The Magicians' Realm Letters and Porch Drinks, a yu-gi-oh fanfic

Chapter 48, everybody! In which the brothers Montgau discuss things and Teana chats with an owl….Forgive me if my author's note doesn't sound like it's firing on all cylinders this time around—I didn't find out until 2:30 last night that the weird noise I kept hearing was a bat in my room until I sat up and turned on the light to investigate. On the list of things you never want to hear in the middle of the night: leathery wings snapping right next to your ear. D: Fortunately, Dad played badminton (or bat-minton) with it and got it out of my room, so there's that.

Movies this week are The Princess and the Frog, Jurassic Park, and Through the Looking Glass—wait until Through the Looking Glass is out on video, in my opinion. And The Princess and the Frog could have used a couple of more rewrites, also in my opinion. Jurassic Park is still a great movie, though—just avoid the books. :P

Angiembabe, thanks for the review! Yes, that may be what we'll have to do—we managed to get another row and a half in, but had to replace another half a row because the plants died. Here's hoping though. Yes, at least there's that….The sad thing is, that was the best I could come up with after sitting there and staring at it. :\ She's working on it….

Fromtheashtrees, thanks for the review! Good question…well, they were trying to get a tomato, so maybe they were after something to eat. Ah, I remember that commercial (we get them too—ABC Family, right?). Yeah…and then you start staring at your watch and become convinced it died….No, don't worry about it—I'm not planning on abandoning the story (which reminds me, I need to sit down and write out the climaxes for my other active stories on here…). Yes, it's going to be long. Ah, success. :D Yes—thank you, FicReader, for writing them all down; if it wasn't for that, I might have been ridiculous and added one more. :\ Too true….And also too true….Ooh, enjoy! And study! Study harder!

Thanks for the review, Guest, and congrats on review 113! (FicReader, is that you?). Haha, yes, Thomas Gibson plays both Aaron Hotchner and Greg Montgomery (so technically, Greg and Hotch's conversation this chapter is a case of the actor talking to himself XD). Ah—I got into it because Mom watched it, and she always liked it and would tell me about it; so when it came on the TV one year as reruns, we watched it. Definitely a fun sitcom. Heheh….I'm not sure if I've ever seen them in person, but if I understand it correctly, they're like tiny oranges—any way you slice it, it's still a fun word to randomly say. :D

References:

Original characters, + setting © Kineil D. Wicks (myself, not the girl in the story)

Teana wasn't entirely surprised to see an owl on her sill when she arrived back at her apartment.

"Hello," she said, upon opening her window. "Been waiting there long?"

"Not really," the owl said, sounding and looking very much like Cory from the other day. "You want me to wait for a return letter?" he asked as Teana took a letter from him.

"Apparently the usual postal system works just fine," Teana pointed out.

Cory looked marginally offended. "Yeah, but they're not owls."

"Are you sure?"

Cory thought about that as Teana opened the letter and read it. Wonder of wonders, Yami was inviting her over to his house. How very, remarkably forward. Typical Yami.

She told him as such in her return letter.

*/*\*

They had eventually managed to find their way out of the maze, after encountering no one in—or later, around—it. General consensus was that whoever it was was long gone by now.

The Klendaniels had left for home, and the Montgaus and the Finkelsteins had retreated to the Finkelstein home, which was built in true Hippie fashion: ramshackle shack to the road, tunnels beneath, and a better-built home deeper in the woods, connected to the shack by the tunnels. It was a holdover behavior from the post-Cataclysmic time period, when the Age of Chaos was establishing itself, and had its charms, Greg supposed—if one liked that sort of thing.

He did like the back porch of the better-built home, and the yard directly behind it, both of which were littered with rocking chairs the Finkelsteins had liberated over the years. The Hippies in the woods had liberated tons of junk that the townsfolk had thrown out, as had those in Railside—there was a landfill the trains visited, somewhere out in the nebulous west, but Greg wasn't certain how much of their junk actually made it there.

He had to admit, though, that Larry's rocking-chair farm—as his father Edward liked to call it—had its charm. Edward and Larry were currently testing out the new ones that Larry and Abby had acquired, while Greg and Hotch were on their preferred two on the porch, nursing mason jars of wine while the kids sat in front of the teleradio and the ladies held forth on everything under the sun in the kitchen. Dinner was being cooked, and would probably consist of very little meat. Greg and Jenna, figuring this in advance, had a roast smothered in vegetables and gravy waiting for them in the oven at home, their neighbor David promising to keep an eye on their house to make sure it didn't burn down or anything like that as it slow-cooked. Who knew—that kid Bakura liked to slide down chimneys and steal things; he might steal the roast and leave it at that. On the positive side, if it survived, that roast would be nice and tender.

Granted, he wasn't entirely certain that they'd be leaving the Finkelsteins tonight—the Hippies might dance to the beat of their own drummer, but their drummer frowned upon stealing things. They were all for share and share alike, and believed that one man's trash was another man's treasure, but outright stealing was…uncool, man.

