Hello again! Okay, I'm glad to know that the story doesn't stink. My muse
is happy too, because now I don't have to shoot him. Thank you to those
that reviewed! You were so encouraging that I decided to write the second
chapter. Hopefully, it'll explain a bit more.
Oh, yeah, something I forgot to put on the last chapter: I don't own the characters. I wish I did, but since that's not possible, I'm content to borrow them for a little bit. I'll give them back unharmed, I promise.
Enjoy!
****
Part II: The Road Less Traveled
Seto Kaiba sat on one end of the back seat of his limo, staring out the window at the quiet streets of Domino City. Joey Wheeler sat stiffly beside him, constantly muttering and whispering. Kaiba couldn't make out what Joey was saying, but he was sure that the words were meant for the non responsive Yugi. Tea sat on the other side of Joey, clutching something in her hands. They looked like a bunch of golden blocks to Kaiba, and he hadn't bothered to ask her what they were.
The last think he'd expected when he had foolishly decided to take a walk was to run into this group of misfits. He certainly hadn't expected that one of them would look as if dearth had come knocking on his door. Yugi looked very pale and small as he lay in Joey's arms, which made the blood on his face and clothing stand out even more. Kaiba hated to admit it, but he'd felt a bit of concern for the younger teen when he'd gotten over the shock of seeing him. Joey had been right about one thing: he did owe Yugi for saving him and Mokuba from Pegasus. After this, they would finally be even.
"What happened to him?" Kaiba finally asked, tearing his eyes away from the passing scenery. He focused instead on Joey, who apparently didn't hear the question. It was Tea who finally answered.
"We don't know what happened. We were on our way to the game shop when Joey found a piece of the puzzle on the street. We looked in the alley where we found more puzzle pieces and then found him."
Tea's voice was soft, and he could hear the fear tainting it. Her sentences were rushed and jumbled, making it hard for him to piece together what had taken place.
"What puzzle?" he asked.
"This," Tea replied, holding up the jumbled blocks in her hands. "The necklace that Yugi wears around his neck, it's a puzzle. We found some of the pieces on the street and knew that something was wrong. When we found him, he had already been beaten," she finished, nodding in Yugi's direction.
Kaiba looked at the unconscious teen, not for the first time wondering why he'd been attacked. Yes, he was well aware that Yugi had been bullied at school for quite some time, but what had been done to him today went way beyond what a school bully would do.
"Kaiba, do you have your mobile phone?" Joey suddenly asked.
Kaiba turned to him, but Joey hadn't looked up and was still staring at Yugi.
"Yes, I have it."
"Call Yugi's grandfather, tell him what happened."
He opened his mouth to remind Joey that he didn't take orders from anyone, but then shut it. This was not the time to argue.
"Fine," he muttered.
He took out the phone and was about to dial when Tea's voice stopped him.
"Let me do it. Yugi's grandfather doesn't like you very much, and he's going to be shocked enough without hearing this from you."
Kaiba looked at her, annoyed, and then simply handed her the phone. He waited with it outstretched until he realized that she already had her hands full. With an annoyed sigh, he lifted up a backpack from the floor, opened it, and held it out to her. Tea looked at it in confusion for a moment, before hastily dumping the puzzle pieces inside. He closed the bag and gave it to her, along with his phone. He settled back on the seat and returned his attention to the outside. They were getting close to the hospital, he could tell.
"Mr. Moto, its Tea. I think you should go to Domino Hospital."
He heard her speaking, and then she waited a bit to get the grandfather's reaction.
"Yes, something has happened to Yugi, but we don't know what. He's been hurt and I think you should be there."
A pause.
"Yes, we're on our way now. Okay, I'll see you there. Bye."
"How'd he take it?"
Tea sighed and handed him back the phone. "Not well. He's worried. He wants us to tell him what happened, but we can't do that because we don't know. I just hope everything's okay," she trailed off as her eyes started to tear up.
