Chapter 7: Full House, Royal Flush, Two of a Kind…
By Ysabet
Some days it just didn't pay to get out of bed.
This… is getting old.
Kuroba Kaito, International Criminal 1412, the Kaitou Kid—whatever you chose to call him, which currently included not only 'that goddamned white-suited jackass' (Nakamori-Keibu's favorite) and quite possibly the Shadow Realm's newest draft choice—fell through empty darkness, one hand holding his hat on, the other firmly clutching his companion's arm.
Boring. Boring, boring, boring. Either those monsters got me and I'm dead and I didn't notice—which I really hope didn't happen—or the Interdimensional Matter Transporter Card worked and we're en route to Somewhere Safe. Either way, I have to say that the scenery sucks Big Time.
It really did; suck, that is. No light, no sound, nothing but the sensation of icy air flowing over clothing, hair, skin; like fingers, stroking away warmth and leaving behind the chill of the grave. Nada, zip, a great big blank universe of empty shadows and wind—
--shadows… Hey, if I'm dead, why wouldn't I remember it? Unless the trauma blanked my mind; Jeeze, if that's the case I feel so cheated… Do I get to complain to the Management? Do I WANT to complain to the Management?
Cloak streaming out behind, falling/flying endlessly through black, airy nothing—
Naahhh; can't be dead. I may be dense sometimes, but I really think THAT would stick in my head. And besides—
(he glanced sideways at his companion, whose black-on-black spikes of hair streamed as he fell, purple eyes unblinking)
--I'm pretty sure Purple Eyes here'd be freaking out even worse than me if we'd gotten ripped to pieces. I don't know about his alter-ego, but if he's who I think he is, he's even younger than me. Fighting off the uneasy recollection that he had actually begun his career as the Kid at the tender age of sixteen, Kaito shrugged to himself. Whatever. At least we don't have that dragon after our asses anymore…
They had been falling for what could have been anything from half an hour to several of the same; it was hard to tell without a point of reference. They had both tried to speak to each other only to find that sound would not carry; you couldn't even hear yourself breathe, which was more than a little hard on Kaito's nerves, thank you very much. And worst of all, there was no way to tell when or even IF they were ever going to stop—
A tug on the thief's sleeve made him jump slightly; Purple Eyes was holding something out… Huh? OH. Heh; smart guy… It was a scrap of paper, almost invisible in the near-pitch-blackness of wherever the hell they were. What was not invisible was the writing; Kaito's companion had apparently hung onto the glow-in-the-dark marker once again.
'YOU NEED TO CONCENTRATE ON WHERE YOU WANT US TO GO' said the note in shaky characters. The thief blinked, thinking furiously. Taking the offered marker, he flipped the paper over and wrote:
'Why don't you do it? It was your card and you know this magic stuff—I don't.'
Black against black, Purple Eyes' fingers dragged a line through his previous message and wrote below it again:
'YES IT WAS MY CARD BUT YOU PLAYED IT. SO YOU HAVE TO DO IT. PLEASE TRY.'
Kaito scowled furiously; Concentrate, huh? Riiiiight… Well, shit; it's not like I can think of anything better to do, so--
Where did he want them to go?
That one was easy; 'someplace safe', he had said. Safe and dragon-free and NO TOMBS OR SCARAB-BEETLES…. and no fish… no zombies either…..
A grin flickered across Kaito's face despite himself. There's no place like home… There's no place like home… There's no place like home… There's--
It started out as a joke; it quickly grew into less of one and more of a soothing sort of mantra (after all, home WOULD fit the dragon/zombie/tomb/fish/beetle-free criteria) that he repeated over and over. Kaito's eyes closed; warmth and strength seemed to flow into him from where his hand was locked onto his companion's arm, bolstering the words that beat through his mind like waves on a shore, the rhythm of a heart:
There's no place like home… There's no place like home… There's no place like home…
Words are important; later on, Kuroba Kaito would think about this. In what he thought of as the Real World, words were a magician's stock-in-trade; they convinced the audience that you were going to pull a rabbit out of your hat, that you could make the cards do what you wanted them to, that you were the Kaitou Kid, International Criminal 1412, and not a slightly-deranged young man with a very odd mission…
And if words had power in the Real World, he'd think, you could just imagine what kind of power they had in a place as subjective as the Shadow Realm…..
There's no place like home… There's no place like home… There's no place like home… No place like home…. Home…. Home….. Home…..
I want to go home.
NOW.
------------------------------WHUMPH.
…and just like that, the fall stopped. Not painlessly, not silently, not gracefully; the thief found himself lying face-down on a cold, gritty surface, feeling distinctly like he had just disjointed his nose and managed to spread himself out thinly over several yards of—
--pavement?
It felt like asphalt. It even smelled like it.
Slowly, slowly, Kaito levered himself up one one hand, the other still attached to a groaning Purple Eyes' elbow. Slowly, slowly, the thief's eyes adjusted to the weak glare of streetlamps and electric lighting as he took in concrete curbs, sidewalks, shrubbery, houses…. Familiar houses…. One familiar house in particular, right up ahead and straight on 'til morning—
"I don't BELIEVE it," he whispered…
He was home.
/What in Ra's name did that thief do NOW? Where ARE we/
Um—I was sort of hoping you'd know…
/Aibou, most of my time spent in the Shadow Realm has been during Games, not… playing tourist. Battle leaves very little time for sight-seeing. And considering how the Thief has been affecting this place, I have not the faintest idea where we are. Geography here is as much an attitude as a physical thing—and we've moved around so much; we could be anywhere… we could exit the Game anywhere…/
Great. Jii-chan's gonna KILL us if we end up in China or Okinawa or, or France or somewhere else weird like that when we finally finish the ninth game—
/Let's worry about that when and if it happens, shall we? I believe we have other concerns at the moment… Errr… aibou? Why would France be so bad/
'Cause I totally failed French last year in school. All I can remember is how to say 'Where is the bathroom?', and if we finish the last game and end up in the middle of Paris I don't think that'll do us a lot of good, do you?
