Disclaimer: I do not own anything. All rights go to their creators. I do own original cards not found on the wikia.
"The test of the morality of a society is what it does for its children." -Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Chapter Seven: Jaden's Back!
Jesse felt as if someone had stabbed his heart with a rusted knife and twisted it. The girl that he knew was technically a fake, the real one was hidden and had been hurt so bad, and now they had no idea where the real one was.
Ruby's ears twitched slightly as she heard a familiar noise. It was the distinct chirping of Winged Kuriboh. The small purple creature ran over to a small crack in the wall and started to paw at it, whining softly.
"What in the world are you up to Ruby?" Jesse asked as he walked over to his smallest duel spirit.
"Rubi!" the legendary animal whined and pointed to the now-glowing crack in the wall.
Haou walked over to the crack and looked through it. "Sweet Dad! I can see Jaden! And some monsters that I've never seen before…"
She turned to Amber Mammoth with a small glint in her eye. "Think you can be a Battering-Ram, big guy?"
Jaden sighed as she drew pictures in the sand with a stick. She wanted to wake up and hang out with her friends. She wanted to duel people again and call her friends back home and laugh about old memories. Heck, she even wanted to go to Crowler's class and have him yell at her for falling asleep and then have the man give her detention.
"You want to channel Cocoon Dolphin and go for another swim, Jaden?" asked Aquos.
Jaden shook her head. "No thanks. I was just thinking about some stuff."
"Like what?" asked Dark Panther as he nuzzled her cheek.
"Just some stuff, like my friends and family. I really miss them." Jaden sighed as she leaned into the comfort provided.
"JADEN! YOU'RE OKAY!"
Jaden snapped her head to the right to see Jesse the Crystal Beasts and Haou running towards her. She stood up and ran towards them crying slightly.
"You guys found me! You guys actually found me, thank Ra!" she sobbed as she reached Jesse.
"Jaden." He breathed. Right now his heart and mind were having a battle with each other. One was telling him that Jaden was never really real and the other was screaming at him to hug her.
"Jesse, what's wrong?" Jaden asked him. Jesse shifted uncomfortably under the gaze of both Jaden and the new cast of monsters behind her.
"Jaden, what do remember about the day your mother left you at the asylum?" Haou asked.
"I remember being locked in a white room and you making a portal of shadows to help me escape. I remember something hitting me, water, and Yubel's eyes. Why do you ask?"
"Jaden." Topaz Tiger intervened. "Do you know what a proxy soul is?"
"Of course I kn-" Jaden stopped talking and started shaking. "No. Please, tell me this is a lie."
Haou stepped to the side and revealed the younger Jaden. The older Jaden fell to her knees and cried.
"Yubel made me didn't she? She tried to make a replacement Jaden and I've been living a lie my entire existence. I-I'm not real."
"No! What you are is real!" Jesse yelled, causing Jaden to look up at him. "You're emotions and memories are all real! What you feel about things is real! What people feel about you is real! What I-"
Jesse stopped and looked away with a blush on his face. Jaden tilted her head in curiosity.
"What Romeo is trying to say here is that BOTH of you are real. You are two halves of the same coin." Haou said as she pushed the young child toward her teenage counterpart. "You two just need to come together."
"How would they do that?" Amber Mammoth wondered out loud. Haou froze.
"That is a very good question, my friend."
"I never thought I would see the day where you didn't know the answer to something." Jaden mused.
"I have a theory." Flame Scarab pointed to the bracelet that young Jaden was wearing. "That bracelet is the only thing keeping the two separated. If it is severed, then the two soul halves will become one again." He crouched down in front of the younger brunette. "How did you wake up, little one?"
"I…remember that entire day. Mommy put me in that scary place because I was playing with the spirits with a boy at the park. I remember that my cards were thrown into the fireplace and I could hear the spirits screaming for help, but my hands hurt too much when I tried to help! Only Yubel was saved!" Jaden started tearing up. "I remember Mom when she yelled at me and put me in that place." Jaden shivered. "I remember seeing Yubel and then sleeping, but I started waking up after the bigger me met Jesse and was awake-awake after they shook hands." She looked over to the two teens. "You two DID meet before! Jesse was the boy I played with!"