Kaiba took the phone from her and put it away.
"Are we there yet?" Joey asked.
This time, he did lift his head and met Kaiba's eyes. Kaiba was slightly shocked to see the utter seriousness in Joey's eyes. There was no joke, no idiotic remarks, just plain worry and unshed tears.
"Master Kaiba, we've arrived."
As soon as the words had left the driver's mouth, Tea and Joey were out of the car. Joey was yelling at the emergency crew that had just gotten into an ambulance, and they quickly got out and took Yugi from Joey, putting him on a stretcher and taking him inside the hospital. Kaiba got out of the car as well and started to follow them inside when he suddenly stopped. What was he doing? They weren't going to want him there. When Yugi's grandfather arrived, the man certainly wasn't going to want him there. So why did he have this urgent need to go inside?
**~~**
Joey ran down the crowded hall of the hospital, pushing people out of his way as he went. He ignored the dirty, and then horrified, looks people gave him, concentrating instead on the body in the stretcher ahead of him. The car ride to the hospital had seemed to last an eternity for him. He'd wanted nothing more than to scream at the driver to speed up and get them to the hospital, but he'd known that it wouldn't have done any good. Instead, he'd settled for softly reassuring Yugi that everything was going to be okay, even though Joey hadn't been sure that it was going to happen. Now that they were in the hospital, he didn't know what to do.
He saw the paramedics take Yugi into one of the emergency rooms and was going to follow them in, when a strong hand on his shoulder stopped him.
"I'm the doctor on duty, and I'm afraid you can't go in there. Young man, do you know what happened?"
Joey looked up at the kind and concerned face of the doctor, startled out of his daze.
"No, I don't know what happened. We found him already like that, but he looks pretty bad. You have to help him, Doctor. He has to get better."
"I understand, young man. We'll do our best." The doctor looked at his face, and then let his eyes travel down to Joey's chest. "My god, are you hurt?"
Joey followed the gaze and saw that his uniform was bloodied where Yugi's head had rested against his chest. He felt bile rise up in his throat at the sight of the blood, but he chocked it down.
"No, it isn't my blood," he whispered.
"Okay, why don't you have a seat in the waiting room and we'll let you know as soon as we're finished fixing up your friend?"
Joey nodded absently.
"Why don't you go and contact the boy's parents? I'm sure they'll want to know that he's here."
"We've already done that, Doctor," Tea answered. "Yugi's grandfather is on his way."
"Very well, you two stay put. We'll do everything we can."
The doctor turned around and went back into the emergency room, leaving the two teenagers standing in the middle of the suddenly overcrowded room.
Joey felt as if he were operating in slow motion. Now that they'd gotten Yugi to the hospital, he didn't know what else to do. He wanted to be in there with his friend, but knew why he couldn't be. He just hoped that they hadn't waited too long, that it wasn't too late to save Yugi.
**~~**
Yugi woke up and found himself surrounded by bland, white walls. He didn't really feel anything. As a matter of fact, he felt as if he were very light, almost as if he were floating. He heard noises behind him and turned around, only to catch his breath when he realized that he was floating a few feet above a bed.
He looked closely at the figure on the bed and realized with a start that he was looking at himself. He was beaten and bloodied, his head and face covered with blood. Several people stood around the bed, working frantically on him. He heard one of the doctors mention something about a severe head injury, and Yugi's hand immediately went up to his head, but he didn't find an injury there. He looked down at himself and saw that his uniform was crisp and clean, not a mark on it. In contrast, the uniform of the Yugi on the bed was torn, bloody and dirty.
He frowned. He didn't know what was happening. He didn't know what had happened. He willed himself to go down closer to the bed and saw himself lying there, pale and unresponsive. The heart monitor beeped softly, so he knew that he wasn't dead. But if he was out here, who was inside the body?
Yami!