If he had been asked, Kaito could have said what he had been doing. He had been quietly, calmly, coming to terms with the fact that Home wasn't Home. 'Quietly and calmly' were, of course, for a given value of 'quiet' and 'calm', which meant that beneath everything he was gibbering.
First off, the street signs were wrong. He did NOT live on 'Earl of Demise Avenue'. That should've been a clue.
Secondly, the streets themselves were wrong; they went off in just slightly different directions than the originals, curving where they should've been straight and running straight where they should've curved. There were sign-posts in the wrong places, and the signs themselves were jet-black and featureless; and everywhere there were details that just didn't fit, like how the streetlights were a funny bluish-purple color and the bus-stop was ten meters from where it should have been and Oh, Jeeze, the only stops listed were for midnight…
Who rode buses that only stopped at midnight? The living dead?
Last of all, there were the houses.
If you only glanced at them, they were okay—same old same old, Aishu-san's house there on the corner, the Yamamoto's place two lots down (and it looked like their son had left his bike in the drive again)—but if you stared hard enough… If you stared hard enough, you'd notice that the stucco on Aishu-san's walls seemed to fade into mortared stone, and the Yamamoto's tile roof looked an awful lot at second glance like thatch, and their son's bike had more pedals than any human being could manage at one time, even though it only had one seat.
Ooogh. NOT home, then. Damn, damn, damn. I knew it was too good to be true. Kaito sighed, mopped his face with one dusty glove and sat down somewhat heavily on a bus-stop bench. "I don't think we're in Kansas anymore, Toto," he muttered, huddling slightly as he looked around. There were lights in the houses; and distantly, he could hear the occasional jangle of voices, laughing, arguing, just talking... People (the Shadow Realm's equivalent, at least) were going about their lives in there.
--not his kind of people, not yet, but—
"Thief?" That was Purple-Eyes—no, now it was Red Eyes, back in the saddle again; and damn but didn't he look awfully weird against Urban Normal? Like one of those dreams you had where the everyday mixed with the nightmares, thought Kaito glumly, the kind where you found yourself halfway through a heist wearing nothing but your boxers and monocle and-- He cut that off mid-thought and looked up into the black, scarlet-eyed face. "Are you alright, Thief?"
"…Hell if I know. This isn't my home. It sort of LOOKS like it, but it's not."
"No." Red Eyes settled noiselessly beside him on the bench; black, wavering spikes of something resembling hair trembled in a blast of wind that swept across them both, bearing scents that Kaito knew like the back of his hand: asphalt, cut grass, exhaust… home. "No, this is not your home. I suspect that the Shadow Realm did its best to approximate a match between what you wanted and what was available, but-- No."
"Why does it look so much like it, though? Unless I really concentrate, I mean…" He was aware that he sounded pretty pathetic but somehow the thief just couldn't bring himself to care.
The creature beside him sighed, looking out across the suburban landscape. "Remember the thunderstorm? You seem to have an uncanny knack for influencing your surroundings here; you… 'color' what's around you, to a certain extent. So what you see—and what I see, as well, I think—is based on what you want to see. Right now, you want your home the most, correct? Which house is yours?"
Without thinking, Kaito raised his head and nodded towards a particular house down the block a little ways; he had to look away after a second, though. "That one," he said quietly. "I know every inch of it; every board and brick and scrap of paint… but it's not really my home, is it?"
"No. Home is something unmistakable; when you see it, your heart will always recognize it, even if it remembers nothing else….." For a moment Red Eyes stared straight ahead at nothing, gaze turned inwards; he stood back up, moving out into the street again. They were at one of those junctions that you got sometimes when you had several lights shining down from above, giving everything multiple shadows; Kaito had four himself, but as Red Eyes spread his hands he looked like the center of a shadowy, 8-petaled chrysanthemum. "Home can be a person as well as a place," the dark voice murmured; "Sometimes that's all we have left of it after time has stolen everything else away. Tell me, Thief: what is your home to you?"
Silence; and for some reason, Kaito thought of Aoko as she had been when he had seen her last, out front across the street from his house, bringing in the newspaper wearing a ratty bath-robe and those stupid bunny-slippers of hers; she had waved to him where he was waiting for the bus-- "Home's… home. Where I belong."
"Yes. But, Thief? You are beginning to belong HERE. It's entirely possible that the Realm was… trying to make you feel at home."
Oh shit, thought Kaito, stomach sinking to his dusty white shoes.
Restlessly he climbed to his feet as well, setting off down the empty sidewalk with no particular aim in mind. Overhead, the blank, black expanse of sky seemed to mock what should have been there—he had always been able to see at least some stars in the Real World, despite the city's haze of light pollution. Not-thinking made the thief's feet follow a particular path; and it was with no real surprise that he looked up and realized that his hand was resting on a familiar gate-latch.
Home. Only it's not. Sucks to be you, Kuroba. He stared at where white-gloved fingers clutched cold metal, trying not to see anything beyond that point. If what lay in front of him changed like the other houses had, that'd be the last straw: home, becoming not-home before his eyes--
(and yet, whispered a tiny voice inside Kaito's head, it could BE home if you let it… This place wants you; it can be anything you want it to be if you work at it hard enough. Is that so bad?)
Behind him, the barest whisper of boot-heels came to a halt. "What do you see, Thief?"
