Happy Easter, everyone! Here, have an update!

Submersion

By: The Half-Blood Guardian

Previously:

"The one who solves me will receive my dark knowledge and power." Those were the words written on the outside of the Millennium Puzzle's box, the promise made to the winner.

Sugoroku had seen too much during his own time as an archaeologist to doubt that those words were true.

It was a good thing the artifact so far appeared to be unsolvable. "Dark knowledge and power" in the hands of anyone was a terrifying thought. In his mind's eye he saw the small teenager, once again sleeping at his desk after the millionth tiring session of working on the puzzle, and Sugoroku shuddered to think of what would become of someone as pure-hearted and kind as Yuugi, should such darkness be introduced to them. He reminded himself once again that according to its own rules, the Puzzle would not penalize those with pure hearts.

Still, it was definitely for the best that his grandson wasn't able to solve it.

Chapter 4: Reckoning

The next day, Yuugi was once again sitting by himself at his desk while his peers headed for the door to spend the well-deserved break outside. Pulling a deck of standard playing cards from his backpack, he began to assemble a house of cards on top of his desk, his nimble fingers and years of practice allowing him to quickly finish the base layer. He soon became engrossed in the task, his eyes narrowed in concentration.

"Yuugi-kun."

He jumped as a deep voice coming from behind brought him back to reality when he was about halfway through the third layer. The motion caused his hand to push the end of the base layer, and the entire house of cards wobbled and tilted before folding on itself, collapsing in a pile while several cards fluttered to the floor. Yuugi released a quiet sigh, shoulders slumping a little. He felt a sense of unpleasant déjà vu. Inwardly cursing his seeming inability to suppress his flinches, he turned to face whoever had spoken.

"Yes?" He said politely. His eyes widened when he saw who it was.

Ushio stood a few feet behind Yuugi, having come in through the door at the back of the classroom and walked up behind him while he was too preoccupied to notice. Normally he was quite alert to his surroundings. He had to be, what with the plethora of irremovable "kick me!" signs that were evidently plastered across his entire body and stitched into every article of clothing he owned.

But this time, he hadn't had the slightest suspicion that anyone had even entered the room, let alone gotten so close to him. Yuugi's heart jolted at the thought of how the scenario could have played out, and he berated himself for his carelessness.

What if instead of Ushio-san, it was somebody who wanted to hurt me? Thankfully, it was the head of the public moral group who had sought him out, and not someone with ill intent.

"Could I see you for a moment?" The large hall monitor asked, jerking his head slightly towards the door. "There's something outside I want to show you."

"Oh, um, okay," Yuugi said, standing quickly.

The short teen had to speed walk to keep pace with Ushio as he was led out of the room, and two worries prickled in the back of his mind. The first was that following someone who said they wanted to show him something "over there" or "behind the school" or other similar phrases usually ended up with him being beaten up. The second was that he was leaving his cards scattered across the floor and desk where they could be damaged or stolen.

The responses he came up with for those worries were first: Ushio-san was a protector, and wouldn't trick him like others had (even if Yuugi did for some silly reason feel distinctly uncomfortable around him) and second: whatever the older teen had to show him had to be more important than a cheap pack of playing cards.

Once outside the school, they began heading for what Yuugi knew to be a secluded area. He grew more uncomfortable, and couldn't help but quietly ask, "Ushio-san… what do you want to show me?"

"Just come with me. It's something I'm sure you'll like."

Warning bells started going off in Yuugi's head at the vague response, but he only swallowed nervously and tried not to let himself fall farther behind. They rounded one last corner, and Yuugi gasped, almost tripping over his own feet as he came to a halt.

Sprawled across the ground were Honda-kun and Jounouchi-kun, both of them slumped against the wall and sporting numerous bruises and scrapes. The former seemed to be unconscious, and the latter's face was scrunched up in pain.

"Jounouchi-kun! Honda-kun!" Without thinking, Yuugi rushed towards them. Suddenly, his path was blocked by an enormous arm, and he was forced to stop.

"So, what do you think, Yuugi-kun?" Ushio asked.

