Disclaimer: I do not own anything relating to Yu-Gi-Oh
Note: Story will be updated every Wednesday
Warning: TONS of cursing throughout story
Chapter Warning: There are mentions of pedophilia in the sixth part of the chapter.
Chapter XXI: Ransom
"…Have fun…on your date," the taller teen muttered softly, not looking up from where he was playing with a couple of Duel Monsters cards; Ra, Osiris and Obelisk kept appearing every single time and he was starting to worry the meaning behind it. The Puzzle glistened and shown when he leaned forward and he could swear as he touched Osiris it burned his fingers and allowed electricity to travel up his arm, killing the nerves beneath his skin for a split second before he could feel his blood pumping again.
He'd learned to read fates from Duel Monsters cards years ago when Bakura taught him how to do so and the problem was that Osiris was officially upwards, Ra was down, Obelisk was up, the Angel of Silence Doma was upwards, Red Eyes was down, and Silver Fang was up. Death, sunlight and power, strength, omen, control, and dangerous instincts.
And they were so completely flipped that it left him wanting to vomit.
Death, sunlight and power, strength, omen, control, and instinct.
Reading it as it was—as it had been every single time he tried to give himself a reading—meant that death was prominent as Osiris being upside predicted, Ra upside down meant that he would not have power over the situation to befall him, Obelisk upside said he would be given strength but that it was a double-edged sword with the placement of Doma and Red Eyes and especially Silver Fang, Doma upwards meant that his senses would fail him and something ill would befall him which only drew more importance from the cards surrounding it, Red Eyes facing downwards meant that he would have no control, and Silver Fang meant—as the wolf meant in animal totems—inner courage and wisdom, strength for when he was completely shaken, a deep connection with his instincts, danger and lack of trust, cunning and intelligence. Placed with those other five cards, it meant all of these qualities were going to be either utilized or pushed into his path, and if Yami really tried, he was pretty sure he could read for the most prominent aspect of the wolf's meaning, but for the moment he couldn't find the strength to do so.
Yami ground his teeth together and sorted them back into his deck as he had for the last three hours, once again shuffling violently and laying out the spread of six cards, flipping them each over and feeling a tremor run through him as the Puzzle burned against his abdomen.
Death, sunlight and power, strength, omen, control, and instinct.
Death in all its glory, a game of survival. Sunlight and power, the loss of familiarity or constants. Strength that would mean blood and sacrifice. Omen meaning the absolution of death and pain, sacrifice and blood, highlighting Osiris and Obelisk. Control being stripped away to push him into the grasp of his instincts. Trusting his instincts as a sure way of survival, absolute endurance that meant death to his threat.
He drew in a deep breath and closed his eyes for a moment, trying to keep from shuddering and letting his fear gain control for the time being. He would have plenty of time to freak out later…perhaps when this…"omen" came to pass.
Yugi froze halfway to the door and looked over his shoulder at the boy who would be manning the shop for him for the next few hours before Seto came over and the two went to go work on finding the guy who was responsible for all the shit that was going on; the taller teen had his palms rested against the glass, leaning forward and rocking gently on the balls of his feet, clenching and unclenching his jaw while drumming his fingers against the counter. Was he worried about him on the date?
He knew it had been such a sore issue between them and there was no blame he could place on the other teen for that; if he were in his shoes, he would have lost it by now. He'd be a mess, trying to make Yami turn back to him and leave Rebecca behind and just trying in general to make him choose him over anyone else, jealous to the core and desperate out of his mind for all of his attention.
But after their initial argument, it had been over as far as discussion went. Yami didn't bring her up and Yugi was careful never to do so just in case the taller teen got shaken anymore than he already was. And with the way that he was just barely keeping himself strung together, mostly through fights with him about nothing and everything, ranging from jelly flavors to the bathroom floor being cold and hard to wishing they had never met in the first place, Yugi was too scared to take any chances.
But…why was he still playing his cards like that? What was the point of that?
"I…Yami…"
He wanted to say it. He wanted so badly to say it.
But he was so much more used to running and avoiding and pretending that it seemed almost impossible to him; red eyes watched him curiously beneath a cold layer of ice that was rapidly melting the more he looked at him before his attention flickered back towards the cards on the counter and he started to draw them back into his deck, dismissing his smaller look-alike as if he were not even there in the first place.
Yugi cringed but he knew that Yami definitely had a reason to feel like this. After all, he had given him false hope when he had said Yami was his that night, furthered by the way that he had said those three words without actually voicing them, and now he was revoking it by going out with the blonde. "My Yami…" How strange but wonderful that still sounded in his head even when his lips refused to give in to the urge to form the words.
"I'm sorry," he muttered instead.
A very loaded apology that held no comparison to Yami's statements of "I love you" which Yugi knew he had taken for granted, the words that he constantly tried to tear out of the red-eyed teen's throat each time they spoke.
Yami flipped his cards over again and stared, startled but not so visibly shaken that it drew and held Yugi's attention; Change of Heart upright, Happy Lover upright, Ra upright, Osiris and Obelisk downwards, and Silver Fang upright.
A small shiver ran through him.
Yugi was going to choose today. Which one he loved. Him or Rebecca and judging by the Happy Lover card, he had a sinking feeling it would be the blonde. Ra upright with those two meant that he would have many good days with her, Osiris and Obelisk downwards meant that it would last and he would give his all, only more pronounced by Silver Fang upright, as wolves were known for mating for life…
He clenched his jaw and tilted his head. Yugi and Rebecca would last. For a long time. Maybe so long that they would get married…
The sound of water, like a small babbling brook, caught his attention as it did Yami's who blinked and retrieved his phone from his pocket to look it over, wide-eyed before rolling his eyes towards the ceiling with a shake of his head.
"What?"
"He's being a fucking bitch," Yami spat, blinking once but not bothering with an apology; Yugi would have blown him off anyways, because he didn't really care for his apologies, especially not when he was justified to feel how he did. How often could one tease another with the possibility of a relationship before things teetered over the edge and shit happened?
"Oh."
"Look"—Yami started out strong, vicious and cold, but ended weakly, eyes glued to the cards on the counter—"just…go have fun with Rebecca."
Yugi had to admit that it was somewhat hilarious that Yami could say her name with a straight face and no menace or true emotion to his voice when her own nose turned up and her eyes rolled behind her glasses when she had to say his.
"And you're sure you'll be all right by yourself?" he asked softly, half hoping that Yami would say no and give him some kind of reason—no matter how weak—to remain there with him instead of going.
But Yami shook his head and started to scoop the cards back into his desk, clenching his jaw and tapping his nails in a strange rhythm against the glass, something like a battle tune that made his ears hurt for a moment. "As long as I don't get fucked up the ass by fate, yes," he muttered moodily, sighing and shaking his head again as he pushed his deck away and leaned against the counter with his elbows, looking at his phone now.
Yugi was about to laugh and say that he would fuck him up the ass anytime but then immediately made the decision not to; one look at him said that Yami had just thought of the same thing and he was far from amused by any means.