Jaden took Woodsman hand and waited as he turned into his knife form. She turned back to the glowing bracelet and started to shake.
"Nervous?"
"You have no freaking idea." Jaden breathed out. "No matter what happens, nothing is going to change between any of us, right?"
"Other than the fact that you will get any memories you are missing and can actually use fusion monsters as weapons, nothing will change." Haou said with a shrug.
"Will this hurt?" The youngest Yuki girl whimpered. Cocoon Pantail nuzzled her in a calming way.
"No, it won't. You two will just be the same person." Aquos assured her.
"Alright, you two. We do this on three."
"1…" The blade put on the bracelet.
I'm scared but…
"2…" The blade slowly sunk into the material
It's for the best
"3!" The bracelet was cut cleanly in two.
I'm glad I saw you again, Jesse. Good-bye…my best friend.
Jesse stumbled out of the shadow portal that Haou created for him to go back. He frowned internally when he saw that his Gem Beasts were no longer solid, but still smiled in relief that he could see them. His smile got bigger when he saw that Jaden was awake.
"Hey, Jess. I'm finally home."
Her answer was a bear hug from her old friend.
"Alrighty then! Jaden is back, so let's party!" yelled Jim.
Jaden laughed nervously as the night went on. From crying dorm mates to socializing new Duel Spirits, it was a long night. Especially since Black*Star was there.
"Oh, Jaden~. Look what I got~." Black*Star sang out.
Jaden whipped her head around to see her elder holding a bag of her biggest weakness.
"BLACK*STAR GIVE ME THOSE CHEETOS RIGHT NOW!"(1)
Jaden rose from her seat and started to run after the ninja, the former swearing and the later laughing.
"SCARED THAT THE GREAT BLACK*STAR HAS YOUR ONE TRUE WEAKNESS AND CAN BRING YOU TO YOUR KNESS?"
"IF YOU DON'T GIVE ME THOSE CHEETOS RIGHT NOW I'M TELLING PATTY AND TSUBAKI!"
Black*Star gave a look of horror and tossed the bag of junk food to the angered teen, which shifted her mood to a happy one. Jaden smiled and skipped back over to her friends, hugging the bag.
"All that over a bag of Cheetos?" Syrus asked.
Jaden nodded. "I never got to eat junk food a lot before I was adopted and theses were some of the first snacks I got to have! They are my favorites!"
"Yeah! Pocky is pretty awesome too!" Mindy added.
"I like Rolos!" Jasmine chirped.
"Vegemite!" Jim cheered. Everyone took a step away from the aussie.
"Chocolate cake!" Atticus yelled.
For the next 15 minutes, people were yelling out their favorite junk food.
"Milky Way!"
"Doritos!"
"Jolly Ranchers!"
"Skittles!"
"Red Vines!" Jesse and Jaden called at the same time while holding up said snack and taking a bite out of it. The two of them looked at each other while the Twizzler like snack stuck out of their mouths. They held up one hand each, mirroring each other, and waved it in a circle. They repeated the action with the other hand. They both chewed off a bit and raised an eyebrow.
"Favorite Aimee Man song on three. 1, 2, 3-" Jesse started.
"Red Vines." They both said.
"Favorite colored vines other than green." Jaden countered.
"Red Vines." They both said again.
"Best way to say Red Wines in a German Accent?" Jesse asked, getting a little excited.
"Red Vines. Oh My Ra! Where have you been all my life?"(2) The two shouted as they hugged.
All humans and duel spirits alike sweat dropped and acted like they didn't know the two.
"By the way, where is Chazz? I wanted to duel him with my new deck!" Jaden pouted.
Axel came over to her, arms crossed. "After you fell into your coma, he went crazy. Started wearing white and saying that he had seen the light. After that, he dueled practically everyone in the Obelisk Blue Dorm and they said that they saw the light too. They painted the entire dorm white! Any escapees went to the Ra Yellow dorms since we have a couple here at Slifer Red."
"YO-HOOO!" Everyone turned to see Black*Star standing atop a speaker with a microphone in hand. "IN HONOR OF OUR FAVORITE SLIFER COMING BACK, WE HAVE A LITTLE SURPRISE FOR THAT CRAZY STUCK-UP WHITE DORM!"
Jaden's jaw dropped as a large catapult was wheeled out. She looked at her childhood friend with a disbelieving look dawning across her face.