Yuugi looked up at him with wide eyes, and his response came out in a stutter. "What is… w-what did you…?"

"I told you, Yuugi-kun. From now on, I'm your bodyguard." The other said. He nodded his head towards the two teens on the ground. "That's why I've been punishing these bullies; they needed to be taught a lesson. One they wouldn't forget."

Yuugi began to shake his head. "But th-that's… Ushio-san, this is just too horrible!" He looked at his injured classmates and worriedly asked, "Are you okay, Jounouchi-kun? Honda-kun?"

"Yuugi…" Jounouchi cast him a glare that smoldered with hate and spat out some bloodied saliva, which landed a few inches from Yuugi's shoes. "Well?" He said, gritting his teeth and trying not to wince in pain. "Are you s-satisfied now…?"

Yuugi sucked in a breath. "You-you've got it all wrong!" He denied fervently. "I would never ask for such a horrible thing!"

Ushio chose then to interrupt.

"Stand back, Yuugi-kun." He "nudged" the boy aside, and Yuugi very nearly tumbled to the ground from the force. "I'm not done teaching them their lesson yet." Almost casually, he thrust his foot into Jounouchi's ribs. The blond let out a choked yelp as the air was forced from his lungs, hunching in on himself.

Yuugi gasped, horrified, and rushed in between Ushio and Jounouchi before the taller could kick his wounded classmate again. Facing Ushio and spreading his arms wide as if the small appendages could provide any resistance, he desperately shouted, "Stop it!"

A bewildered expression crossed the older teen's face for a second. Then the look became one of slight amusement. "Are you covering for these two, Yuugi-kun?" There was silence for a moment, Yuugi not knowing how to respond, before Ushio gave a short chuckle.

"You sure are a strange one." He remarked with an amused expression. "Come on. This is your chance to take out any resentment you have for them. For once, they're the ones on the ground and at your mercy, instead of the other way around. Go ahead! Punch them! Kick them!"

"I could never do that to my friends!" Yuugi shouted, hands curled into little fists at his sides and eyes squeezed shut. Booming laughter caused them to fly back open.

"Friends, huh?" Ushio said between chuckles. "Is that what they're calling them now? I was under the impression people like them were called bullies."

"They weren't bullying me," Yuugi argued weakly, but a slight tremor in his voice gave away his uncertainty. "They just wanted me to be a man. Jounouchi-kun said so." He looked at the ground and shuffled his feet.

Ushio stared at the younger teen like he was delusional, but conceded, "Alright, if that's what you want to believe, fine." Then his posture shifted, and Yuugi stiffened, already sensing that something unpleasant was going to happen. "By the way, kid, it's about time for you to pay up." Ushio said. Yuugi's head snapped up to look at him in surprise, both at what he'd said and at the way he'd said it. "Bodyguards do charge fees, you know. I'd say two hundred thousand yen is a fair trade for my top of the line services, wouldn't you agree?"

"Two hundred thousand yen?!" Yuugi squeaked, eyes wide in sheer disbelieving astonishment.

Ushio just hummed in affirmation and nodded, seemingly unaware of the smaller teen's reaction. "I'll need to collect that really soon. But you seem like the honest type, so I'm sure you would never try and get out of paying the proper amount, would you?" He asked. The tone of false kindness in his voice was so convincing it was horrifying now that Yuugi had seen his true colors, and the younger boy could only stare at him, speechless. Ushio gave a "comforting" smile.

"Hey, what's with that look? There's no need to worry. All you have to do is be a good boy and have that money ready for me by the next time I see you and everything will be just fine."

Lightly trembling fingers gripped golden puzzle pieces, attempting to fit them together and being hindered slightly by the jerkiness of the movements.

What was he going to do? Ushio-san was asking for two hundred thousand yen! Two hundred thousand! No one had that kind of money just lying around waiting to be blown, at least not as far as he knew. And even if there were some people who did, he certainly wasn't one of them! Yuugi glanced at his shaking hands and scoffed.

What am I doing? He thought, lips twitching downwards in a half-scowl. How can I be working on the Puzzle at a time like this?

