June, 2003
Kame Game Shop
Jou was over at the game shop to visit with Yugi and Atem and upgrade their computers with the latest Radeon and GeForce video cards. Having just finished installing the Radeon in Yugi's computer, Jou reconnected everything and, with the tricolors watching, fired up the machine. When the machine loaded the login screen. Jou stood from the chair and gestured for Yugi.
"All yers, Yuge," said the blond.
"Thanks," said Yugi brightly as he plopped down on his seat and typed in his password.
When Windows loaded, everything looked fine and Yugi fired up Netscape and began clicking through his bookmarked sites to see how everything looked.
"Looks good," said Jou as he and Atem read over Yugi's shoulder.
Just then, a picture linking to an article caught Yugi's eye and he clicked on it to enlarge it. The picture showed several very beautiful golden items that had just been unearthed in the Valley of the Kings.
"Wow…" Yugi breathed as Jou leaned in to look.
"Wonder wut dey'll do wit' it," the blond remarked.
"There's nothing they can do legally, except put it in the museum. Egypt doesn't allow stuff to be taken out anymore. Too many artifacts were being sold to private collectors around the world and never seen again," said Yugi. "You remember, Isis told us that."
"Well, I dun see nut'n wrong wit' sellin' some of it," protested Jou.
"It's not theirs to sell," pointed out Yugi.
"Well, so? It ain't like nobody from back den's 'round to say nothin'," grinned Jou.
"But…" began Yugi, only to find his eyes drawn to a solid gold crown being held up for display in the next picture. "Wow! That one's gorgeous!"
"Dat musta been dat Pharaoh's crown!" said Jou. "Wicked sick!"
"I wonder how much you could make if you sold it on eBay!" said Yugi, staring long and hard at his screen.
"A king's ransom!" said Jou, causing both of them to collapse into a guffawing fit.
Unseen by either of the two friends, an ancient pharaoh stood behind them, helplessly staring at the belongings of another ancient pharaoh, long consigned to the dust, having his property, which was supposed to have gone with him to the afterlife, being ruthlessly torn from his tomb by these tomb robbers who now called themselves archeologists. Nausea churned in the Egyptian's stomach. Abruptly, he turned and left the room, retreating to his own.
"Hey, Temu, check dis shit ou…" Jou began, only to fall silent when he realized the Pharaoh had left without so much as a word. "Well, wut crawled up his ass 'n died?"
"No idea," said Yugi with a shrug. "I'll go… say, look at this. Egyptian map packs for UT2003. I'm downloading!"
"Oh, shit! I gotta git dat when I git home!" declared Jou in delight. "Host 'em on yer machine 'n we'll test yer new card and da new maps in one fell swoop."
Forgetting anything else for the time being, Yugi happily clicked on the link to the UT download site to get the map pack.
"Wait till I git home and git online! I'll frag yer ass!" grinned Jou as he turned for Yugi's door.
"Pfft! I've heard that before," quipped Yugi.
"See ya!" grinned Jou.
"Bye!" called Yugi.
Yugi unzipped and installed the new maps, then spent a bit of time exploring them in Instant Action mode. After 20 minutes, he set up to host the maps online. Soon, he was in the maps, playing against the bots. They were easy enough to deal with, even on their godlike settings, offering him no real challenge.
Soon however, Dog of War entered the server. Then the real fun began. Yugi and Jou spent the next couple hours exploring the new maps on Yugi's computer and blowing each other away over and over again. Yugi won every round, though most were within three points of each other.
'He's really good at this game,' Yugi had to admit to himself.
After exiting the game, Yugi fired up Netscape again, clicking around on a few more sites. As he did so, he got the distinct feeling that something was amiss and looked around the room.
No sign of Atem.
"That's odd. Where'd he…" Yugi trailed off as he remembered Jou mentioning the Egyptian's departure hours ago.
'Uh-oh…'
With that sinking feeling in his chest, Yugi slid off his computer chair and crossed the hallway to the door to Atem's room. He saw light streaming under the crack at the bottom of the door, so knew the Pharaoh hadn't yet gone to bed.
Marshaling his courage, he called to his boyfriend.
"Atem?"
"What?!" snapped a gruff voice from behind the door.
Yugi mentally recoiled from the sound of Atem's voice. He had heard Atem's anger before, but only seldom had it been directed at him.
"Uh, wanna take our bath?" Yugi called softly.
"I showered hours ago!" barked the voice on the other side of the door.
"Yeah. I guess I got kinda caught up in video games. Sorry about that," said Yugi.
No reply.
"Wanna play UT2003 against me? I downloaded some cool Egyptian maps," Yugi called.
Again, no answer.
With a sigh, Yugi turned and retreated to his room.
'Wow! What put him in such a sour mood?' the young man wondered.
In the shower room, Yugi doused himself in the hot water, then soaped up, all the enjoyment gone from the solitary ritual. After rinsing himself off, Yugi soaked in the bathtub. He spent only 15 minutes instead of the usual hour, as there was no point staying in longer alone.