He held up his hands and the looked him over, frowning slightly at the way that he seemed to curl in on himself for a split second. "Text me when you leave, okay?" he mumbled, the words so soft that he almost didn't think Yami heard him.
That was different. Yugi had never said anything about that before. For a long moment Yami couldn't find it in himself to respond, maybe because he knew that Yugi would choose Rebecca or possibly just because he didn't know what to say, but managed a nod. "All right."
"I, uh…I guess I'll see you whenever then…"
How awkward a goodbye. Could you get more awkward than that? Yugi felt sick after the words left his mouth, tongue feeling bitter and a little swollen, weighted by the words and making his stomach twist violently. Oh, gods, he was such a fucking douche for letting the words out of his mouth in the first place. What the fuck was wrong with him?
"I mean—"
"Yeah, yeah, I got it," Yami snapped before pausing and sighing, giving him a weak, strained smile that didn't quite meet his eyes. "Seriously, have fun."
Yugi stared at him for a long minute. Because Yami…actually sounded like he wanted him to have a good time, to not feel awkward and strange because it was Rebecca and he should have been in her place. And he didn't sound the least bit jealous or anything like that.
He sounded a little weak. Maybe a little defeated.
But that could have been for a number of reasons.
And Yugi couldn't help but wonder what the fuck was going on with that.
"Okay…Thanks…"
Yami let out a soft hum but didn't bother to voice an answer, instead turning his attention back to his cousin; as soon as Yugi was gone, he set out another six cards, flipped them over, and felt himself break.
Change of Heart, Happy Lover, Ra, Osiris, Obelisk and Silver Fang.
The Puzzle grew hot but flared cold when he touched it and vaguely he wondered if maybe it somehow shared his pain.
"So…what exactly makes you two psychos?" Ryou finally asked, passing his paper over to Bakura who snorted in amusement and shook his head slowly, smirking and flipping his binder open.
"Well…let's see. I've pulled the fire alarm just to skip a test in sixth period. I've overridden the sprinkler system. I made a blackout in the school to skip gym. I soaked the cafeteria floors with corn syrup. They have no proof but I constantly put signs on the cars in the lot saying that they're for sale. I dropped candy bars into the school swimming pool. I melted caramel and splattered it all across the principal's walls. Hmm…I've blown up exactly"—he paused, rolling his eyes up to the ceiling for a second before smirking at him—"twenty chemistry labs from freshman year to now. I put sewer water in the instruments for band. I've started three foodfights just this year to add to my record of thirty four other ones. I caught a wasp on fire with spray paint and a match when it wouldn't leave me alone in art class. I draw naked women on my math tests. I curse so much that my teachers don't care anymore. I ate my biology midterm right in front of my teacher when she pissed me off. I drew gang and satanic symbols all over the principal's lawn and driveway with chalk and spray paint. I've officially been called a menace to society by my parents, my teachers, classmates, my cousins, and the police are so used to getting calls about me that they just don't give a fuck anymore. I put up pictures of my principal fucking a goat on the walls. I've…hmm…let's see…"
"At this rate, the better question would have been what the fuck he hasn't done," Marik muttered, shaking his head slightly.
"I can list that off too. I mean, if you want," Bakura sniped, rolling his eyes.
"Okay…so, uh…wow, let's just change the—"
"But you haven't even heard of what I've done yet!" Malik objected angrily.
"I…Okay, what have you done?"
"I've stuffed rotting cheese into the air vents, set off a mass amount of soda fountains with Bakura and Yami, set off cherry bombs all throughout the girls' bathrooms, I've actually rented a forklift and lifted my biology teacher's car out of the lot and thrown it, I've caught the gym on fire. I put soda in the sprinklers and set them off, I drew on my teacher's walls, vandalized the principal's car, broke into the vending machines and stole the money and the drinks I wanted. I video taped my teacher cheating with a student. I convinced the math teacher to let me fuck my girlfriend against his desk when I threatened him with that. I got my dad stoned on accident. I—"
"Whoa, whoa, wait…on accident?" Marik cut in, furrowing his brows and swapping a look with Ryou as Bakura snorted laughingly and flipped through his assignment papers. "How the fuck do you get someone stoned on accident?"
"How?" he snickered, nudging his silver-haired cousin who smirked in response and shook him off. "I got the stupid brownie for this moron over here but the ones that we bought from the café down the street over there were wrapped up the same way and he ate the regular ones while my dad got the drugged one and my mom had a heart attack trying to figure out what the fuck was going on when he ate Lucky Charms out of an ice cream carton saying it was the best invention since soda."
Marik fell over laughing and Ryou snickered, shaking his head as Malik smirked and Bakura nudged him with his elbow and the blond went about adding, "Then I've gone and stolen the principal's keys and crashed his car into the side of the gym building. I've put itch powder in the entire football team's uniforms before a big game. I've stolen weight equipment from the gym and put it in random places around the school. I took my ex's underwear and hung them up in the trophy case. I pissed in someone's locker when they made me mad. I might or might not have hired a couple of guys to break into class one time and attack the teacher with Nerf guns and scare her into giving us another week to study for our final exams…"
"Wow. You must really…hate this school," Ryou commented, furrowing his brows and wondering what exactly could make them dislike it so much; aside from this social hierarchy they had going on it seemed pretty easygoing for the most part. The teachers were pretty nice aside from Mrs. Chono and things weren't too hard to do around there, regardless of the advanced placement classes he was taking.
"What?" Bakura asked, blinking in confusion before swapping a look with his cousin. "We don't hate it. We just get bored."
Yugi met Rebecca at the restaurant, feeling disgustingly awkward the moment he even got within feet of the extravagant looking building. But, then again, he was only sixteen, didn't know how to drive, had no driving experience to speak of, and he didn't even have a car. Plus, his grandfather was seriously pretty convinced that if he walked around enough, he would somehow grow taller.
How that made sense, he had no idea, but the old man came to that conclusion somehow despite how nonsensical it was.
But then again, this was his grandpa he was talking about. Strange was a synonym for the old man.
Even Yugi knew that.
The outfit was itchy against his skin as he walked in, spotted her, and then quickly took a seat in front of her, somewhat surprised by the fact that her hair was down and she had curled it into ringlets, wearing an expensive-looking sea-green dress that made her eyes shine all the brighter. She was beautiful, he admitted that, but she was also fourteen and while he didn't really care about that either because couples between sixteen-year-olds and fourteen-year-olds happened a lot at his school as it was, he still failed to see her as more than his family friend.
He tilted his head to the side slightly, studying her slowly and taking every note he could of what was going on. Her body language said she was nervous but utterly excited and he was somewhat curious about the moment that she would start trembling in exuberance. Huh. Was that how you were supposed to feel when you went out with someone? He really kind of wanted that.
And it didn't take a genius to realize that he would never get that with her.
He knew that but it didn't keep him from trying to feel something of that as he watched her, their conversation so mild that it bordered pathetic, eyes on her as their food arrived and she took her first bite. And he watched her take a sip of her soda and then stare at him in confusion.
