Fragilis Pondera (Fragile Balance)

Part III: Gemstones


Amethyst : Yugi

I still remember the world,
From the eyes of a child.

I remember a lot of things that I don't always show.

I've forgotten things I probably shouldn't have.

I've blocked things out that could both help and harm me.

And I've let things through that will never, ever go away.

I've lived with Grandpa since I was 7. I moved in with him during the summer. We packed up my stuff from my house -- I didn't have very much that I could take with me -- and moved across town to the Turtle Game Shop. I remember… he didn't say a lot. 'My' room was neat when I got it. Kind of flat-looking… sparse. A guest room with a little more heart than normal, but still a guest room up until then.

Grandpa was going to be my family.

A year previous to that, he had given me a golden box filled gleaming, oddly shaped pieces. I asked him what it was.

"It's a puzzle, from Egypt. I want you to have it, Yugi."

For me ? "Thanks, Grandpa ! I'm going to solve it right now !"

Gentle laughter. "It may not be so easy, I heard no one's solved it since it was created !"

"I'll figure it out !"

I was very confident. So very impulsive.

… It took me 8 years.

Confidence turned into tenacious persistence after a while, but I could always find another couple of minutes when I should have been running for school (so as not to be late) to turn the intricate pieces over and over in my hands, trying to figure them out.

… I could never figure out why the pieces always felt warm.

Slowly those feelings
Were clouded by what I know now.

School was… school was tolerable.

I loved learning. That was no secret. Puzzles, of any variety, fascinated me. I did math problems for the challenge of logic they presented. Strategic games were mesmerizing. And yet, I didn't think of myself as competitive. Quite the opposite, actually, to be competitive, don't you need opponents ? I shied away from people, from the oppression they presented.

It was a validated fear !

And I kept stubbornly trying to fit random, gold-gleaming pieces together. Eight years…

I always assumed -- knew, somehow -- that I would eventually solve the puzzle. The Puzzle, rather. But to actually do it… to find myself suddenly in an unfamiliar bedroom full of toys.

I could still hear voices.

"Let's play a game, Ushio."

"Game start."

"Ace of Spades… I win."

"I knew you wouldn't be able to obey the rules…"

"Who are you ?"

"Who are you ?"

"Thank you… for protecting me…"

Where has my heart gone ?
An uneven trade for the real world.

So am I the innocent everyone believes I am ?

I… suppose, I am.

Sometimes, it's so hard to be the 'good' side. The hikari. Why is being innocent so much harder than being corrupt ? It's one of those never-answered questions. What makes a person, a soul, corrupt ? Evil ? What's to say I'm not evil ? I don't feel evil… but there are times I don't feel innocent or naïve, either.

I wonder if Yami would know ?

I want to go back to believing in everything,
And knowing nothing at all.

I've seen darkness.

Seen the way it consumes, the way it washes over a soul with no room left for anything else, eclipses everything else, washes away doubt and makes everything clear like obsidian crystal. That's darkness. Clarity and purpose and comfort.

Innocence doesn't come with much of a purpose. But I'm the innocent one, the pure one, the good one. The one who balances things out.

It's tempting. The darkness, I mean. You wouldn't believe how tempting. Sometimes I feel like I could switch sides and no one would notice. I'm not sure if it'd be a subtle shift but I bet I could do it and have no one know. Yami might know, though. I wonder what he would think of that, of his Little Aibou becoming dark like him ? Would he become Light ? Or would we just become two darknesses, whirling around each other ?

I wonder what brought all this to light.

Pun intended.

I still remember the sun,
Always warm on my back.

So many times, when I wasn't strong enough, or fast enough, or smart enough… you see, I have a replacement, someone who steps in during those times when I just don't measure up. The better version of me. When the little one isn't enough.

How come the darkness is always stronger than the light ? Even twilight is more shadow than sun.

Maybe I'm tired of all of that. Tired of being set aside when the important things need to be done, like I'm only good enough for the simple and the mundane.

Somehow it seems colder now.

Where's that uncrossable line ? I stand on it's edge all the time and look over, and it's like a cliff or a bottomless pit, all shadows and tempting and glorious. And I throw rocks down into it's depths and listen to the echoes until they fade and wonder if I threw myself over that same edge, what kind of echoes I would make.

And the funniest thing, is that everybody else has no idea.

They look at me and see nothing amiss, nothing wrong. They laugh and joke around and play games and tell jokes and do everything that I do, and all the time I'm wondering what I'm doing, how things would be different, if only…

Well, who can blame them, really ?

After all… darkness doesn't call to them the way it does to me. Maybe because I'm a hikari, I feel it more. My separate, precious darkness is cut off from me. If we're meant to balance each other… what balance is there within ourselves ?

Where has my heart gone ?
Trapped in the eyes of a stranger.

But…

But then there are those times when Yami looks at me like I'm the only thing keeping him sane, because he's darkness too, that same darkness that I always find so alluring, and he pretends that he can handle it all on his own, but I know he needs me. And I kind of like that feeling, almost powerful, of being in charge, and the tables are turned because suddenly I'm the stronger one and if I was dark, I wouldn't get that…

And Yami would have no one to turn to, to fight back his darkness, because he wants to do it himself but he can't, because he's a part of it and he needs me to help him and at the same time, he blames himself for exposing me to the very thing that I find so fascinating.

What a contradiction.

Some days, that's all I am, is a contradiction !

I want to go back
To believing in everything.

//Aibou ? You're very quiet.

/Just thinking, Yami./

//Is everything all right ?//

/Yep./

//Very well, aibou. You know I'm always here if you need to talk.

/I know, Yami./

See ? I can't even tell him… heh, what a conversation that would be.

No, this secret's all mine. Mine, and it will stay that way.

I'm the innocent one, remember.

"Field of Innocence" – Evanescence