After he was dry and clad in his PJs, Yugi decided one more time to try to talk to the irate Egyptian. He went up to the door and called.
"Atem?"
"Leave me alone!" Atem's voice barked from the other side of the door.
Yugi's eyes narrowed as a frown pursed his lips. This couldn't go on. Bracing himself, Yugi opened the door to confront Atem.
Atem's demeanor went from foul to wrathful in a heartbeat as he swiveled around in his computer chair, narrow eyes glaring wrathfully at Yugi, every inch of his being bristling at this invasion of his private space.
"I said I wanted to be alone!" he snarled at the younger man.
"Well, that's just too bad because I'm not leaving until you talk to me," said Yugi, gently but firmly.
"There's nothing to talk about! I just want to be alone tonight! Is that too much to ask?" cried Atem.
"It is when you just push me away and don't even tell me why," countered Yugi evenly. "Did I do or say something to upset you? If I did, I'm sorry."
"This has nothing to do with you," said Atem in a dropped voice, looking away from Yugi.
"Can I help…"
"No!" Atem shouted, eyes blazing again. "You can't help me! Not with this! Nothing can help!"
"Easy, Atem. It's alright," Yugi tried to soothe.
"Don't you tell me it's alright! It is not alright when everything feels wrong!" Atem roared, banging his fist on his desk as a few tears spilled from his eyes.
"What's wrong? Please talk to me!" Yugi cried, frantic with worry for his Pharaoh.
"I said, you can't help me!" Atem almost screamed, dashing the tears from his cheeks with the back of his hand.
"At…"
"Get out! Just leave me alone!" Atem cried, jumping up from his chair with such force that the chair rolled back a few feet until it bumped into the wall.
"Alright, Atem, I'm going. We'll try again in the morning," Yugi said softly in a final attempt to soothe the Pharaoh's agitated state.
Hands held up in a placatory gesture, the younger man backed out of the room, shutting the door as he went.
For a moment Atem was still, then he whirled around and punched the wall with such force that his fist broke through the plaster. Startled, he snapped his hand back, and stared at the hole in the wall and the blood on his knuckles. Absently wiping the plaster and blood off on his pants, he tore open his closet door and pulled down a box from the top shelf. Opening it, his eyes beheld his white shenti, purple cape, some of the gold finery that he no longer regularly wore and his winged diadem, which he now pulled out.
Atem walked over to his mirror and slipped the diadem onto his brow, then stared at his reflection, a mix of the modern in his gray tank top and the ancient wearing the crown. With his forefinger, he slowly traced the Eye of Wadjet, which reposed in the middle of his brow. Abruptly, he tore the crown from his brow and threw it roughly onto his mattress, where it bounced twice before coming to rest near his pillow. Groaning in spirit, Atem closed his eyes and rested his forehead against the smooth, cool surface of the mirror as tears coursed anew from his eyes.
Yugi fairly fled to his room and shut the door behind him. He wasn't afraid of Atem of course, but the Pharaoh's temper was nothing to take lightly either. Yugi had the distinct impression that while Atem was in this state, anything Yugi said or did would only rile him up more. He decided it best to leave the Egyptian alone for the evening and try to talk to him in the morning, when he was sure to be calmer.
With this happy thought in his head, Yugi climbed into bed, shut off his lamp and fell into a restless sleep.
Yugi opened his eyes and looked out the window to see Ra's light blessing the world outside. Then he remembered last evening.
'He should be OK after a good night's sleep,' Yugi thought to himself as he threw his blanket down and got up.
After getting dressed, Yugi opened his door and was greeted by the sound of pots and pans banging down below.
BANG! CLASH! BANG!
'Or not…' he thought with a wince.
This looked to be a very unpleasant breakfast.
Yugi came down the stairs and peeked around the corner into the kitchen. There at the stove, seemingly in no better frame of mind than last night, was the Pharaoh, banging unfortunate pots and pans down onto the burners and slamming cupboards shut. Yugi winced and slid quietly into his place at the table to wait.
'Oh, yeah. He's gonna be fun to deal with today,' he thought, already dreading the rest of the day.
"Morning, Até," Yugi said brightly.
"That isn't my name!" Atem snarled, glaring daggers at Yugi as he veritably dropped their breakfast to the table.
"Sorry…" said Yugi quietly.
Not responding, the Pharaoh dropped into his seat, absently mumbled the blessing and tore into his food.
Yugi ate his breakfast slowly, without much of an appetite. Normally, he and Atem would have exchanged glances and smiles as they ate, making the food taste even better. Now Yugi kept his eyes fixed on his bowl, wary of setting the Pharaoh off by making eye contact.
After that silent breakfast, Atem stood up, took his dishes and laid them ungently in the sink. He turned to Yugi, eyes still bright with wrath.
"I'm going out. I'll be back later," he said gruffly as he headed for the genkan to step down into his shoes.
"Wait! I'll…" Yugi said.