"Yugi?"
His name made him want to vomit. His stomach twisted with something he didn't quite recognize but he knew for a fact that this was a mistake and something was terribly, horribly, viciously wrong. With the sight before him. His eyes hurt just looking and his head was throbbing as if he had gotten hammered.
Or maybe the hangover would feel better than this painful sensation he was experiencing now.
Oh gods, she shouldn't be here. Rebecca shouldn't be here.
He shouldn't be here. Yugi shouldn't be here.
He almost felt like breaking down and sobbing on the floor with the harsh blow of that realization; he had thought it would just be a simple little thing, just him and Rebecca in a restaurant, on a date that was all about paying her back for her efforts with Yami's laptop, the two of them eating and him pretending that he liked her back because that was exactly what he had signed up for. But, oh how wrong he was.
His mind struggled in vain to try to find something to rein his franticness in with but with the spinning in the room that sent his thoughts everywhere in his head and the pain his chest that made him feel cold and weak, it was impossible to do so.
He put his fork down and stared at his cup with the focus of a predator stalking its prey, watching a bead of condensation and tracing its path a moment later with his fingertip, feeling his stomach twist with anxiety as his mind produced the image of Yami licking and kissing the tears on his cheeks.
"Yami loves me," Yugi breathed, anticipating the wave of emotions that never came. There was no panic or fear that stormed through him, replaced instead with an intense twist of pure, unfiltered guilt that tore at his insides and left him completely exposed and his fingers trembling. Rebecca watched him, eyes widening slightly as the blue-violet gaze flickered and gleamed, flashing as he repeated, "Yami loves me."
The blonde watched the way his eyebrows slowly drew together in confusion and thoughtful anxiety, his jaw working as he started to tear into his cheek violently; he looked confused, drowning in it, his eyes clouding as he tried to sort through whatever it was in his head.
"Yugi?"
Those blue-violet eyes she had always loved so much slowly flickered up to hers and Yugi sat back slightly in his seat, still looking confused and a little dazed with a hint of horror lingering somewhere beneath it all but making his voice tremble violently as he whispered, "I'm so sorry, Rebecca. I know you've got to be angry with me…"
She was, a little bit, but mostly because she hated the fact that she really had already lost him without the chance to actually fight for him in the first place. Just as she had been afraid of.
"I'm not mad at you…" She paused, the words tasting foreign on her tongue; she'd never had a reason to say them before, she realized, a little shaken by the fact but growing a little more confident with it too. "I promise."
Yugi spared a small glance at his food, trying to collect himself and somehow managing to do so just enough to turn his attention back to her and tilt his head. "I know you're probably disappointed. Especially considering how I've handled this whole situation with you and Yami in the first place."
But he couldn't really find it in himself to care for her disappointment when his own made his heart heavy and his stomach feel like it was burning beneath his skin, searing and making him want to vomit.
She sighed and shook her head slowly, somewhat annoyed by the idea of having lost so easily without even really getting the chance, but when she thought about it, she couldn't find a single moment where Yugi had actually given her a reason to believe that they could ever get together in the first place. "It's none of my business," she stated softly, frowning as the words rang in Yugi's ears and made him stare at her for a second, obviously surprised. "I was just being a jealous bitch."
He offered a small laugh that was shaky around the edges. "Yes, you were, but that's why I love you, remember?"
She frowned as she stared into his eyes. "I'm sorry I've been like this, Yugi. I was thinking about it all and I thought about how impossible it was to even make you pay attention to me when we were younger, how reserved you were, and realized just how hard this must have really been for you." She idly jingled her bracelets, watching him. "Choosing between your heart and your head…"
Yugi didn't answer her, instead blinking once and turning his face away to glance at the others in the restaurant, feeling strange and sick with this conversation; most of the small teen wanted to go to Yami but another part of him just wanted to flee from it all because it was just so fucking hard…
"Yugi…look, whatever you decide to do—be with Yami, don't be with Yami—it's your decision, okay? Don't…think about what anyone else thinks….Even me."
The stiffness in her voice drew Yugi's attention back towards her, his eyes staring at a girl who seemed much older than she had been for the last couple of months. Even when they had been in the hospital, she did not look like this; her eyes had a fire he had never seen before and her stance spoke of determination that was directed towards him understanding what she was saying. It was pretty obvious, however, that she was embarrassed by the childish approach she'd taken when trying to gather his attention, and Yugi know for a fact that she had bore witness to that pained expression Yami had worn when they had looked at the footprints on his kitchen floor.
The image made him flinch.
She sighed softly, a deep ache filling her voice when she whispered, "You've chosen Yami, right?"
He bit his lip, but the smile caught the edge of his mouth as he shook his head ruefully, sighing softly and looking up at the ceiling. "I don't think I could ever love him the way he needs," he admitted quietly, swallowing hard as he dragged his eyes back to his cup and watching a bubble rise to the surface. "I don't know if I ever could love him. I don't think I know how…"
Rebecca shook her head and though her heart hurt, she found herself smiling a little. "That's not true. If you could see the way you look at him sometimes…" Her smile grew wider and her eyes brightened slightly. "I mean, I always caught you checking him out because you want him. But besides that, you look at him like…like you're fascinated by him. Yugi, you look at him like he's the only one there…"
He couldn't fight off the small blush that claimed his cheeks. "It caught me off guard, I guess. Feeling like this about Yami…is pretty much the last thing I ever expected to happen."
"That's how it always is."
"I just…" Yugi trailed off for a long moment and his lips twitched slightly as he stared at his lasagna remains and poked at them with a shake of his head. "I've been so terrified of having no choice. For the longest time, I didn't want to be in love with Yami so I convinced myself I wasn't. But I was so busy running away from him that I didn't notice I was getting trapped by myself into a life I didn't want. I was just numb…and I never noticed that was happening until it all felt too late."
The blonde looked away from him.
"I dreamed of Yami every single night and when I woke up I spent every hour erasing his existence. But I'm getting so tired of it and I don't think I want to deny it anymore. I'm in love with him."
Rebecca made a choking noise and her head whipped back towards him to find he was staring at her with a despaired expression, making her want to flee from the intensity. She took a deep breath and closed her eyes for a moment, saying, "And he's yours. He's so completely at your feet, it just makes me want to cry."
Yugi turned away again to stare at the remains of his dinner and then looked up at the ceiling. "I have to be prepared for the fact that he might pull away from me. We don't exactly have the best history. I've never told you what it was like when we first started…having sex. Every time he woke up, he'd look so disgusted and make a run for—"
"You're in the past, Yugi. I don't think he'll run again." She searched his face, remembering the way that Yami would look at him as if he were the most special thing in existence and he just wanted to keep him completely safe no matter what. "We live in each day we're given. What do you want now?"
"I want…to be with him…Always."
"Then what are we still doing here?" she laughed, though her eyes were a little sad and yet bright with happiness for him. "Be brave, Yugi. Your life with him won't be easy, I can guarantee you that much. But it will be a life. You've woken up."
"He might run away from me. We're good at doing that to each other."
