Angst is real. That's all I say. Of course, I should also barricade myself in a room so any people mad that I...you know what? Just read, and you'll find out.
Review...please?
His eyes were flashing so many colors.
"Please...just this one favor, Yuzu...I can't hold him back forever..."
Turquoise, glittering and beautiful, as clear as the ocean.
"Yuzu..."
Pink, narrow and sharp, as deadly as poisonous flowers.
"Do..."
Grey, warm and cold at the same time, shining like polished steel.
"It..."
Red, vibrant and yet glassy, as vivaciously red as blood.
She recognizes all of them, even if they aren't her memories.
The turquoise to a boy with bright yellow bangs and an omnipresent aura of hyperactivity.
The pink to a boy with purple strands of hair and a psychotic outlook on life.
The grey to a boy with spiky purple hair that only wants to protect those he loves.
The red to a boy with floppy green/red bangs who only wants everyone to smile.
Now, their faces are combined into one, their eyes swirling before hers, that red-eyed boy back once more. His voice is weak and strained, the expression on his face tortured as he fights against someone none of them can see.
But she's met who he's fighting before.
The heartbreaking bit? He's calling her Yuzu. The name of one of her counterparts, the name of a girl whose life she took to make her own revive. As if Yuzu was the one standing before him, not herself.
Then it's Rin. Ruri. The only name not called is Serena.
Somewhere in her subconscious, other voices reply, feminine and filled with concern and worry.
Yuuya, Yuuto, Yuugo, are you okay?
"Yuzu...please..." those crimson eyes take on a unholy shine, his expression twisting back into anger as Zarc fights through the barriers the boy has tried so hard to keep up, along with his own counterparts. "Plea-stop- do it-shut up!"
A hand that Zarc controls shoots out to slap her face, and she uses her newfound agility to backflip away, landing on two feet a safe distance away from the conflicted boy. His eyes flash to cold grey, and the expression in them is pure torture. Turquoise holds pain, while pink is of uncertainty.
Then the color returns to normal crimson red, and the boy is back, pushing down Zarc and reaching out to her with a shaking hand. His fingers are streaked in blood, fiery and daunting.
"Please...the...cards...agh......Yuzu..."
Yuzu again. The other two...had they submitted?
No! Two voices, crying in unison, each believing in the strength of their beloved partner.
Her eyes dart to the string around his neck.
The beautiful blue crystal of his silver and blue pendulum is splattered in red, and there's a visible crack along the stone. But it's still shining, helping the boy along in pushing the monster in him back.
Light of Hope.
Assisting.
Stopping.
With shaking hands, she takes the four spells from her thigh pouch and fans them out in her hand, the shining pink blade of her duel disk biting her peripheral vision. These cards could split Zarc, but the four would just be split again, still able to get together and fuse.
This time, she would not be revived. Zarc may be forever immortal after his fusing stunt, but she wasn't. Her body couldn't take so much strain.
She wouldn't be able to stop him. Whatever the red-eyed boy was thinking, it would eradicate the demon for good.
Said boy falls to his knees, eyes continuing to cycle through the four colors as they begin to fade into the deadly gold of the Supreme Dragon King. His hand is still outstretched, a pleading expression overtaking the anger on his face, as his multi-colored eyes meet hers.
"You're...still as...beautiful...as ever..." he whispers, though she's not sure who is in control anymore. "...Ray..."
Her surprise is palpable at the mention of her name, but when she looks at him, his lips are pulled into the smallest of smiles. It's so, so small, but a smile nonetheless.
It's her Zarc, the one that had 'died' when he'd started injuring fellow duelists in his duels. He's back, through the kindness of his reincarnations, and she doesn't care if this is the last time she'll be alive anymore. If she gets to spend it with her Zarc, that's good enough for her.
She squeezes her eyes shut, tears threatening to fall, before walking forward and pressing the cards into the boy's hand, ignoring the cries of her father in the background.
The last thing she remembers is his smile.
...
