A/N: Welp, this is why I should never come up with crack theories about stuff when I'm operating on four hours of sleep. It's also why I shouldn't share those ideas with CorinnetheAnime or Ulrich362. They encouraged this, monstrosity into existence.

You have been warned.

(I don't own Yu-Gi-Oh! ARC-V.)


Nii-san. Where's nii-san? Oto-san said we had to stick together…!

My knees hurt, and my hands are bleeding. I fell—someone had pushed me. And now I couldn't see nii-san. He must've been pushed back by the crowd, and now I can't see him. I scream for him—but I know he can't hear me over the sound of all the other people screaming and crying and those machines tearing everyone and everything apart. The scary people masked in blue are right behind us and I can't find nii-san…!

I fall again. This time it's because my head hurts and I can't breathe and my knees just give up.

I have to get up. I-I have to find nii-san!

But I can't move. All I can do is lay there and cough up my lungs beyond the point of pain and in that moment, I hate how weak my body is and always has been. The sick people always die quickly in the "end of the world" movies that would sometimes be on TV. Sick people like me… and no one wants to help a little boy that sounds like he's about to die anyways when they're all fleeing for their lives.

Someone… please… h-help me… Nii-san…

There's footsteps by my head. I work up enough strength to turn my head enough to see them—it's one of the invaders, the upper half of their face hidden behind a mask with a red gem at the top, and the lower half exposed to show me the cold smile on their face. Their hand is hovering over their Duel Disk.

I shut my eyes and scream. I don't—I don't want to be turned into a card! I don't want to die!

I still see the purple flash—but. It's not from the person in front of me.

"Revolt of the Lightning, Disobey!"

My eyes snap open in time to see the person in blue sent flying when a massive black dragon surrounded by flashing violet lightning rams into them. I gasp a little when I recognize the dragon—Dark Rebellion Xyz Dragon. Which means…!

The next thing I see is the face of a boy with grey eyes and spiky hair—black in the back and bluish-purple in the front—kneeling next to me and looking for anywhere was hurt. "I got here just in time… C'mon Haruto, I know where your brother is."

Nii-san's friend. Yuto. I cough a few times—no way I can stand. So I muster up what I can and mutter, "Sick… can't move."

Yuto's eyes narrow slightly, then he nods and scoops me up.

I'm so… tired…

Yuto's gone the next time I open my eyes. Nii-san's here now, standing defiantly in front of me while he fights off a dozen of the people in blue. He'll win, I know he will. Nii-san doesn't lose once he brings out Neo Galaxy-Eyes Cipher Dragon. And he's already got it out, the dragon's bright wings casting a warm light across the area. My back is up against a wall, and next to me is some sort of box that nii-san must have propped me up against.

I close my eyes again, I'm still so tired. But since I'm with nii-san again, I know I'll be safe.

…Until someone's voice—too close, too close—whistles loudly by my head. "Oi, Xyz scum, look at this!"

I open my eyes.

Nii-san's face goes from confidence to horror to anger in a single second, and he lunges at the soldier standing right next to me. "You won't touch my brother!" Kaito screams.

"Too late~!"

Purple light flashes all around me.

Cold. Why is it suddenly so cold? And dark. Where did nii-san's dragon go?

"HARUTO!"

Where… am I…?

I can't see. There's nothing but pitch-black all around me. I can't move. It feels like there's something crushing me from all sides, like I'm stuck in a box almost too small to fit me. Am I on my back or on my stomach? I can't tell that either. The only thing I can feel is the cold. I can't even feel my own heartbeat.

I can breathe, though. Barely.

I'm at least still alive.

Nii-san. Where's nii-san? I was just with him, he wouldn't leave me behind.

That purple light. My breath catches in my throat.

Nii-san, he couldn't have… he couldn't have been carded…

Which means…

I'm a card.

I'm—a—card.

If I could move, I would be thrashing about and screaming out my lungs. But while I can breathe, I can't scream, and I can't move. All I can do is watch the never-ending darkness suffocate me from how tight it is around me.

Nii-san…!

A voice suddenly cuts through the shadows. Old. Male. Terrifying.

"Heeheehee…! You—yes—you'll make a wonderful parasite! So young and frightened—perhaps I should request more children for my experiments—"

I'll, make a wonderful parasite? What does that mean?

I don't like this man. He's, he's scary. Isn't nii-san here yet? Nii-san's going to save me, I know he will.

He, he has to find me.

"Well, well, whoever you are, boy, you should just give in. Fighting it won't do you any good."

Huh…?

The darkness is gone—I'm falling. The sensation makes me feel sick—I haven't felt anything other than that cold for so long. I'm not cold anymore though—I'm hot, too hot, everything inside me set on fire by the pale-green light I'm submerged in.

This time I scream—louder than I ever have before.

It hurts, the fire inside of me.

"NII-SAN! HELP ME!"

Hurtshurtshurtshurts—

"PLEASE!"

My bones twist and snap. I don't know anything anymore other than painpainpainpain—

"SOMEONE!"

I can feel myself shrinking, my legs bending out in ways that they shouldn't, my toes and fingers fusing into one point, a third set of limbs bursting out from the sides of my face.

"ANYONE!"

A tail sprouts from my back, another wave of pain up my—spine? Do I even have one anymore? My neck is gone.

My mouth is the next to go—I can't scream anymore, not through the two green feelers that replace it. Then it's my eyes, four more sprouting on my face where my nose should be. Just more ways to see the bad green light.

Everything goes cold—cold, like the darkness.

I picture the face of my brother one last time. He's smiling at me, rubbing my head when I showed him the butterfly that landed on my arm one time. That was… so long ago…

Nii-san… I'm so…

sleepy…


The Doctor grinned as he watched the pale-green light flicker inside of his machine.

That boy would make the perfect parasite, he was sure of it.


A/N: Obviously this is AU—Leo Akaba might let the Doctor get away with a bunch of crap, but definitely not this.

If anyone cares to know, this was inspired by the machines everyone thought held carded people being revealed as holding the Doctor's parasites instead in episode 125. And no, I haven't been sitting on this idea since that reveal, I literally came up with it yesterday because my muses like to think of some really random stuff whenever I stay up past two doing homework.

This is a one-shot, but there's a huge possibility for a follow-up one-shot or two. Just so you know.

Please review!