That was his first thought, until he realized that the Yugi on the bed wasn't wearing the Millenium Puzzle. He looked down at himself again and saw that he wasn't wearing it either. No, it couldn't be Yami then. Where was he? Where was the puzzle?
/Yami/ he called through the mental link, fully expecting his other half to reply. Instead, Yugi found only silence. /Yami, where are you?/
The scenery suddenly changed, and Yugi found himself outside of the room, standing in the middle of a hallway. Directly in front of him, he saw Joey and Tea. Tea was softly crying, while Joey simply sat on one of the chairs, stunned. Yugi noted the blood on his clothes and wondered if he'd gotten hurt as well.
"Joey, what happened to you? Are you okay?"
Yugi frowned when no one answered him. He walked closer to his friends in an attempt to get their attention, but they didn't see him.
"Tea, do you still have the puzzle?" Yugi heard Joey ask.
"Yeah, it's in your backpack. I got all the pieces."
Pieces?
Suddenly, the scene changed again, and Yugi found himself in a dark alley.
He had been pulled inside as he walked home from school. It had caught him so by surprise that he hadn't even had time to call out to Yami for help. There had been two men, who easily outweighed him. They'd slammed him face first into the wall, and Yugi could clearly remember how the edge of the puzzle had cut into his chest, before he'd felt it shatter into pieces. He'd tried to call out for help, but a well placed fist to the stomach had quieted him.
Yugi remembered the men wanting something from him. They'd asked him something, and he could remember not knowing how to answer them. He'd told them that he didn't know, but they hadn't believed him. They'd tried beating the answer out of him, but he couldn't give them what they wanted. He'd managed to break free and run away, but they'd caught him. When they'd finally got tired of him, they'd slammed him into the floor. Yugi could still remember the overwhelming pain as his head hit the concrete.
The scene changed again, and he was standing in the corridor again, facing Joey and Tea. His hand automatically went to his head, but he didn't feel any pain. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed his grandfather running towards Joey and Tea. Yugi wanted to say something to him, but found himself being pulled away.
There was a flash of bright light, and he then found himself standing out in the open, in the middle of a field with nothing but black skies above him. He looked up and saw the endless night, full of stars so big and bright that they seemed to have been painted on the sky just for him. He took a deep breath as he examined them, feeling peace and calm for the first time in a long time.
"Welcome to the road less traveled, Yugi-boy."
Yugi whirled around and was shocked to come face to face with a smiling Maximillion Pegasus.
"Pegasus? What are you doing here? Where are we?"
Pegasus laughed as he walked to stand next to Yugi. He stretched out his hands, taking in the entire landscape.
"This, my dear boy, is a representation of your mind. It's kind of boring, if you ask me, but I don't have a say in the décor." He paused, and then gave his full attention to Yugi.
"You're currently in the hospital, fighting for your life. This is simply your way of coping with what's going on out there," Pegasus explained, comically pointing to an area out of their reach. "I'm your guide on your journey through the road less traveled."
"The road less traveled?" Yugi asked, now even more confused than before.
He'd seen his broken body on the hospital bed and knew that Pegasus spoke the truth. If this was really his mind, why did Pegasus have to be here?
"You are a slow one, aren't you little one? You see it's like this: You're being given a choice. You may live, or you may die. Before you decide, however, you must review your life and the choices you've made. You're fairly young, so I don't think it will take you too long to do that. This is the road less traveled because not many get the chance to take this journey. You are special in that regard. As a part of your mind, I know that you've done a lot for a boy your age. You have only yourself to hold accountable for your actions."
Yugi's frown deepened, and he found himself staring up at Pegasus, hoping for more clarification. When none was forthcoming, he sighed.
"Okay, since I don't seem to have a choice in the matter, what do I do?"
Pegasus chuckled and clapped his hands in delight, before pointing one manicured finger at something behind Yugi.
"Behold, your first stop."
Yugi looked to where Pegasus was pointing and found himself staring at a quickly approaching Seto Kaiba.