Sunlight casts its warm rays upon the backs of the unconscious people cast around the rubble of the destroyed roof, their bodies splattered with blood, grime, dirt, and water droplets that are most likely from tears.
The most noticeable people are four teenage boys, curled into positions that suggest that they're asleep. Their bodies are covered in more blood than anyone else's, along with black ash spread in a fine layer across their skin.
Then next to each boy is a teenage girl, also unconscious. A form of golden dust is sparkling in the sunlight all over their bodies, thick in places where they should've been covered in blood, the bright colors of their hair melding in to form a pleasant sight.
For hours, the area is completely silent, a drastic change to the environment before.
The one who stirs first is a young boy, his light blue hoodie sliced beyond repair and multiple cuts bleeding along his arms. His duel disk is cracked along the glass, screen display flickering on and off.
He opens his bright blue eyes slowly, blinking to adjust to the sunlight, before scrambling up into a sitting position to survey the room. His wide eyes land on the form of an unusually tall teenager crumpled by a cracked marble column, and he crawls over to him, ignoring the pain flaring up in his knees.
"Nii-sama!"
At his cry, more than one person stirs. The person whom the cry is directed at does, as well as one of the girls collapsed by the boys. One with dark purple hair and beautiful eyes the color of pink roses, her clothes ripped and torn even more than usual.
She, like the younger boy, takes a while to adjust to the sunlight streaming in the collapsed ceiling, before scrambling to her feet and analyzing her surroundings. Her hair is coming undone, tangling in with her movements, and she ignores the pesky strands as she turns and finds the boys lying next to her.
A small yelp is heard as she drops to her knees by the side of the boy with spiky lavender hair, her hands shaking his shoulders as an attempt to wake him. After a few tries, his eyes crack open.
"Yuuto!" she breathes in relief.
His grey irises become lighter in the sunlight, going from steel grey to a warmer shade. They fill with the same ecstatic feeling as he sees the girl he's been searching for for so long right next to him.
"Ruri..." he sighs, a weak hand reaching up to brush her cheek. Then his eyes widen. "...have you checked on the others?"
Ruri jolts, having completely forgotten about the other boys. Fortunately, when she had been trying to get Yuuto awake, Rin had woken and was now tending to Yuugo, said boy groaning with an arm over his eyes as he lies on his back.
"Rin's awake and is tending to Yuugo," she says to Yuuto, the boy struggling to sit up. Livid purple bruises dot his neck and back, where he (as Zarc) had slammed into a concrete wall when Ray had activated her first spell card, before handing them to Yuuya. Yuugo has the same bruises, and upon inspection, so do Yuuri and Yuuya.
Yuuto manages to a sitting position and leans against the concrete shards of the fallen roof, sunlight bathing his face in its warmth. Blood is splattered across his arm, and his fingers brush the red liquid across the palette that is his skin absentmindedly, also disturbing the black ash all over his body.
Then he takes a good look at the girl sitting across from him, and his eyebrows furrow. "Hey, Ruri...why is there gold dust on your skin?"
Ruri takes a self-conscious glance at herself, a soft pink blush dusting her cheeks. "I don't know...why don't you rest here? I'll go wake Serena and Yuzu."
Rin leads Yuugo over and plunks the Synchro duelist down next to Yuuto, who gives him a tired look as Ruri stands to wake the other girls.
Yuugo sighs and places an ash-covered glove on the Xyz duelist's knee, Yuuto flinching in surprise as his instincts from the Resistance kick in. "I'm sorry for 'killing' you back then with Clear Wing...if only I had known about this entire mess with Zarc."
Recovering from his temporary petrification, Yuuto covers Yuugo's hand with his own, the silver studs of his wristband dulled by the ash. "It's fine, Yuugo. None of us knew."
The now-somber Synchro duelist sighs, dipping his head. "Still..."
Ruri's voice interrupts them, high-pitched and filled with fear. "Hey, Yuzu?"
