A/N: Written for the YGO Straightshippers Apocalypse contest on dA.
The world was going to end in less than twenty minutes. You'd have thought it would have been a little louder.
Téa drummed her fingers on the table. Yesterday, there had been a forced cheerfulness in the air. Everyone had been trying to act like things were normal, like they weren't all huddled up in a secret bunker under Kaiba Mansion. Like the chance of surviving the meteor impact wasn't 1 in 10. Like it wasn't the day before the last day on earth.
Today, no one was trying. The silence was uneerie. A few KaibaCorp employees-or maybe their family members-sobbed in the corner, but other than that, an unnatural quiet had settled over the dark underground space. No one spoke above a whisper. Even Kaiba had finally put away his laptop and simply sat staring into space, one hand curled in the black mass of Mokuba's hair as he laid his head on his lap.
The noisiest thing in the room was Joey and Mai beside her, making up for lost time. It had only been three days after the meteor had made the news, after the countdown had begun, that Mai had pulled into town. She'd parked her bike right outside Joey's apartment and knocked on his door. Joey opened it and there she was. Three years Joey had searched, worried, waited without any sign. And now, at the end of the world, she came back to him. She didn't offer any apologies, any explanations, anything at all. All she said was, "Life's too short, and I won't waste any more of it without you."
That was enough for Joey. For the five days since, Téa had barely seen them apart. Right now, they were tangled up together, kissing like there was no tomorrow.
They weren't the only ones either. Even if it wasn't for Mai, Joey would have given up trying to keep Tristan and Serenity apart. "What good is an apocalypse if you've got no one to spend it with," he said, clapping his best friend on the back and smiling at his sister. Still, Tristan and Serenity were quieter about their affection, confining themselves mostly to handholding and lingering gazes in between stolen kisses. It was still a new love, shy and sweet, even if it was a last one.
Tea's gaze lingered on the faces of her friends one by one and thought about those who weren't here-Rebecca and her grandfather, still in California, Duke in Vegas, gambling away his last days, the Ishtars in Egypt... She'd never see any of them again, at least not in this world.
The light she'd once seen from the doors of tomb were a whispered promise in the back of her mind, but she refused to trust herself to it completely. She wasn't a pharaoh or a sorcerer-priest and this wasn't Ancient Egypt. There was no way to know if there would be a dawn beyond the dark.
She'd never thought it would be like this. She knew what it was like to see the world ending. Marik, Dartz, Zorc...How many times had she ridden the crest of that wave, the crash always averted at the last minute?
But not this time. This time, the world didn't ride on the turn of a card. There was no last ditch strategy, no ancient magic, no sudden strength of friendship that could help them now. A bitter, strangled laugh rose to Téa's lips. She forced it back. The world was finally ending and there was nothing any of them could do but sit and wait.
Her eyes locked with Yugi's. Were his thoughts the same as hers, she wondered. Sometimes, she almost felt like she could read his mind. They were so close, friends for so many years...
Fifteen minutes left.
Téa's stomach plummeted and cold seeped through her limbs. So this was it. They would sit here in deathly silence and wait until death claimed them all.
No. She wouldn't. If she only had fifteen minutes left, this was not how she would spend them.
She stood. Aware on all the eyes suddenly focused on her, she dug her mp3 player out of her bag, walked over to Kaiba and handed it to him. "Play it," she said. He stared at her outstretched hand. "The sound system," she said. "If the world's going to end, we might as well listen to music while we wait."
She wasn't sure how much of what she had said got through the shocked shell that had frozen around him since it had become clear that even Seto Kaiba and all his wealth and connections and genius could not save his little brother from the apocalypse, but he took the player from her and plugged it into the bunker's sound system. Strains of bright, fast-paced music filled the room. Dance music.
Since she was a little girl, dance had been her escape from the world around her, the thing that more than anything else made her feel intensely her and intensely alive. She needed to feel alive right now. She refused to die feeling anything less than fully, vividly, wondrously alive.