Brick and white-washed stucco, tiles and a slanted roof; the place where he liked to climb up and sit and watch the stars (only there weren't any here, right?), the bushes that needed trimming back and the lawn that always seemed two weeks late for a mowing-- Upstairs, someone had left a window open; there were curtains fluttering in the breeze, and if he was close enough to see he'd bet that one corner of them had a snag in them from when he had caught them on the frame a few months back—
Kaito stared; then stared harder, frowning as he concentrated. It'll all change any minute now, just like the others--
"Well?"
"…………………………."
It wasn't changing.
Once again, non-thought took over and allowed fingers to open the gate, allowed silent feet to take him up the path to the door. The name-plate that should've read KUROBA was missing, he noted numbly; in its place was a card, rendered with careful detail in glaze on tile: 'GREAT PHANTOM THIEF' it said. Gleaming dully in the lamplight, the blue-hatted-and-suited figure loomed mysteriously against a full moon. "Oh boy," whispered Kaito; 'CLICK' answered the door, and he realized that he had just turned the knob. The thief swallowed hard, glancing back over his shoulder; barely a step back, Red Eyes nodded silently, and he pushed the door open.
Same foyer; same hallway; same everything…. Okay, except for the portrait of his father—THAT looked different; the face wasn't Kuroba Toichi's, the suit was dark blue and all, and… Nnngh. He wasn't going to go into the secret room, he wasn't he wasn't he wasn't. All it would take would be a push in the right place, but—no. No.
He didn't think he could stand seeing that place belonging to someone else.
Nobody seemed to be home; this, thought Kaito as he ghosted apprehensively through the familiar/unfamiliar rooms, was probably a good thing. It was/wasn't his home, things were the same/different everywhere--- the way the furniture was placed, even the dishes in the kitchen— He didn't dare go up the stairs to his/whoever's room. Not after staring at the photos in the family room… Okay, not photos per se; everything seemed to be hand-drawn or painted… But the people in the pictures weren't his mother, his father, or him.
Not my home. Never my home. Whoever that is, he isn't me and I'm not him, no matter what this goddamn place is trying to do to me. I don't belong here and I'm not gonna be hammered into place like a Kaito-shaped peg into a, a, a card-shaped hole. I. Am. NOT. Gonna. Stay. Here. I--
Behind him, Red Eyes had just asked a question; Kaito blinked, looking back. "Uhh—what?"
Throat-clearing sounds. "….. Err. Thief? I realize that this is not actually your home, but…" The other made a rather embarrassed sort of gesture; it could have meant almost anything. "That is… Where would the bathroom be?"
"……………………." he said intelligently, his brain-cells momentarily fusing at the thought of Red Eyes and facilities. Kaito silently pointed towards what he hoped was the correct doorway. With a nod, his companion padded silently around the corner, and the thief resolutely refused to even THINK about the matter beyond that point. Looking around this bizarre mirror-image reflection of his home was… difficult, but damned near anything was better than contemplating Red Eyes and, well, facilities.
Erk. And—thinking back, why had it almost sounded like he had said something in French, of all things? Why French?
Never mind…
A flyer on the refrigerator caught his eye as he wandered around a little aimlessly; the words were in an unknown, angular script, but somehow they seemed to make a kind of sense to him if Kaito stared at them long enough. THEATER, he read, and PERFORMANCE and MAGIC SHOW and GREAT PHANTOM THIEF. There was a date (circled in red marker) that made little sense, but the tiny scribble beside it clanged alarm-bells inside Kaito's head that very nearly drowned out the sense of displacement that had struck him ever since they had entered the not-his-home…..
A tiny, red-marker Tic-Tac-Toe board.
From somewhere down the hall there was a distinct flushing noise. Restlessly the thief turned away, opening the back door and peering out. Birds fluttered and cooed in the pens on the back porch: jet-black doves. Not his birds, even though they seemed to know him; Kaito turned away without a word, closing the back door as Red Eyes reappeared around the corner, back from… doing whatever he had done. "I think I know where the next game might be," said the thief quietly as he fought off an almost overwhelming desire to ask if the other had washed his hands.
"Hmmm?" Red Eyes had found one of the many juggling-sets scattered throughout the house and was rather bemusedly hefting the small, brightly-colored balls in his hands. For a moment Kaito's mind flashed back on their conversation beside the village well: 'You're good at that; why?' he had been asked, and he had answered 'It's something my dad started teaching me when I was a kid…' And if he didn't know better, he would swear that these were the balls he had learned juggling with—
"Where?" Kaito's companion placed the set back on the shelf where he had found it. "I can feel it somewhere a distance from here; near enough to reach, but… If directions meant anything here at all, I would say that we need to go west. Well?" In answer, the thief pointed at the tiny diagram on the flyer; Red Eyes shrugged after a moment. "Well enough." A scarlet gaze swept the room before returning to the thief's face. "Is there anything you need from here before we go?"
Only a fresh serving of sanity, thought Kaito silently as he shook his head. And maybe a side order of common sense, hold the fries. "Let's go."
He locked the door on the way out; his key fit without any problem at all.
-- I SAID I was sorry. It just popped into my head--
/--and out of my mouth, aibou. 'Ou est les doublevay-ce?' I don't speak French; I'm not even certain where the place IS./
I'll show you on an atlas when we get back, okay?
It was something of an anticlimax, thought Kaito, to end up waiting at the bus-stop for midnight to come…..
…..or at least it was until people—and things—started arriving there to wait for the bus as well.
At least there weren't any zombies, he considered; it could have been worse. The oddly-dressed men, women, kids and whatevers had begun to stroll up from various directions in ones and twos and groups, sitting down on the curb or loitering on the sidewalk; they chattered or stood idly silent, just like regular people. –Well, okay, NOT like regular people in that regular people usually had a reasonable number of limbs and carried less weaponry, but… still. Kaito politely stood up and offered his seat with a gesture to a diminutive crone-like creature carrying a broom; she accepted with an obaasan's smile (fanged) and sat down, smoothing her black skirt into place. Red Eyes shrugged slightly and joined him; and the thief noticed that the assemblage of bizarre creatures made way for him without comment but with a few rather wide-eyed stares.