The teenager studied the shiny clump in his grasp, and his frown let up a bit at what he saw. His brow furrowed, this time in thoughtful consideration rather than worry.

But… I am making more progress than usual.

He hesitantly allowed his fingers to start working with the pieces again. The familiar actions soothed his nerves just a little, and soon his fingers were moving mostly on autopilot as he settled into a state of contemplation.

It was strange; his body felt absolutely terrible, and Ushio's threat loomed constantly at the back of his mind, but at the same time, a sense of empowerment had settled over him. For the first time in his memory, he actually felt like he could accomplish anything he wanted to. And right now, he wanted to solve the Millennium Puzzle.

Despite this rare bout of confidence, he was still astonished when he focused back on the Puzzle and realized it was nearly three quarters of the way complete. He'd never gotten much more than a third of the way through before! Heart rate accelerating, he allowed his hands to move however they wished, and watched in awe as the puzzle that had confounded him for the past eight years came together before his very eyes, taking the shape of a miniature golden pyramid.

Finally, the last corner of the Puzzle locked into place. Yuugi turned the artifact over in his hands, and noted that the final gap left in the artifact was the shape of his favorite piece: the one with the beautifully intricate yet imposing eye. All he had to do was connect the final piece, and he would be the first person to have ever completed the mystical puzzle. Barely daring to breathe and unable to take his eyes off the pyramid, he blindly reached into the puzzle box and grasped…

…nothing?

He brushed his fingers around the inside corners of the box, but the feeling of the last puzzle piece continued to elude him. Finally looking away from the artifact, he pulled the golden case closer to him and peered inside. Something gripped his insides and twisted them harshly when he looked down and saw that the box that had held all the pieces of the Millennium Puzzle was completely empty. Yuugi slowly rose from his chair and took a step back.

"No…"

He shook his head in denial. This couldn't be happening! He'd held that piece in his hands only yesterday. It couldn't just be gone! He quickly dropped to all fours, crouching to look under his bed, behind his nightstand, beneath his desk, in the tiny crack between his bookcase and the bedroom wall. It wasn't anywhere in his room! There was only one other place he could think of where he might have lost it: at school.

(He refused to consider the possibility that he had somehow dropped it on the way back home, where it was about ten times more likely to have been found and pocketed by a random stranger.)

His mind made up, he stood and glanced back down at the golden objects on his desk. Without that final piece, the Puzzle would remain incomplete, and his wish would never come true. He snatched his book bag from the floor, almost tossing the puzzle box and nearly complete Millennium Puzzle into it but catching himself just in time to prevent any potential damage, and gently slid the items in instead. He paused just long enough to stuff his feet into his shoes before dashing through the apartment and out the door.

Please be at school! He silently begged the missing piece as he practically flew down the sidewalk.

"Like I said, we don't know what's really going on in his head." Honda said, hands stuffed into his pockets as he walked alongside a canal that ran parallel to one edge of the school. Jounouchi skulked along a few steps behind him. The blond had finally managed to rouse him a few minutes ago, and was relieved that his friend hadn't shown any sign of being concussed – not that Jounouchi could see, at least.

The relief had soon turned to irritation, though, the many bruises, scrapes, and blows to his pride putting him in a foul mood that he still had yet to come out of.

Jounouchi scowled at the back of Honda's head, the other teen's words annoying him. He kicked a small pebble he came across, and it missed hitting Honda in the leg by a few inches. Biting back a curse, he replied, "You didn't say that, I did."

Honda frowned in confusion. "Really? I could've sworn it was me. Are you sure I didn't say it?"

"Positive."

"Huh." The brunet scratched the back of his neck. "Well, I was thinking it pretty hard."(1) Ignoring Jounouchi's responding scoff, Honda continued talking. At the same moment, Jounouchi noticed the section of the canal they were about to walk by, and found it harder to focus on his friend's words as another voice echoed in his mind.

'I could never do that to my friends!'

Honda hadn't been awake to hear Yuugi say those words. Nor had he seen the way that the smaller teen's body had shaken with fear while he stood as a shield between his classmates and a giant. But Jounouchi had, and he finally gave up holding onto his flimsy excuses for distrusting Yuugi, instead remembering the other's actions with disbelief and the unwanted guilt he'd been trying to ignore.