"He won't run and you don't have a reason to either."
"I don't know what I'm doing."
"But you'll know when you need to."
"So…what exactly are you doing in Japan, anyways?" Marik wondered as Ryou passed a pen over to Bakura who started to write in the answer that he had given him a second again; when the wider set of lighter brown eyes singled in on his he found himself blinking and backpedaling at the confused expression. "I mean, you're British and you're already most of the way through high school so I don't get why you're here when you could still be there. Plus you had to learn Japanese to get here and…Yeah, I just really don't get it. What's the point?"
Malik stopped short, curious now, and Bakura paused in his writing, tilting his head but not giving his attention to them, going back to his task but making it clear that he was listening as well.
The smaller albino let out a soft laugh. "Domino has one of the best medical schools in the entire world. And one of the world's leading surgeons is in the local hospital here. Besides, I've always wanted to come here anyways. School just gave me an excuse."
"So, wait, your parents dropped their lives back in Britain just to bring you here for schooling?" Bakura asked, incredulous as he stared at him; something about that story just sounded completely off and stupid and he didn't like having someone think they could pull the wool over his eyes.
Ryou fell silent for a second and then sighed. "Well, considering my mom is dead, I don't suppose she had much to object about," he muttered, rolling his eyes when Malik smacked the other teen upside the head and a little mystified but terribly grateful when Bakura merely narrowed his eyes and avoided apology altogether. "And my dad constantly travels anyways and because I'm an only child, he likes to spoil me and give me things I want. Hence, the reason I am in Japan and he is off to…well, that's disturbing…I seem to have forgotten where he went to this time…"
Now Bakura burst out laughing and Marik and Malik shot him a couple of glares while Ryou snickered and shrugged at their stunned expressions, enjoying the fact that the taller boy wasn't afraid to find the humor in the statement, no matter how dark it was. He could at least appreciate that in a friend.
It made things easier.
"This is it," Seto muttered.
Yami glanced at the crappy-looking building and frowned. There was no way. Absolutely none. The apartments looked like crap. They were built on a rather steep slope and had stupid wooden steps that were half-assed in design and led up to the doors where one was missing a handle while the other didn't even settle right like it was supposed to in order to be considered closed. There were trees with burrs on either side of the doors and it stood at only three stories high. There was a sewer head a few feet away to the left and beer cans scattered around along with cigarette butts all over the ground littering the rather flammable grass and pine needles and shed burrs. There were a bunch of trees off to the side that completely hid the third building all the way to the left and there were a few trees past that and Yami could just barely make out a strip of asphalt that meant there was a small parking lot in the back. The townhouses that they had passed looked just as shitty as the apartments themselves.
A fat boy ran around and then stared at them as they got out.
A small girl scooted on her scooter and flipped when she ran over a rather large stone, oddly too distracted by the two boys to even notice that she had scraped herself up.
"There is no fucking way," Yami breathed, shaking his head.
Seto tapped his GPS monitor and then looked at the IP address confirmation before pointing to the bottom left apartment of the building in front of them with the cigarette butts that littered the grass. "That's it."
"Fuck my life, there's no way."
"That's it, Yami. Come on."
The red-eyed teen shook his head, but followed him regardless, both of them going up the hill and then dodging clumps of dog shit hidden in the grass. What the fuck? Seto led the way over to the sliding glass doors, peering past the blinds, but the apartment was completely empty.
"You know how to pick a lock still?"
"Yeah, but…judging by the lock on that door, I won't be able to without a key."
"All right. We'll talk to the superintendent."
"Fuck that. I'll make use with something else," Yami announced, heading over to the windows; it was even worse because only the room on the far left had a screen to its window and the one he messed with squeaked terribly but gave way as he pulled it open. Seto followed him through, glaring at the bushes that pressed into his clothes and the leaves that shed themselves on him.
The red-eyed teen tipped his head up, blinking wide eyes to see a large ring of dark green mold growing on the ceiling before glancing around to take in the rest of the empty room. The air was stale and humid due to the mold and the water stains that he knew the green mass engrossed.
"Fucking hell. No wonder no one wants to live around here," the brunet said gruffly.
Yami snorted once and then headed into the master bedroom to find once again that it was empty, even checking the storage closet and the other bedroom to see that it was empty as well, checking the restroom where the tub was oozing something from the wall and water dripped from three places as the shower upstairs continued its course of relieving its owner of the dirt on their skin. He led the way into the kitchen and backtracked to the living room and finally spotted it, pointing wordlessly.
"That makes no fucking sense," Seto said, shaking his head and looking at the single modem in the wall. The single item in the entire apartment.
"You think maybe they hijacked someone else's internet feed and broke in here to send the shit to us?" Yami murmured thoughtfully in a soft voice, staring at the small black box and feeling the Puzzle burn through his clothing; he reached up, cupping it and stroking the center of the eye, trying to gather some kind of calmness to scatter the memory of the readings he had done earlier.
Vaguely his thoughts circulated for one brief second on Yugi and Rebecca, on the reading he had produced, and then his mind cleared completely and the Puzzle burned with a warmth that made him want to melt for a split second, so comfortable that it made his heart hurt for a moment.
"Fuckers are a lot smarter than I thought."
"Obviously it has to have been a while since someone has lived in this apartment, right?"
"No, I think someone lived here yesterday and moved out that fast," Seto deadpanned.
Yami gave him a sharp look. "I wanted to estimate how long it has been," he snapped. "But now that you mention it, I think they probably broke in through that same window and set this shit up in order to do all of this. Yesterday."
"You think that they did this yesterday?" the brunet asked, straightening and putting his things in his pockets, frowning as his youngest cousin stared at the modem thoughtfully.
"Have you noticed the way that girl stared at us? Almost as if she was in awe."
"So what? Little kids are excitable."
Yami shook his head slightly. "Excitable does not explain why they are out there on the street watching us this second nor does it give reason as to why they have not reported us," he responded, not even needing to go to the window and peek out to know that they were watching the sliding glass doors despite not being able to see them through the thick blinds. "It's almost like they knew we were coming."
"You think that this guy told them we were coming?"
Red eyes sharpened and flickered towards him. "I do."
"Why the fuck would he have done that, Atem? You're not making sense."
"Because if he told them to expect us, it gave them a reason not to report him when he broke in. Children are easily manipulated. Perhaps he told them that he lived here or something or that he was setting up something or other—a game, maybe. And that we were going to be his two friends to play."
A game…
A game of survival…
Death in all its glory…
"You're giving them too much credit."
"And you are giving them too little."
For a long minute neither of them spoke, both of them remembering the videos being leaked, the pictures, the fact that they had somehow convinced Duke and his father to work with them, the computer crashes, the emails, gathering the media as they had…
"You honestly think that he would have done this?"
"I think that if I was going to break into an apartment and knew that two others were going to follow suit soon enough, I would have done something to decrease suspicion and risk of exposure. I would have told the kids that it was a secret. That I was having friends over the next day. I would have humored them until they promised to keep my secret. And look at them. They are looking at us as if they know who we are and what we're doing." He paused, glancing at him. "And no offense, but little kids beneath the age of twelve don't even know you exist, Seto."
