Disclaimer: I do not own Yugioh. Only this story.
To all things on Earth. Inner strength is the most Beautiful of all. Beauty can be found in all forms of life, in the heart. Don't dismiss people by their covers without looking into them, for you might have missed a lonely beautiful soul.
Christmas Special: Beautiful
"Yugi, I need some help over here."
Grandpa's voice came out muffled from behind the Christmas tree. Yugi hopped over, nearly tripping over a box of ornaments.
It was the month of celebrating, and like every other household, the Mutous were decorating the house. Yugi helped put up the Christmas baubles. Then he spent even longer trying to reach up to put the star at the top of the tree.
"Eeek!" Grandpa rushed into the room to find Yugi toppled into one of the boxes lying around. Grandpa laughed and shook his head, and helped Yugi stand up.
Yugi sat in his room, leaning against the window, his breath misting the glass. He observed the white world beyond the window, thinking back at what had happened the last summer. Anyone who passed by the window at the time would have seen a sad, lonely teen sitting by himself.
Yugi breathed onto the glass, misting it over. A thin hand reached from under the leather jacket, tracing out a single word. He stared at the writing for a while, then went back to looking at the laughing children outside. The children were playing blissfully in the snow. It reminded him of all the happy times he had spent with his friends.
Yugi sighed, then collapsed on his bed. He lay there for what seemed like hours to him when Grandpa knocked on the door.
"Yugi? It's time for dinner." Grandpa poked his head into the bare room.
"Be right there."
Grandpa forced a smile. His grandson hadn't been his cheerful self ever since that fateful summer. But he couldn't blame him...
Grandpa caught sight of the word drawn onto the condensation on the window, and shook his head sadly. He closed the door and went downstairs.
Written on the window was Atemu.
That night, Yugi was looking out of the window again. The white snow that had looked so pure was now purple. The writing had also long faded. He thought about spending the Christmas alone with Grandpa. His friends had disappeared, they never called, never contacted him. They were having their own fun in their own world, Yugi thought bitterly.
Yugi spotted a shooting star in the far horizon of stars. He closed his eyes and silently prayed for a miracle.
"I wish, that Atemu would come back to celebrate this Christmas with us, with me. Just this once. Just this once..."
A breeze of warm wind from nowhere sent Yugi to sleep by the window.
Unknown to him, a passing angel had heard his wish to see his other half again. Overcome by pity when she saw Yugi, she granted his wish. She gently kissed his forehead and left.
Yugi celebrated with Grandpa on Christmas day. He considered calling the others over, but thought better of it. They had better things to do anyway, things they could do without him.
Putting on his scarf and mittens, Yugi stepped into the frosty world. He had wanted to take a walk. He passed by children and couples. He passed by snowmen and snowball fights.
It was getting very cold by now, so Yugi decided to head back. He had barely walked through a street when a snowball hit him squarely in the small of his back. Yugi spun around to laughter. It was the old gang.
"That was a good one, Joey!" Tristan yelled.
"Fifty points to me! And a hundred points to the one that hits his face!"
Realising where it was going, Yugi hid his face in the scarf, covered his head and ran.
"He looks like a midget that's worn too many layers of clothing!" Tea shrieked in the background. The others laughed.
Yugi stopped once he was out of the threesome's reach of snowballs. After he finally regained his breath, he straightened up and took in his surroundings. He was in a different part of Domino. He registered the fact that he was lost, and frantically began the search for the way home.
There wasn't anyone on the streets, they had all probably gone home to celebrate. That wasn't good news to Yugi, because it was getting dark, and Yugi was seriously getting the chills. He didn't want to get frostbite on Christmas on a street he had never been to.
The wind picked up and Yugi tried desperately to find someone to ask directions from. He went and knocked on a door, then the next, but no one seemed to have heard him. Yugi bit his lip. Then snow started falling.
Oh, great. Just great. There's a snowstorm coming.
Yugi found himself stuck deeply into the snow. He couldn't move. All around him was a blur of white and rushing wind.
Pray that I get through this alive. Then again, if I died, only Grandpa would have cared. And I could see Atemu again...Yugi shook his head furiously, he shouldn't be thinking like that.
Yugi was about to pass out when he saw a glimmer of hope: A figure was standing very close to him, and was looking right at him. Yugi hadn't noticed him before. He tried to move towards the figure, but his legs were numb, and the figure caught him just before he fell.
He looked at the cloaked stranger. His robe was fluttering in the wind. The stranger felt slightly familiar.
Under Yugi's sad and innocent gaze, the stranger lowered his hood. A voice well-known to Yugi spoke out: "Merry Christmas, aibou."
The snow fell endlessly, building mountains of white fluff. The wind howled, but still a teenage boy stood outside, unaware of the brewing storm. He was speechless, not with cold, but with shock. Shock that someone he knew, someone that had left for the afterlife, had come back, and was presently right in front of him.
Yugi's mind went blank. There was no doubt about it, he was looking at his alter ego, his other self. Yugi decided that either he was dreaming, he was already dead, or both.
Atemu seemed to have read his mind, as he spoke softly, "That doesn't matter now. What matters is that I'm here."
