Alternate Reality

V. S. Windheart

To my regular reviewers, if any:

I'm baaack! *everyone groans* Hey...!

I suppose you're all wondering what happened to me in the three (!) months since I finished "Trust." Well, I announced my plans and the reason why my poem didn't show up (formatting errors), but in my new...Golden Sun fic. I forgot that I am most unusual for both watching Yu-Gi-Oh and playing Golden Sun. Yeah.

So, this is my new fic. A warning though--I personally feel this is one of the crappiest things I've written for a very long time. *sweatdrop* But they say with fan art, to post even the stuff you think is junk, since somebody will like it, so I'm doing so with this story. It's nowhere near the calibre of "Trust," in my humble opinion. I started this in a fit of optimism, but then went and wrote two complete fics. When I came back, I realized how colossally bad this is. It's been a struggle ever since. I didn't want to just leave it, as I had nothing else prepared to put on ff.net and I had put many hours into what I had already written. So be prepared, and if this gloomy self-kicking hasn't put you off, enjoy the fic!

To my new reviewers:

Welcome! I'm Vyctori, your resident insane author with her equally insane muse, who I will introduce at the bottom of this. Don't judge my skills as an author by this fic, please. Read my other one, "Trust," instead, okay? Anyway, sit back and have fun with the fic...if you can...

Disclaimer: I do not own Yu-Gi-Oh. Really and truly. I am not Kazuki Takahashi. Heck, I don't even remotely look like him. But if I did own Yu-Gi-Oh, the show would revolve around Mai! Yes, that's right, Mai. ^_^

~ * * * ~

I was lost in a maze, stumbling around the twining corridors. Every time I thought I knew which way I was going, the labyrinth would shift once again, and I would be even more confused than before. But I pressed on. I knew that escaping the maze was the only chance I had to see my one true love again.

Finally, I succeeded. The light at the end almost blinded me. It blazed like a lighthouse through the cold black tunnel.

"Maximillion!"

It was her voice, her blessed voice. I sprinted towards its glorious sound. "Cecelia, my darling, I'm coming!" I could see her silhouette against the light.

Then her shadow twisted. She crumpled to the floor like a broken doll. I raced towards her, but never seemed to get closer. "Cecelia! No!"

She began to slowly dissipate.

"Noooo!"

I lurched forwards, sitting up and thrashing against the blankets.  "Cecelia!" I cried before realizing where I was. The labyrinth, the light, all of it was a dream. And I was once again without the only woman I would love.

I stared at my hands, which were twisting the sheets into a knot. A single tear dripped down upon my hands. My wife, Cecelia Pegasus, was dead. And had been for five endless years. Years of despair, of hope being crushed ever again into defeat. I had never learned to accept her death, always believing there to be a way for us to be reunited. But time after time, I had met with failure.  My only solace had been...

"Daddy?" A young voice interrupted my contemplation.

It was my daughter, Helena. She hesitantly entered my bedchamber and climbed onto my bed. "Have you been dreaming again?"

I pulled her close, regarded her blond hair and deep brown eyes with love. "Yes, sweetheart. But it's okay now."

"Bad dreams?" she pressed on. "Cause I heard you yell again. You only yell when things are bad. I had hoped things were going to be okay again."

"Things are okay right now, Flower." I used my pet name for her. She so reminded me of my other blossom… "Everything's fine. You should go back to sleep. You're a growing girl and you need your rest. Besides, how will you be able to stay up for the trip tomorrow to our new island? Wouldn't you want to explore? There are all sorts of places we can go!"

Helena bounced on the bed, excited about our vacation. "Yeah! And do we get to go flying again in the big plane?"

"That's right, sweetheart. So you better get lots of sleep or I just might leave you behind." I tweaked her button nose teasingly.

"Daddy!" She giggled. "Don't leave me behind. You can leave silly old Croquet! You don't need him!"

"No, but I need you." I hugged her again.