Jounouchi was a skilled street fighter, and Honda wasn't too bad himself. Whether they were protecting someone or not, they could hold their own against an opponent far better than the shorter boy could. But that was just it: aside from yesterday and a handful of times when they were younger, the duo could keep themselves from being too badly injured. Yuugi knew full well that he had no chance against Ushio; that the extortionist could easily crush him. And he had stepped between them anyway. A mouse going up against a lion for the sake of two injured wolves.

Jounouchi had always thought of as Yuugi a little wimp, and had accused him of it on several occasions. The "little" part may have been true, but he could see now that beneath the timidity, at his core, Yuugi was far from being a wimp.

Reevaluating his previous interactions with him, Jounouchi now realized that his treatment of the smaller teen was completely uncalled for. Besides the fact that he could be brave when he truly set his mind to it (and therefore had no need of the blond's 'lessons') there was also the fact that Jounouchi hadn't given those lessons solely – or even mostly – for Yuugi's benefit. More than half of his motivation for doing so was that messing with him had felt… fun.

He thought about the helplessness and humiliation he'd felt when he and his friend were so easily beaten down. The blow to his pride had hurt just as much as the blows to his body, if not more. Other than a few little pushes, shoves, and that one accidental textbook incident, neither he nor Honda had ever laid a hand on Yuugi. But if he'd felt anything close to the amount of helplessness that Jounouchi had been feeling yesterday, the fact that the two of them hadn't physically abused the smaller teen didn't mean nearly as much as he'd thought it did.

He looked at the canal and pictured Yuugi's metal puzzle piece sinking to the bottom of it. The water was moving slowly enough that it couldn't have swept away something as heavy as that, so the thing should still be directly under the window he'd tossed it out of…

His mind now made up, he stepped towards the concrete barrier that divided the blacktop from the sudden drop into the canal.

"-nd as a beautification club member, I- are you even listening to me?" Honda interrupted himself as he finally noticed that the other teen had stopped following him. He turned back to scowl at his friend. Then he saw Jounouchi climbing onto the barrier, and the brunet shouted wordlessly, sprinting towards him as he jumped. He heard a splash just before he reached the edge, and looked down. Relief filled his chest when he saw the blond about fifteen feet below, wading through the slow current. He was completely unharmed, the water having softened his landing.

In a second, he remembered he was supposed to be mad at the other teen and shouted, "What the heck are you doing?!" Jounouchi didn't answer. Instead, he took a deep breath and ducked under the surface of the water to look for the object he'd tossed in the day before.

By the time the school was within sight, Yuugi was panting heavily, his lungs and leg muscles burning and a stitch forming in his side. The only thing that had kept him from taking a break or at least slowing to a walk halfway there was his brain constantly reminding him that he needed to get that last puzzle piece.

As he drew closer, he was relieved to see that the gates were still open. Hopefully that meant that the school doors hadn't been locked yet, either. Ignoring the continually worsening pain from the stitch in his side, he rushed past the gates and headed for the building.

He had almost reached his goal when a deep, familiar voice stopped him in his tracks.

"Hey, Yuugi."

Yuugi breathed in sharply, his eyes snapping away from the front doors of the school and towards a large figure that was both unexpected and fear-inducing.

"U-Ushio-san…" he responded in a hushed voice.

"So, you showed up after all. To be honest I hadn't really been expecting that you would. Good boy." Ushio stepped out from when he'd been standing in a long shadow. "I'm guessing you brought the money for my bodyguard services then, right?"

Yuugi's eyes widened. "N-no, I just left something at school and came to pick it up," he said, and his eyes flicked timidly to the ground, unable to hold the other's gaze. "…a-and anyway, I can't pay you; I… I don't have enough money…" he said quietly, almost whispering.

"I see," Ushio said blandly, raising one bushy eyebrow. Then he closed his eyes and heaved an exaggerated sigh before crossing his arms in front of his chest. "So, you didn't bring it, huh?" He tsked and shook his head from side to side with an expression of mock sadness. "And here I was thinking you were a good, honest guy."