"Um, do you have any idea what they use for money here?" he muttered from the side of his mouth to his companion, who frowned; if they were waiting for a bus, they were going to need coin of the Realm, so to speak—
Red Eyes seemed to be in the midst of a conversation with himself; Kaito could almost see his lips moving. "I… do not know," he said slowly; "It's not something that I've had to deal with in the past. Most of my activities in the Realm have involved battles, not… public transport?" He said the last phrase with the air of someone repeating it after hearing it from someone else, which was not exactly surprising.
Wristwatches were being looked at among the crowd (sometimes on wrists, sometimes not; sometimes they were skeletal-armwatches or tentaclewatches or anonymous-furry-limbwatches), and someone behind Kaito could be heard muttering about how the bus was always running late these days and Wasn't it a crying shame and SOMEBODY should contact the Transport Office, they really should, and Oh Look, is that it now?
With a pneumatic hiss of brakes it arrived, doors accordioning open as it chugged to a stop; it was without surprise that the thief noticed that the bus was jet-black from bumper to bumper. Other than that, though, it looked pretty much like any other city bus he had ever ridden… Well, okay, except for the passengers ("Whoops, 'scuse me, sorry I stepped on your tentacle there—", but for the most part they were the usual crowded-too-many-to-a-seat lot ("Oof! You want to watch it with that scythe, buddy? Thanks.") and paid little attention to the pair…
…other than all those looks that Red Eyes kept getting. Lots of them. And the soft buzz of whispered comment:
"—pharaoh, what's he DOING here? It's really the—"
"—traveling with us? Doesn't he usually—"
"—never seen him quite like that before. The Dark Magician and the—"
"—rrrrrrRRRRRRrrrrrrrgrowlsnarlrrrrrrrawrrrrrrrrhissssss—"
"—when he battles, though; I'm not sure about the one with him, he—"
And the bus-driver (green-scaled, fangy, bespecticaled, batwinged and with a distinct Korean accent) had waved away Kaito's cautious inquiries about paying the toll. And nodded respectfully to Red Eyes as he passed.
Weirder and weirder…..
They took a seat behind a lizardish mother-and-child pair, who chattered together in quick, sibilant voices. The bus smelled like all buses did, a funk of cleaning solution, gas fumes and personal hygiene or the lack thereof, possibly made a tad more exotic by more species differentiation that you usually found on a public transport. As the doors cranked shut and the engine revved, a sound from outside made the driver put on his brakes again. Kaito blinked, peering through his cloudy window; what the-- It had sounded like—
OH no. Uh uh. If it were her, I'd've seen her by now, wouldn't I? No way.
The doors opened again, and in came a—
ERK.
She was slender, athletically built, and a fiery redhead. Nice jewelry, thought the thief automatically… and nice fur, fangs, four legs, whiskers, black nose-tip and long, lashable tail. And nice stripes, too, lots of them. Nice stripes, yeah. In short, she was a tiger, big as a freaking horse and ornamented with begemmed anklets and a collar. One brilliant blue eye glittered as the great beast climbed aboard the bus; the other was seamed shut by a scar that bisected it, running down one furry cheek all the way to her throat.
"Thanks for waiting," said the tigress in a raspy, catastrophically familiar voice as Kaito gawked. The driver just nodded, closed the doors, and pulled away from the curb in a cloud of exhaust. Swaying with the movement of the vehicle, the tigress sauntered her impressive self a little ways down the aisle and then lay down calmly on the floor.
Right beside Kaito. He could hear her breathing.
And he could see her shiny black claws flexing in and out against the ribbed rubber matting of the bus floor. In and out, in and out, in and out…..
Oh. My. Freaking. God. 'There once was a lady from Liger / Who smiled as she rode on a tiger—'
…Aoko.
This, he thought in a rather panicky fashion, was one of those moments you read about where a person's life passed before their eyes. On the whole, his looked much shorter than he would have preferred, contained way too many violent bits and looked to be ending in teeth. That voice. Holy shit, holy shit, holy shit…… Aoko…? Nonono, NOT Aoko, remember that. Remember that. And stop hyperventilating RIGHT NOW. If you pass out, you'll fall on top of her and she'll turn you into a travel-snack.
'They came back from the ride / With the lady inside/ And the smile on the face of the tiger…' Eeeeeeurkk!
There went her claws again, in and out and in and out and in and… They made little popping noises as they bit through the rubber flooring; he could hear them ever-so-faintly over the engine sounds. In and out and in and out and…..
I'd better not even THINK about flipping anybody's skirt. She won't hit me with a mop, she'll EAT me.
Sweat, sweat; Kaito sat rigid in his seat, wondering privately if the predator beside him would consider him to be white meat or dark meat, and the bus continued on its way.
The city that they passed through—well, sometimes it was a city, all concrete and light-poles and so forth; other times it looked different, thatch and stonework—wasn't the one he knew, but at the same time it was. Stores with familiar windows were mixed with the totally unfamiliar and bizarre (who, for instance, would ever expect there to be anything called 'Haga's Bug Emporium'? or a place with a deranged-looking black clown's face over the entrance? Weeeeeird) and the whole place had a feeling of surreality… which, come to think of it, was definitely not helped by the citizenry. There were quite a few people/things/whatevers about, too—they strolled, shambled, slithered, crawled, clopped, staggered, lurched and sauntered past, appearances ranging from the commonplace to the bizarre—
(Kaito glanced around surreptitiously; Tigress-Aoko was daintily washing her paws with a large, pink tongue, and the little lizard-kid in the next seat forward was munching on a bag of what looked for all the world like dried flies.)
