Yu-Gi-Oh!
Balance

CHAPTER TWELVE – GRYFFINDOR VERSUS RAVENCLAW

Yugi tossed and turned in his four-poster bed, having difficulty sleeping and knowing that his mere wakefulness was keeping his other half up as well. He could hear Yami Yugi shifting a bit restlessly in his Soul Room, before the pharaoh appeared in the bed next to him. He turned slightly and looked up at the concerned look on his darker half's face.

"Koibito, what's wrong?" Yami Yugi asked, resting a hand on his shoulder.

Yugi smiled up at him sweetly. "Lots of things, Panseru-kun," he admitted. "I'm worried about Mokuba, and I miss hanging around with Seto. I'm worried about the match tomorrow too."

Yami Yugi frowned slightly. Everyone's nerves where stretched thin lately. Ron and Hermione had more or less stopped looking at each other, and Harry and the others tried to keep the peace between them, but they could only do so much. Marik was sore at Ron as well, for embarrassing his girlfriend in front of the whole common room like he had. Add to that everyone's nervousness over the upcoming match against Ravenclaw, and it was easy to understand why everyone was so pent up with tension.

"Why don't you see if Seto's sent you anything?" he suggested. "Maybe that'll help ease your nerves a bit."

Yugi smiled brightly, before reaching under the bed, where he kept the laptop Seto had let him borrow. Yami Yugi sighed mentally at his hikari's sweet look. Of course, if he had things his way, his hikari would not have been so depressed. He refused to do that though, not unless his hikari asked it of him.

Yugi pulled the laptop onto his lap, flipping it open and logging onto his account. As he waited patiently for the computer to finish loading, he spotted something… odd. It was an icon on the desktop, one he had not seen before. Curious, he waited for the computer to finish loading before he double clicked on the strange icon.

"Aibou…?" Yami Yugi began, curious as to what he was doing.

He smiled at his other half briefly, before turning back to the screen. A window had opened up on the screen, showing something he was not expecting. It was of a bedroom, definitely a boy's room, with toys and other such things littering the floor. There as the sound of happy giggling coming from behind the curtains of the bed, before someone fell out, holding a little puppy and getting a lick bath.

Yugi and Yami Yugi's eyes nearly bugged out of their heads. There was no mistaking that messy mop of aqua colored hair and white suit.

"Noah!" the two of the exclaimed; quietly, so as not to wake anyone else up.

Still giggling, Noah looked up at them, slightly surprised. He nudged the puppy off of him, before standing up and straightening out his suit. His mouth started moving, but no sound was coming out. The digitalized boy frowned, before indicating that Yugi should turn the volume on. Embarrassed, Yugi did so, turning up the volume just enough so that the two of them in the real world could hear.

"Ohayo, Type-A Yugi! Ohayo, Type-B Yugi!" Noah exclaimed pleasantly. "What are you doing with otouto's laptop?"

Yami Yugi snickered at Seto being referred to as someone's little brother. Yugi elbowed him before answering, "Mokuba-kun's sick. Seto-kun went back to Domino City to take care of him. What are you doing on here?"

Noah giggled. "Seto-kun found what little of me remained in the core of Kaiba Corporation's central computer. He downloaded me on here, and reconstructed my personality and my world," he explained, before ducking down into a playful bow. "May I present Noah Version Three Point O!" he introduced playfully, giggling as he came back up again.

Yugi and Yami Yugi could do nothing but stare, blinking in disbelief. "But…" Yugi began, finding his voice first. "Why are you on my account?"

Noah scrunched his face up in thought. "Well, I suppose it's because I'm a universal program on here," he explained. "Otouto did that so it would save room on this laptop. You can only put so much hard drive on these things without it being too heavy."

"But… didn't you want your own body?" Yami Yugi asked.

Noah just smiled brightly. "Maybe someday," he said. "I know that I am still human, and right now, that's enough for me." He looked off to the side suddenly. "Ah! It looks like you've got mail. I'll go now. See you later!"