When he re-opened his eyes, he took another couple of steps toward Yuugi, making the difference in their sizes even more pronounced. His huge frame towered over Yuugi's little one, and the boy tried his best not to cower before him. His feeble attempts at standing up straight (if not tall) were dashed to pieces and rendered useless upon hearing Ushio's next words:

"It looks like you need someone to re-educate you. Luckily, you've got someone right here who's willing to do the job."

The enormous teen's narrowed eyes now looked sharp and dangerous as they bored into the wide amethyst ones of his prey.

Yuugi could only stare up at him with those wide eyes while his heart pattered frantically inside his rib cage. He became frozen like a deer caught in the headlights of an oncoming car, his knees locking as his body started to tremble in fear.

"Aha, I found it!" Jounouchi shouted, proudly holding the puzzle piece up in the air with such elation he barely noticed the way the canal water soaking the sleeve of his school uniform began to trickle back in the opposite direction, running along his skin in an irritating manner; it didn't really matter anyway, since he was already sopping wet. Instead he continued to crow triumphantly up at an amused Honda.

"Ha, I-!" He cut himself off with a noise that was definitely not a yelp when his vision was suddenly obstructed by something that had managed to land right on his upturned head. He quickly snatched the offending object from his face and found, to his surprise, that it was a dish towel.

"As a beautification club member, I commonly handle dirty objects." Honda explained at the other teen's puzzled expression as said teen looked up at him. Then he smirked lightly. "You owe me a new towel, by the way."

Jounouchi spluttered indignantly before regaining his ability to speak. "What did you say?!" He demanded, then growled and shook his fist angrily at Honda with the self-proclaimed beautification club member's towel still clenched between his now white-knuckled fingers. "You cheapskate! Why, I oughta-!"

Honda watched with a slightly mischievous grin on his face while the blond ranted at him from down in the canal. Preoccupied with his amusement, he almost missed the colorful blur in his peripheral vision. He instinctively turned his head to figure out what it was, and the smile fell from his face. A smug looking Ushio had a huge hand on Yuugi's back and was using it to herd him behind the school.

Having cleaned the place himself, Honda knew that there was a secluded strip of asphalt between a chain link fence and a wall at the back of the building. He also knew that there were no security cameras back there. It was the school's very own back alley. Even from where he stood, Honda could make out the expression of dread on his short classmate's face as he was led away.

"Jounouchi." He interrupted the other boy, and something in his tone made the blond halt his tirade.

"What is it now?" He huffed, though caution now peeked through in his words.

"Well…"

Ushio swung his foot into Yuugi's gut, and the boy let out a pained, choked whimper, collapsing as the air was forced from him again. He stayed sprawled on the ground, too busy struggling to pull oxygen into his lungs to really notice or care much about the dirt and gravel that was being ground into his cheek and getting into his gaping, gasping mouth.

Yuugi wasn't sure how long he laid there, curled up on the ground as huge fists and boots rained down on him, but by the time Ushio decided that he had been sufficiently beaten, the small teen was only half conscious, delirious from pain and from having taken more than one blow to the head.

Ushio gave him one last kick, this time in the shoulder to flip him face down, and took a step back to inspect his work. He gave a satisfied grunt at the sight of the thoroughly pummeled boy.

"I think that's enough for today," Ushio stated before turning to leave. He began to stroll away at a sedate, casual pace as though nothing had happened. Yuugi distantly felt a sense of relief under all of his aches and pains. Then his brain reminded him of the words "for today," and his dread immediately returned. At the same time, Ushio paused before lazily turning his head halfway back towards Yuugi.

"Tomorrow we'll see if I've successfully re-educated you. If you haven't brought me the money by the end of tomorrow, I'll have to assume that I need to be firmer in handling your education." He said, then resumed walking.