--which, all things considered, fit the surroundings perfectly. As they paused at a stop-light, he craned his head to read a billboard (What in the name of Harry Houdini are 'Big Shield Guardna Marital Aids'--?? On second thought, never mind--), Kaito noticed that Red Eyes seemed to be whispering to himself again. "Something wrong?"
"Not really… That is, my other self is somewhat perturbed by the denizens of this place." Black spikes of hair shifted like seaweed as scarlet glows turned to regard the thief, and he barely kept from edging back; it was a bit unnerving to stare into that shadowy face from so close. "We do not usually deal with them on such a… personal basis. Most of our contact with the Realm's inhabitants has been upon the field of battle," he added a little remotely. "One does not think of them as having other things to do."
"Mmph. I guess." Kaito watched a pair of feathery-winged girls in school-uniforms cross the road, birdlike talons clutching shopping-bags. "When I was a kid, when my dad used to perform magic for audiences, he told me one time that it was important to remember that the magic only lived when it had people to be performed for, and that you had to remember that there was a world beyond the stage." The girls reached the sidewalk, talking animatedly; from a distance, they could've been normal students from anywhere at all, except for the wings. "He loved performing, my dad did."
"And do you? Love to perform, that is?"
The bus pulled away from the intersection, and Kaito smiled to himself. "Oh yeah; there's nothing like it, whether I'm showing off a new trick for my friends or evading the cops during a heist—a good audience makes a good show, and makes me do my best work." He chuckled. "A good audience, it can make you a little crazy, y'know? Stuff happens sometimes that you can't even explain—tricks are better, everything flows, it all goes smooth as silk without a hitch… And," he added, warming to the subject, "playing for a bad audience is just the worst—like having to crawl uphill carrying a big rock, like that Greek guy in the myth, Sissy-something—"
Red Eyes blinked, a sight reminiscent of stop-lights changing. "Sissy-something…?"
"Yeah—a dead king, I think he was—he'd managed to cheat death for ages, so after the gods finally did him in he had to spend eternity pushing this boulder up a hill. Soon as he got to the top, it'd roll right back down and he'd have to do it all over again; must've pissed him off no end. Anyway… that's what a bad audience is like: Sissy-something and his rock."
"………I… see. I think. Thief?"
"Yeah?"
"My other self wishes to tell you 'good luck'. For your next performance, I believe."
"Oh? Uh—"
"Do you do magic tricks?" purred a familiar voice from Kaito's left; he jumped. He had almost forgotten—
Tigress-Aoko was looking at him with one interested blue eye; her pointed ears were perked, her whiskers were forward, and she had the appearance of a cat eying a mouse that might, just possibly, be more interesting alive than dead. "Are you a magician like the Great Phantom Thief?" She—well, what she was doing was probably smiling; he sure hoped so, since it involved a lot of teeth. "I love magic shows… Well? Are you?"
Uh—what? Oh, right. "Sort of," he hedged, thinking fast. What to do, what to—oh. OH. Stupid me; of course…" And Kaito suddenly grinned; it was like the world had just snapped into place, even if it was only for a second… because he knew exactly what to do. "M'name's… Kaito. And this—" (he held out an open hand) "—is for you." POOF!!! The scarlet silk rose glinted in his white glove as the Tigress' eye grew wide. "What's your name?" asked the magician as he handed it to her.
"OH! Thank you— I'm—"
He never got to hear her name, as the sudden pneumatic hiss and squeal of brakes drowned it out. "I believe we've arrived," murmured Red Eyes from beside him, siding off the seat. All around them people were gathering their belongings and climbing to their feet, tentacles or other appendages as the bus slowed. Tigress-Aoko said something else, but her words were lost in the tumult. "—What?"
"I said—" and the irritation in the slightly growly voice was clear "—that we'd better get inside if we want good seats. I'm larger than you two are, you can follow me if you'd like—" Her broad, striped body moved easily through the crowd like a furry tank as Tigress-Aoko pushed forward; the thief and Red Eyes looked at each other and then silently trailed along behind.
It was a performance hall like any other—big, dark and drafty, with that same cleaning-fluid-and-body-odor scent that all such halls in Kaito's experience had. This one might have had somewhat wider seats than the usual (presumably to accommodate the varying body-shapes of its clientele) but still, it was… just another hall. He wasn't certain whether to be disappointed or not. The aisles were pretty wide, too; Tigress-Aoko picked a spot near the front and reclined, nodding at the two open seats beside her; Kaito shrugged, sat down… and removed his hat somewhat belatedly.
You didn't wear a hat during a performance, after all… not unless you were the performer.
Beside him, Red Eyes was watching the rest of the audience stream in through the double-doors. "So many," he murmured; "I have called upon the denizens of the Realm over and over in my battles… so many of these, so many times: Celtic Guardian, Black Lustre Soldier, Lady of Faith… but if I have ever walked with them in this manner, I cannot recall it." Scarlet swept across the rows; occasionally someone would nod respectfully back or elbow their neighbor and say an excited something as they saw the sanguine gaze light upon them. Red Eyes drew a deep breath. "If for nothing else, Thief, I have that to thank you for…"
"Umm, right. You're welcome, I guess." Kaito nodded, even though he wasn't quite sure what he was nodding about. "It's the audience thing again, though—remember what I told you that my dad said? Magic only lives when you have someone to perform it for… So maybe your duels give these guys an outlet too. They all seem to know who you are." The woman/thing/whatever at the box-office had just waved them through, just like the bus-driver had—no tickets had been required, not even of Tigress-Aoko (which, the thief though somewhat dubiously, might have had more to do with their erstwhile companion's teeth and claws than with any Respect-Of-Red-Eyes that was going on.) "You call on 'em in those duel-thingies, right? Back in the Real World, I mean?"