The pink-haired girl, now awake, turns to Ruri, who is kneeling with a hand on a certain Entertainment duelist's shoulders. "Yeah?"
"Yuuya...I think he's nearly gone."
"What!?"
"He held Zarc back the longest, remember? He was the one who fused himself, Zarc, and the cards, and pushed out the other three before they could intervene. It's thanks to Yuuya that Yuuto, Yuugo, and Yuuri escaped with the injuries they have."
Yuzu drops everything and rushes over to her childhood friend. His eyes are halfway open, bloodshot and faded, and his fingers are weakly clutched around his cracked pendulum. One of his legs is twisted awkwardly, and there's a deep gash leaking blood on his chest. When he sees her, he can only manage the smallest smile she's ever seen on his face.
"Yu...zu," he whispers. The same black ash on the other boys' bodies is on his, in a thicker coat and prominent where he's bleeding.
"Shhh, Yuuya, you'll be fine," she croaks back, her throat dry.
"You...kn...ow...I...won't...be," Yuuya coughs, blood dripping down his chin. Multiple cuts line his face where Zarc had probably clawed him when they were fighting, and the purple bruises Yuuto, Yuugo, and Yuuri all have are vivider on his unnaturally pale skin.
Shadows fall over them, and a quick glance confirms them to be Yuuto, Yuugo, and Yuuri, the latter looking slightly uncomfortable and covered in blood.
Yuuto drops to his knees on the opposite side of Yuuya, facing Yuzu, as he uses his legs a support to prop the injured boy up. Living in the boy's body had told him how fragile he was, thin and lean with nothing but skin on bones as his wiry frame.
Yuuya probably knew he was too weak to hold Zarc back physically, but still, he had refused help and had done it himself, pushing himself to the brink of death in the process.
Yuuya coughs again, and this time, blood comes out of his mouth and mixes in with the splatters on his chin.
"No..." Yuugo's voice trails off as he stares with horrified turquoise eyes at Yuuya.
Yuuri can't do anything but stare, eyes unblinking as he takes in the scene.
"Please..." sobs Yuzu. "Please...no..."
Yuuya's fingers let go of his pendulum and find Yuzu's, clenching them as tightly as he can in his weakened state. His eyes are fluttering now, straining to keep open, as their fingers intertwine together, pale against vibrant.
"Yuzu..."
"Here, Yuuya," three voices say.
It's Yuuto, Yuugo, and Yuuri, their eyes glowing faintly as each of them presses a hand onto Yuuya, as if to lend him their strength for his last moments.
Yuuya smiles, faintly. "Thank you..."
The boys can only nod, Yuuto's eyes filling with tears that were so scarce during their return to Heartland. Yuugo squeezes his own eyes shut, and Yuuri clearly doesn't know what to think.
"Yuzu...I'm sorry..."
Yuzu blinks back tears as she tightens her grip on his fingers.
"And..."
His eyes flicker shut as he breathes out his last words in a whisper she has to strain to hear.
"I...love you..."
And as she desperately reaches for him, his hand goes limp in hers.
Yuuto, Yuugo, and Yuuri take their own hands away, Yuuto's tears falling as Ruri attempts to comfort him. The female Kurosaki never knew Yuuya that well, and so, no tears fall from her.
"Thank you, Yuuya," says a quiet voice. Yuuri, not wanting to let the boy's sacrifice go without expressing his thanks. "And..."
In unison, Yuuto, Yuugo, and Yuuri whisper the last word.
"Goodbye."
None of them notice the pendulum lying on his chest, or the blue-star printed lense on his goggles.
In the complete silence of grief, they crack.
Sorry, not sorry.
If you guys haven't figured it out yet, the name is taken from the fifth ending theme of ARC-V. This is based off the ending lyric of the chorus, which, translated, is:
"Because for you, you are my vision."
I flip-flopped it so that for Yuzu, Yuuya is her vision, and now he's dead.
Hence the "impossible".
Okay, let me go before anyone tries to kill me!