Yuugi continued to lay nearly face down on the ground, dragging in shallow, ragged breaths while pain shot through his body and pounded in his head. Then Ushio's words registered to him and joined the percussion performance in his skull, and his already hurting chest was aggravated by the squeezing grip of dread as he thought of the consequences he knew would result from his inability to comply with the enormous hall monitor's impossible demands. A few tears of despair escaped and he didn't bother trying to stop them, letting them trickle sideways down his face, where they left trails of salt water that stung the abused skin of his scraped cheek and bloodied nose.

Firmer handling? Ushio had already "handled" him so "firmly" he could barely move. Sure, Yuugi had taken beatings before, and quite a few of them at that, but he could count on one hand the number of times those beatings had ever been this bad and still have four fingers left over.

But the worst part was that Ushio didn't seem to understand the full extent of how badly he had injured Yuugi, otherwise he wouldn't have gone as far as he did; after all, how was Yuugi supposed to pay him if he couldn't even move? And if the older student didn't know how bad it had been this time, he also wouldn't know just what an even harder beating would do to the boy.

He seemed to have easily taken out Honda-kun and Jounouchi-kun (and Yuugi was pretty sure Ushio had done it on his own without help, as a demonstration for the students who were also in the "public moral" group, since they hadn't looked like they were doing anything other than watch).

Ushio was huge and possessed an abnormal level of strength, and he was well aware of both of these things, but since he was already used to being significantly bigger than everyone else around him, he had failed to take into account that his current victim was even smaller than any of the others.

The dread gripping Yuugi's heart squeezed even harder when he realized that there was a very real possibility that with Ushio's next "lesson," he would either be landed in the hospital or…

…Or dead.

Heedless of the deep aches and sharp pains that both and lingered in his bones and throbbed in time with his pulse, his muscles bunched up without his consent as he quivered in fear, the strain adding to the agony he was already feeling.

The slapping of sneakers on asphalt pulled him from his panicked thoughts and allowed his tense muscles to slacken, leaving him lying once again in a boneless heap. The noise grew louder and soon he could hear heavy panting as well. Then the sound of noisy, hurried footsteps came to a stop, and there were two loud gasps coming from a few feet away from him. For a moment after that there was silence, save for the sound of muted breathing from whoever had run up to him; then he heard a familiar voice shout, "Hey, you! What do you think you're doing?!"

Jounouchi-kun? Why is he here? Yuugi wondered. Another thought sluggishly followed: Why does he sound so upset?

"Huh. It's you two again." Ushio commented blandly from the opposite side of his victim's prone form.

Jounouchi, who had been glaring at the hall monitor/extortionist, ignored the comment and turned from Ushio to Yuugi, and the scowl on his face was quickly dropped and replaced with an expression of worry. His small classmate looked like he was in really bad shape.

"Yuugi!"

He rushed to the other boy's side and fell to his knees beside him, reaching out to help before pausing with his hands hovering uncertainly when he realized he had no idea what he could do without further injuring him, hating his powerlessness in this situation. "Just, just hold on, okay?" he said as he finally resigned himself to not being able to do anything else for the boy.

The blond-haired teenager lifted his head to glower at the man who was still standing nearby and watching the scene, calmly. He gave a low growl before opening his mouth and letting loose a torrent of rather creative curses that would've made a sailor blush.

Yuugi twitched and a small noise left his lips when he heard his classmate's voice. Jounouchi immediately shut off his flow of cussing to look down at him in concern, waiting for the other boy to do something else. Yuugi didn't open his eyes or move or make any more noises. After several seconds though, he whispered, "I… I asked the Puzzle… f-for true friends…"

He wasn't completely aware of what was going on anymore, but for some reason he wanted to tell the blond teenager of his wish, the one wish he'd never said aloud to anyone but himself.

Jounouchi's breath hitched slightly and he glanced over at the nearly completed puzzle sitting on the flap of Yuugi's open and spilled bookbag. He quickly dug through his pocket until he found what he wanted and pulled it out, turning back to the other teen. He carefully uncurled Yuugi's fingers, which he had been clenching against the pain of his injuries, and slipped the item into the palm of the much smaller hand before gently encouraging the other boy to wrap his fingers around it. Jounouchi closed his eyes and took a deep breath.

