I'm back again! Yeas for more reviews from peoples! As for the two questions I saw, yes, the other characters will be making appearances. As I told one reviewer, Bakura shows up really soon (chapter 4 actually), so please enjoy the fic.

Also, special thanks to: greenluver14, SkaleFlapper15, AngelsGemini, earthluva, and Charley Reede. Comments make authors happy and write faster; we like knowing that people actually read it (and love if they have suggestions). Also thanks to Yami No Musume and BeccaTheElf who didn't review, but they did put me on their fav lists. I'll take that as a, "Keep going."

Chapter 3: What Drugs Are These People On?

Auri fought desperately to contain the blush threatening to engulf her face. "Fangirl fantasies are so not something I want to discuss with guys. Especially when it happens to be one of mine! Eeks! Do not want!' "Isn't it obvious from the word?" she hurriedly replied hoping to buy time to figure out a way to change the topic.

Yugi rubbed the back of head lightly. "Ah, English isn't my first language, and I'm still not so good with slang."

'Topic change for the win!' she thought happily. "It isn't? What's your first one?"

"Japanese."

"Seriously?"

"Yes."

"Neat! How long have you been studying English? I couldn't tell it isn't your native tongue at all; you don't have an accent as far as I can tell."

He smiled at that. "Since I was kid; I started learning from my Grandpa, and I've also been taking it in school too."

"Cool."

"How long do you intend to avoid answering the question," Yami interrupted.

Auri flinched. 'Busted.' "I wasn't avoiding it," she lied.

Yami stared icily.

She blanched at being put on the spot. "It's not important anyway!" she insisted while pushing herself to her feet and brushing off her skirt.

Yami moved in front of her to block her escape. "I think it is." A dark flash glowed in his red eyes for a few seconds.

Auri backed up slightly only to brush against the glass behind her. 'Whoa…wherever he got those contacts from, they were worth the money,' she thought while looking back at him with wide eyes. 'If I didn't know better, I would swear they just started glowing. It's kinda scary to look at.' Then she blinked. At some point during her internal rant about scary contact lenses, Yugi had risen to stand between herself and Yami.

"That's enough, Yami," he said. "You're scaring her."

Yami backed off slightly. "Yugi," he began, "We don't know yet if she's and enemy, and if she insists on hiding information concerning us then I've no choice but to conclude that it is at least possible that she is working for Bakura."

'Bakura? As in, "Yami Bakura?" Okay, this is offically taking the cosplay too far. Dangit Auri, why did you have to help the crazies?'

Yugi shook his head. "If she was evil and with him, then why would she help me find you and then save you from the fangirls?"

"It could be a ploy to gain our trust," Yami argued. "I would not put it past him; he did try something similar before. Not to mention it was his doing that brought us here, be it intentional or not."

Yugi deflated slightly at this. "But…she seems really nice."

Yami's gaze softened. "I'm sorry, but we must have the truth, Aibou. She knows much, too much for her to be a simple innocent in all this." His eyes shifted back Auri again, and she stiffened at the sharp, wary look. "There is also the matter of those two girls. They also knew who I was, but, even stranger, they did not seem at all surprised by the two of us. As long a time as it took your close friends to begin to notice the differences between us, they caught it right away. Also, neither they nor she seem at all surprised to see us separated."

"Of course none of us were surprised," Auri broke in indignantly. "You're cosplaying Yugi and Yami. This is and anime convention after all; that's hardly abnormal, but you taking the whole, "in character," thing this far is. You're weirding me out now, so give it a rest."

"Cosplay?" Yami asked.

"It's when you dress up as a character or person you think is cool," Yugi explained. "Auri mentioned it before, and there were two other girls who thought I was doing that too. I figured they meant it because of the "King of Games" title. I've seen pictures online of people cosplaying Kaiba and Pegasas before anyway."

"Auri?"

Yugi pointed to the girl. "Her name."

"I see. However, that still doesn't explain how they knew my name. It has not been mentioned outside of your friends that I can recall, and there is also the matter of the Mind Crush. How is she so familiar with that spell?"

'Oh for the love of,' she growled mentally while reaching into her bag. 'This has gone on long enough.' "Look, I'm just going humor you and be done with it, so here." Auri pulled out one of the newly purchased mangas from the bag and handed to Yugi. "That is how I know. Ditto with those girls and thousands of other people too." 'There's also an anime that differs from the manga at points, but whatever.'