With that, the window into Noah's work disappeared, having closed itself, just as the little jingle that told him he had mail played. Yugi did not open it right away, he just stared at the screen where Noah had been, the surprise and confusion he felt mixed on his face. After a moment, Yami Yugi blew out a frustrated sigh, flopping back on the bed.

"What is it that Jonouchi-kun says?" he asked. "That was a nine point nine on the 'Weird Shit 'O Meter'?"

Yugi poked him in the leg for swearing, before turning back to the laptop. "I guess that just goes to show how much Seto-kun has changed since coming here."

-.oOOo.-

Harry went down to breakfast the morning of the match with an honor guard for his Firebolt. It was not his idea to do that, of course, but Marik and Draco and the rest of the team insisted. This shameless display was not meant to intimidate the Ravenclaw team – though if it did, that would be wonderful – but to see how the Slytherin team would react. Their reactions to the superior broom were priceless too; they all gazed at the broom, thunderstruck.

Draco let out a laugh of triumph. "Did you see the look on Ecillia's face?" he whispered in Harry's ear. "I told you she'd turn green!"

Indeed, Draco's cousin was glaring at them with a look that combined jealousy and hatred all in one. Harry was not so sure it would be a good idea to get her riled up like that. She was on a taunting spree, between getting Hagrid in trouble, what she did to Bakura's hair, Gryffindor loosing, Harry falling off his broom, and Harry's Nimbus getting smashed to bits. Who knew what she would do when she was really mad?

They all sat down for breakfast, with Bakura sneaking over from the Hufflepuff table to be with his friends. It was an effort to try to enjoy themselves, with so much riding on a single match, but they managed just nicely. The only trouble they had was when Ecillia came over to their table with Crabbe and Goyle in tow as always, much to Draco's displeasure. She did not pay him any heed, however, as she was too focused on the Firebolt and Harry.

"Think you can handle that thing, Pothead?" she sneered.

"I'll manage," Harry responded flippantly, taking a bite out of a biscuit and promptly ignoring her. Ecillia would not let him get away with that, however.

"Maybe they should install a parachute on it, incase you get too close to a dementor," she replied.

Crabbe and Goyle snickered.

"Maybe you should install an extra arm on yours, so it can catch the Snitch for you," Harry returned coolly, looking pointedly to her "injured" arm, which was still in a sling even after all this time.

The surrounding students laughed. Ecillia just fumed silently, before stalking back to the Slytherin table. Draco looked over his shoulder to see that her and the rest of the Slytherin team had put their heads together, probably asking her if Harry's broom was really a Firebolt… or discussing a way to sabotage the game. He turned back to his meal, assigning himself a covert operation: watch Ecillia.

When the team got up to go to the locker room, Draco immediately went to Wood and told him his suspicions. Wood got that "deep thinking" look on his face, tapping his foot on the floor.

"Well, it's not like we're playing against Slytherin, so the likelihood of one of the others getting pummeled is next to none…" he muttered. "All right, trail Ecillia, but if it looks like she's not going to do anything major, come back right away, okay?"

Draco nodded emphatically, before following the rest of the team out onto the grounds. He split off from them just as they reached the Gryffindor locker room and hid in the bushes, keeping the entrance to the castle in sight. Time passed, and he started getting impatient – he never was one for waiting for something to happen. One would have thought that Ecillia would have come out from school by now! He heard the starting whistle go off inside the stadium and started to stand. Maybe she really was not going to do anything…

He ducked back down almost immediately. Ecillia, Crabbe, Goyle, and the Slytherin team captain, Marcus Flint, had just emerged from the double doors of the school. The two bodyguards had some kind of black bundles slung over their shoulders. They headed for the stadium and went around to one of the main spectators entrances. Draco followed as closely as he dared, sticking to any kind of shrubbery where he could, or distancing himself enough away so they would not see him if they turned around. Not that they did; they were too caught up in their plot to take much notice in anyone trailing them.