"Ushio…" he muttered quietly, his voice shaking faintly with barely repressed anger. He opened his eyes and looked back up at the man who was supposed to be a protector for people like the boy who was now laying severely injured on the ground. He stood.

"Even after you beat up me and Honda, I still respected you, 'cause I thought you were only trying to stand up for a guy who seemed like he needed help…" The flimsy façade of calm dropped from Jounouchi's face and voice as he gestured at the bruised, bloodied teen near his feet and shouted, "But now, any respect I ever had for you is gone! And I'm not gonna let this slide!"

At the blond's side, Honda curled his hands into fists and nodded firmly in agreement. Both of them were tense and ready for a fight. Ushio just raised a brow again.

"Oh? And I suppose you think the fact that there are two of you and only one of me means you're going to win?" He sounded amused.

Rather than responding, Jounouchi gave a wordless shout of anger and charged his large opponent, Honda right behind him with his own angry cry.

It didn't take long for Honda to be beaten down, and though Jounouchi managed to last a bit longer against their huge adversary, he was soon laying on the ground unconscious as well.

"You should have known better than to try taking me on," Ushio addressed his defeated and unconscious opponents, "Because this is what happens to those who defy me; remember that!" He laughed as he walked away.

Yuugi, hearing the deep voice and noticing that the sounds of fighting had ceased, cracked his eyes open and dragged his uncooperative mind further into the waking world, not relenting until he managed to lift his head off the ground and shift his upper body enough to look in the direction the sound of Ushio's retreating footsteps was coming from. A mere five feet from him were the unconscious bodies of his classmates who had come to his aid, only to be beaten and knocked out as well for trying to help.

"Jounouchi-kun… Honda-kun…" Yuugi croaked, staring at them in wonder and slight disbelief. Neither of them moved. Fear for the two coursed through him and lent him enough strength to cry out to them. "Jounouchi-kun! Honda-kun!"

He struggled to lift his upper body using his elbows as leverage, but even with the extra adrenaline, the exhausted muscles of his arms only tensed and quivered, lifting his torso a few inches higher before giving out on him. He wheezed as he roughly met the ground and the air was forced from his lungs, leaving them feeling like overstretched balloons. Tears pricked at his eyes again. He would never be able to wake the two other teens, or even check on them, with his own body rebelling against any attempt he made to move towards them.

Darkness tugged at the edges of his vision, beckoning him to retreat into blissful unconsciousness. Just as he closed his eyes and was about to give in to the tempting pull, he noticed the weight of a small object in his hand, something heavy for its size, and faintly remembered Jounouchi pressing it into his palm before he and Honda went after Ushio. Now that he was more concentrated on it, he realized its shape, texture and even weight all felt very familiar.

There was no doubt about it: the object in his hand was the final piece of the Millennium Puzzle. Even with his thoughts as fuzzy and clouded as they were, a faded sort of shock settled over him at the realization.

He uncurled his hand and cracked his eyelids open to look at the last puzzle piece, and the carving of a familiar eye stared back at him. The gleam that reflected off of its smooth surface was almost too bright to be natural by the meager light provided by the waning sunset. Something else was shining nearby as well, and he shifted his gaze towards it.

His open book bag rested a few feet away, its contents spilled across the ground. Only one thing among those contents caught his attention, and that was the miniature gold pyramid, finished save for the one piece he was still holding. The pyramid was no more than six inches from the hand that held that piece. His weary mind stuttered to a halt. Then the last of the gleam caused by the sunset died, and a nearby security light flickered on. The change brought him out of his trance, and when his brain whirred back to life, all his troubles suddenly felt so far away.

Never mind the fact that he would probably be getting the worst beating of his life tomorrow; all he could focus on was that his wish was finally going to come true. In his concussed state, he had even forgotten about his classmates for the time being, something that he normally would have never done.

Right now, all that existed were the Millennium Puzzle, the dream that was so close to being a reality, and the final piece of gold sitting in his hand. He reached out towards the Puzzle, barely flinching at the pain, and fumbled for a bit while he shifted the object in his hand to the correct angle. Trembling in exhaustion from the small movements, he could barely keep his eyelids open as he pushed the piece into place.

