever have a moment of peace?! He wasn't really that afraid of the intruder; he couldn't die anyway. It was the pain that came from coming back to life that he had no desire to experience once again.
Yugi had attempted suicide multiple times before.
"The owner of this house, that's who's here!" Yugi growled in response. A dark chuckle echoed outside and the door began to swing open, inch by slow inch.
"I own this territory, fool. I suggest you leave before I have to prove it to you."
"No," Yugi snapped. A ticked off grunt was heard before the door was slammed open by a somewhat bony, pale hand. The owner of it lay hidden in the hallway's shadows.
"Come out from behind that piece of wood, you coward," he voice ordered, and Yugi saw the glint of a knife. The amethyst-eyed boy choked in furious exasperation and stood up from behind the desk defiantly, Puzzle in hand and ready to imbed itself into someone's skull.
"This is my game shop, and I am not leaving it until it crumbles beneath my feet!" Yugi seethed, abruptly enraged. After so many years he had finally come back to his home, and no one was about to make him turn around and leave it again. It would be unbearable.
The mystery figure stood in silence for a few tense seconds, and then the blade flashed again as if its owner was preparing to throw it. Yugi braced his every nerve, solely focused on dodging the dagger, but what came next he could never have been prepared for.
"Yugi?"
A thin, willowy frame stepped over the threshold and into his room, a mop of silvery hair and two widened chocolate orbs melting out of the blackness. Yugi's mouth dropped open.
"R-Ryou?"
The boy didn't look a day older than when Yugi had last seen him in Egypt; with torn clothes, a famished body, and longer, more unruly hair, the albino simply looked as if he had been camping for a week and forgot to take food.
"Yugi...oh Ra...Yugi..." Ryou launched himself toward the other as his knees buckled in shock and enveloped him in a crushing embrace, tears streaming down his face. "After all this time—you have no idea what I've been through! How are you here?! What happened?! Have I finally died?! Oh Yugi—!" Ryou crushed his lips against Yugi's unashamedly, so happy was he to see his friend.
Yugi kissed back dazedly, still in shock. So many vivid memories were rushing back to him and bombarding him at the sight of his long-lost friend—Yami, Bakura, the ritual, his high school parties, his dueling glory, everything! He laid in a sobbing Ryou's arms for a long while, mind too overloaded to do anything except drink in the feel of the other's body, the warmth of his skin, the touch of his lips all over Yugi's face...
Much later, the two sat silent upon the floor, cradled in each other's arms, souls brimming with elation.
"Ryou..." I whispered hoarsely, and he hugs me tighter. "How did you...live?"
This is unbelievable. This is...indescribable. I think of Yami's smiling face next to Bakura's, and they unexpectedly fade out and are replaced by a vision of Ryou, breaking down as his yami leaves him forever...
"I loved him," Ryou said softly, his voice thick with tears. "I loved Bakura with all my heart, and the least I could do was give him my mortal life...I assume that's what happened with you and Yami?"
"...Yeah..." I nod vaguely as he starts to slowly rock my body back and forth in his lap. This feels...nice...
"I thought I was going to be in hell forever, wherever I went, so eventually I came back here," Ryou offered forlornly. "It's a rough life. I've become a thief." He smiled wryly through his misery. "I guess it was meant to be. The low voice was just an intimidation technique I've picked up..." My friend trailed off, and started to rub my back soothingly. "You have no idea what your being here means to me," he whispered.
A smile tugs at my lips. "And vice versa."
I can barely believe it. Here I was, thinking I was damned for all eternity, but after everything I've gone through, he's had it worse. We never paid enough attention to him; something I regret fiercely as I look back on it now. He's lived the life of a thief while I've just used what Mokuba left me, never worrying about where I'd find my next meal, what would shelter me from the cold the next night. I know I cannot fathom how long and anguishedly Ryou ached, even before all this, and I disregard my own agony entirely.
To have no life, to love someone that hates you, to be abandoned at such an early age...I nuzzle into his soft, smooth neck, and suddenly realize that I care for him. A lot.
The room falls into a tranquil silence once more, and we stay unmoved for what seems like forever.
Then, "Yugi...will you spend eternity with me?"
I'm not sure how to respond. He and I have nothing but each other as a foundation from now on, and we've both realized it. I know that my heart belongs to my yami, no matter how long gone he is, but...maybe there's a piece left for Ryou.
"Ryou, do you love me?"
Maybe, if I'm lucky, I'll die someday...
"I...I think so, Yugi."
...But...I don't think waiting is going to be so bad anymore.
"...I think I love you, too."
Maybe being chosen...doesn'thave to mean being alone.
#&# OWARI #&#