Chapter Six: Showing

YUGI

So there it is, accompanied by a purely imaginary drum roll; it's the big reveal, the telling of the master plan that has Yugi shaking in his tacky sneakers. He stops struggling at that stage, sags against the wall in the uncomfortable position he is forced into by the shackles around his wrists and ankles; arms pulled vertically above his head, legs chained together. Those big purple eyes have long stopped pleading silently for Yugo to just let him go, because it clearly isn't going to happen, not if Yugo was the one to chain him here, which he has effectively just admitted to. Freedom certainly isn't about to come while the other teenager is busy babbling about the intricacies of his master plan – and now, Yugi hangs his head and stares at the floor, letting himself sink into a state of shock.

And that's easy enough to do, because Yugi really is shocked by what just happened; although he's never really trusted Yugo all that much, he sure as heck wasn't expecting any of this. His twin had taken the boy's hand in the dark, said that he was leading Yugi to safety, put them in a lift – but now the niceties are over, Yugi's shackled to the wall and Yugo's laughing at him, laughing and gently explaining how he planned everything out. The room is dimly lit, and Yugo appears to be attempting to blind him with his flashlight, so it's not like there's much for the other boy to look at, not much for him to distract himself with.

"So you see, only one of us can leave now", Yugo is saying – and suddenly, he pauses, looking expectantly at Yugi. "Well?"

"Well, what?", the other boy mumbles, but to his dismay the wealthy teenager's grin becomes so wide that it could put the Cheshire Cat to shame. Yugo giggles, and it's a horrible sound; it reminds Yugi way too much of fingernails on a blackboard in its harsh undertones, and the way it steadily increases in pitch until it's hurting the boy's ears is nothing short of horrendous.

Mind you, what he says when he eventually calms down is far, far worse than the giggle; it's creepy, sure, but the level of fear it results in is nothing compared to just how badly Yugo's next words make his twin feel.

"So, you've already forgotten about your so–called source of power. How very cute."

A cold chill works its way down Yugi's spine, and he immediately starts racking his slow mind for the thing he has 'forgotten'. "My… my what?"

"I wouldn't worry about it if I were you. It's just something you lost – ahhh, not lost, because if you had really lost it, you'd remember it." Yugo moves out of his twin's line of sight; and there is a click a few seconds later, lights flickering on around Yugi. "Here, you might as well have a reward for forgetting. Positive reinforcement works quite well on people our age. But, what do you say?"

If he expects Yugi to thank him in any way, he is sadly mistaken. The boy merely glares around the white, pristine room as soon as his eyes have adjusted to the change in light, gaze drifting over the extra shackles sitting beside his Millennium Puzzle, placed on a plastic classroom desk a little behind and to the left of his torturer. He surveys the room as diligently as he can with his limited head movement; it looks to be some sort of converted office, all gleaming white walls and plain, plastic furniture. Clearly it's state of the art, though he only knows that because (a) everything else in the house has been state of the art, so why not, and (b) Yugo is babbling again, striding confidently and almost rudely into Yugi's line of sight.

"...And the chairs are Swiss, I believe. It took me forever to hunt them down, but the way they curve against one's back is nothing short of remarkable..."

The boy makes himself take careful note of the remote in Yugo's hand and the gun collection on the wall, identifying basically anything that could possibly hurt him – but time and time again, Yugi finds that his eyes are drawn back to stare at the large and obnoxious collection of screens behind his twin. He's not quite sure why, but there's something almost magical about them, or at least something very important about them. Blurry images of green, white, and black dance across their surfaces, even as Yugo's head bobs in front of them; for at some point, the boy has turned and walked over to watch the screens himself. Yugi's twin is clearly enjoying the show; for he studies each screen in turn, humming softly to himself; before he quite abruptly faces Yugi with a twisted smile that to the boy appears borderline psychopathic.

"Ah, I see that you are enjoying my security footage, just as I predicted – though I guess you can't really see it. There's a friend on the screen, you know..."

And now what he's forgotten – it's just so obvious now that Yugi thinks about it. The source of his power, he had once said, was the friendship he had with Honda and Anzu and Jounouchi and all the rest…

Of course.

