DARK SIDE OF DIMENSIONS NOTE: In the movie, Kaiba builds a space station to guard the Puzzle and to assemble it in zero gravity. At the end of the movie, it's where he launches his Dimensional Cannon, which takes him to the netherworld and Atem.
CHAPTER 3: DIFFERENT RIVER, SAME PROBLEM
BARGAINING: The Spoon River Anthology by Edgar Lee Masters is set in a cemetery. The residents, through a series of poems, tell their stories – and gossip about each other, hold on to old grudges, rant about real and perceived injustices... and occasionally try to make sense of the lives they can't quite abandon.
MORAL: Stories and poems about death usually focus on the living. Spoon River suggests it may be just as hard for the dead to let go of the things that matter.
As Yugi hurried to class, he tried to decide what had changed and what had stayed the same. He'd graduated high school. He was in college. Jounouchi and Honda weren't flanking him in the hallways. Anzu was in New York. He was still going to class.
He was popular. Kids wanted to sit next to him. They wanted to ask questions. "Is it fun winning all the time? What really went on at Kaiba's tournament?" Once, Yugi would have stepped back and let Atem or Jounouchi answer. But Atem was gone and Jounouchi wasn't sitting next to him, ready to jump in. So Yugi had smiled, ducked his head and given the best answer he could: "I'm not sure." Occasionally, they'd ask, "Why did Kaiba smile like that at your match?" But Yugi had never known what any of Kaiba's smiles had meant, and that one least of all.
Even when he hadn't answered (or given the right answers), they still sat next to him and talked about the class or the teacher or the weather. Yugi had wished for friends in high school. He'd gotten them. He'd lost one, forever. The idea of new friends was strange, something he hadn't expected or considered.
Yugi slowed down as he reached the campus. Ryou Bakura was waiting. Yugi waved and crossed the street to join him. They both wanted to be game designers. They had a couple of classes together. Nothing they were studying seemed likely to lead to game design, but they were both philosophical. They were both ready for the normalcy of wondering if their classes would ever make sense. That had been familiar in high school as well.
"How are you?" Bakura asked. It was their usual check-in.
Yugi smiled. "Fine."
Bakura reached out to touch his arm, successfully translating "fine" as "I'm trying."
"Me too," Bakura said. "I'm getting used to… you know… everything." Bakura had never sorted out just how he'd felt about the Spirit of the Ring. It wasn't that Bakura missed the spirit exactly, it was more that he was gone, and welcome or not, his absence left a gap.
Yugi nodded. "That's good."
"It's weird, meeting all these new people," Bakura said.
Yugi nodded again.
"I mean, I've changed schools before, but it's different, now. I keep telling myself I can invite people over. I don't have to worry. I forget sometimes and then I have to remind myself. It gets easier every day," Bakura assured him.
Yugi gave him a thumbs up. "And we're both going to keep moving forward. Our whole lives are ahead of us. That's what matters." Yugi laughed. "I sounded like Kaiba, didn't I?"
Bakura smiled. "How is he?"
Yugi shrugged. "I haven't seen him since the duel." Yugi had looked for Kaiba at graduation, even though Kaiba hadn't attended a single class since the day he'd first sat down to play a penalty game with Atem. That had been years ago. The duel with Diva had been the first and last time they'd really talked, the first time Kaiba had looked at him without also seeing Atem. "I emailed him and asked how he was doing. I got a one word answer: 'Working.'"
Bakura chuckled. "That sounds like him." He paused and then added, "That duel changed a lot of things."
"I got to see my partner again."
"I finally believed the Spirit of the Ring was gone," said Bakura at the same time.
They both smiled at each other and added, "I'm glad it's over."
As they reached their class, Yugi wondered if they should name themselves, "The Moving-On Club," and if it was okay for a club to have only two members.
Across town, Kaiba was pretending to work. His computer was on; he was staring at the screen. He was thinking about Atem.
Atem had told him at Alcatraz that even if he won, he'd never stop chasing the next victory on the next horizon. Atem hadn't been right.
But he hadn't been wrong, either.
Kaiba had hunted Atem right into a different dimension. And now there was nothing left to chase. Kaiba frowned and tapped his fingers on the desktop. Why didn't it feel over?