****
End of part two. Just what does Seto Kaiba have to say to Yugi? Stay tuned and find out.
Oh, yeah, something I forgot to put on the last chapter: I don't own the characters. I wish I did, but since that's not possible, I'm content to borrow them for a little bit. I'll give them back unharmed, I promise.
Enjoy!
****
Part II: The Road Less Traveled
Seto Kaiba sat on one end of the back seat of his limo, staring out the window at the quiet streets of Domino City. Joey Wheeler sat stiffly beside him, constantly muttering and whispering. Kaiba couldn't make out what Joey was saying, but he was sure that the words were meant for the non responsive Yugi. Tea sat on the other side of Joey, clutching something in her hands. They looked like a bunch of golden blocks to Kaiba, and he hadn't bothered to ask her what they were.
The last think he'd expected when he had foolishly decided to take a walk was to run into this group of misfits. He certainly hadn't expected that one of them would look as if dearth had come knocking on his door. Yugi looked very pale and small as he lay in Joey's arms, which made the blood on his face and clothing stand out even more. Kaiba hated to admit it, but he'd felt a bit of concern for the younger teen when he'd gotten over the shock of seeing him. Joey had been right about one thing: he did owe Yugi for saving him and Mokuba from Pegasus. After this, they would finally be even.
"What happened to him?" Kaiba finally asked, tearing his eyes away from the passing scenery. He focused instead on Joey, who apparently didn't hear the question. It was Tea who finally answered.
"We don't know what happened. We were on our way to the game shop when Joey found a piece of the puzzle on the street. We looked in the alley where we found more puzzle pieces and then found him."
Tea's voice was soft, and he could hear the fear tainting it. Her sentences were rushed and jumbled, making it hard for him to piece together what had taken place.
"What puzzle?" he asked.
"This," Tea replied, holding up the jumbled blocks in her hands. "The necklace that Yugi wears around his neck, it's a puzzle. We found some of the pieces on the street and knew that something was wrong. When we found him, he had already been beaten," she finished, nodding in Yugi's direction.
Kaiba looked at the unconscious teen, not for the first time wondering why he'd been attacked. Yes, he was well aware that Yugi had been bullied at school for quite some time, but what had been done to him today went way beyond what a school bully would do.
"Kaiba, do you have your mobile phone?" Joey suddenly asked.
Kaiba turned to him, but Joey hadn't looked up and was still staring at Yugi.
"Yes, I have it."
"Call Yugi's grandfather, tell him what happened."
He opened his mouth to remind Joey that he didn't take orders from anyone, but then shut it. This was not the time to argue.
"Fine," he muttered.
He took out the phone and was about to dial when Tea's voice stopped him.
"Let me do it. Yugi's grandfather doesn't like you very much, and he's going to be shocked enough without hearing this from you."
Kaiba looked at her, annoyed, and then simply handed her the phone. He waited with it outstretched until he realized that she already had her hands full. With an annoyed sigh, he lifted up a backpack from the floor, opened it, and held it out to her. Tea looked at it in confusion for a moment, before hastily dumping the puzzle pieces inside. He closed the bag and gave it to her, along with his phone. He settled back on the seat and returned his attention to the outside. They were getting close to the hospital, he could tell.
"Mr. Moto, its Tea. I think you should go to Domino Hospital."
He heard her speaking, and then she waited a bit to get the grandfather's reaction.
"Yes, something has happened to Yugi, but we don't know what. He's been hurt and I think you should be there."
A pause.
"Yes, we're on our way now. Okay, I'll see you there. Bye."
"How'd he take it?"
Tea sighed and handed him back the phone. "Not well. He's worried. He wants us to tell him what happened, but we can't do that because we don't know. I just hope everything's okay," she trailed off as her eyes started to tear up.
Kaiba took the phone from her and put it away.
"Are we there yet?" Joey asked.
