Chapter Two: In which two idiots meet two OTHER idiots, who are from a fandom utterly unrelated to the initial fandoms crossed, and so dig the fic ever so slightly deeper into its grave.
Jounouchi, once he was finished screaming, skidded to a halt and looked around, eyes - no, I take that back, his honey orbs - bright with mischief. "Cool, there's magic everywhere! And pointy sticks! And kids playing with their owls!"
"And also, a train!", Honda chimes in.
"And chi- I mean, duelists! Duelists everywhere!"
"Magic gir- I mean, magic everywhere! Magic magic magic!"
"IT'S ALL SO MAGICAL!"
"WHAT A WONDERFUL WOOOORLLLD!"
Having finished the obligatory recap, and with arms thrown around each other's shoulders, they broke out into a musical number - some monstrosity that I'm not about to type out here because I happen to be a goody goody two shoes who never breaks the rules, if we don't count the fourth wall. All you need to know is that the song was loud, with a pounding beat, and a really silly dance as well, one that no sane performer would even attempt, one that nearly decapitated several members of the Nine and Three Quarters crew. The lyrics were of course highly relevant - they were all about getting drunk, hitting the floor, and then meeting an absolutely magical chi- I mean, magical duelist - which basically describes ninety-nine percent of all modern pop songs.
Of course, the author was later done in for using someone else's lyrics, and having raged about it in their Author's Note and/or had the reviewer butchered 'fer flamingz', they proceeded to try their hand at - oh, god - poetry. So, since the end result was all so original, let it here be recorded for all eternity. The author used script format, but as that's banned, Honda's lines are bracketed, whilst Jounouchi's are unbracketed.
Love, love, love, love playing cards, I mean- whydoesthislinehavesomanysyllablesletmetryitagain.
(Relevance, words words, rhyming!)
'Kay, this is totes original, no stealing
(No stealing, y'hear?)
I'm gunna duel some peeps
(Only got forty cards in my pocket)
I-I'm a hunting
(Looking for a picture)
This is there-goes-our-rate-ing awesome!
(I can't rap, so let's keep singing)
Singing is just ever so manly
(Let's put some more syllables here so the song's unrecognizable, and we aren't breaking copyright)
No-one will get the joke in three years time
(Yeah, yeah yeah, I don't know how to rhyme)
Wait a second, did you just-
(LOVE LOVE LUURVE)
OH I GET IT, WE DRINK AND STUFF
(AND DON'T GIVE A-)
And then a student came barreling through the wall behind them, and absolutely flattened the dreadful duo with his heavy trolley before Platform Nine and Three Quarters could be violated any further.
At any rate, it was a damn good thing that heavy trunk was magical, or everyone's favourite duo might have actually gotten hurt. As it was, they simply got back on their feet, raced out of the way before they could be run over a second time, and went right back to emphasizing just how awesomely magical and wondrous the place was, and how bloody jealous all their friends were going to be when they went home and told their friends all about it. In fact, they yelled and hollered this sort of thing at the top of their lungs; and for some utterly obscure reason, none of the wizards or witches actually raised the alarm at this point. Maybe they were deaf-
-and then, in a terrible development intended to draw the readers away from that little plot hole and back into the STORY, Jounouchi dropped dead for no good reason. Unfortunately, this didn't help matters much, because the people of Nine and Three Quarters didn't even blink.
Of course, there had to be a semi-logical sounding explanation for that - so here we go: Magic in this place basically meant that you could make people drop dead for no good reason, people dropping dead was a pretty common occurrence. And besides - when Honda noticed what had just happened to his buddy, he squeezed his eyes shut; and the other two people to take notice of the incident stared, which means that no-one aware of Jounouchi's death was technically blinking.
Speaking of Honda - in a show of angst, the brunette beat his chest and screamed out an almighty "NOoOOO000O!1!I!", one that shook the station and shattered the glass with its pure manliness. He wailed and howled and thought lots of angsty things, he knelt at Jounouchi's side and cried until his voice was husky, his hands curled into firsts, eyes bloodshot. Everything was going wrong in his world; Jounouchi should have died of a nosebleed, or of bootleg alcohol, or a drug overdose, or all at once - not just suddenly collapse, dead without even a knife though his chest, or any blood for that matter. With a trembling hand, he laid the blonde's Duel Disk at his side...
...and this was about when the author realized that Honda hadn't exactly checked Jounouchi's pulse, and so couldn't have known that he was, in fact, dead. She made up some sort of excuse - Honda was just so worried and had assumed the worst. Soon enough, the brunette came to his senses and checked Jounouchi's pulse - insert a Little Kuriboh joke here - and so the angst went on and on, page after page of depressed teenager; who may or may not have been looking up the skirts of the girls walking past him as he crouched over his prone friend.
Jounouchi would have wanted him to do it, after all.
After a great deal of crying and screaming from the brunette (the audience now feeling rather lost and lonely themselves, though more due to confusion than any decent writing on the author's part - when exactly did this plot get so whiny?), the two observers the readers totally forgot about came over to Honda.