"Yes. I call upon them, I use them to fight my battles, and—they die within the duels. The deaths are never permanent—frequently they are resurrected with 'Monster Reborn' or some such, or they simply are back to normal for the next duel, but still… they die. They are slain by their opponents; they are sacrificed by I and my other self to summon creatures of greater power. Why do they not resent us?" A passing large, greenish furry thing with smaller greenish furry things in tow nodded its fangy head at Red Eyes, shifting its hold on a bag of what looked like popcorn as it went by. "Why do they not hate us, the duelists who drag them into our conflicts?"
"Why don't you ask them?"
"What?"
The thief blinked at Red Eyes innocently. He had faced enough of his own ghosts during this whole mess; somehow it just seemed fitting that someone else should take their turn. "C'mon, you want to know, don't you? Oh, don't give me that look; you know you do. Here, hang on, I'll ask for you—" He knew he was pushing it, but somehow Kaito just couldn't resist. Ignoring the sputters to his left, the thief turned towards Tigress-Aoko. Oh well, he thought cheerfully as he applied his absolute best Poker Face, If she attacks, at least I'm already used to running from her…
"Um, hey—could I ask you a question?" She was, he saw, absently grooming her claws with short, careful licks; pale pink tongue still sticking out from between her teeth, she looked up inquiringly. "Do you know the guy with me?"
A blue eye blinked. "Of course I know him; everybody does. What kind of question is that?" She licked at a huge paw again.
Red Eyes was silent now, and Kaito studiously kept from looking his direction. "Well… what do you and the others think about him? I mean," and the thief floundered a little; how did you say this sort of thing, anyway? "I mean, he-- Does anybody have any problem with him pulling you into duels?" When her brow furrowed above her muzzle, Kaito elaborated. "You know, those fights where he puts you against some of the others living here—"
"Oh, do you mean the Games?" Lick, lick; shiny ebony claws were spread wide for inspection, and the thief fought off a strong vision of Nakamori Aoko after having just painted her nails. The tigress seemed slightly confused; long whiskers twitched as she frowned again. "We all play the Games; only a few of us get called on by the Outside players, the Duelists…" She curled a paw, graceful claws extending and retracting idly. "I've never played in one of those myself but I've been told that it's not much different from one of our regular Games, except that you don't get to choose who you play with or against; you're summoned to one of the playing-fields, you fight—" She yawned, pink tongue curling past far too many teeth for comfort. "My cousin Amazon Archer told me that when she got summoned last year, she only lasted five rounds before she got killed by the Flame Princess."
"Your cousin…" Red Eyes was leaning forward, two unwavering flames in the blackness of his face. "She died-- I know that after the Game ended, all was well with her, the players are always restored afterwards; but did she not resent those who used her life like that? Did she not hate the Flame Princess… and the Duelists?"
Tigress-Aoko tilted her head a little, flicking an ear; a delicate silver hoop twinkled. "Why? It was only a Game… and we play those all the time. ALL the time. And when they're over, they're over. " She hesitated, obviously torn between respect and stating something that was so very obvious to her, so ingrained. "Otherwise… how could we face our friends the next day?"
"Like me and Nakamori," muttered Kaito to himself; "When the game's over, it's over and that's it, at least for me—"
Claws slid back into their sheaths and the tigress regarded them both with one lambent blue eye. "Yes. Sometimes the dragons hold grudges—but they're dragons; they're like that. The rest of us—" and she shrugged, sleek-furred shoulders shifting beneath stripes.
"I… see."
I told you not to worry. When we duel, none of the cards—I mean, the spirits—I mean… you know, the people here… seem to hold grudges when we see them again, and just because we're here now instead of in the—what'd they call it, the 'Outside'?— why should they feel any different? The Black Magician even sacrificed himself for us back when we were up against that magician guy Pandora, remember?
/I know, but Aibou… My memories do not reach beyond the moment that I awoke within the Puzzle. No matter how long ago I came to be, in a way I am younger than an infant not yet old enough to walk. Although the Heart of the Cards is my legacy and part of my soul, I know very little of the Shadow Realm's inhabitants save for the small things I remember and the experiences I've had since I—/
Okay, okay! I get it. Jeeeeze, enough drama. It doesn't matter, really; they know what they're doing, don't they? The spirits in the cards, I mean; they fight for us, they fight WITH us… and… Think about Pandora again, remember how his Black Magician looked at him? They know us. And I think they understand who they're fighting for when we call on them, at least the Duelists who can reach the Heart of the Cards.
/Perhaps you are right. It's true, they seem to recognize us here, don't they?/
Uhuh. Feel better now? Good. Don't worry so much; you'll give us wrinkles.
/……very funny, Aibou. But— thank you./
"—hello? Hello in there?" Kaito waved a gloved hand in front of the face of the black figure beside them. "Y'know, if I'd had that glow-in-the-dark marker in my hand, I could've given you a new look you wouldn't believe, you were so out of it—"
A burning stare came close to frying him alive. "Don't even THINK of doing that, Thief. Not if you want to live."
"Killjoy."
Settling back into his seat, Kaito sighed, fiddling idly with his hat as he waited for the curtain to rise; it felt odd, holding it in his lap like that—how often did he take it off when he was the Kid, after all?—and he turned it around by its brim, running a gloved fingertip across the fabric. For a hat that had its origins from a game-card, it sure looked and felt like the real thing, hidden pockets and all; and Kaito wondered if, when he made it back to the Real World, he'd be able to take it with him. Man, he sure hoped so, or Nakamori-keibu was going to get a better eyeful than usual, and that was not good, now was it?