The brunet nodded. "And those kids are all around eight or nine aren't they?"
Yami mimicked him. "This was a setup but I don't understand the trap…"
The Puzzle burned against him as if laughing at his statement, the bold-faced lie making him almost smirk in amusement; his omen. That was what this was. And, talking about it, letting his mind circulate on it, only made it that much clearer to him.
The game was starting.
Now he just had to play his part and figure out his strategy because otherwise he knew he would be the one that wound up dead.
"I don't know, but we're going to have to be careful."
He nodded again. "I'll be back. I'm going to ask that little girl if she knows anything."
Seto gave him a small glance. "Be careful and don't do anything stupid."
"I make no promises."
"Atem."
Yami blinked and turned his head. "Cousin, have a little faith, will you? I will be careful, all right?" he murmured, shaking his head and then heading back out of the apartment through the window. The Puzzle was growing cold and for a second he contemplated the odds of being able to get inside of Seto's car and just sit there until the brunet came out again, his instincts screaming for him to turn away, that reading of cards flashing through his mind like the pounding of blood with each beat of his heart.
But he was tired of playing the coward and he refused to back away from this challenge. Not when the cards refused to change. If he didn't do as he needed to in order to win, he had a feeling that Osiris's prominence in his reading would take on a much wider range than just himself.
The little girl came running up as if summoned and he froze in place but was immediately wary and alert when she grabbed his hand and bounced up and down, saying, "You came to play! You came to play!"
"I did," he responded slowly, smoothly, offering a small smile that made her beam even more, brown eyes bright as they bore into his; the Puzzle burned, flashing between shots of fire and ice that tore through him like panic. "Can you tell me what the game is?"
"He said it was hide-and-seek."
"Who is he exactly?"
"I don't know. He wore a mask."
"A mask?" Yami repeated softly, furrowing his brows before blinking and shaking his head. He honestly didn't understand. Why would they wear a mask? Obviously to protect his identity but if he wanted the kids to think it was a game, why would he wear it in front of them as well? It would make sense to show his face to them so that it seemed like they were all in on the secret game.
"Yeah, a mask like a clown."
"A clown?"
A clown? Why a clown? Clowns scared children…
"A jester," the fat boy said in a strange voice that sounded thick and awkward due to his physique, frowning slightly when those red eyes met his, visibly unnerved by the flashing of violent shades of the color. "He had a mask like a jester."
"A jester…?"
Why a jester?
That made no sense.
Was it supposed to mean something?
Jesters were historical entertainment that was normally employed to please royal figures or nobility in medieval or Tudor times or sometimes just itinerant performers who delighted common folk at fairs and markets. Jesters in medieval times were thought to wear brightly colored clothes and eccentric hats in a motley pattern and their modern counterparts commonly mimicked this costume. In medieval times they entertained with a wide variety of skills that ranged from songs to music to storytelling and acrobatics, juggling and even magic. Much of it was meant to be comical so they would commonly make contemporary jokes in word or song about people or events well known to their audiences…
And then it clicked very slowly.
In Tarot, "The Fool" was a card of the Major Arkana.
Arkana…
He gave Yami his name without even trying to hide it.
Just as he had with the crash that had overcome his laptop.
But in Tarot, another character depicted as the jester was Death. In the Middle Ages, Death was often shown in a jester's clothing because the last laugh…was reserved for death as well as the fact that Death humbled everyone while jesters made fun of everyone regardless of standing…
He shook off that last thought. No, Yami refused to believe that. There was no way they were going to kill him. How would that benefit them?
But Osiris flashed through his mind, branded there in his forethoughts, leaving him feeling sickly but oddly strong all at once; Osiris was his god. Death was his god.
Arkana had a lot to learn if he planned to play with him.
The Puzzle flashed hot against his skin, burned his fingers when he touched the eye, flared through his senses like a new pulse, electricity and fire that curled in his lungs like the thick black smoke from his dreams.
Death was his. Osiris was his.
"He's waiting for you," the girl said excitedly. "He said to bring you to him."
A smirk threatened to cross his face; so the game truly began.
He'd put an end to all of this. And he would enjoy it.
Because he was done with doing as Arkana and whoever the hell his accomplice was bid him to. He was done folding over and allowing this to happen. He was done being manipulated.
And it was going to be that much more fun to beat them at their own game.
He'd make them fall like a house of cards.
It was over for them.
He was done playing the pushover.
The King of Clubs, the conqueror…Osiris, the god of death…
"Did he?" he wondered out loud, blinking once as they nodded eagerly; the girl squeezed his hand and he thought vaguely to turn back around and speak to Seto because he knew that it was probably smarter than just going with them, but then the girl and the chubby boy pulled on his arm and led him along.
Instinct told him to pull away and go back to his cousin but pride tore away his reason and his own hatred and need to protect himself centered inside of him, surged through him like fire, curled into his lungs again and spread through his veins like heated blood. This game was going to be over.
When they got back there, both children ran off and Yami cast a glance around slowly; the Puzzle flashed again, heat like lava, froze over like ice, grew weighted and heavy and then light and almost completely unnoticeable once more. He was here.
Trees in front with a few rocks, a rock garden amongst straw, a few cars off to the side—and there he was. Yami saw him without effort, almost as if his senses were all tuned to catch the other, eyes burning with fire as they tracked the movement of his feet as he walked around the car only a spot away from him, not once looking away, totally prepared for it when the man suddenly sprang and leaped at him from behind the vehicle.
The red-eyed teen hit the ground on his back but kicked him off easily and sprang to his feet in one fluid motion, the Puzzle feeling hot once more, burning at the fabric of his shirt and leaving a fire lapping at his skin.
And then he really stared.
Because…what the actual fuck…was this…?
The man really was dressed as a jester.
Yami furrowed his brows in confusion.
What the fuck?
A fuchsia-maroon hybrid of a color made up his straight-shouldered jacket to a suit that had a striped undershirt and a bowtie both consisting of white and blue that made up his mask as well.
"Ha, you're a fucking clown!" he crowed, laughing in delight.
But why did that color seem to set something off in the back of his head?
Something stirred in the darkest corner of his mind but he could not focus on it.
An instinct told him that the color meant something but still his mind could not come up with the answer.
Arkana shot a hard cross his to right cheekbone, making him stumble slightly before he righted himself and threw out a kick that should have shattered his knee, but it hardly seemed to slow him down and Yami hurried to back up before he could retaliate. Arkana threw a punch that he ducked to evade, attempting a kick to throw him off his feet again, but he anticipated it and dodged to the right, away from his leg. He bounced back on the balls of his feet and raised his hands up warily in front of his face.
He came at the teen again and his head whipped to the side with the blow to his cheek but held his ground, kicking him hard against his side just beneath his ribcage and then following it up with one upside the face.