"Me too. Love you, Daddy." She gave me a four-year-old's sloppy kiss on my cheek and then scurried off. "G'night!" She scampered out the door.

"Good night," I called softly after her before lying back on the bed. I smiled tenderly at the thought of my Helena. I always had trouble deciding whom she looked most like. Was it my departed wife, Cecelia, with her long blond hair and huge eyes? Or was she more like me, Maximillion Pegasus, with her slenderness and the brown eyes I used to have?

I touched a finger to where my left eye had been. Instead, there now remained a chilly Egyptian artefact, the Millennium Eye. I began to think of when I had received it, but vowed not to even consider it. Instead, I thought of my wonderful daughter, and had pleasant dreams until the morning.

* * *

The next morning, as I was overseeing the servants who were taking out our luggage to the limousine, Helena zipped energetically into the room. She dragged her stuffed Kuriboh behind her. Her nurse, Laura, stood at the door; I waved her off. Although Laura did watch over Helena some of the time, I preferred to look after my beautiful daughter myself.

"Daddy, Daddy, Daddy!" she shrieked happily and leapt for me.

I caught her in my arms and swung her around high so that she screamed with laughter. Then I brought her close and kissed her cheek.

"One for Weebo, too!" She thrust her stuffed toy in my face.

I dutifully kissed her Kuriboh.  Her mother had given Helena the toy at her birth and the two were inseparable.  She had christened it "Weebo" as soon as she was able to talk because she couldn't pronounce its real name, and so Weebo it remained.

 "Hi there, Flower!" I greeted her. "What are you doing here?"

"I wanted to make sure you didn't forget anything!" Helena beamed at me. She squirmed until I let her down.

"You think you can do a better job at supervision than me?" I kidded.

"Supe...Super-what?" She tried to get her mouth around the word.

"Looking after things," I explained.

"Doing nothing," Croquet contributed from behind me. He left the room, shaking his head.

"Daddy, who's right?" She looked up at me.

I couldn't help smiling. "We both are, in a way."

"Oh, okay." For a while, she amused herself by prodding and jumping about the various baggage. Then she turned her face back up to me and queried, "Daddy, who's coming to our tournament?"

I sat down on the lush carpeting so Helena wouldn't get a crick in her neck. Then I withdrew a list from my pocket. I had placed it there that morning, knowing she would ask. My Helena is so very curious about absolutely everything.

"Let's see..." I scanned the list. "There's Yugi Motou, Rex Raptor, Mai Kujaku*, Keith Howard..."

"Bandit's coming? Oh good!" Helena clapped her hands together.

My lips twitched at Helena's nickname for my friend. The first time she had seen him with his rough appearance and bandanna, she had instantly began capering around, yodelling, "Yo ho ho!" in the very best tradition of all pirates. Keith had been Bandit to her ever since. Even I found myself calling him by her nickname, usually remembering at the last minute to address him by his real name.  Keith himself had loved her tag for him and referred to himself as "Bandit Keith" ever since.

Bringing myself back to the present, I continued my recitation. "Mako Tsunami, Weevil Underwood..."

Helena groaned. "Not Evil Underpants!"

"Now, 'Lena," I admonished, trying to not to chuckle. "Even if Weevil is a little annoying, there's no need to call him names."

"Ohhh." Helena pouted and hugged Weebo. "Anybody else?"

"Not anybody you'd have met." I folded the list and jammed it back into my pants pocket. "But I'm sure you'll make lots of nice friends once we get there."

"Excuse me, sir, but your private plane awaits." Kimo saluted me at the door.

I rose. "Well then, we had better not keep our pilot waiting, right, sweetheart? Next stop, Duellist Kingdom!"