There was a tag on the inner lining; in faded ink, it read: BEWD Milliners, Inc. What on earth was a 'bewd'? Frowning, the thief reached deep into his headgear and rummaged around at the far end; it looked a little different than before. Something about the texture—
"Huh?"
His fingers had brushed against… fur? Something warm and alive—and before he knew it, Kaito had grabbed instinctively and yanked hard, pulling out…
"Oh, for crying out loud. This place just keeps getting weirder and weirder." The pink-eyed, white-furred bunny twitched its nose at him inquisitively as it dangled from the thief's hand and he regarded it solemnly. "You know, if I stuck a moustache on you and gave you a badge, you'd look just like Inspector Nakamori would after a long conference with a vodka bottle," he told it; it twitched at him again, and Kaito sighed before placing it carefully onto the auditorium floor. "Go be a good rabbit and… I dunno, find yourself a carrot or something Or a lady rabbit. Whatever." It hopped off into the shadows of the seats, and he allowed his head to fall back against the back of his chair. "Mmph. Wake me when the show starts, okay?" he said to his companions, eyes closing tiredly.
"Certainly."
If it had been quiet, perhaps he would have napped; God knew he was tired enough. But all around Kaito, the dull roar of the audience's whispers washed back and forth like a tide. Occasionally a bit of it would become audible, and some of the conversations concerned him….
"What WAS that thing that that magician just pulled out of his hat? I would've thought he'd pull out a kuriboh—"
"I think it's called a 'bunny', they have them in the World Outside. Funny-looking thing, isn't it? Eww, pink eyes, and did you see those ears?—"
"Brrrr… I'm glad I've never had to manifest, I don't think I'd like it. A 'bunny'? What else do they have in the World Outside?"
"……Well, I've heard Dark Magician talk to those Blue Eyes bigshots about something called an 'airplane'; it's supposed to be sort of like a big metal dragon that drinks oil and carries people in its stomach, only it lets them out afterwards…"
"—You're JOKING. No, really? Gods, that has got to be messy."
"And he kept talking about the 'Kaiba Blimp Of Doom', but he said that it was an obvious attempt to overcompensate for one's shortcomings, whatever that meant. I think maybe his alchemy lab needs a little better ventilation sometimes… those fumes CAN'T be good for you, even if you're a Level Six."
"Mmph. Well, you know what they say about magicians, always smoking something…"
(There was a faint noise from Kaito's seatmate; if he didn't know better, he could've sworn that Red Eyes was suppressing a snort of laughter. Must've been the 'Blimp Of Doom' thing, he thought drowsily, and allowed his attention to drift again.)
"—mama? I need to go to the baaaathroom!"
"Again? Dear, could you please take your little brother to the lavatory? And don't forget to make him wash his hands, all six of them this time. Go on, now, the show'll be starting soon—"
(The thief tuned that bit out, yawning, stretching his attention a little further…)
"—heard that this act drew record crowds in Endymion and Thebis. I wonder if he needs an assistant?"
"Oh, don't be such a fangirl, Mari! You wouldn't look good in a leotard."
(…and further…)
"HOW much for popcorn? That's outrageous! Pass me one of those candied bat's-heads, will you? Thanks." Crunch!
(...and even further…)
"and then Rhea and me told Thak to get a life and stop bothering us, and Rhea let him have it with her club—you know, the one with the copper nails in it?—and then Thak showed up at Trish Firehair's later on completely trashed with his loincloth on backwards, and we had to call the Troll Squad and he got booked for disturbing the peace and public nudity, you should've seen it—"
"Thief?"
"—and the next day he made bail but then he got summoned RIGHT into one of those Outsiders' games with this huuuge hangover, and he—"
"Thief? Can you hear me?"
"—all over the playing field, it was so disgusting, and Rhea and me damn near laughed ourselves sick—"
"Thief?"
(There was something poking him in the shoulder…) "Thief? Wake up."
"!!!" Dark blue eyes popped wide open. "H-Huh? What?" Blinking hard, Kaito turned his head towards the pair of lambent scarlet eyes that regarded him through the darkness that now filled the hall. "What's wrong?"
"Nothing is wrong yet, Thief… but the show is beginning. Wake up and pay attention."
"……..Oh." Kaito scrubbed at his eyes; from her place beside him, Tigress-Aoko purred briefly in amusement, her one eye flashing. "Right."
Showtime.
And on the stage, the curtain opened. And the lights focused on a cloaked figure wearing a top-hat—
To be continued…………
Ysabet's Notes: A little shorter of a chapter this time, but that felt like a good ending bit. Sorry about the delay; what with the holidays, some side-fics and a lot of work on another large fic of mine ('Windfall'), this one got set aside for a bit. But it's back up and moving, and we're ready for showtime and the last two games. And for the Kaiba brothers; don't forget about THOSE two, whatever you do—because Seto and Mokuba are waiting.
BTW, the chapter title was just my idea of a little joke. Don't murder me for it, okay? I just couldn't resist! 'Royal Flush', heh heh heh…
And now, because I can't seem to leave well enough alone, here's the next installment in the Omake Dinner Theatre Series, with at least one more to follow. I'm not quite sure how these things turned into a storyline on their own, but they did. That'll teach me.
Omake Dinner Theater IV: In Through The Out Door
"You know, I just can't believe nobody's ever tried this before." Paper rustled; a smell of ink permeated the air of the small cottage on the edge of one of the Shadow Realm's smaller hamlets.
"Think about it logically, Kuroba… They'd have to know with complete certainty that there was someplace to go, and besides, if they're native to the Realm, I doubt it could work in any permanent sort of way. And… perhaps this is why playing cards seems to be prohibited here with such emphasis."