The barely-heard sound of knuckles brushing against the office door broke into Kaiba's thoughts, unprofitable as they were. Only two people would dare to knock on his door after he'd said that he didn't want to be disturbed. Only one would do it so deferentially.
"Come in," Kaiba said to Isono. He returned his attention to the monitor. Isono came into the room and slid some papers on his desk.
Kaiba didn't look up. A couple of minutes ticked by. Isono wondered what his boss was seeing.
"Do you remember what Diva said?" Kaiba asked, his gaze still on his screen. "About memory connecting us, about how our memories held the world together? I knew then that I could use them as a string, that I could follow anywhere… even to the Netherworld."
"And back home again," Isono added. "That's important, too. I'm glad you're safe, sir."
Kaiba steepled his fingers and rested his chin on them briefly. He looked at Isono for the first time. "I won."
Isono nodded. "You got what you went for, sir."
It was hard to tell if Isono was stating a fact or asking a question – and only one of those two options was acceptable. Kaiba narrowed his eyes and scanned Isono's face, but his subordinate, as usual, had kept his sunglasses on. "I won," Kaiba snarled. There was a hint of danger in his voice, or of warning. Kaiba shook his head. "Logically, that should be the end of it. As you pointed out, I got what I wanted."
Isono coughed into his hand. "Connections are rarely that easy to sever, sir."
"Is this your way of telling me, like Yugi did, that it's time to move on?"
"The last time someone tried to tell you that, you moved right on to another dimension."
Kaiba smiled. "You can go," he said. "I'll look at this stuff later."
Isono bowed and left. Kaiba went back to staring at the computer screen until it was time to go home.
Several hours later and a dimension away, Atem lay in bed waiting for sleep. He wondered what time it was in Domino. He'd forgotten to ask Kaiba if time ran in sync however far apart their worlds were. It would be nice if it did... if right now, Kaiba was turning down the covers and climbing into bed, finally ready to put the day and its worries aside. Atem chuckled to himself. No matter how time ran, he couldn't imagine Kaiba tamely surrendering to sleep.
Kaiba opened his eyes and looked around. He remembered going home. He remembered going to bed. Now he was in his space station dressed in his dueling outfit. There was only one logical conclusion to draw...
Kaiba walked over to the windows, looked out and frowned. The stars were so close. It was an optical illusion, of course. They were brighter without Earth's pollution and ambient light, but not, relatively speaking, appreciably closer.
He heard a chuckle behind him. "Overanalyzing everything, again?"
Kaiba turned to face Atem. He crossed his arms and stood even straighter, leaning back to increase the appearance of height. "This is a dream," Kaiba stated.
"That would mean you're dreaming of me," Atem pointed out.
Kaiba frowned. He probably was, but that didn't mean he was going to agree so easily. He studied the man before him. Atem's face was thinner, his skin darker than when he'd shared a body with Yugi. He was dressed like a pharaoh. His forehead, chest and arms were covered in gold; it dripped from his earlobes. This was the man Kaiba dueled in the Netherworld, not the pale copy conjured up by Kaiba's faulty memories in his computer lab.
"For all I know, you're the one dreaming and I'm in your dream," Kaiba countered.
"Yes. It's possible. I thought I'd let you go. We had our meeting. We dueled. We said goodbye. You should have moved on. I shouldn't have wanted… this shouldn't have happened."
"Still binding your life by 'shoulds' and 'shouldn'ts' I see," said Kaiba with a smirk.
"What else is strong enough to hold our inclinations in check?" Atem gestured to the space station walls. "This is the proof of why all those 'shoulds' and 'shouldn'ts' are necessary."
"And what is your Netherworld, then? Just one more obligation?"
Atem shook his head. Golden stalks of hair swung gently from side to side. His thoughts travelled backwards through time. This was exactly why he hadn't contacted Kaiba before he had left. He wondered if Kaiba, too, was looking past the stars outside, was seeing the morning when Atem had walked into a tomb to duel Yugi and all possibility for goodbyes had vanished. "I'm where I belong," he said.
"Oh, really? Then why are you here shuffling through other people's dreams?"
"Not anyone's. Yours."