"Maybe it was someone from Railside," Greg said finally, rubbing the thread of the mason jar—he had asked what had happened to the case of wine glasses he had given the Finkelsteins last Christmas, to be told that they had tied bountiful-harvest charms to the stems and given them to the Konoviches because their daughter was getting married and it made a nice wedding gift and they had plenty of perfectly good glasses already so why not share the wealth?

"Or someone from town thinking they were pulling a fast one," Hotch supplied.

"Yeah, that too."

They paused, took a drink—Mother Nature was nice enough to supply a good wine recipe, although the recipe for potato vodka that she had apparently shared with the Finkelsteins left something to be desired. Fireflies were starting to come out—they'd be gone soon, if the nippy edge to the breeze was anything to go by.

"So," Hotch noised, after a while. "How is Yami taking things?"

"About as well as can be expected," Greg said, now tracing the Mason cursive on the side of the jar. "I think he's trying to find a way around the Administrators' ruling, but I don't think he's found it yet."

"You're sure about that?"

Greg scowled at his brother. "Pretty sure—what, you don't think I know my own son?"

Hotch shrugged and took another sip of wine. "Let me put it this way—you seem distracted. Something eating you?"

In a word, yes—literally, he reflected, slapping at his neck. Joy, mosquitoes. He checked for Abby before casting a minor spell to ward pests away, then entertained himself with wondering if it would work on Bakura. Or Administrator Carter. Speaking of….

"I have something interesting to tell you," he said to Hotch, and then recounted his recent encounters with the currently absent Administrator. By the time he finished, Hotch was rubbing at his mouth and tapping on the rocker's armrest, thinking over his story.

"What do you think he's playing at?" Hotch asked finally.

"I don't know," Greg told him, watching Larry and Edward rocking in a pair of red chairs and commenting on them. "And that scares me, to be honest. Administrator Carter has never been…well, let's just say that he's not the sort to have others' best interest at heart."

"Uh huh. So what's the plan, then? There is a plan, isn't there?"

Greg scratched at his mosquito bite. "There's…sort of a plan. It involves you and your 'dream team' up at the Capitol, though."

Hotch was smirking now. "Finally admitting that our branch is more important?"

"Don't start," Greg said, pointing. "I'm saying that technically, investigating this would be your job, since your branch is concerned with Commoner law and order. By the way, there's a potions still case I'm fobbing off on you as well—never got around to sending it, since you were already on your way to your doom."

"Woo," Hotch noised drily.

"I thought you might like that. You might also like how nicely the other folder of interest fits inside it as well."

"You're being remarkably duplicitous."

"Family matters."

"You do realize that if this blows up in your face, you'll be playing poker with Skellington."

"I've already had that conversation."

"So long as you know."

Silence for a few moments.

"So," Greg noised finally. "Are you going to help?"

Hotch considered this.

"Sure," he said finally. "Family matters—and besides, Reid will be thrilled to death at such a challenging cold case."

"Less thrilled at the still, though."

"Rossi might like that one. Here's to you."

They clinked their glasses together, finished the wine as Kitty came out to summon them for dinner.

Here was hoping.

*\*/*

Teana tried hard not to sigh at the sight of Cory once again sitting on her windowsill.

"Is this going to become habit?" she asked, opening the window for him.

"I hope not," Cory said, holding out the letter for her. She took it, read it—Yami apologizing for being so forward, but he had merely intended for it to be drinks and maybe dinner and listening to the teleradio, and there weren't as many interested parties there to be as nosy. Well, except for Hephaestus, Vulcan, and Kineil, but short of dynamite or a snipe hunt, he wasn't entirely certain how to get rid of them. And besides, Kineil might see through a snipe hunt, and then she might be offended, and Yami wasn't certain he'd survive her being offended. Teana couldn't help but snicker at that.

"What is it?" Cory asked.

"Mr. Skellington is attempting to invite me over to his house," Teana said.

"Ooh, you should go," Cory said. "You need to see it. It's like…." Here Cory spread his wings and rolled his head, like he was trying to encapsulate a great huge description, but words were currently failing him. "It's impressive," he settled on finally.

She tapped her finger against her mouth, thinking. "Well," she noised finally. "I suppose Thursday evenings are free for me now." Storming out on that job had been refreshing, even if it had put a strain on her finances—the lovely Administrators had decided that the town needed an upgrade, and every renter in Delvaire had to sign on or ship out. And because of that, expenses were passed on to the tenants. Dave a floor down had already signed off, wrapping his long multicolored scarf around his neck and storming out of the building as he headed home. Teana, lacking such a luxury to fall back on, was forced to cut corners and eat at her waitressing job. At least she got to keep the day-old pastries.

"All right," Teana said finally, flipping the paper over and writing out her response on it. "If for nothing else but the free food."

"You'll like it," Cory assured her, sticking out his foot so she could attach the letter. She rolled it up and stuffed it through the tiny tube on the ring on his leg.

"How do you handle bigger letters?" she asked as Cory ruffled his feathers and turned for the sky.

"Bigger owls," Cory said simply, before launching away. "Ta! See you soon!"

Undoubtedly, knowing Yami.

Although she did have to wonder why the notion cheered her so.