A blinding light flared from the eye of the Puzzle in the same moment the artifact finally became whole, and Yuugi's eyes widened in shock. Then a beam of the same light burst from the golden pyramid, heading straight for him. It collided with his forehead almost like a physical thing, first touching the skin before continuing onward. Streams of searing gold flooded his mind, smothering him in a torrent of sensations and quickly building up and expanding inside of him.

Before long he felt as though he were being compacted, being crushed by the foreign energy that just wouldn't stop shoving its way into his head, and soon the mental agony far overshadowed even the pain his body was in. His mouth opened in a mute scream that lasted barely a second before a large shadow shot out of the Puzzle to join the gold that was being crammed into his mind. Then everything became too much for him to handle. His eyes rolled back before sliding closed and he collapsed, gratefully surrendering to the pull of unconsciousness.

Not five seconds later, his eyes snapped back open. However, they were no longer kind and expressively large. This time, they were harsh, angular, and devoid of any compassion. The pupils immediately shrank to pinpricks upon being exposed to the glare of the security light, but quickly grew as they got used to it. They expanded and contracted at an inhuman rate while they adjusted, making them appear almost avian. The irises, rather than being their normal color – a soft, pleasant shade of lilac – were a disturbing mixture of blackish red and a bright scarlet that danced like flames. A thin layer of golden energy glowed on the surface.

The eyes blinked. The gold gradually died away, leaving only a faint glow that would have been undetectable were it daytime. The scarlet flames began to calm and blend with the darker red, mixing until they were almost indistinct from each other. The resulting hue perfectly matched that of freshly spilled blood.

Memories slowly trickled back into the spirit's mind, and with those memories rose a feeling of fury that swelled inside a bruised and battered chest, numbing the pain to a degree and granting strength to tired limbs.

Yuugi's nose wrinkled and his lips were pulled back into a snarl. The eyes that both were and weren't Yuugi's narrowed dangerously. Then they seemed to ignite. The two colors of red separated themselves again, scarlet flicking even more wildly over dark crimson, and the sparks of gold flared back to life. This time, though, they didn't stop there. The gold blazed even brighter until all of the surroundings were lit in a brilliant white light. The bulb in the dull security light shattered with a loud pop! and a host of irritating clinks.

When the energy settled down from white back to gold, it had congregated in the center of his forehead in the shape of a third eye, which burned with the same intensity as the other two.

Yuugi's body turned in the direction that Ushio had gone, and all three eyes glared out into the night, their vision remaining perfectly intact even in the dark. The entity took a step forward before suddenly halting. His eyes flicked back to the ground. Yuugi's two classmates were still laying there a few paces in front of him, out cold.

The entity in Yuugi's body regarded them distractedly and impatiently for a moment, his golden eye piercing their unconscious minds and examining some of their most recent thoughts. Satisfied with what he'd found, he withdrew his power from their minds, careful not to cause any damage.

He summoned a few of his Shadows and ordered them to transport the teenagers to somewhere they wouldn't be disturbed before they woke. He firmly commanded them not to harm the boys in any way. The Shadows complied, perfectly happy for once to help mostly unfamiliar humans. This was a special case, after all; the two had just tried to defend their master's Light.

With all else taken care of, the spirit was free to go after his target, and he did so without hesitation.

Shadows slunk across the walls and slithered along the ground, following the enraged figure as he stalked silently through the dark. Each one eagerly anticipated the moment they would finally receive another naughty mortal that they could play with. Despite their enthusiasm, they obediently stayed a single stride behind their master. He was more angry than he had been in a long time, and they knew he would not hesitate to take out his rage on them should they disobey. Although it evoked caution, their master's intense anger also excited them. If they were right in their assumptions, this time he would probably let them play to their hearts' content.

Deep inside his mind, Yuugi continued to rest obliviously in the merciful arms of unconsciousness.

A/N: I'll be posting a oneshot probably sometime this month that starts during the last part of this chapter and details, from the spirit's point of view, the events that take place soon after. I was going to post it as the next chapter of Submersion, but then decided that it just wouldn't quite fit in correctly between this chapter and what will now be the next one.