Yugi turned the book in his hands over to the front, and his breath caught in his throat. "Yugioh: Duelist, Volume One," was written on the front. Wordlessly, the suddenly very pale Yugi began to flip through it.

Yami's brow furrowed, and he moved next to Yugi to get a good look at it as well. "What….what is this?" the millennium spirit cosplayer asked.

"The Yugioh manga that your costumes are based off of, what else?" she growled. "You're the ones dressed as them, not me!"

"Is there more of this?" Yugi shakily asked.

She shrugged. "Sure. The first part of the Yugioh manga is just titled Yugioh, and it's seven volumes long. Yugioh: Duelist is what you have there, and it's the second part. There are twenty some volumes of that and then there's a third arc, but I forget the name. I only have through the end of Duelist Kingdom thus far though."

Yugi's head snapped up to meet her gaze. "Since when?"

Auri raised an eyebrow and pulled volumes two through eight out of her bag as well. "Dealers room at the con, and since sometime this afternoon."

"Then everyone knows about my whole life?"

"Just what drugs are you on, anyway?" she asked crossly. "It's fiction!" All three were quiet for a moment.

"What do you mean?" Yugi asked.

She rolled her eyes. "It isn't real." 'What else could I have meant?' "It's a story made up by Takahashi." Auri yanked the book out of Yugi's hands and pointed to the author's name on the cover. "See?" Yugi was silent.

"It would seem that Bakura has sent us much farther away than I thought," Yami murmured.

"Huh?" Yugi asked.

'Oh boy, here we go again.'

"I think that Bakura has dropped us into another world," said Yami.

"There are other worlds?" Yugi asked.

"He means the alternate dimension theory," Auri offered to which Yami gave her a startled look. "Basically, it says that an infinite number of dimensions, or worlds or realms or whatever you want to call them, all exist at the same time and space. They're just separated from each other by different planes of existence, so they don't overlap. The theory also goes that reason for the infinite number of worlds is due to the infinite possibilities for their creation."

"How does that work?" Yugi asked.

"Think of it this way," she began, "Let's say you went out for breakfast at a café, and you were trying to decide what drink to order. You can choose: coffee, milk, or orange juice. Pretend that you ordered the milk and the milk turned out to be bad and you got sick; that could be one world's timeline. In another one you might have chosen the coffee and been perfectly fine."

"Then, each person's choices…"

"…Are what create the possibilities for differing timelines and thus different worlds. Supposedly, there's a nexus point at which all worlds are joined at and spring from too, but it's just a theory," she finished.

"How do you know about that?" Yami asked.

"I'm a fan of science fiction," she answered with a shrug. "It comes with the territory." 'That, and I may have written a really bad fanfic about it before,' she added with a mental cringe. 'But they don't have to know that part.'

Yugi turned back to Yami. "Then we're in another world where we only exist in a story."

Yami nodded. "That's what I think."

"And I think you're both insane," Auri added while putting all the manga back in her bag. "It's just a theory; it can't be proven, and fiction is called "fiction" for a reason after all."

"But we're telling the truth!" Yugi insisted. "I really am Yugi Mutou!"

'If they're that insistent, then fine. I'm calling the bluff.' "Prove it," said Auri.

Yugi faltered. "I…I don't know how. Wait, Yami try summoning something!"

"Summon?" Yami asked.

Yugi nodded excitedly. "Yeah, you can do it the shadow realm battles using the millennium puzzle's magic. Maybe it also works in the real world!"

Yami frowned and looked at the puzzle. "I could give it a try." He reached down and pulled the deck of cards off the holder at his waist and sorted through them swiftly before pulling out one card and replacing the rest. He closed his and held the card in both hands.

At first, nothing happened. Auri was about to make a comment about her being right when the trademark eye of Horus appeared on Yami's forehead and the puzzle flared. She yelped and shut her eyes against bright light. After it faded, she slowly opened them again, blinking away the spots. Once the spots were gone, her gaze settled on small, brown ball of fluff in front of her. Floating. With little bitty claws and big, cuddly eyes.

"Kuri?" it voiced.

"Eep!" Auri fell back against the thick glass window. "N…no way." She looked back and forth between the two boys. "Is that really what I think it is?"

Yami nodded, a small smirk on his lips.

"Does he bite?"

This time Yugi laughed. "No, we aren't dueling so I'm sure he wouldn't bite you," he said as he petted Kuriboh.

