"I did it!" The Reaper of Magic crowed, its strange mixed voice seeming worse now, its hints of Yugi digging the monster's grave deeper as Joey shook with barely suppressed emotions, "I killed the heir!"
Joey let out a snarl but Atem snapped first.
Black wings flared out from the Pharaoh's back as he gave voice to a howl rage and grief and lost what was left of his grip on his mind and magic. The monster the King had become launched himself forward, golden amour reminiscent of the Winged Dragon of Ra taking shape and sword appearing in his hand as he narrowly avoided the scythe and ducked in under the Reaper's guard.
The Reaper just managed to block the sword with the shaft of his scythe in time, narrowly avoiding being cleaved in two. He launched a punch, planning on his effect kicking in to send the Pharaoh into the afterlife behind his vessel only for panic to set in crossed Medan's features as the blow landed when he realised that Atem was pressing his attack rather than exploding into light as Yugi had.
"You made an error in your calculations." The beast that had been Atem snarled as he attacked again, narrowly missing taking Medan's head off with his swing, "I cannot be targeted by monster effects once Responsibilities of Friendship has been destroyed and you killed Yugi."
The Reaper let out a grunt as he blocked the creature's sword once again, unable to get his scythe in close enough to actually land a damaging blow. There was no way this creature was stronger than him. He, in modern parlance, was a twelve star Spellcaster/effect monster with over three thousand attack, still he had to know, "What are you?"
"My name is Yami." The creature snarled, "I'm the Protector of the Light..." His sword came arcing in, managing to cut the robes of the Reaper who had leapt back to avoid it, leaving a huge tear in the stomach area, "And I'm severely pissed off."
"Shit..." Joey murmured, staring in a combination of horror, amazement and shock as the Protector of the Light pressed the Reaper back, not letting up on his attack for a moment.
"We should move." Kaiba's tone was bland, devoid of any sort of emotion. If Joey had been in any fit state to recognise it, he would have done so easily. Kaiba had gone much the same when Kari had been killed. However the blonde was lost too deeply in his own emotions to notice and didn't even respond to his comment.
Instead he stared at his friend, what was left of him, or rather of them for what had happened in the world of the Pharaoh's memories was fresh in his mind. He didn't want to believe his eyes. Yugi couldn't be dead, he just couldn't. As long as Yami was alive, there was a way to get Yugi back, there just had to be. They needed each other after all. As long as one survived the other would too. That was how it worked and he clung to that hope, though it was a fickle thing.
"Mahado, we have to get Yami away." As though the thought that living Yami equalled living Yugi was the force he needed to galvanise him into action, Joey's mind jumped into high gear as it only did during crisis situations.
The Dark Magician looked a little lost. He had failed. Yugi had been killed protecting him, Atem had turned into his Ka beast and he didn't know what he could do to fix any of it.
"Dark Magician!" Kaiba's snap forced Mahado to react, turning to stare at the CEO of Kaiba Corp, "Atem must leave. Now. He lives, Yugi lives."
That was great in principle but Protector of the Light had no intention of letting anyone take him anywhere until after his enemy was decimated, a fact that was made obvious by their inability to get close to the battle.
A very one sided battle as Yami swept through Medan's defences without a sweat and the struggling Reaper of Magic found it almost impossible to keep up. Time after time he found himself millimetres from death.
"You know," Protector of the Light commented as his sword impacted with the shaft of the Reaper of Magic's scythe once again, only for the wooden stick to break into two, "I just realised something. Killing you does nothing."
The Reaper's eyes widened. He'd hoped that in his psychotic rage, the Duel Monster before him had forgotten that.
"After all, in twelve hours you'll just resummon and we'll have to go through this again." Yami continued, his blade at Medan's neck, "And as satisfying as killing you over and over again would be, I do have much better things to do with my time, so..."
The Shadows rose around them sealing them in the darkness, just the two of them.
"Let's play a game."
LINE_RECOGNITION_HAS_GONE_AGAIN Author Note: So wrote this after work, it was buzzing around my head all day and wouldn't go away. :) Hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.