Disclaimer: You know the drill – WookieeBeta doesn't own Yu-Gi-Oh!…
Unknown Identity
Chapter Six: Many Reunions
"Bakura! Hey, Bakura, wake up! You did it! Come on, man, wake up! We made it! We're home!" Jounouchi was shaking his shoulders violently. "Come on, man, let's go see your dad." Bakura finally looked up and stared into his friend's face.
"Dad…dad? Yes, let's…" His voice trailed off and his shoulders went slack as he slipped back into unconsciousness.
"What's with him?" Honda asked.
"He's exhausted," Anzu said. "He went through much more than the three of us, and nearly got trapped in the Shadow Realm on top of it all. Or didn't you see his yami sneaking up on him while he sent us?" Honda stared at her in surprise.
"His yami?"
Anzu nodded. "He's trapped in the Shadow Realm. I guess when Bakura took us there his yami felt his presence, because I saw him coming. I didn't get a chance to tell him, though… We're lucky he made it." Tears formed at the corners of her eyes again. "Come on, you two pick him up. We'll carry him home." Jounouchi and Honda nodded and lifted their pale-haired friend between them. He was frighteningly lightweight, and Jounouchi had the bad feeling that it wasn't just his naturally light figure that was to blame.
"We'll go to his house first," Anzu said. "It's just a few blocks away. This way we won't have to ride the bus." Jounouchi nodded, and they set off to Bakura's house.
Mr. Bakura's head jerked up as the doorbell rang, snapping him out of a light doze.
"Who is it?" he called. His voice was tired and rough – the past two weeks had been torturous for him.
"Open the door," a girl's voice called. "We're friends of Bakura's." Bakura. The policemen had told him that if his son hadn't returned by now, he probably never would.
"Coming," Mr. Bakura replied, standing and walking to the door. He opened it and stood aside without looking up.
"Dad?" Bakura's weak voice came. Mr. Bakura's head snapped up, and tears streamed down his face when he saw his son being half-carried by two other teenage boys. He rushed forward and they embraced, neither taking any notice of the other three around them.
"Ryou…oh, God, Ryou, it's really you, you're really alive…" Mr. Bakura was sobbing uncontrollably.
"Sir, Bakura really needs to lie down," Jounouchi said gently, carefully separating father from son. "He's had a rougher time of it than we have, and that's saying something." For the first time Mr. Bakura looked at the other three teenagers, and he gasped in surprise. They were all thin and exhausted-looking, covered from head to toe in dirt and leaves. His son's hair was dark with filth and tied away from his face with a vine.
"What happened?" Mr. Bakura said, lifting his son gently from Jounouchi and Honda and carrying him to a nearby couch.
"We're still not quite sure," Anzu said. "Um, do you mind if we borrow your phone and ask our families to come over?"
"They don't know you're back?" Mr. Bakura asked in surprise. Jounouchi shook his head.
"We came here first. Your son is in pretty bad shape, and your house was closer than any of ours." Mr. Bakura shook his head in surprise.
"Sure, go ahead – it's right over there." He pointed.
"Thanks," Anzu said. She turned to the others. "Mind if I call first?" Jounouchi and Honda shook their heads.
"Wait a second," Honda blurted quietly just as she began dialing. "We should call Mr. Mouto, too. He needs to know what happened to…"
"To Yugi," Jounouchi said, nodding. "I'll do it." Anzu nodded and redialed. There were tears running down her face by the time she hung up, but she was smiling.
"You next, Honda," Jounouchi said.
"Where's Yugi Mouto?" Mr. Bakura asked from the other side of the room. He hadn't overheard their quiet conversation. "I thought he was with you." Honda's voice was the only sound in the room as he talked to his parents. The tears that suddenly appeared in Jounouchi's eyes were enough answer, and Mr. Bakura didn't ask for more details.
"Your turn, Jounouchi," Honda said, setting down the receiver. "You sure you want to do this?" Jounouchi nodded.
"Someone has to, it may as well be me. I was closest to him, after all…" Jounouchi called his parents first. The answering machine picked up. He left a message saying that he was safe and at Mr. Bakura's house, and would they please come. He gave the address and then hung up. He took a deep steadying breath before dialing the number of Mr. Mouto's game shop.
"Hello?"
"Hello, Mr. Mouto? This is Jounouchi, a friend of your grandson's."
"Yugi's not here," the old man said. Jounouchi could hear the pain in the old man's voice.
"Mr. Mouto, could you please come to Mr. Bakura's house for a few hours? I have some news about Yugi."
"Who is this?" Mr. Mouto asked.
"I'm Jounouchi. I used to come around to your store with
Yugi all the time – I'm the one that knocked over that display rack year before
last."
"Jounouchi? Weren't you one of the ones
who disappeared with my grandson?"
"I am," Jounouchi said.
"You were all together, then? You're all back?"
"Most of us," Jounouchi said, nodding. His voice broke.
"Why hasn't Yugi called, then?"
"Mr. Mouto…" Jounouchi took another deep breath. "Could you please close the store and come to Mr. Bakura's house for a few hours? I have some news that I'd prefer to tell you face-to-face." He heard the shopkeeper's sudden intake of breath on the other end of the line.
"It's not about my grandson, is it?" he asked.
"I'm afraid it is, sir…" Jounouchi told him the address and said goodbye, then hung up.
"He'll be here as soon as he can," he said to the others. "Oh, I really don't want to do this…." He sighed. The sound of car doors outside made them all look up. Mr. Bakura went to the door and opened it almost before the doorbell rang.
"Anzu!" Anzu ran forward and nearly jumped into her parents' arms, tears streaming down her face once more. Honda's parents arrived only a minute later, trailing a police car. The policeman got out and seemed ready to give Honda's dad a ticket for speeding, but when he saw Honda's now well-known face framed in the window he immediately got back into his car and left.
"Now we're just waiting for my parents and Mr. Mouto," Jounouchi said softly, watching Honda's emotional reunion with his parents.
Jounouchi's dad walked into the dark house and flipped on the lights. A blinking light on the answering machine told him that he had fifteen messages. He listened to them with half an ear, finger poised above the 'erase' button. They seemed to all be messages from friends and coworkers sympathizing with him for the loss of his only son. Hot tears welled up in his eyes and his finger stabbed down viciously toward the button as the fifteenth message started, but a familiar voice made him freeze.
"Hey, Mom, Dad, it's Jounouchi…."
The next morning, every newspaper in the county had a headline along the lines of "Missing Teenagers Return!" There was throng of students outside of the local high school, all discussing the strange reappearance of their friends, but they were disappointed when none of them turned up for class.
The gamers in the area were disappointed when they saw the sign on Mr. Mouto's game shop, "Closed," but they were even more surprised when Kaiba Land too shut down. When it opened again a week later, there was a large statue of the Dark Magician card with an inscription. It read "In memory of Yugi Mouto, King of Games."
A/N: Many reunions, yes, but not quite enough for poor Grampa… (What's his name in Japanese, btw? I'm stuck with the American dubbed version, all the names I've used here I picked up from other fics – which is my excuse for any misspellings, etc ^grin^ Let me know if I've gotten any of them wrong and I'll try to fix them, btw…)
One more thing – btw means 'by the way' ^is too lazy to type it out^