Kaiba flinched. He paused, and then as though reading all of Atem's unspoken doubts, he asked, "Were your memories worth losing your life over?"
"Enough, Kaiba. I didn't lose my life. I rejoined it."
Kaiba snorted. "You left it behind as well."
Atem smiled, a slight lift of the lips that managed to convey sadness instead of joy. It was strange that Kaiba of all people, had been the one to notice something that Atem had spent every moment denying.
Talking about memories was safer.
"As I walked into the Netherworld, my memories flooded back like a wave battering the shoreline. Suddenly, I wasn't trying to figure out who everyone was, I wasn't pretending to rule and hoping no one would notice… I was the pharaoh. I knew it. I remembered it." He shook his head. "It was overwhelming. I was drowning when I'd only known thirst before."
"Did you tell all those people I saw in your throne room that you'd been faking it the whole time?"
"Of course not. I'm their infallible, semi-divine pharaoh. I'm their friend." A slight bitterness laced his words.
Kaiba had never figured out the intricacies of friendship. It made sense that lying was one of the prerequisites. "So, why tell me?"
"I'm not sure." This time Atem's smile touched his eyes. "Because I can. Because you're just as stubborn and wrong-headed as I am. Because you're smart enough to figure out a way to barge into the Netherworld and short-sighted enough not to have asked yourself 'why.'"
Kaiba snorted. The sound was almost friendly.
"What about you?" Atem asked, finally moving from defense to attack. "After all, I'm not the only one wandering through dreams tonight."
"You once told me that even if I beat you, I wouldn't be able to hold on to it, that within a week it would become as meaningless as all my other victories. I'm going to prove you wrong." Even in a dream, Kaiba's voice was harsh. It was hard to tell if he was answering Atem's question or changing the subject.
"You already have. You've changed since that day at Alcatraz. You've grown, Kaiba. Accept it."
"Do you really think that?" Kaiba asked. He knew he would dismiss whatever answer he received once he woke up.
"Yes." Atem looked away from the naked longing in Kaiba's eyes. "I'm sorry."
"Why?" Kaiba asked.
"I never wanted to hurt you."
Kaiba's eyebrows drew together. His lip curled. "You think you could hurt me?"
"I think I did. I never meant to make things worse."
Kaiba reminded himself that this was just a dream. None of it counted. He paused. The words came slowly; Kaiba found a freedom in saying them. "Learning too late that you were gone without a word of goodbye... the months of trial and error to find you, wondering if everyone was right. You have a long way to go to reach worse."
Atem's eyes fell once again. "Even dreams are dangerous, then."
Kaiba's smile was a knife edge in the darkness. "They always are."
Atem paused. "I miss danger," he whispered. He felt free to admit it here. "This must be a dream," Atem thought.
"Is your Netherworld so lacking in challenge?" Kaiba asked.
Atem drew in a breath and then released it. There was no one to hear his confession but Kaiba. "The challenge is living in peace."
Kaiba laughed. "So much for paradise."
Atem smiled back. He couldn't bring himself to agree, that was too disloyal, too much in opposition to the gods who had brought him to a safe harbor, a place of rest. But he was glad Kaiba was here to put his own selfish thoughts into words.
Kaiba pressed his lips together. If this was his dream, he should know what to say next. But standing here, watching Atem watch him, was enough.
Almost.
"We said goodbye already. Why are you here?" Kaiba asked.
Atem shook his head. "I don't know. There are no bindings between us, nothing owed. But here we are. Dueling you is like nothing else. Each duel left me aching for… something… for the next time we met. That hasn't changed."
Kaiba's skin shone in the starlight, pale as a statue that had yet to be painted. Atem felt an impulse to reach out, to touch his rival in a way he never had before. That felt dangerous, too. Atem shifted his weight, then took a step towards Kaiba.
"You were right about one thing," Kaiba said, his voice husky and rough. "Winning… it isn't enough." Kaiba took an unconscious, unwary step forward in response.
Whatever tie had connected them broke. The dream shattered, snapping them back to their own worlds.
Atem sat up in bed, gasping, his fine cotton sheets pooling in his lap. He had the advantage of Kaiba in this: he believed in dreams. Atem lay back down, waiting for his breathing to slow, trying to relax into the room's silence. He closed his eyes but they snapped open almost instantly. He stared at the darkness, then groaned and got out of bed and walked out into the courtyard.