"Black*Star you didn't…Please tell me you didn't…" Jaden said with a hint of laughter in her voice.
"Yep! The great Black*Star was able to convince the Artisan and Crafts Club into making this if I gave them each an autographed picture of the great me!" He turned to the members of the Red Dorm and pointed to a pile of junk. "Alright kiddies, it's time to load the washing machine onto this bad boy!" (3)
Currently, the members of the Society of Light were worshipping their precious light when they heard a loud 'CLANG' come from outside. They went outside to investigate and saw a washing machine on the front lawn of their dorm. They were all dumbfounded. The founding brainwasher of the dorm walked out to the abandoned cleaning mechanism and nudged it with his foot.
"What in the world-"
Chazz was cut off when another washing machine landed in front of them. He looked at everyone else and started freaking out.
"Just what is going on-"
He was cut off again when someone landed on him. It turned out to be Dimitri of Ra Yellow. Chazz looked at him with a crazy smile. He picked the boy up by his collar and showed him to the rest of the dorm.
"It seems that we have a new recruit."
"You guys just flung Dimitri! What were you thinking?" Jaden screamed.
"That he is a stalker and must be dealt with as such." Axel said as he nodded sagely.
"You know, we forgot to do something…" Jim trailed off.
"Sweet Ra, what did you forget?" Jaden asked, but regretted it as Syrus came out with a flaming torch. Jim then handed his hat to Hassleberry, who then extinguished the flame with it.
"He has been officially voted out of the Red Dorm." Jim said in an official sounding voice.
Jaden groaned as she took a sip of her Pepsi and shook her head. "So you guys are playing Survivor with your classmates now? You guys are crazy. Insane crazy jerks. Insane crazy jerks with a death wish." (4)
"At least we didn't send him to find that guy." Black*Star cut in.
Jaden jumped up and started shaking the life out the blue haired ninja, much to the surprise of everybody else. "That thing is not allowed to be mentioned around here! You hear me? That abomination is not to be mentioned on these hallowed grounds!"
Axel came over and whispered something in her ear, which caused her to scream and start to flail about running before she was calmed down with a bucket of ice.
"What exactly did you say to her?" Alexis asked.
"Excalibur." Axel said casually.
This time Black*Star joined Jaden in her panic session.
"Should we help them?" Jasmine asked.
"This is quite fascinating. To think that a small word could have such an effect on someone." Bastion mused.
"Don't even think about it." Syrus growled. "From what I read, that…thing is evil incarnate."
Jaden hugged Stein and Black*Star as they waited for their ship to be ready to leave. They were needed back in Death City, much to Jaden's chagrin.
"Do you guys really have to go?" Jaden whined.
"Unfortunately, we do. Medusa and Salieri are still out there, so we are needed back home. If you ever need us, you know what to do." Stein said as he took a drag of his cigarette.
"Write 42-42-564 on a mirror and knock to be at Death's door." Jaden recited. "I know you guys. Stay safe for me okay? Oh, and tell the rest of Spartoi that I said hi!"
"We will. By the way, can you give this to that Jesse kid? It's from your dad."
"Okay! I will!" Jaden said with a smile on her face, completely oblivious to what her father might have written.
Later that night in Jaden's former room, an Obelisk Blue by the name of Jesse Anderson got no sleep, despite the fact that he had a small army of Duel Spirits and two roommates that would protect him.
Chibi: So that was Chapter 6. There are a lot of references in this one, all of which are humorous. This can be considered a filler chapter, but the ball will start rolling after this. Like I said before, some duels will be mentioned but not written out unless they involve one on the center characters like Jaden, Jesse, Axel, and a few others. Anyway, references of the Chapter:
(1): DarkSideCorporated and Yu-Gi-Oh GX Abridged. Enough said. Give us back Episode 11, 4kids!
(2): I got this line from A Very Potter Sequel, the second part of the Very Potter Musical series. Check it out some time.
(3): My friend's cousin goes to a college where the Band Dorm hated the German Club Dorm and they dress like Vikings and fling washing machines onto the German Club's front lawn. No joke. I've seen pictures.
(4): Dubbed line from Soul Eater. Liz said this when they investigated the Ghost Ship/Black Dragon.