Yuiko.

The impossible child that appeared out of the love of two men. The baby girl who undeniably carried both DNA from father and father- Kaiba and Atem. The two men who were not married, who did not say they loved each other, who did not sleep next to each other after every day's end, who did not eat together when the morning began; the couple that wasn't a couple at all. Yet the couple that possibly loved each other more than any other in a deeply, nearly disturbed sort of fashion.

Did they not also deserve a child? A fruit of their love? Did they even want a child? It was impossible for the two of them to garner a real child of their own.

And yet the child was born and raised by and with the two. Their baby girl.

Where on earth did she come from?

From one point of view, magic.

From another, science.

But it was truly the two combined- one from each parent.

The afterlife was no place for Kaiba, really. Atem would disagree. The two were there whether Kaiba liked it or not, however. The two had lived fulfilling lives. The two had loved and fought and lived side by side. The difference made from this line of life towards the one with the impossible child was the one difference that mattered.

"Pharaoh," Mahaad called Atem's attention.

"Mn?"

"I have reached the furthest stretches of this plane, I think. And there I have seen so many lives not lived- not by you or I, nor your ...other." Sometimes Mahaad still had trouble with the idea of Kaiba, much less the idea that Atem was so entangled in the other's life. The magician cleared his throat to excuse his folly before continuing. "Each one is an existence so original to itself. I cannot explain it. You must come."

Atem looked at the magician with an arched brow. "I don't understand."

"You will if you come see." Mahaad said with confidence.

Atem regarded him for a long moment before nodding. The magician left then but Kaiba was called for. Atem just had a feeling... Kaiba would certainly find some sort of fascination with whatever this was. Magic or science.

The pair followed Mahaad's footsteps for what felt like a thousand years. It was the afterlife, it full well could have been, not that time mattered here any longer- there was no fatigue to be felt. No hunger to be gained. So it was with ease that they did match the man's steps.

Finally they reached what seemed to be an edge of the world. It felt impossible and ominous. Mahaad pressed his hand against the air, laid flat, as if he'd encountered a wall, yet it seemed like eternity still stretched forever. Mahaad pushed harder and the wall began to crack.

"Stop!" Atem warned, suddenly nervous.

Kaiba watched with curiosity.

Mahaad pressed the wall more until it cracked completely. "Do not worry, Pharaoh." He assured. "Step closer. Here. Look." He pointed downwards.

Once Atem and Kaiba moved closer and looked over the edge they saw a swirling black pool. Almost like an infinite galaxy. And yet when one star was inspected closely enough, Atem could see familiar faces, familiar points in time and memories, familiar things. "What is this?"

"...multiverse?" Kaiba questioned so suddenly. It was a crackpot theory, to be sure. And one that never sat right with him. The thought that millions of choices, made or unmade, would inspire and start infinite new universes. All the things he could have accomplished. All the things he could have failed at. No one had a right to be him twice, let alone billions of times over.

"What is that?" Atem questioned, looking up at him. It was easier than looking down on all those points in time.

Kaiba stood at his full height, shifting slightly as he thought. "It's every moment in every point of time where you were faced with a decision. It doesn't matter how great or how trivial, but your answer to it, likewise the answer you didn't pick, and the several others that you could have, spawned countless of other existences that could have happened had you picked something else." A light pause before he turned his head up. "Supposedly. The theory doesn't hold."

"Does it not?" The magician asked. "Look at them all..."

"Countless other existences?" Atem questioned in a small voice. How could one not feel small looking down on all of that? When one was rethinking of every point in time where a choice was made?

There is an existence that could do with your decision here.

The voice was everywhere at once. Soft, gentle, and understanding. Atem recognized it immediately, Kaiba fought against it just as quickly, and Mahaad bowed.

"What does that mean?" The once Pharaoh asked.

Look.

The black and cloudy universe filled with stars swirled in on itself. One of those stars burst into an explosion of thousands of colors before opening wide to show just one life. Just one moment.

In it, Atem and Kaiba were yelling about something. Atem smiled, Kaiba smirked. Both remembered that fight. It was pointless, ridiculous, and led to a bout of rough sex. It was so trivial, and yet both could remember it. They could almost remember everything, as if every memory was precious no matter how small and unimportant.

"What's this got to do with anything?" Kaiba barked, still not liking any of this. He never would.

Atem still was scrutinizing that moment. What was so important about it? The two of them did look very young. Perhaps just a few years after starting their relationship. A few years before...

This one pair of you will never know the lives you led.

"Was the choice that great?" Mahaad asked, looking towards Atem for guidance.

Atem didn't know. Kaiba wasn't sure.