This time, he did lift his head and met Kaiba's eyes. Kaiba was slightly shocked to see the utter seriousness in Joey's eyes. There was no joke, no idiotic remarks, just plain worry and unshed tears.
"Master Kaiba, we've arrived."
As soon as the words had left the driver's mouth, Tea and Joey were out of the car. Joey was yelling at the emergency crew that had just gotten into an ambulance, and they quickly got out and took Yugi from Joey, putting him on a stretcher and taking him inside the hospital. Kaiba got out of the car as well and started to follow them inside when he suddenly stopped. What was he doing? They weren't going to want him there. When Yugi's grandfather arrived, the man certainly wasn't going to want him there. So why did he have this urgent need to go inside?
**~~**
Joey ran down the crowded hall of the hospital, pushing people out of his way as he went. He ignored the dirty, and then horrified, looks people gave him, concentrating instead on the body in the stretcher ahead of him. The car ride to the hospital had seemed to last an eternity for him. He'd wanted nothing more than to scream at the driver to speed up and get them to the hospital, but he'd known that it wouldn't have done any good. Instead, he'd settled for softly reassuring Yugi that everything was going to be okay, even though Joey hadn't been sure that it was going to happen. Now that they were in the hospital, he didn't know what to do.
He saw the paramedics take Yugi into one of the emergency rooms and was going to follow them in, when a strong hand on his shoulder stopped him.
"I'm the doctor on duty, and I'm afraid you can't go in there. Young man, do you know what happened?"
Joey looked up at the kind and concerned face of the doctor, startled out of his daze.
"No, I don't know what happened. We found him already like that, but he looks pretty bad. You have to help him, Doctor. He has to get better."
"I understand, young man. We'll do our best." The doctor looked at his face, and then let his eyes travel down to Joey's chest. "My god, are you hurt?"
Joey followed the gaze and saw that his uniform was bloodied where Yugi's head had rested against his chest. He felt bile rise up in his throat at the sight of the blood, but he chocked it down.
"No, it isn't my blood," he whispered.
"Okay, why don't you have a seat in the waiting room and we'll let you know as soon as we're finished fixing up your friend?"
Joey nodded absently.
"Why don't you go and contact the boy's parents? I'm sure they'll want to know that he's here."
"We've already done that, Doctor," Tea answered. "Yugi's grandfather is on his way."
"Very well, you two stay put. We'll do everything we can."
The doctor turned around and went back into the emergency room, leaving the two teenagers standing in the middle of the suddenly overcrowded room.
Joey felt as if he were operating in slow motion. Now that they'd gotten Yugi to the hospital, he didn't know what else to do. He wanted to be in there with his friend, but knew why he couldn't be. He just hoped that they hadn't waited too long, that it wasn't too late to save Yugi.
**~~**
Yugi woke up and found himself surrounded by bland, white walls. He didn't really feel anything. As a matter of fact, he felt as if he were very light, almost as if he were floating. He heard noises behind him and turned around, only to catch his breath when he realized that he was floating a few feet above a bed.
He looked closely at the figure on the bed and realized with a start that he was looking at himself. He was beaten and bloodied, his head and face covered with blood. Several people stood around the bed, working frantically on him. He heard one of the doctors mention something about a severe head injury, and Yugi's hand immediately went up to his head, but he didn't find an injury there. He looked down at himself and saw that his uniform was crisp and clean, not a mark on it. In contrast, the uniform of the Yugi on the bed was torn, bloody and dirty.
He frowned. He didn't know what was happening. He didn't know what had happened. He willed himself to go down closer to the bed and saw himself lying there, pale and unresponsive. The heart monitor beeped softly, so he knew that he wasn't dead. But if he was out here, who was inside the body?
Yami!
That was his first thought, until he realized that the Yugi on the bed wasn't wearing the Millenium Puzzle. He looked down at himself again and saw that he wasn't wearing it either. No, it couldn't be Yami then. Where was he? Where was the puzzle?