Atem gazed up at the stars. The courtyard was quiet, the essence of peace. Even the rustle of Mahaad's robes blended in with the water in the fountain. Atem turned to face his friend. "You always know when I'm awake."
"I always know when you're troubled, my prince."
"Please, my name is Atem."
"As you wish."
Atem looked up again. "The stars are brighter here than in Domino."
"Everything is."
An image of Kaiba bathed in light in came into Atem's mind. "Everything? I wonder." Atem looked at the courtyard, at the flowing water, the fruit filled trees. His lips twisted. "I don't think he's made for peace."
"Who?"
"Seto Kaiba."
Mahaad folded his arms across his chest and nodded. "Seto. It's a dangerous name to give a child. The God of Storms shapes his own."
Atem switched his gaze back to Mahaad. "I had a dream… except it was more than a dream. It was real."
"Such dreams are gifts from the gods."
Atem shook his head, trying to clear it. "Kaiba was there. I wanted to see him. I was on his space station instead of here, where I belong. I was happy. I don't understand."
Mahaad tilted his head. "What?"
"Why am I dreaming of Kaiba when this world is my destiny? How can my dream – the dream we shared – be a gift from the gods, when it left me tossing and turning, when it has me fleeing my bed for a glimpse of the stars?" Atem looked at Mahaad, half hoping that his friend and counselor would have an easy answer that made his difficult feelings fall into place.
"You are asking a lesser being questions that only a god can answer."
Atem nodded. He reached up to squeeze Mahaad's shoulder, then headed back to his bedroom and into a dreamless sleep.
It was morning. Daylight was filtering through the bedroom window. Kaiba sat up and shook his head. He'd dreamed of his mother, once. She'd told him she loved him. She'd told him to look after his little brother. She'd told him that he was going to be okay. He'd felt better when he'd woken up. Then again, he'd been eight. She'd said what he wanted to hear. It hadn't been real.
It had been a dream.
Just like last night.
But last night had been the wrong dream.
Kaiba should have dreamed about beating Atem. He should have re-lived his victory, just as he'd re-lived that vision of being torn apart by monsters night after night in the months that had followed that first penalty game.
Instead, Kaiba had dreamed that Atem had been reaching out to him, he'd dreamed that Atem had missed him, had mourned his absence.
It was worse than a nightmare. Those he could live with. Nightmares were meant to be lived through until you wished that you believed in prayers so that you could beg for them to end.
Nightmares were meant to dismissed when morning broke as you buried yourself in work until night came and sleep could no longer be avoided.
This had been more terrifying. Atem had come for him… not for Yugi or for Jounouchi, or even because the fate of the world was at stake and Atem needed his help or a ride home. Kaiba had been blindsided by his own desire. His dream had forced Kaiba to realize how badly he'd wanted Atem to want him.
Kaiba heaved himself out of bed.
"It was just a dream," Kaiba reminded himself.
And the cure for unruly dreams was to avoid sleeping. He had enough work to keep him busy, anyway.
If he didn't sleep, he couldn't dream.
.
Thanks to Bnomiko for betaing this chapter and for reminding me that transitions between scenes are a good thing!
AUTHOR'S NOTE: There's a real freedom for me in how much about Yu-Gi-Oh! is left to the reader's imagination. Not only are the big questions, like what happened to Kaiba at the end of the movie left open, but so are smaller more intimate ones – like how would Yugi adjust to starting college? Or to life on his own? Would he – or Ryou Bakura for that matter – still hear echoes, still listen for a second set of footprints? Why does Isono keep working for Kaiba? Is the pay really that good? Or is the bonus sometimes hearing the thoughts his boss will only say in the privacy of his office while Isono pretends to fade into the background? The thing I love about fanfiction is that you don't just get to explore all of these questions, big and small – you get to write a story and show what the answers could look like.
SOCIAL MEDIA NOTE: I am on Tumblr, Dreamwidth and Pillowfort as Nenya85. Come check me out there!
To paraphrase Louise Rosenblatt, "A story's just ink on the page until a reader comes along to give it life." This is my way of saying that I'd really like to know what you think.