"I go alone!" Atem snapped, opening the door and slamming it behind him with enough force to make the house's timbers rattle.
Yugi flinched.
"Atem, what's wrong with you?" he said to the empty air.
Grievously troubled in mind and vexed deep in his heart, Atem pounded down the sidewalk, heading for the only place in Domino that would afford him some silence and solitude: the park.
Domino Park was a wide expanse of grass, trees, benches, fields, even a pond in the middle. It was the perfect place to go to walk and think. Atem began walking on the paved path that ran the circumference of the park, moving with quick angry steps, always facing forward. Other park patrons, sensing the dangerously agitated aura that rose from the Pharaoh like steam, wisely gave him a wide berth.
As his eyes darted about, Atem felt his heart aching in his chest. There were no beautiful pyramids and palaces. Green grass and trees littered the landscape instead of hot, white sand. Everything was the familiar, yet alien, landscape of 21st century Japan.
After putting everything away, Yugi set out for a walk, by means of clearing his own mental atmosphere. He paid no attention and just went where his feet took him. Somehow, he ended up in Downtown Domino, at the foot of the steps of the Domino Museum.
'How strange to end up here,' the young man thought absently. 'Might as well go and see what's inside this month.'
Yugi walked up the steps and looked around inside. The great hall spread open, welcoming him and he began walking, shoes squeaking a bit on the marble floor. He hadn't even taken five steps when a familiar voice called to him.
"Yugi, hello!"
A smile found its way to Yugi's lips as he was approached by the silver haired teen.
"Hi, Bakura!" he returned.
"Fancy seeing you here," said Bakura, looking around as if expecting someone to be with Yugi.
"I'm here alone," Yugi said flatly.
Brown eyes widened.
"Trouble in paradise?" Bakura asked sweetly.
Yugi winced and looked away.
"Come. Let's take this into the private area," said Bakura, leading Yugi into the employees only place.
Once they were safely behind doors, Bakura looked expectantly at Yugi.
"What happened?"
"It was weird," said Yugi. "Jou was over last night to upgrade our PCs with new video cards. After that, we were all looking at the Web on my computer and Atem just left the room and wouldn't come out. He was in a nasty mood at breakfast too, and then he just stormed out."
"Hm. That's odd behavior for him," said Bakura.
"Yeah," said Yugi, frowning.
Then a thought seemed to strike Bakura.
"When you were online, what were you looking at?" he asked.
Yugi thought a moment.
"Oh, yeah! It was an article about a Pharaoh's tomb that had just been opened up in the Valley of the Kings! There was a photo of all the golden treasures the archeologists found. It was beautiful, especially that crown!" Yugi said enthusiastically.
"Yes. I've heard all about it. It's a great find," agreed Bakura quietly. "And a great desecration…"
"Desec…" Yugi's stopped short as he thought this over. "Oh, crap…"
"You know, I wonder how we would feel if we suddenly found ourselves thousands of years in the future, in an alien world, whose customs we really didn't know, everything dear and familiar to us consigned to the history books and the dust," mused Bakura. "Then on top of that, to have the things we did remember and treasure being looted from the graves of people we might have known, and pawed over, with no true understanding of their value."
Yugi frowned and looked at the floor.
"I never thought of that," he admitted.
"I never did either, until I began studying archeology and got to know Atem," said Bakura.
"Well, what can we do about it? It's not like I can build a time machine and send him back to Ancient Egypt. Besides, as selfish as this is gonna sound, I wouldn't want to, 'cause then… I'd lose him again," Yugi said softly.
Bakura thought deeply for a moment. Then, a smile slowly spread across his pale features as his warm brown eyes locked gazes with Yugi's perplexed violets.
"Well, perhaps we needn't send Atem to Ancient Egypt. Perhaps we can bring part of Ancient Egypt back for him," he said, picking up a small vase and holding it up.
"Bakura, what are you thinking of?" asked Yugi.
"Well, all of these things were found in a certain Nameless Pharaoh's tomb a few years ago," Bakura said, gesturing about the room. "Now normally, of course, it's strictly against the rules for Egyptian artifacts to be removed from the museum, but in this case, the Pharaoh himself might like to have a few of his things back."
"Yeah?" said Yugi.
"How long do you think Atem will be out today?" Bakura asked.
"He was pretty steamed, so I think he'll be gone for a while. When he's mad, he generally goes off by himself till he cools down," said Yugi.
"Perfect. I'll get Jou to help me with…" Bakura began.
Yugi's eyes widened in delight at Bakura's description of the plan.
"It sounds great. But what about all the laws?" Yugi asked.
"Oh, I think a certain tombkeeper in Egypt will be able to help me with that part," said Bakura with a wink and a smile.
Yugi's eyes lit with glad understanding and he nodded.
"I just hope it'll work," he said.
"I think it will. If he doesn't like it, it can be undone easily enough," said Bakura with a smile.
"Thanks, Bakura," said Yugi with a slight bow.