In the memory, the two were still fighting. It was only then that Kaiba reached forward to yank a handful of Atem's hair. The present Atem gasped lightly. Kaiba's head tilted with an arched brow. The change was vast, both saw that now.

The Pharaoh almost couldn't speak. "I'm a man." She said in bewilderment.

"What's that got to do with anything?" Kaiba asked dryly, losing his interest in all of this. He wanted to leave.

Think. What did the two of you cultivate that these two can never?

Crimson met blue in thought before both softened and realized what the voice was talking about. "Yuiko." Both voices chimed in at once.

Yuiko had been the best part of their lives together. Both had agreed on that a long, long time ago. The young girl born in accident had brought them closer together. She had forced them to start a family neither knew they wanted, but that both needed. Their love had gotten a chance to grow so strong because of that girl. Here, now, Atem frowned. How would a baby girl like Yuiko, such a special part of their lives, truly not be present? In any universe born of choices? How could that be?

Suddenly that little girl was back in Atem's arms in the present, and she hugged the baby to her as if she'd just been born all over again. She didn't understand why or how, but Yuiko was their baby again, and she could do nothing but hold her.

Would you like to give them the chance to know what it could be like?

Atem hesitated then. Giving away Yuiko? No. Absolutely not. She would never give away her baby girl. She looked to Kaiba for guidance then. The brunet seemed stoic, but she could see the thought behind his eyes.

Yuiko had helped him. Had made him better. Sure she'd weakened him a great deal, but she'd also strengthened him. He loved her like no other.

To let another him know that? Another him that supposedly would have never? His answer should have straight away been no. If Yuiko was special to him and him alone then he definitely should keep her forever and never let her go.

But the truth was she was already gone, and he knew then that Atem didn't understand.

"You're not giving her away." He said after a moment. Atem still looked confused. "This is all bullshit anyway." He sighed as he prepared to nullify that statement with a 'however'. "Your memories, your experiences, they've already past. We're dead, remember?" He wasn't about to keep the sarcasm out of his voice completely as he said this. "Whoever that is is asking you to give a new Yuiko, that newborn in your arms, to them. Everything you've already had is over and done with."

Atem looked back at that baby. Kaiba was right. She had the markings of the newborn Yuiko that she remembered. The little girl didn't even have her eyes open. And Kaiba was still right, the more she thought about it. Yuiko had already grown up. She'd become a strong, beautiful, and loving woman. She was still alive somewhere. Atem hoped, despite herself, that they wouldn't see her for quite some time so she could go on living. This little Yuiko in her arms didn't belong in this afterlife. She no longer belonged with Atem and Kaiba.

But did she belong with an Atem and Kaiba that would never know her otherwise?

A long, long moment passed as Atem stared down at the two bickering in Kaiba's office. Yes. She remembered it now. The fight was insignificant to their relationship. It had ended with the sex that Yuiko was consummated from. But here it would not. It never would. Not ever. They would never know the feeling of having a daughter. Of raising her. Of loving her. Together.

She didn't want to give her baby girl to anyone. Not even a part of herself- man or not.

But she had to.

She knew it almost immediately after that.

So be it. The voice chimed in without any response from Atem. What did it matter? It could hear her, obviously.

The baby disappeared from her arms and already she felt the loss. She remembered what being a young mother was like. Would Atem, a man bound to be father, know those experiences somehow too? She leaned against Kaiba to make up the difference of warmth.

"They won't believe it. They'll think the baby was dropped on the doorstep from someone else." Atem said softly.

Kaiba inclined his head in agreement. "Especially not-" Himself. He would never believe some bullshit story about multiverse and a female Atem, if he'd grown to know a male rival and lover, about a baby girl... no. None of him would believe a baby appeared from nowhere, and not with that story. He'd reject the child immediately simply because of that.

Kaiba's mind started to race. He couldn't let himself do that. Not to Yuiko.

"Send her with a letter." He said after a moment, voice tense.

What will it say?

"That's my business. I will write it. You will deliver it." Kaiba was back to giving orders. He knew himself best (maybe except for Atem). He would know exactly what to write to make sure he believed it.

Atem smirked. Kaiba ordering around Gods. Nothing had changed. Nothing ever would.

As you wish.

The impossible baby girl who appeared out of nowhere, to two men who were destined otherwise not to know what having a daughter felt like. Kaiba was never one for fate- and Atem had always been one for breaking it in one form or another. So of course a baby girl had yet been in the plans, with that pair.

The girl with the dark maroon hair, and crimson eyes like her father's. An intelligence like her other father's. And the love of both.

Yuiko.