* * *

The ride over was smooth and fairly brief. On the flight to Duellist Kingdom, Helena spent most of her time chatting energetically with the security guards. It never failed to amuse me. When I had hired most of them, they were just…security guards. They did their job and nothing more. But once I trusted them enough to let Helena near them, well, that was that. One by one they fell under her spell and now each and every one of my sentinels dote on her. They spoil her absolutely rotten—although I know for certain that I'm guilty of that same fault. Whatever she says, goes. If she wants them to build her a rocket and fly her to the moon, they'll bring out the monkey wrenches. As a result, they're all much more open and friendly. One or two of my bodyguards will even discuss their family, friends, and personal life with each other and me. It's unbelievable, and yet I wasn't surprised in the slightest when the transformation of my security guards—from objects to living, breathing people—occurred. I expected no less of my Helena.

As the jet touched down, Helena put the scraps of paper she had been tearing up into an airsick bag and skipped over to my side. I raised an eyebrow at her parcel but decided to let her tell me about it in due time.

We stepped out into the bright, warm sunlight onto a grassy meadow.  I led Helena away so that the pilot could take off again.

"Where are we staying, Daddy?" she inquired as I showed her through a nearby forest.

"You'll see..." I answered mysteriously, and winked--although now it's kind of hard to tell when I do so, I can't seem to break the habit.

When we exited the woods, I pointed up to a castle on a hill. Stone steps curved their way up to the fortress. The castle looked as thought it came straight out of a fairy tale and was hewn of the same brown stone as the surrounding rise. All that was missing were flags flying on the turrets, something I resolved to fix as soon as possible.

"Oooh!  Daddy, is that where we're living?" Helena squealed in delight.

"That's right. I built a castle just for my little princess." I smiled fondly down at her.

"Yahoo!" she shrieked and tore off for the castle, Weebo bouncing along behind her.

"Slow down, sweetheart! You're leaving your old father in the dust!" I laughed and ran to catch up. "I'm going to catch you!"

Helena screamed in glee and scooted as fast as her short legs could manage. I pretended that I was just too slow to grab her until we reached the stairs, where I caught her from behind and whirled her upon my shoulders. Then I mounted the long flight of stairs, Helena yanking on my long hair to keep her balance.

We spent the rest of the day settling in. I spent half my time exploring the castle with Helena--who loved our new home to pieces--and the rest of the time proofreading the final revisions to the new rules for our competition and working on my opening speech. I would have greatly preferred to spend the time with Helena, but these things have to be done.

Eventually, after a hard day's work, both Helena and I headed to our beds.  Helena, worn out by her big day, dropped off to sleep immediately. I have to admit, however, that I was awake for a long time, worrying about this little detail and that small thing that needed to be done. Eventually, though, I fell into the land of dreams.

~ * * * ~

* I have chosen to use Mai's Japanese name as I feel that her English name trivializes a very admirable character.

Menardi: Enough blabbing! Introduce me!

Vyctori: *sighs* This is my muse, Menardi of Prox from Golden Sun. She arrived at the first of my second ff.net fic, "Blaze," and even though I had a chance to get rid of her, I didn't. And now I'm really regretting it. Anyway, you can find a link to a picture of her on my bio page, if you want to know what she looks like. Menardi's basically Mai, only she can use a huge blood-red scythe...

Menardi: *holds up scythe with a wicked glint in her red eyes*

Vyctori: *eyes scythe nervously* ...and she's excellent at fire-based magic. She regularly sets me on fire to get me to update, because she's in a bad mood, or just for the heck of it, plain and simple.

Menardi: ^_^ I also hold the job of review enforcer. Each update, I threaten you, dear readers, with an untimely ending if you don't review this poorly written fic.

Vyctori: # Menardi! It's one thing for me to say that, but something completely different if you're so negative!

Menardi: *snickers* Anyway, the death threat this week is...hmm...I can't really threaten them with an orange-soda'd Saturos or an anime-d up Picard, can I? They wouldn't know what I'm talking about. How about this: I give you my best Searing Beam attack, all right? *smiles sweetly*

Vyctori: That's one of the most powerful fire attacks in Golden Sun! Review, or you're seriously doomed! Don't be smug, thinking she can't get you through your computer, because believe me, she can! I've seen the results, and they're not pretty!