The earlier conversation makes sense now; Yugo had expected Yugi to be worried about his friends, and of course the latter had forgotten to. He guesses that his momentary lapse in worrying for his friends could have been blamed on his initial panic due to his finding out that he was shackled to the wall in an extremely uncomfortable position; that sounds valid enough. However, he still feel ashamed anyway – he's never actually forgotten before, and somewhere in the middle of the mixed bag of emotions that are threatening to overwhelm him, Yugi vows to never, ever, forget his friends ever again. To have friends is the wish that he made on the Millennium Puzzle, after all…

"Hmm... this is rather interesting. Your friend is... Well, I think you'd like to see your friend, yes?" Striding back to his twin, Yugo clicks a button on his remote, being sure to put as much effort into the pressing of the button as he can. He whirls dramatically to face the security panel, arms held wide for a moment as one of the middle screens slides slowly towards the two twins, a dreadful grinding, screeching sound echoing throughout the room as metal moves against metal. The doppelganger, of course, is banging on about night vision cameras and their specifics the entire time; how much the system cost, how much it cost to install. No piece of the system is mentioned without an accompanying price tag and a confident smirk that says 'You're not getting this' – the price of things seems to be incredibly important to Yugo, and he's evidently not worried about that showing.

His words fall on deaf ears, however; for Yugi is busy concentrating on the current situation, his mind racing. the boy's eyes are soon straining to see the image, trying to bring it into focus as quickly as he can – for all he knows, one of his friends could be dead or worse, and there's no way of knowing who exactly is dead, not until he can see the dratted image in better detail. He squints and stretches his neck as far out as it will go, as the screen crawls closer and closer to him at a frustratingly slow pace–

Ah!

The screen is showing a picture of Honda, a green–and–black Honda but still a Honda, wandering aimlessly down a corridor. He evidently can't see at all; he's keeping his left hand brushing the left wall as he jogs, to make sure that he's moving relatively straight. Interestingly enough, this method doesn't keep the brunette from walking clean into a wall.

"No, this is the wrong channel. I am sorry."

Yugo mashes his remote, and now the screen is showing a green–and–black picture of Anzu, holding the Millennium Ring for some odd reason as she talks to Honda... only Honda shouldn't even be anywhere near her, he should be lying sprawled in the corridor at that T–junction, groaning and grumbling about walls. It's enough to make Yugi's head spin; Yugo's saying that it's all live footage, but Honda can't be in two places at the same time, can he?

Can he?

Click, click, click, goes the remote – and now there's a picture of Anzu, who's not holding the Ring anymore,(wait, what?) talking to Jounouchi, who is shouldering a rifle (how did he even get that?). The two of them look distinctly worried–

"No, not that..."

Click, click, click...

"Ah, here we are!"

–and at last he sees Ryou, standing very still in the middle of the room Yugi was dueling in not so long ago, as though he never left. The pale teen doesn't look to be hurt at all; which is a bit odd because Ryou was the one who was screaming in terror when they'd all been in the dark. He's holding a flashlight in his left hand and some sort of stick in his right; and after a moment he looks up, staring directly at the camera. Smiling gently, he salutes some invisible observer with – ahhh, that's not a stick he's got, but a machete. The steel blade glints dully under the infrared light; and to Yugi's surprise, Yugo merely nods at the image.

But wait… Ryou, with a machete? Gentle, peaceful Ryou, the guy who would never hurt unless he had a good reason to? That's even more ridiculous than imagining Jounouchi being able to shoulder a rifle as professionally as he had been shouldering the one in the last clear picture.

The pale teenager on the camera doesn't even need to start pointing at a nearby cupboard and swishing his weapon threateningly for Yugi's heart to plummet. Yugo isn't helping, of course; he's playing with Yugi's nerves, wondering out loud if perhaps something might be wrong. All the other twin can do is grit his teeth against the taunts; because even before Ryou has approached the cupboard, his observer knows that there's something terribly wrong with the pale boy.

He just doesn't know how much of an understatement 'terribly wrong' is, until with a flamboyant gesture, the teenager pulls from the cupboard a second Ryou Bakura, the night vision cameras showing that this one is bleeding dark green blood all over his almost–white skin. The second Ryou staggers as the first one brings him to his feet, only to fall to one knee when he's abruptly shoved between the shoulderblades by the first Ryou. The machete describes a slow, graceful half–circle in the air, as the first Ryou taps it gently on his victim's neck, miming what he's going to do. The second swing is clearly the serious one; the pale teen grins like a maniac, bringing his weapon over his head and–

–and the screen goes black, Yugo grinning lopsidedly at him over his shoulder. "Too much TV is bad for you. Everyone knows that." The twin turns away from his brother, and something deep inside the boy goes snap.

"L–let me go!", Yugi screams, thrashing against his bonds at the thought that Ryou must surely be dead by this point. The shackles rub against his wrists and ankles, causing him pain, but in this moment he doesn't care. Ryou is dead, Ryou is dead–

"–oh, all right. I'll let you watch another show, okay? But you have to listen to me while the pretty pictures are playing, or there'll be no dinner for you."