If he could just hit him in the temple or the neck, put his body weight into it, he could knock him unconscious and keep him sluggish long enough to get Seto out there and then they could put him somewhere, get answers…but if things kept going as they were he was actually scared he might go a little overboard and kill him because he was honestly starting to piss him off.
He stumbled but got to his feet fast and lunged which was countered when Yami dodged the punch he threw in order to roll to the side and kick himself to his feet again.
And then the answer came.
Like a small wisp of fog that cooled his mind and left his thoughts growing sluggish and weak, to the point that everything seemed to slow around him like some kind of bad action movie.
He dodged the punch to his left but let the one from his right hit, his temple taking the blow but the Puzzle burning harshly enough to keep him completely conscious. But he didn't care enough to actually focus on that.
Arkana had pulled something out of his pocket as he grabbed him by his jacket's lapel and pulled him forward, his body at first resisting but his mind giving him the ruse of sluggishness to follow, stumbling forward. The end of the tazer pressed into his neck and every single nerve ending along his pulse splintered with pain and sent sparks of alarm down his spine.
But the alarm died almost instantly, as did the sensation of being awake.
Blackness swam up out of nowhere—or at least he thought it was from nowhere—and he couldn't fight it off as he fell to his back and remained that way, an unconscious heap of limbs with the Puzzle flaring, the last sensation of feeling in his body.
"And you're sure he's your father?"
"Paternity tests, remember?"
"Yeah, but you don't think he could have just paid the doctors off?"
"Oh yes, of course he could have. But I actually had a DNA test done a couple of weeks ago. I was hoping that I would find out that I had other parents and I could humiliate him with that but not so much."
"Really? Damn."
"Yeah, they're really my parents."
"So…are they really related to the pharaoh or is it just…designer baby?"
"One of them is truly related to the pharaoh. Though I don't know which of them it is."
"Wouldn't that be a mind fuck if it was your mom? I mean, with the way your dad parades around like he's god-sent…"
"My father can kiss my little flat ass. Damn him to hell. I don't give two shits about him anyways."
"Well, I wouldn't say flat…But it's not the most—"
"Goddamn it, Yugi."
"Okay, okay, calm down. Sheesh. I try to give you a small compliment and you want to tear my fucking head off. Gods, this is why no one wants to date you."
"Right. Because it's not like I've been hooking up with you or anything."
"Point taken. Ahem, back to the subject. So then why do the DNA test?"
"Because I plan to fuck him up."
"…Okay then. That's…very nice."
"No shit, I thought it was the most amazing thing ever."
"Someone's a little full of himself."
"I might just be."
"So…Atem wasn't gay, huh?"
"No. But I'm sure he experimented…They all did…if you trust everything that you read and hear about in books or online. But you can't really be sure. The scientists and historians didn't live back then and I don't think they knew everything about them—or nearly as much as they pretend."
"Ooh, I've been fucking a skeptic."
"Mmhmm. Always the skeptic."
"Well…that's probably a good thing though, right?"
"Why?"
"Helps you keep a clear mind about all of the things that have been going on. The things that will happen."
"…Sometimes I wish that my mind wasn't so clear…"
"Yami-boy."
His head lolled when he breathed in a certain smell like warmed concrete that burned against stale air, the stench of something almost dead making his skin crawl as consciousness began to pull at his mind and his and Yugi's discussion slowly began to fade away into nothingness. His body felt odd, not weak, but as if something was weighing him down and the thought almost made him laugh out loud.
The Puzzle felt cold through his clothing as he breathed in a deep breath and opened his eyes into tiny slits of red irises that held drastically dilated black pupils and strained pink in the whites of his gaze. For a moment he could see nothing but small spots and something like black clouds that were morphing and seeming to melt into pinpricks before disappearing altogether.
His long lashes cut off his vision but there was nothing that hurt outside of the throbbing mess of a furious burning sensation in his neck that left him feeling winded as he drew in a deep breath.
Slowly he managed to make his neck, stiff with the weight of his head which currently held his chin against his chest uncomfortably, crane slightly just enough to wake the muscles of his jaw which just barely allowed him to raise his head to help in his quest of pulling together some information of his surroundings.
Salt water. He could smell…salt water.
He forced his eyes to open fully, to see the past the shadows cast by their lashes, his pupils dilating further and burning with the force of the light that was shined into them immediately. The light brought immense pain into his temple where fireworks seemed to explode and ricochet in his frontal lobe.
The light came to his left eye and evoked a growl of irritation that made his throat hurt from disuse, his breathing picking up from the double assault of pain. When a hand reached out, he lunged purely out of instinct, baring his teeth and chomping his jaws in the space they had just been.
The Puzzle was slowly starting to warm against his torso, whether from the anger it fed from him or his own body heat, he was unsure, but it was beginning to grow in temperature and it was both oddly alarming but wholly comforting.
"Well, at least we know he's alive."
Red eyes flickered and drew in the jester-like figure of Arkana who stared back at him with his arms crossed and an annoyed expression on his face. At first glance he had the impulse to burst out laughing at the sight before him, his eyes dancing as he took him in, infuriating the older male immensely as he stared back at him angrily. Half of his mask was torn up, his lip was busted and scabbed, he had bruises all over, and it was beyond liberating to see just how much damage he had done in such a short time. But the thought of laughing at that simply hurt his head which made him cut the idea off before it even really formed in his mind.
No, his head would explode if he did anything stupid like laughing.
His eyes very slowly changed focus to stare at the other man.
What the fuck was with all of those goddamned colors? Was fuchsia their favorite or something?
No, that wasn't fuchsia.
It was wine red…
His head tilted slowly as his eyes flickered from classy black dress shoes upwards and slowly to draw in the taller build of someone who looked much too lanky and scrawny to be a true threat towards him. Long gray-silver hair covered his left eye and Yami stared in confusion as his head slowly wrapped around the fact that that brown eye he was given view of…
"Pegasus," he hissed, a sound of mostly uncomfortable pain from the ragged burn of his throat than anything else, his Millennium Item gleaming and flashing, hot like fire and then chilled like a chunk of golden ice. For a moment the man didn't speak, his visible eye widening in surprise before a smirk graced his lips.
"So you do remember me, Yami-boy."
The boy tipped his head up slightly to study both of them slowly, drawing in all the notes he could make in his slightly dazed state which he knew was growing rapidly more coherent and alarmed.
And that answered the question of what big corporation had been the one to control the internet; Maximillion Pegasus, the owner of Industrial Illusions, the maker of Duel Monsters.
Now the question was why exactly he was the one going up against his father. What money did he owe him? The two of them had never been in business together; in fact, if he remembered correctly, he wasn't even in business with Seto either for one reason or another…
He hated to think of the reason that popped into his head immediately, his stomach twisting at the very thought and making him feel sick; oh gods, no.
"I do," he agreed simply, calmly, cutting away at both of their relaxed physiques to make Pegasus narrow his eye slightly while Arkana snorted in disgust and curled his lip slightly in distaste. The other man had to wonder just how many children "remembered" Pegasus, but a small bit of laughter bubbled out of his mouth at the idea that Yami had been one of them. "That business meeting with my father…"
His stomach twisted again. Oh yes, he remembered the stare of two amber-brown eyes that peered straight into his the entire time he sat beside his father, in between him and his mother. The way he had squirmed and gotten hissed at by his father, the way that Pegasus had refused to even once take his eyes off him. It was like some kind of sickening obsession that Yami had no name for that day.