The four of them stopped at the entrance closest to the gate to the school, and Crabbe and Goyle dropped their bundles.

"Careful with those, you idiots!" Flint snapped as Draco pressed himself flat against the ground amongst a crowd of small bushes. He peered around the branches of one bush to see what they had dropped… and nearly laughed out loud.

Dementor costumes!

They could not be serious? Even they had to be smart enough to know that Harry was not afraid of dementors themselves, but the repressed memories that they forced him to view. What dolts!

Draco waited until the four of them were too preoccupied with putting on the overly large costumes before sneaking away from them; he was not going to miss this show. Once he was out of sight, he broke out into a run, barreling into the Gryffindor locker room, throwing on his scarlet and gold robes and grabbing his broom before racing out to the reservists spot. Marik gave him a strange look as he approached, gasping for breath.

"Where the hell have you been?" he asked. "You've missed half the game!"

"But not half the show," Draco replied, a secret smile on his face. Marik just raised an eyebrow, not really understanding what he meant, and getting the feeling he did not want to either.

The two of them cast their eyes to the sky as a loud groan of disappointment came from the stands. Apparently, and Ravenclaw beater had hit a bludger toward Harry, making him loose sight of the Snitch. Fred or George – they could not tell which – hit a bludger toward the beater in retaliation, making the person spin in mid air to avoid it.

"Gryffindor leads eighty points to zero," the commentator, Lee Jordan, announced, before going into a long vocal fondling of the Firebolt. McGonagall yelled him at for that, getting a smile out of Draco. It was always enjoyable during a match with those two.

Harry started accelerating suddenly, only to have to swerve away to avoid colliding with the Ravenclaw Seeker, a girl by the name of Cho Chang.

"Harry! This is no time to be a gentleman!" Wood roared from the goal posts. "Knock her off her broom if you have to!"

Draco shifted on his feet, getting anxious. Sure, Harry played fair, but if you were stupid enough to get in front of him when he saw the Snitch, he was not going to stop for you. This was a fact he had found out the hard way one day during practice. So, why the heck did he stop? Just because Cho was a girl… well, that was no excuse!

Harry dived suddenly toward the ground. Cho, thinking he had seen the Snitch, followed suit; only to get quite a surprise when he suddenly shot up into the air toward where the Snitch really was. He was so close… only a little farther…

Someone screamed. Marik groaned.

"Not again!" he exclaimed.

Draco looked down to see that the "dementors" had finally showed up. He snickered in a sort of sadistic excitement, which got a confused look out of Marik.

"You feeling okay?" he asked, before pausing a moment. "And why didn't it get cold?"

"You'll see."

Up above, Harry was not fazed by the appearance of the dementors either. Reaching into his robes, he pulled out his wand and waved it.

"Expecto patronum!"

Something silvery and white shot out of his wand, but he did not stick around to see what it looked like. He had a Snitch to catch! Reaching out with the hand still clutching his wand, he felt it wrap about the Golden Snitch…

Madam Hooch's whistle sounded, and before Harry knew it, he was surrounded by the rest of the team, all of them hugging or pounding him on the back. Somehow, they all managed to get back down to the ground, where the Gryffindor supporters – led by Draco and Marik – poured out onto the field. Surrounded by such reveling, Harry almost did not see Professor Lupin come up behind him and congratulate him on his patronus.

"Professor, it was amazing!" he exclaimed. "The dementors didn't affect me at all!"

Draco sniggered. "That's 'cause they weren't dementors."

Harry blinked, confused, as Draco grabbed him by the arm and led him to where the dementors were, only, like he had said, they were not dementors. Ecillia, Crabbe, Goyle, and Flint were struggling to untangle themselves from the costumes they had donned. Apparently, Ecillia had been standing on Goyle's shoulders, because she was trying to kick his head away from her. Both McGonagall and Snape were hovering over the four of them, furious and disappointed looks on their respective faces.

"An underhanded trick!" McGonagall exclaimed, pulling Ecillia up by her ear. "Fifty points from Slytherin and detentions for each of you!"