The moves came easily to her, as they always did, and she gave herself over, losing herself in the beat, the notes, the movements, the rush of endorphins and adrenaline. She wasn't so lost to it all not to notice that she wasn't alone on the dance floor. All around her, others had joined in, some alone, some in couples, some in groups and clusters, whirling, twirling, jiving, grooving. Wild, frantic, vital.
Mai and Joey had joined the throng, their bodies twisting, pulsing. Tristan and Serenity danced beside them, while Grandpa and Bakura had linked hands and were marching and leaping in a mad kind of whirl. Only Yugi still sat, stock-still, just watching the dance.
She went to him and stretched out her hands. "Dance with me," she whispered.
And they danced.
The music swirled around them and they moved with it. It felt like prom, or a wedding, or a fairytale ball. Anything but the end of the world.
But the world was ending. Téa could feel the seconds ticking by, falling into the black never to be recovered.
Less than ten minutes now.
Her eyes met Yugi's and the breath she hadn't known she was holding came out all in a rush. Life was too short, Mai had said. Téa didn't want another second to slip by. "I love you," she blurted.
The words came out so easily. Strange, Téa had thought they'd stick in her throat and then clatter ignominously to the ground when they did crawl their way out. She had expected them to feel like a weight around her neck, not this wondrous, beautiful buoyancy filling her chest. "I love you," she repeated, for the sheer joy of saying the words and knowing they were true.
Yugi was looking back at her, smiling. Sublime joy shone from his eyes and she knew at once that her eyes looked the same. "I love you too," he whispered. "I've always loved you."
"I know." Suddenly, tears sprang to her eyes. Why had she thought this would be so hard? Why had she put this off for so long? Why had she let all these complications, the emotional refuse of too many years, build up between them? They could have been happy...
He silenced her thoughts with a kiss.
She kissed him back, desperately, wildly, abandoned to a fervor she didn't know she possessed. He matched her ardor for ardor, flame for flame. Neither of them cared that they stood in the middle of a crowded dance floor, surrounded by friends and family. Neither of them cared that their friends were cheering, clapping, exchanging knowing looks, and following their example. They just kissed, on and on, as if the world had stopped spinning, as if nothing else existed besides the two of them.
When at last they drew apart for breath, Téa couldn't stop the tears from rolling down her cheeks. She tried. She wanted to savor these last sweet minutes, not spend them in regret. But she couldn't help mourning all those seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks, years, even that they could have had.
They would never get a chance to settle down, raise a family, or grow old together. That couldn't be helped. But if only she hadn't been so stupid, so self-absorbed, so unsure of what she wanted, so ignorant of her own heart... There could have been so many kisses. Hundreds of kisses. Thousands of hugs. Tens of thousands of tender glances and loving words. Imagine all the loving they could have done in just one week.
Yugi laced his fingers with hers. The warm, rough reality of them snapped her attention completely onto him. "It's okay, Téa. We're here now, together. That's all that matters."
"Is it?" she asked him. Her voice trembled despite herself.
He nodded. "It's enough." His eyes were so soft, so full of love, that it broke her heart. "Even just one moment with you would be enough reason for this whole crazy world to have ever spun round."
"One minute until impact," a man called out in a hollow, broken voice.
A low, wordless rumble tore through the crowd. There was a sound like a shriek. "Dear God," a woman cried out.
Yugi ran his fingers over the curve of her cheek, drawing her eyes back to his. "Hey, I'm here," he whispered tenderly. "Stay with me."
Téa covered his hand with her own. "I'm here," she said fiercely. "I wouldn't be anywhere else for the world."
As all around them families huddled together, friends shook hands and smiled, lovers embraced, and believers fell to their knees, Yugi and Téa held each other close, locking eyes, holding hearts. A thousand words of love that would never be spoken out loud passed between them in a single look. And then, when they could bear it no longer, they leaned in and their lips met.
And the world went black.