Now he knew exactly what it was and if Pegasus thought for a second that he would get that from him now, he'd kill him first.
"You look rather well."
"What is this about? Why am I here?" he bit out, his voice coming out strained but steady all at once, his head exploding from the noise of it as it echoed around them, his neck aching violently with the movement of drawing more attention towards the stupid bastards. "Where…? I don't…My head…"
"It's nothing against you, Yami-boy—or would you rather I call you Atem?"
When he didn't continue he narrowed his eyes into slits and shook his head slowly. "Yami is fine. I've been Yami for two years now."
Pegasus nodded, looking delighted though Yami didn't really understand why. "Well, Yami-boy"—his head pounded with annoyance at the sound of his own name passing through the man's lips in that lilted drawl he knew was American though his Japanese was rather flawless—"as I was saying, it is absolutely nothing against you. My vendetta is against your father."
He already knew this.
"What did you do, Arkana? Why did he fire you?" He glanced at Pegasus, raising an eyebrow and tipping his head to the side despite the pain. "How did you get wrapped up in all of this?"
"One question at a time, Yami-boy," the gray-silver-haired man admonished with a teasing undertone; he saw red for a moment but the accompanying anger was nonexistent which told him it was probably from the pain in his head and neck rather than anything else. "Now, what is your first? You must have a bunch."
Was this some kind of sick game?
Yami bit back the sharp response and instead shakily cleared his scorched throat. "What is this all about?" he asked, licking his lips to wet them and then feeling his hands clench as he saw the darkened flash of lust that lit that strange brown eye. Son of a bitch…
"Your mother is a goddamned slut," Arkana barked.
Yami couldn't help it when he threw his head back and laughed, his lungs straining with the sensation after being unconscious for so long, his torso jumping with the force of the sounds, his Puzzle seeming to throb with energy, pulsing with something like his heartbeat as it rose up and down with each exhale.
"Now, now," Pegasus interrupted, though the smirk was evident in his voice. "Let's not pick at our guest of honor's heritage. After all, it's pretty obvious where his little bedding skills come from, yes?"
Arkana sneered out chuckles that made Yami's skin crawl but Yami merely laughed and snorted, rolling his neck so that his head settled some to press his chin into the groove of his left shoulder.
"Yeah, the very open closet nymphomaniac," he said with a wide, dry smirk as his eyes closed and his head tipped slightly to the side. His fingers felt odd and stiff and it hardly took a genius to realize that they had tied the rope biting into the flesh of his wrists too tightly and now the circulation was coming out cut because of the way he had not moved his hands moments ago. "We spread our legs like an obese person eats fast food."
He didn't really have to open his eyes to know that Pegasus had a hint of a smirk and his eyes were insanely dark while his partner in crime looked utterly disgusted. He breathed out a laugh that was nearly soundless in the strange staleness of the air around them; he planned to win this game, no matter the digs he had to take and make, no matter the amount of time he had to bide or the threats he knew he would have to test in order to gain knowledge of. He twisted his thumbs up, coaxed at the rope with his nail, not really doing much but letting his nail create a small gap that was just enough to allow his wrists more room to breathe.
"Hmm…tell me, Pegasus," he muttered, raising his head with a wide smirk that made his eyes darken unnaturally. "Did you get off on me and Yugi fucking?"
Arkana, obviously fed up with the topic of discussion, smacked him so that his head flew to the side, pain erupting in his right temple from the impact and making his blood boil with directionless anger.
"Now, back to your question," he snapped, giving Pegasus an annoyed look that the other man rolled his eye at before crossing his arms.
"My wife, Cecelia—beautiful name, isn't it?—is sick and I need the money that your father rightfully owes me."
"Owes you?" Yami repeated softly. "And that means what exactly, Pegasus?"
"I have supported and funded his campaign for years and yet he never once has made this entire event worth my wild. He spat in my face when I asked for some money to help with my poor, poor wife's health," he growled, that teasing lilt completely gone and replaced with an undertone of menace.
Yami almost snapped at him that maybe if he hadn't fucking touched him provocatively in front of his father two years ago he might have gotten that raise he needed. But his mind almost shut down with the memory. Pegasus had cornered him when he was going to his room after studies. His father was walking up behind him to speak to him about his chores but the gray-silver-haired man instead stroked up his spine from his lower back to his shoulders and Yami had jumped, knocking into the vase on the side-table and breaking the damn thing. This would not have been a problem—the touching would have been completely disregarded as far as Yami was concerned; he had no proof so even if he had told his parents they would never believe him—but he made the fatal mistake of not making sure his father was not around before doing such a thing. Hell, Pegasus could have raped him up against the wall and Yami would never have said anything because there would be no proof, but his father was right there. And as far as Yami was really concerned, it was possible his father blamed his "contamination" on the brown-eyed American in front of him.
No, if Pegasus had been careful, if he had not been so stupid, if his father had not seen, perhaps he would have gotten his way with him and he would have that money for his wife.
"You're holding me for ransom," he deduced, unimpressed. Obviously he had attempted first to sleep with his mother, as his father's statement of "I would not allow him near a bitch should he ask it" or something along those lines—he was a little fuzzy and he didn't truly care enough to be exact in remembering that comment—implied. Oh, great, so his father had probably walked in on his attempt to make his mother sleep with him and Pegasus had gotten his ass kicked around for being so ignorant and now, of course, he had gone after the only one in the family who was by far more important to the media than either of his parents.
Atem Sennen.
The sixteen-year-old wonder who had turned into the exact replica of his ancestor the pharaoh Atem.
Just great.
Yami nearly laughed at the thought and shook his head; Cecelia was Pegasus's weak spot, the one that he would have to use later.
Silver Fang flashed through his mind for a second and then, unbidden, Osiris followed, the two of the burning in his forethoughts as the Puzzle took up the blaze and burned into his abdomen.
"Smart boy."
"But you've overestimated my importance. My father doesn't care for me anymore. You know this yourself. You have been spying on me all this time. You have the videos…"
But this was where he questioned the logic of this plan. Why did he think this idea of ransom would work in the first place?
Did Pegasus know of a way to bring his father running? Perhaps he thought that using Yami as a threat to his campaign once more would work…?
He nearly laughed at the mockery of that thought.
Nothing would make his father come running to his rescue.
Nothing.
"Why did he fire you, Arkana?"
"He caught me stealing money from the company."
Yami barked out a laugh, a sharp noise underlined with triumph. He was surrounded by fucking idiots. This game was going to be that much easier.
He didn't miss the way that Arkana smirked slightly, the left side of his mouth curving up in pure amusement. But he was just as stupid as Pegasus. They were both so stupid…
He needed only find Arkana's weak spot. And test at his boundaries, push and pull and figure out what the hell he could do to win; he couldn't underestimate them entirely. That was the way people got killed. But his mind begged him to despite the way that his instincts screamed to pay attention and keep constant alert.