Snape pulled Flint up to his feet by his arm. "And I expect essays from each of you," he snarled, seeming more disappointed that the prank failed. "Two rolls on what the dementors abilities are and how they affect humans!"

Ron, Yugi, Bakura, and Marik joined up with Harry and Draco as the four Slytherins were led away. They were nearly doubled up with laughter as Ecillia said something that only made McGonagall twist her ear a little harder.

"Hey, Harry!" George called over the crowd. "Party! Gryffindor common room! Now!"

"Yeah!" Harry called back, feeling better than he had in a long time.

-.oOOo.-

The party for the Gryffindor team that night was so exuberant, that it was almost as if they had already won the Quidditch Cup. The Weasley twins had "disappeared" for a while, only to return with butterbeer, pumpkin fizz, and bags full of Honeydukes candy. Despite the fact that the origin of the candy was questionable (to everyone but Harry and his group of friends), it only added to the excitement.

As George started tossing peppermint frogs out into the crowd, Marik went over to where Hermione was curled up in a chair away from everyone else, an inhumanly large book in her lap. He frowned, before tossing her a pumpkin pasty.

"Did you even come to the match?" he asked.

"Of course I did!" she replied shrilly. "I'm very glad we won, but I have to finish reading this by Monday!"

"Come on, Hermi-chan, give it a rest," Marik encouraged. "We're all having fun here, you should too."

Hermione sighed, calming down a bit as she opened up her pumpkin pasty. "I know, Marik, and I would love to, but I still have over four hundred pages to go through. Besides," she added, nodding in Ron's direction, "he doesn't want me around."

Of course, to exemplify the point, Ron chose at that moment to say aloud, "It's a shame Scabbers had just been eaten. He could have had some of these fudge flies. He really used to love them…"

Before Marik could do or say anything, Hermione burst into tears and ran up the stairs to the girl's dormitory. Frowning, the Egyptian went over to where Ron was standing, giving him a cold look.

"Knock it off," he ordered.

"No," Ron replied flatly. "If she just acted like she was sorry – but she'll never admit she's wrong, Hermione. She's still acting like Scabbers has gone on vacation or something."

It took all the restraint available in the world to prevent Marik from hitting him.

The party continued on well into the night, and only ended when Professor McGonagall turned up in her dressing gown and hair net to chase them to bed. Not that she needed to work too hard, showing up like that. Everyone climbed up the stairs to their respective dormitories, many of them still discussing the match. When they finally reached their dorm, Yugi and Yami Yugi exhaustedly collapsed into their bed and drew the curtains closed with barely a muttered "G'night", getting looks from some of the other boys and a snicker from Seamus. Marik just rolled his eyes before falling into his own bed, managing to draw the curtains closed before drifting off to sleep…

The Egyptian's favorite dream filled his vision almost instantly. He was on his motorcycle, ripping though the deserts of his home country, kicking up piles of sand as he passed. His helmet was off, allowing the wind to fly through his whitish blonde hair, twining grains of the ever-present sand into it.

Something was different, though. Normally, there were not any people in this dream, but as Marik squinted ahead, he could have sworn he saw someone or something… Truthfully, all he had seen was a glint of gold, but that usually meant someone was around, right? He revved the engine, turning slightly to head in the direction of the glint.

As he got closer, he saw that the glint did indeed belong to a "someone"; a man to be exact, and even though Marik was still a ways off, he could tell the man was wearing priests robes. He slowed as he got closer, and in the end stopped his bike right before the man.

The man was definitely from the past, there was no question about that. He was fairly tall, but not much taller than Marik himself was. His white headdress was secured to his head by a priest's crown topped with a strange circular design. He stood tall and proud, but there was a bit of a sad gentleness in his chiseled face. None of this really caught Marik's attention, though. What really caught his attention was what was hanging around the man's neck.

The Millennium Ring!

Marik looked up at the man. Could he be…?