"Mmph; I s'pose… Hand me that jar of silver ink, will you? I need to put the last touches on—" Silence, and then a flapping noise as of someone trying to dry a recalcitrant piece of paper. "Ooookay; guess it's now or never—Ahem. Great Sh—"
"Wait a minute, WAIT a minute! Why are you doing it?"
"YOU think about it logically, Sherlock: Who made the damned card? Who's been here the longest? And lastly, who beat your pony-tailed four-legged butt into the ground at our last Duel? You'd've been headed to the Big Pasture In The Sky if it hadn't been for Mystical Elf and her potions— So shuddup; I'm gonna be the one to do it. Great S--"
"Really? So tell me, Kuroba: Who has been proven already to have access to the Heart Of The Cards? I didn't win all those bloody tournaments just because you were in my deck. Well?"
"…………………"
"Well?"
"…………..if we end up six feet under in the Graveyard I'm gonna tell the Headless Knight that you said his horse had a nice ass. Here, take the goddamned card."
"Thank you. Ready? Hang onto my shoulder." There was a throat-clearing sound as hooves shuffled nervously on threadbare carpet. "Right….."
"…..Great Shoehorn Of Destiny!"
Reality went POOF!!! and the lights went out.
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There was a knock on the door. It creaked open.
"Hello, Hat? Hat, are you around? Black Magician Girl and I were wondering if we might borrow your--- Hello? Is anybody home?" A tall, purple-and-blue set of headgear was removed as someone ducked in through the low doorway. "Hat?"
"I don't understand, Djet, I could swear I saw him and that centaur friend of his through the window just a moment ago—oh; what's this?"
"It… looks like a… card….. "
"It can't be a card, cards are illegal here… Of course, this IS Hat we're talking about. Djet--? "
Two pairs of eyes locked on the piece of paper, and then looked up furtively at each other. Magicians and engineers have one thing very much in common: an itch to experiment. An itch that was being felt…
"--I wonder what it does?"
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"….groan…."
"Owwww… I—knew we shouldn't have made that left at Albuquerque— Hakuba? You okay?"
"I think so—aaagh, my legs are tangled up--- oh—"
"………………………."
"………………………."
"Hakuba? You're still a horse's ass. WHY are you still a horse's ass?"
"I—ow—could ask you the same, Kuroba—and it's 'centaur,' as I've told you repeatedly. And I have no idea. I thought we'd go back to our normal selves when we were sent home….. OH. Dear. Bloody hell."
"Yeeeeeeahhhh….. Where the #$&!! are we? The ground's all hard, sort of like… baked clay And there's trenches, regular ones, like a checkerboard—and that's not the sky up there… I see some columns off that way, at least I think they're columns and—oh. Oh, wait just a—a minute—"
"I see it, Kuroba. I've been in your home once before, after all."
"…..That's my dad's portrait. My dad's portrait, up there on the wall... It's, it's so BIG. That's my dad's—"
"Yes, yes, panic later, please…. We're standing in your foyer on a tile floor; those aren't columns, they're table-legs, and more vitally, that thing hanging down from it looks to be the wire from a telephone. Am I correct?"
"….that's my dad's portrait up there……."
"Quite, Kuroba. Kuroba? Kaito? Dammit, thief—" A deep breath. "HAT!"
"Bwah?"
"Please pay attention, will you? Your particular skills are about to come in very handy, as centaurs are not what one could call deft climbers. Do you see that table? There IS a phone on it, isn't there?"
"Uh—yeah? Why? And why the freaking HELL are we so, so, so SMALL?!?"
"Err. Well. You used one of the remaining cards that you had left over in your pocket to paint the image of the Shoehorn on, did you not? An effect card, one without a monster? I estimate the size of the cards to be roughly nine centimeters tall; the 'picture' area could not be more than half that, which would make us at the very most no more than four centimeters tall. Probably less, considering the texture of the tiles underfoot and the depth of the trenches—the grout—which, by the way, could do with a little work once you have regained your usual size— And therefore, without our original bodies existing in this world as a reference, we were… probably sent back as…. ah…….. that is…… I mean, hypothesizing that the cards work as a template for—no, wait, that's wrong……….. errr……….. "
"Hakuba, did someone tell you when you were a kid that admitting that you didn't know something would make your head explode? Just wondering. Now, about that 'usual size' thing…. The phone, huh? Who'd you want me to call, Akako? You really think she'll help us?"
"Once she stops laughing, yes…"
"…and once you finish apologizing for pissing her off, you mean. Remember, Hakuba? That's how YOU ended up stuck in the Realm in the first place."
"………………."
"Okay. So—we need to cross the Great Tiled Foyer Desert, scale what looks like a thousand meters of table-leg, move a gigantic phone-handset from its cradle, jump up and down on a bunch of freaking huge buttons, and scream like blue fuck into the receiver. AND convince Koizumi to come help us. Am I forgetting anything?"
"Only that you'll be doing it all. As I said, centaurs aren't very good at climbing."
"Wonderful. Hakuba? After this, running from you and Nakamori's brute squad will be a pleasure."
"Understood; I'm very much anticipating getting back to the chase myself. Let's get going, shall we? It looks to be quite a long ways away… relatively speaking…"
"Yeah. Oh well… at least there aren't any dragons around. I HATE dragons. Hey, did I ever tell you about the time me and the Trap Master got piss-drunk on some of the Black Magician's home-made hooch and booby-trapped the Hyozanryu's lair with a couple of my sonic grenades, wire, a banana peel and fifty-three gallons of bright pink paint?"
"Let's just GO, Kuroba."
Very small footsteps set off, keeping time to the ringing of very tiny horseshoes.
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-Owari-
