STALEMATE
Summary: Yami left for the afterlife two years ago. These days Yugi is the world's best gamer. He remains unbeaten even without his yami and the world of gamers worships him as an idol. However things are about to get complicated. What with Yugi at the peak of his career he is in terrible danger from his restless rivals and from himself. In fact, so great is the danger that Yami has been sent back to protect him, but this time in his own body!
At first the arrangement seems like a wish come true. But nothing is ever as straight forward as it seems. When Yami and Yugi duelled for the last time each of them left as a complete person, a perfect balance of darkness and light, Yami left with a little bit of Yugi and Yugi left with a little bit of Yami. Now that Yugi is more confident and Yami is more compassionate can the two survive without killing each other over? How will Yami cope with Yugi's new attitude now that he's had to harden up in order to survive in the world alone? Will the Pharaoh have enough patience and dedication to save his hikari from hismelf?
More importantly will he have what it takes to stick with Yugi even when their relationship grows more turbulent every day? After all opposties attract but similarities repel...And in all of this what is the real threat? Yugi's enemies threatening his life, his new attitude threatening to send him off the rails or his best friend threatening his title?
Warnings: This is a MONSTER of a story...ie its quite chunky as far as words are concerned, so just be aware of that. Secondly this is a YAOI (YxYY)story so that'll eventually mean some boy on boy action, if you arn't into that sort of thing I'm sorry but that's what this is. In the future I may be co-erced into writing an alternative non-yaoi version but let me just finish this one first hmm? Oh, and if you don't like yaoi check out 'The Darkest Light' that's an action/adventure that isn't yaoi! See, I do cater for as many people as I can /winks/!
Err...what else...oh ok ah, violence, drug, alcohol, rape, self harm references...potentially some steamy bits later on. Basically this is a little bit dark here and there, so watch out for that. Oh, I almost forgot, this isn't beta-ed so any mistakes are entirely my own and I appologise for them in advance, if someone does want to beta then get in touch because I am potentially looking for one...
Disclaimer: Unless I'm getting a contract in my stocking this year I don't own Yu-Gi-Oh.
Author's Note: So! Here it is at last! The greatly anticipated 'Stalemate'! I'll just throw you a taster for now, but it'll get much juicier later on! I hope you all enjoy it and for those of you who I've talked with before I especially it meets your expectations, after all its you guys I'm really trying to impress /winks/
-Prologue-
My Own Darkness
Yugi let out a scream. It wasn't really a scream of pain, more of frustration, anger and loneliness. Throwing down the pencil that had just snapped in his hand the young duellist flung himself face down onto his bed and beat the pillows with his fists for a few moments taking out frustration that had been building up inside of him for the last two months. The two months he had been without Yami. The normality of his life was suddenly killing him and the monotony of the days was slowly suffocating him. With Yami everything had been an adventure, they had been the best of friends, supporting each other in everything and talking to each other on every topic imaginable. But now he was alone again. Alone in his head and in his life. Sure Tristan, Joey, Tea and his other friends were still there to support him, but after his friendship with Yami, a relationship that had known no limitations, all of those friendships seemed suddenly superficial.
Then the tears came. He'd been bottling it up inside ever since his best friend had walked through those doors to the afterlife. Somehow he'd managed to make everyone think he was ok. A fake smile and some highly artificial excuses had, horrifyingly, done the trick on the friends and family that were supposed to understand him and know him best. But now he couldn't handle it any longer. It was all too much, something had to give, something had to change.
After a few minutes Yugi finally pulled his face out of the sodden pillow, though he could not bring the tears to a halt. With a sniff and a rub at his still streaming eyes the ex-hikari stood and made his way back to the desk, where he had been before his outburst. On it was a small notebook, open on a page reading '13th September'. He'd kept a diary for years now, ever since his parents had died and he'd moved to live with his grandpa. The series of identical notebooks catalogued every single day of his life since he'd been able to write. Even the days where he had been away, like when the seal of orichalcoas had taken him or when he'd been at the battle city tournament he had always gone back afterwards and faithfully filled in the pages he had skipped.
But now the story of Yugi's life would no longer be complete. It was time something changed and it would all start here. "I've had enough!" Yugi shouted at no one in particular, not caring who heard. "You can't keep haunting me even when you aren't here!" knotting his hands into his hair Yugi pulled at the strands in frustration as he yelled out his thoughts. "You left me, and I sent you away! I'll never let anyone get that close again, you hear me!" Yugi pulled his hands from his hair and glared at the diary in front of him, seizing it up in his hands. "I told everyone I was fine, I didn't expect them to buy it! I wanted someone to comfort me, to help me, to let me cry, but I was betrayed by my own lies!" With an angry scream the teen ripped two pages from the documentation of his life. "Some friends, if they couldn't even see what was happening to me!" Another three pages were torn from the diary and fluttered to the floor. "And you weren't here, when I needed you most! I'll never take you back now, even if you beg, not after what you've done to me!" Five more pages joined those on the floor. "I. Am. My. Own. Darkness!" Paged fluttered down to the floor with each of every word. Day erased forever from Yugi Moto's life. With that he flung the diary down onto the desk and wiped away some more of the angry tears that were streaming down his face. "I am my own darkness." Then, with a deep breath the teenage duellist turned and left his bedroom, slamming the door behind him. It was that day that Yugi Moto changed. He would never be the same again. His separation, the day he unwillingly had the full scale of his independence thrust upon him. Two hours later, when it was starting to get dark, it began to rain, the wind picking up and billowing out the curtains of the bedroom. On the floor the pages of the diary swirled about in miniature hurricanes, rising and falling on air currents gusting in through the window. Up in the air, like Yugi had been. And then the wind direction changed, letting the pages settle on the carpeted floor in disordered piles. On the desk, now the new subject of the wind's taunts, the ravaged diary blew shut with a snap. Closed. Apart from the ragged paper edges that marked the 16th July to the 13th September there was no trace of the two months of hell that Yugi had endured since the loss of his greatest companion. Forgotten. The missing months of Yugi's life. Those that he chose to forget.