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGHHHHHH! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"

Marik awoke with a jolt, surprised and a little annoyed by the sudden scream that had interrupted his dream. He tore open his curtains, just in time to see a dark figure rush out of the room, slamming the door behind.

General commotions where going around. The bulging from Harry's bed curtains indicated he was having trouble getting them open. Yugi and Yami Yugi poked their heads out from behind their curtains, looking like some two-headed animal in the near darkness. Seamus and Neville had fallen out of their respective beds, and the former was looking around, asking what was going on. There was no movement from Draco's bed; how could he have slept through that? Harry finally managed to get his curtains open as Dean Thomas lit his bed lamp.

Ron, however, was sitting up in bed, a look of horror on his pale face. The hangings on his bed were torn on one side.

"Ron, what's the big idea?" Harry asked tiredly.

"Black!" Ron shouted hysterically. "Sirius Black! Knife!"

"What!" Dean exclaimed.

"Here! Just now! Slashed curtain! Woke me up!"

"You sure you weren't dreaming?" Yami Yugi asked.

Ron managed to calm down enough to yell a full sentence. "Do the curtains look like I was dreaming!"

Everyone scrambled out of bed, sprinting for the door and back down to the common room. Doors opened behind them, and sleepy heads poked out from behind them, asking what was going on. They were ignored for the most part, unless they joined the third year boys in the dash back to the common room. Unfortunately, other than the usual and the debris from the party, the common room was deserted.

"Are you sure you weren't dreaming, Ron-kun?" Yugi asked around a yawn.

"I'm telling you, I saw him!"

At this point, some of the girls came down from their dorm, pulling on dressing gowns. Percy also appeared, pinning on his Head Boy badge to his pajamas.

"Everyone back upstairs!" he ordered. "McGonagall said no more for tonight."

"Perce!" Ron exclaimed, running to his brother. "Sirius Black! In our dormitory! With a knife! Woke me up!"

The common room got very quiet.

"Nonsense!" Percy stated, looking a bit rattled. "You had too much candy, Ron. You had a nightmare."

"I'm telling you – !"

"Now really, enough's enough!"

Professor McGonagall was back. She slammed the portrait closed behind her as she entered the common room, more than a little peeved that the students of her house were still up.

"I am delighted that Gryffindor won the match, but this is getting ridiculous!" she exclaimed. "Percy, I expected better of you!"

"I didn't authorize this, Professor!" Percy exclaimed, rattled that she would suggest such a thing. "My brother just had a nightmare –"

"IT WASN'T A NIGHTMARE!" Ron wailed. "PROFESSOR, I WOKE UP, AND SIRIUS BLACK WAS STANDING OVER ME WITH A KNIFE!"

Professor McGonagall just stared. "Don't be ridiculous, Weasley, how could he have gotten in?"

"Well, someone was in here that shouldn't be," Marik spoke up. "I saw someone bolt out of the dormitory just after Ron-kun screamed."

"See!" Ron exclaimed. "Ask Cadogan! Ask him if he saw…!"

Glaring at him with a suffocating amount of suspicion, McGonagall ducked back out of the portrait hole to talk to Sir Cadogan. Inside the common room, the students waited with bated breath, hoping against hope that the two of them were only dreaming…

"Sir Cadogan," McGonagall began, "did you just let a man enter Gryffindor Tower?"

"Certainly, good lady!" the knight proclaimed.

Stunned silence filled both inside and outside the common room. Yugi looked like he was going to faint; his bed was right next to Ron's.

"You… you did!" McGonagall exclaimed. "But… but the password!"

"He had 'em!" Sir Cadogan replied proudly. "Had the whole week's written on a piece of paper, my lady!"

After a long pause, Professor McGonagall pulled herself back through the portrait hole. Her face was white with quiet disbelief and rage. She gazed at the crowd of silent students.

"Which person," she began, her voice shaking slightly. "Which abysmally foolish person wrote down the week's passwords and left them lying around!"

There was utter silence, except for a small squeak of fear coming from Neville Longbottom.