'Holy crud. They were…telling the truth?' Slowly, Auri reached out with one arm to pat Kuribo on the head. He made a happy noise at the attention and leaned into her hand. She smiled softly and petted him. "He's real," she whispered in awe. "You're real," she said this time directed at the other two. Then she remembering her earlier comments she winced and withdrew her hand from Kuriboh's fluffy fur. "Sorry about calling you guys crazy."

"It's okay," replied Yugi. "I wouldn't really have believed it without proof either."

"My apologies for assuming you with Bakura," Yami added.

"No harm done," she replied, but then bit her lip. 'I suppose I still owe them an answer for the first question,' she thought while still gnawing on her lower lip, 'but this won't be pretty.' "Puzzleshipping refers to fanfiction that pairs you and Yugi together."

Yami just blinked.

"What?" Yugi asked.

Auri took a deep breath. "Shipping is when people pick two characters in series and pair them romantically in a fanfic. The Yugioh fanfiction base is really big, so people have made up names for all the different pairings. For example, peachshipping is when they pair Yugi and Anzu." Yugi blushed at that. "Puzzleshipping is when they pair the two of you up that way." Yugi's blush instantly faded, and there was a long, eerie silence as several expressions flitted across Yugi's face at rapid speed. Yami, by contrast, seemed contend to settle on a WTF look.

"They what?" Yugi shouted after his brain had rebooted. " But he's my partner! We're not that way all!" he insisted fervently.

"Indeed," the spirit agreed.

She offered them a look of pity. "See now, that's part of the reason they do it."

"Huh?" Yugi asked.

"You know how a lot of words in the English language have multiple meanings based on the context in which they're used?" she asked.

"Yes, and?"

"Partner can either mean a something along the lines of an ally or friend, or it can mean a…um…a lover."

"It does?"

"I'm afraid so. Also, you know how sometimes refer to Yami as your other half?"

Yugi groaned and rubbed on hand over his eyes. "Please tell me there isn't one for that too."

"Yep. Pretty much means the same thing actually. Hence the reason so many girls pair the two of you together; you give them a lot of out of context ammo, so probably around half your female fanbase thinks you're in love with Yami. Nevermind that the manga and anime both make it very clear you like Anzu." 'Doesn't mean we can't imagine it though…mmm…Yami making out with Yugi…' Yugi's blush returned in full force and he began stuttering something about everyone knowing about his love for Anzu and how embarrassing it was, but Auri really wasn't paying attention anymore.

"…And she doesn't even know yet!"

Auri blinked. Apparently, the conversation had continued while she indulged in shonen-ai fantasies. 'Mmmm…shonen-ai with hot bishonen…'

"Aibou, I'm sure it will be fine. There is no way for her to get here, much less read the series."

'Right. Anime characters to sort out. Focus, Auri! Focus!' She ignored the flustered Yugi and his Yami (who tried in vain to calm him down), and checked the time on her cell phone. It was 2:23. "You two wanna go get some munchies?" They, and the kuriboh, turned to stare at her. "What? I think better with munchies, and you can tell me how you wound up here with psycho-Bakura on your tail. Besides, if you two are separated, then he and Ryou probably are also. We may as well wander around and keep an eye out for him too." 'Please let Ryou be here, please let Ryou be here, please let Ryou be here!' her inner fangirl chanted with fingers crossed.

"You still want to help?" Yugi asked incredulously.

She tilted her head slightly to one side in confusion. "Why wouldn't I?"

"Bakura is dangerous," Yami told her firmly. "You could be killed or have your soul stranded in the shadow realm."

She shivered at the shadow realm part. "Yeah, but to miss the chance to watch you kick his ass? No way." 'Bakura is also hot; villain or no, he full of hotness. Ogling his hotness is now very high on my list of priorities.'

Yugi grinned at her (verbal) response. "Come on, Yami. Let her come with us for now; we don't know how to get around here anyway, so we need her help."

"Very well," Yami acquiesced with a soft chuckle.

"Great!" she cheered. "Follow me then, there's a 24-hour convenience store a few blocks from here."

As she turned and lead them out of the darkened shops one thing remained on her mind. 'It would be best to keep the one other detail about shipping from them for now. There are also pairings involving more than two characters, and they don't have to know about that one yaoi fic with Yami, Yugi, and Bakura.' Glancing back at the pair, she added, 'Yeah, he might really mind crush me for that one.'