And it didn't take a genius to know that they were not the only two involved. No, there had to be more. A bunch more.
Now it was only a question of who, how many, what weapons they had to keep him contained, their schedules and patterns of keeping watch over him and how soon he could sink his teeth into them without making it obvious the threat he posed or giving away his position altogether.
"Your father may have disowned you, Yami, but it is far from wrong to say that he won't come for his only son. Remember, you have something of extreme value resting around your neck."
"The Puzzle would be a better object for ransom," Yami muttered, rolling his eyes and feeling it burn against his stomach, pulsing for a second before growing cold again; vaguely he had a moment of remembrance, an arrow pulled taut and quivering, a target across a lake of still beautiful glistening water, a mumble of "Fucking demon" that he shouldn't have heard, the flash of the Puzzle…
His jaw clenched, struggling to clear that memory out of his head, frustrated with the idea of it all, forcing away his train of thought and chewing his cheek to keep from letting his hatred show to the other two. If he did, he would lose…
Osiris…
King of Clubs…
Death…
Victory…
"That's where you are wrong. Your father may be a fool, but even he would not give over the one thing of significance for just nothing. No, the Millennium Puzzle may be worth a fortune, but you're worth more," Pegasus argued so that Yami curled his lips back and bared his teeth in a soundless snarl of pure rage when the man looked him up and down and smirked slightly in amusement. He obviously disregarded his discomfort, smirking wider. "No, you look like your ancestor and you bear the Puzzle as well. That makes you worth almost three times as much as that little artifact. Besides, how illegal would it be to sell that? All of Egypt would be at my heels for it."
"I'm pretty sure ransom is a more serious charge."
"You would be surprised by how little human lives actually matter."
Yami laughed once and shook his head. "No, I wouldn't."
Especially not his.
"Yugi."
The small boy spun around at the bark of his name, eyes widening drastically as Seto Kaiba approached him; Rebecca stood off to his side, tilting her head in confusion at the rapidly advancing CEO.
"I need you to come with me."
He felt his stomach twist. "Why?"
"Yami decided to play Sherlock and got his ass captured."
"Sherlock normally did get in a lot of trouble," Rebecca muttered, though she blushed when both of them shot her strange looks before Yugi snapped his eyes back to the brunet with a startled expression, his words sinking in.
Panic made his spine go completely straight, his lungs strained as his mind swirled with possibilities. And then he shut his mind down for a second, though he was unable to quell the weak whisper that passed through his lips the split second before.
"Oh gods…"
Seto watched him closely and Yugi almost felt as if he were looking for a weakness, some kind of chink in his armor, and he almost screamed that there were a million if he looked hard enough, but forced it back down. He needed to stay calm. He needed to not freak out…
"A-any idea w-where…?"
Well…at least he tried.
The sharp blue eyes narrowed into slits and regarded him coldly, not the least bit amused by the crack that fissured his voice. "No," he stated crisply.
"I…How…?"
"He wandered off on his own like the fucking dumbass he is."
Yugi felt a tremor of anger pass through him but the rage died in his bones and turned into some kind of distinct unnerved numbness that bit at his subconscious and made his senses slowly shut down one by one.
"So he could be…?"
"He's not fucking dead, you moron," Seto spat and Yugi's head whipped up at the statement, logic slowly making itself known in the back of his mind, his frazzled state of thought coming to the same conclusion; no, whoever it was that was fucking with them, they needed Yami to be able to play this game. Yami was the king in this situation, like some kind of chess game. The rest of them were all brooks in comparison. They surrounded the king. Now they had to find a way to make their way through their defenses to get him back…
"So what do we do?"
"Obviously we have to find some fucking way to get to him," the brunet growled, oddly unnerved by the determination that made Yugi's eyes shine against the darkness of the coming of the late sunset. "Come on. We have to get to Kaiba Corp. so that we can try to track him or something."
"I have a phone app—"
The brunet dug through his pockets and then held out the slender white device, dropping it into Yugi's hands carelessly; when he turned it on, the screen came up with a picture of Yami unconscious and laying in the grass, bleeding from a wound on the side of his head, spread-eagled on the ground to show off the state of his being.
"Oh god…"
"He won't help us, you idiot. Now come on."
Yami stared at a camera lens with a bored expression, too tired to care that they were documenting him now. Arkana and Pegasus had already said their piece which consisted of his father having three days in which on the fourth, at three a.m., if he was not there, Yami was dead.
He had barely restrained himself from laughing at their statement because that honestly had to be one of the funniest things he had heard in his entire life. His father was not going to come and if he did…
No, Yami refused to think of the if.
He was not coming.
Yami would not need him to come.
He could handle a bunch of fucking idiots.
First Rebecca tried, being the little computer geek that she was. She had hacked halfway and then the server had said it was unable to go any further. She tried to override it at least twenty times but each time it came up with a dancing bunny that said something along the lines of "What's the magic word?" or "Nice try, Kaiba" which had only made the brunet even more furious.
His own firewall, as intelligent as it was, had not been able to break past it when he tried next. He overrode and overrode and overrode some more but each time a new image of that bunny appeared.
Yugi, lacking the most in actual computer hacking, but knowing how to from movies and his own altering of his friends' report cards—ha, friends, the irony—tried last. Of course he didn't get very far though he did manage to get past the stupid bunnies using satellite instead, but the IP address was false and did not work for shit so despite all of the efforts, it did not work at all.
He collapsed back against the black leather chair, biting his lip to keep from crying. Blood spilled into his mouth with the force of his bite, but the metallic taste and the sting of his open skin was welcomed by far compared to the present numbness that exhausted his features momentarily.
Rebecca and Seto both glanced at him just as his nervous breakdown began. His eyes dilated and became completely unfocused. His body went limp but remained upright due to the chair, and his fingers started trembling against his knees.
If they couldn't find Yami, who was say that he wouldn't be killed? Because he could honestly not see Yami cooperating with them and if he didn't cooperate, then what was going to keep them from killing him? Yes, he was the bargaining chip, but if the bargaining chip outstayed its welcome…?
Yami had honestly impacted his life much more than he wanted to admit and it was beyond terrifying to actually think about what would happen if the red-eyed boy was killed. What was he going to do after that anyways?
How cruel could life be if Yami was to die before he even got to admit to loving him back? His stomach twisted with the thought and his heart hurt in his chest as his lungs constricted harder.
Yeah, if he was killed before then, Yugi swore he would never get close to anyone else ever again. Purely for the fact that this pain in his system was killing him slowly from the inside out and he could not take it a second time in life.
His head continued slowly shutting down, each thought bleeding into the other until the words were no longer coherent and his trembling fingers came to a still against his kneecaps where they went limp along with the rest of the muscles in his body.
On a side note, I don't play chess and I'm pretty sure I messed up that analogy but either way, I tried, so…yeah…just, take pity on me xD