boy band : For the benefit of all those unaware of where this idea comes from: the Japanese voice actors of these three protagonists are all part of boy bands. YES.

I wonder if it's painfully obvious that I've only played Guitar Hero once in my life.

boy band

Anzu plays games like Rockband and Dance Dance Revolution, and oh, man, she's really good at them, so whenever Yugi goes to her place or to the arcade with her, he's seized with the need to play some music or rhythm based game. The boys do own several versions of several games, but they only play them when they're in the mood — something which doesn't happen all that often.

As it so happens, however, presently Yugi is in one of those moods. He cranks out his streak on the guitar—one of the cool custom ones that was a present from Anzu's brother—and he goes for the high score on Atem's best song. He beats his own score, which is pretty good, but it barely surpasses Judai's so there's probably no way it'll reach Atem's. And he's right: he screws up halfway between there's no way I'll get this and OHMYGOD, LOOK AT THAT STREAK and then sighs, drops the guitar on the couch and flops down next to it dejectedly, sighing as the song ends.

Yugi looks from the TV to his hands to the TV again, wondering if he should bother trying again right away. He sighs again, gets up, and heads to the kitchen for some refreshments, which totally doesn't translate to "comfort food."

He finds Yusei there, drinking milk as always, because the guy runs off the stuff apparently; he's sitting at the table with his laptop out, typing away a storm with one hand into some program that Yugi won't be able to understand if he tries.

"Beat his score?" asks Yusei, eyes flickering up from the screen. He's well aware of Yugi's goal: Yugi's been at it for about an hour now, and playing a single song that many times simply shouldn't be allowed, because now Yusei has it in his head and he's going to be singing it all week long at the most inconvenient of times.

Yugi shakes his head and opens a cabinet, takes out a bag of chips. "No," he says, pulling it open, and whoa, look at that, someone put some chips in his bag of air. He stuffs some into his mouth and grabs a bottle of water from the fridge, then sits down at the table next to Yusei. Swallowing, he says, "I think he's a musical god or something."

Yusei raises an eyebrow and takes a few chips. "You can do it," he says, pressing some more keys, and Yugi swears he's just hitting random buttons and making random sounds. "You're the King of Games, aren't you?"

Yugi smiles sheepishly, because technically the Millennium Puzzle's ability was to alter reality as needed, so he might not really be the King of Games… but then again, he did defeat the pharaoh that one time, and of course Judai challenged him—and the show is called Yu-Gi-Oh, and he's the absolute star of it, so… so—

Yugi hangs his head.

"…It can't be that hard," says Yusei, a little bewildered. A beat, and then: "Maybe a break will set you right. You've played it so many times you can probably hit the keys right with your eyes closed by now."

"…Sorry," says Yugi, flushing. "It must be getting annoying."

"No," Yusei responds, "It'll be in my head all week, sure, but it's not that bad. And someone that isn't Judai needs to beat Atem's score before he holds all the records in the house."

"Yeah?" ask Yugi, laughing, but he's not so content with the fate of the world being on his shoulders again, so he suggests: "Then why don't you give it a try?"

Yusei shrugs, closes his laptop, gets up, and leads the way.

And then he breaks his fingers.

"Ow," complains Yusei, and he drops the controller and slumps into the couch, staring at his fingers like he's never seen them before. He slides off his gloves – something Yugi doesn't think he's ever seen before, the guy probably sleeps with them on – and massages his thumbs before proceeding to his announcement: "That controller is the enemy."

Yugi bites his lower lip and scrolls through the scores. Yusei's doesn't even show up because it's the worst one in the history of the song, which is saying something considering that Yuma's scores are there.

"I'm never playing this game again," Yusei decides.

"I don't understand how his hands work that fast," Yugi affirms. He restarts the song for the umpteenth time and Yusei moans as the song breaks in; it's nailed in the back of his head. He finds himself subconsciously singing along as Yugi gets a streak of fifty, breaks it, gets one of thirty, breaks it, and finally finishes with one hundred ten. Atem's longest is one hundred eleven.

Yugi starts getting frustrated, and lets out a sound somewhere between a cicada and a garbage disposer.

Yusei loops the chorus.

Judai finds them like that half an hour later and laughs like a mad man, since he knows what it's like to try to beat the score on that song. He says he'll give his Winged Kuriboh to whomever can beat it, which isn't saying much because it's not about to happen anytime soon. Eventually Judai's pestering combined with Yusei's singing drives Yugi insane and he gives up, stomps out, and then comes back to try again. Judai laughs some more, plugs in the drum set, and tosses Yusei the microphone.

Together they do better, but they still don't break the high score.

Going fast makes me feel alive!