"Hello", said one; a well-kept young man of perhaps eighteen in a suit and tie, brown hair plastered against his head.
"Hello", said his companion - a gangly eighteen year old, dirty clothes hanging off his hunched frame, black hair sticking out in all directions, and incidentally handcuffed to his friend. His right thumb was in his mouth, forcing his companion to bring his left hand close to his head; something the latter was clearly comfortable with, but which the shabby man seemed to be utterly unaware of.
"What is your name?", asked the clean one.
Clearly, this is a most appropriate question to be asking someone whose friend has just died.
"Did you kill that person?", asked the dirty one.
And this is clearly an even more appropriate question to be asking someone whose friend has just died.
With a guttural noise, Honda got to his feet and shook-
-uh, shook their hands warmly; very warmly, so much so that somehow both of the newcomers ended up on the ground, battered and bruised. He glared down at them - in a rather friendly way, of course. "My name is Hiroto Honda," he snarled, the sort of joyous sound that served to warm the hearts of everyone present. "This is Katsuya Jounouchi - and no, I did not kill him."
"Exactly what the serial killer Kira would say," declared the ill-dressed newcomer. "I am now fifty-four point nine percent sure that you are Kira, which means that much like Light here - you're under arrest."
Silence.
"Can you wait here while I get another set of handcuffs?"
Silence.
Silence.
Growl.
"You know, I don't think I hit y- I mean, I don't think I greeted you quite warmly enough before. Let me just try that again." Honda bent to shake the dirty one's hand a second time, and the clean one wisely decided to change the subject, making use of their being handcuffed to pull his inquisitive companion behind his back.
"I am ever so sorry, we really should have introduced ourselves - I am Light, and this is Ryuuzaki. We are here because"- and here, his eyes flickered slightly to the duel disk at Jounouchi's side - "Ryuuzaki is a Duel Monsters champion, and we were looking for the tournament."
Before Honda could comment on how he knew Dino Ryuuzaki - and Dino Ryuuzaki, despite being a champion, was an arrogant twelve year old with a thing for dinosaurs, the shabby one blinked for the first time in six minutes. This alone was enough to shut the brunette's mouth, never mind the sudden unsettling gaze he was transfixed with. After a long pause, the young man murmured; "You threatened me... I am now fifty - six percent certain that you are Kira."
Light shrugged, his expression unreadable. "Kira would react with anger at being accused, I suppose. He would be frustrated that someone had found out his identity."
Ryuuzaki hummed a little, thumb pulling at his lower lip as he rocked back on his heels. "Then again... We must assume that Kira is the greatest of all actors. He would be more than capable of hiding such a violent reaction."
"Or maybe he would react that way deliberately, thinking that we were expecting to see a nonviolent reaction from Kira."
The shabby one cocked his head to one side, evidently deep in thought. "So the question, then, is this: What were we expecting...?"
And so on and on our needlessly convoluted introduction goes, during which a plot long enough to fill a good thirteen books is condensed into five hundred words and shoved down the readers' throats, putting them off Death Note for life...
Eventually, Honda managed to force his way back into the discussion, rubbing at his temples - he, much like the readers, had absolutely no idea what the hell was going on here, and he didn't particularly want to find out. All he wanted was to be allowed to have his angsty chapter in peace, without those two drongos discussing whether or not he was a serial killer right over his head.
Seriously, these guys were clearly geniuses.
"Look - I'm sure you both reckon you're secret agents-"
Ryuuzaki, being Ryuuzaki, didn't even let him finish: "Detectives, actually."
"- well, whatever you think you are - I'm trying to grieve here. So, if you could possibly push off-"
"I am now fifty eight point three percent certain that you are Kira."
Silence.
Silence.
AND DEN A RANDUN MEMBER OF CROWD SHWED UP AN EX-PLANE-ED DAT JOUNOUCHI WAZ INNLY LITLEE BIT DEAD, SUMONE KEARLEE STOFFED UP TEIR ADRA KEDRAVADASDFGHJKL, AN LOOKEE NOW HES GUT SPEKIAL SKAR LIKE HARRY'S, BUT EVEN BETTER AND ISNT DIS SOE EXTING PLZ R&R-
-and they all decided to just forget about everything that had just happened in this thoroughly useless chapter.
Notes:
- Serieses shown so far: YGO, Harry Potter, Death Note. For the record, I obviously own no songs referenced or serieses portrayed in this fic.
- You've gotta love it when an entire chapter is just dedicated to introducing characters or similar, and then those characters serve absolutely no purpose whatsoever in the story until after you've forgotten all about them. Ironic, that is.
- Heads up: I am being dragged off to some remote bushland for a 'holiday', which basically means that when I get back on Sunday, you guys may well be spammed with chapters on this fic and 'Dear Fan Fiction Writers', due to my mind going into overdrive with no distractions.
Review replies for Chapter One (for now, additional guests reviewing on Chapter One will find that their replies are placed on this doc as well):
leppy: Th'nark! It's probably best not to mention Johji to me, though - given his tendencies, he may well end up in the fic at some later stage.