/Yami/ he called through the mental link, fully expecting his other half to reply. Instead, Yugi found only silence. /Yami, where are you?/
The scenery suddenly changed, and Yugi found himself outside of the room, standing in the middle of a hallway. Directly in front of him, he saw Joey and Tea. Tea was softly crying, while Joey simply sat on one of the chairs, stunned. Yugi noted the blood on his clothes and wondered if he'd gotten hurt as well.
"Joey, what happened to you? Are you okay?"
Yugi frowned when no one answered him. He walked closer to his friends in an attempt to get their attention, but they didn't see him.
"Tea, do you still have the puzzle?" Yugi heard Joey ask.
"Yeah, it's in your backpack. I got all the pieces."
Pieces?
Suddenly, the scene changed again, and Yugi found himself in a dark alley.
He had been pulled inside as he walked home from school. It had caught him so by surprise that he hadn't even had time to call out to Yami for help. There had been two men, who easily outweighed him. They'd slammed him face first into the wall, and Yugi could clearly remember how the edge of the puzzle had cut into his chest, before he'd felt it shatter into pieces. He'd tried to call out for help, but a well placed fist to the stomach had quieted him.
Yugi remembered the men wanting something from him. They'd asked him something, and he could remember not knowing how to answer them. He'd told them that he didn't know, but they hadn't believed him. They'd tried beating the answer out of him, but he couldn't give them what they wanted. He'd managed to break free and run away, but they'd caught him. When they'd finally got tired of him, they'd slammed him into the floor. Yugi could still remember the overwhelming pain as his head hit the concrete.
The scene changed again, and he was standing in the corridor again, facing Joey and Tea. His hand automatically went to his head, but he didn't feel any pain. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed his grandfather running towards Joey and Tea. Yugi wanted to say something to him, but found himself being pulled away.
There was a flash of bright light, and he then found himself standing out in the open, in the middle of a field with nothing but black skies above him. He looked up and saw the endless night, full of stars so big and bright that they seemed to have been painted on the sky just for him. He took a deep breath as he examined them, feeling peace and calm for the first time in a long time.
"Welcome to the road less traveled, Yugi-boy."
Yugi whirled around and was shocked to come face to face with a smiling Maximillion Pegasus.
"Pegasus? What are you doing here? Where are we?"
Pegasus laughed as he walked to stand next to Yugi. He stretched out his hands, taking in the entire landscape.
"This, my dear boy, is a representation of your mind. It's kind of boring, if you ask me, but I don't have a say in the décor." He paused, and then gave his full attention to Yugi.
"You're currently in the hospital, fighting for your life. This is simply your way of coping with what's going on out there," Pegasus explained, comically pointing to an area out of their reach. "I'm your guide on your journey through the road less traveled."
"The road less traveled?" Yugi asked, now even more confused than before.
He'd seen his broken body on the hospital bed and knew that Pegasus spoke the truth. If this was really his mind, why did Pegasus have to be here?
"You are a slow one, aren't you little one? You see it's like this: You're being given a choice. You may live, or you may die. Before you decide, however, you must review your life and the choices you've made. You're fairly young, so I don't think it will take you too long to do that. This is the road less traveled because not many get the chance to take this journey. You are special in that regard. As a part of your mind, I know that you've done a lot for a boy your age. You have only yourself to hold accountable for your actions."
Yugi's frown deepened, and he found himself staring up at Pegasus, hoping for more clarification. When none was forthcoming, he sighed.
"Okay, since I don't seem to have a choice in the matter, what do I do?"
Pegasus chuckled and clapped his hands in delight, before pointing one manicured finger at something behind Yugi.
"Behold, your first stop."
Yugi looked to where Pegasus was pointing and found himself staring at a quickly approaching Seto Kaiba.
****
End of part two. Just what does Seto Kaiba have to say to Yugi? Stay tuned and find out.