It's all Yugi can do to tolerate the condescending wag of the finger, let alone the whole 'baby' thing. Still, he manages to keep his mouth shut and nod hard, although tears are now flowing down his cheeks; because if he shuts up and nods, he may be allowed to see whether or not his friends are all right.

His heart flutters when Yugo presses another button on his remote; but then Yugi's tired eyes are assaulted by an array of bright colours; furry monsters dancing on the screen, their toothless grins almost seeming to mock the boy. His torturer turns around to glance almost apologetically at him, though he's smiling gently at the way his twin's face falls in disappointment. "There you go. Baby shows for my baby brother – the finest quality, of course. So, before you drift off into the wonderful world of Sesame Street, any thoughts on my master plan?"

With a Herculean effort, the boy tears his eyes away from the painful image of Big Bird raving about the letter B, glancing at his smirking twin and trying very hard not to cry. "What you're doing is... what you're going to do... it's..." And then his voice cracks, rendering him speechless; he shakes his head slowly, stares at the floor.

"Wrong, perhaps?", Yugo scoffs, turning away to stare back at his screens. "Well... I'd prefer 'genius', to be honest. I would have thought that what with you being my brother and all, you'd have appreciated the intrica–"

"No! You're not my brother!"

"Maybe I wasn't before, but I am now. Face it, Yugi – I'm your lost long twin." A sick smile plays over the way–too–familiar features. "And I'm the better twin, aren't I? I grew up in wealth. I have everything I want and more. And as for you... well, I wasn't expecting much, but I still hoped for more than this. I mean, you really are weak without that Millennium Puzzle..."

There is a long silence.

"Look – just admit it already, I'm the better twin." There's a dangerous glint in the boy's eyes, as he grabs Yugi's chin in one hand, forcing it upwards until the boy feels that his neck is about to snap. "Admit it! I'll prove it to you if you don't!"

One purple eye cracks open in reply, staring accusingly at the boy. "Y–you're..."

"Yes?"

"...mad. You're mad."

Yugo merely leans closer, hissing softly in Yugi's ear. "Who cares? I've got the money. I'm more powerful than you, more powerful than you could ever hope for. You were given a wish on that Puzzle, I know you were, you could have had anything you wanted – and you wasted it. On friends."

"No. It's friendship that's real power. Having friends, that's..."

"...what you forgot about for a while there. We are all selfish at heart." With a snicker; Yugo steps away from his twin, turning back towards the other security screens; one press of a his remote, and they are sliding forwards to catch up with the one currently displaying Sesame Street. "Let us see if any of your friends are co– huh?"

One by one, Yugo's screens are going black; something that Yugi might have pinned on his twin as being yet another cruel joke, if it wasn't for the surprised, faintly concerned look on the teenager's face. Then again, Yugo is a good enough actor to have fooled his twin before; it's hard for Yugi to believe him any more. The two of them stare absentmindedly at the screens; watching carefully as a green blur covers one of them for a moment, just before the whole thing goes black. A few minutes later, this pattern repeats with the next screen on the right, then the next, and the next; slowly but surely someone must be moving through the rooms, and somehow disabling the cameras.

And if the rooms are connected, they must be moving towards Jounouchi and Anzu... Jou's got a rifle, but it must be awfully dark in there.

"How... curious," Yugo mutters to himself, eyes narrowing as he watches. "This interference – ah, you will have to excuse me."

And so saying, turning on his heel, Yugo calmly leaves Yugi to watch the plights of his friends, and pray that those who are left will be all right.

Don't think about Ryou.

Don't think about Ryou.

Don't think about Ryou...

and auuugh he feels so sick.

UAB

– Yes, the plot just got even more complicated.

– Yes, Yugo's starting to lose his little airs and graces, now that he's alone with Yugi.

– No, I really can't think of much more to say aside from that. Maybe I should just say "Reviewwww" for the word count's sake or something...

Reply to Guest Review:

Yami E: Oh yes - Yugo's got the Millennium Puzzle! At least he hasn't taken it apart or anything, but still...

Eheheh, you're right; there's definitely two Anzus, two Hondas, and two Ryous existing at exactly the time as each other; and... well, the second Ryou is stated to have grey eyes in chapter five. I reckon you might be onto something here! ;)

Heh - Kaiba and Malik's fight was definitely live on TV~ I remember editing that chapter so that the presenter wouldn't shut up about it, xDDD. And yet, Malik's clearly on the island...

Feel free to try and figure it all out before the big reveal - it's great to see someone interested in what's going on here! :D It's not annoying me in the least! ^_^

Ahhh, thankyou so muchos~ I love it when people are enjoying my scratchings!