Yugi bit his lip, and punished it really hard. Is Atemu real? What if this was all a lie, a trick? But Yugi wanted to believe Atemu was really there with him, whether he was in spirit form or not. If it was a dream, then he didn't want to wake up so soon.
The blur white of snow around them suddenly disappeared, and Yugi found himself standing on solid ground. He was in his own room! Atemu laughed at the expression on Yugi's face, then nodded towards the desk. Yugi leaned forwards.
He was looking at a younger version of himself fixing the Millennium Puzzle. He watched as the Puzzle was fixed piece by piece. Yugi stared at the sixteen year old, his eyes the size of dinner plates. Atemu tried not to puncture Yugi's excitement with his laughter.
The last piece was fixed in its right place and they were blinded by bright light. This time Yugi saw himself in Duelist Kingdom, in the middle of a duel with Pegasus. Yugi stood transfixed as memory after memory of himself, his alter ego and his friends were relieved in front of him. Atemu was reminding him.
At the last memory, Yugi watched Atemu enter the doors to his proper retirement of life. The real Atemu put an arm around his hikari. He paused, as though savouring the moment together, then whispered in his ear, "Let me go."
Yugi was pulled out of his reverie and stared at Atemu, his eyes shining with hope, and at the same time with fear. He was afraid.
"Let me go, aibou." Atemu repeated.
Yugi's big amethyst eyes flickered for a moment, as though pleading with him. But Atemu was strong and remained his ground. His face remained impassive and solemn as he stared into the young one's face.
The last memory faded away from sight, and in a flash Yugi was knee-deep into the snow again, the wind howling louder than ever. But Yugi couldn't hear it, he could only hear Atemu's answer.
"Little one, you belong here. Live your life. You still have your friends, you still have Grandpa, you have your own life to live -"
"I don't have friends anymore," Yugi said, his voice full of remorse.
"Don't have friends? What about Joey? And Tea?" Atemu frowned, worry written on his face.
"They have their own fun. They don't care about me anymore, in fact I think they weren't friends with me in the first place, they were friends with you."
Atemu took awhile to recover from his shock. "You can make new friends. Stop moping around and make an effort. I'm sure there'll be someone who notices you and will appreciate you for who you are."
"But - I don't want to. I'm afraid I'll forget you completely." Yugi breathed hard, it was extremely cold, he didn't think he could survive through the storm.
"I didn't ask you to forget me. I want you to remember me. It's just that if you keep on dwelling on the past, you won't live the present, or see the future. I'm still alive, I'm alive in your heart as a memory," Atemu tried again. But nothing seemed to break Yugi.
"I know you can't stay long..." Yugi started. He was right, the snowstorm was clearing up, Atemu had to leave soon.
"...And I can't take you with me all the time." Atemu nodded slowly.
"So...I'm begging you...take me with you."
Atemu blinked. He couldn't believe Yugi had just said that.
"You know I can't do that."
"Yes you can, and I'm coming with you," Yugi insisted.
"But..." Atemu's mouth grew thin as he thought of a way to reject Yugi without hurting him. "You shouldn't give up on life that easily."
"I don't want to continue fighting anymore, I'm tired of this. I want to stay with you." Yugi persisted.
"You haven't graduated from high school yet and you're tired of living. How life makes a fool of us all sometimes."
But Yugi still wouldn't change his mind. He refused to.
Atemu felt guilty, guilty because a part of him wanted Yugi to be with him, but the other part of his spirit form knew that it was wrong. How can he explain it to Yugi? Atemu held Yugi to him closely.
The snow was really starting to thin, and Atemu was getting desperate for answers to Yugi's questions. Then a figure materialised before them.
It was the angel who had granted Yugi's wish before.
She had a sweet and serene smile on her face, and her aura itself seemed to be glowing with energy, of hope and peace. Atemu lowered his eyes to Yugi, doubt resurfacing in his mind.
The angel smiled again and bowed her head. Then she faded into a wisp of smoke. Behind Yugi, Atemu did the same.
Yugi felt lost. He fell over as a blast of cold wintry air whipped his face. In fact, he could barely feel anymore. He felt his breath catch within him in the freezing snow. The wind beckoned, and called his name, and the small boy murmured a silent prayer before he collapsed, knocked out, from the cold.
The cold morning sun rose to greet the world before it. The air was filled with the chattering of youths, the chirping of birds, the calls of merry making. The unbroken, innocent smiles of children shone, oblivious to the fact that a mile away, a little home, a little room was filled with the shadows of emptiness.
Then a woman screamed. Silence spread through the street, as people hurried over. Time slowed, colors broke and music stopped. But a mile away, in that little house, an old man was preparing breakfast, the smells wafting through to the empty room above.
It was a beautiful morning. Beautiful.
Beautiful were the cries of laughter that echoed down the streets.
Beautiful were the faces that woke up to greet the new day, to greet the glorious sun.
Beautiful were the tears that were shed that fateful morning.
And he heard it: A mile away, barely a whisper to the ear, he heard it. Prayers. Some prayers are never heard, never answered, but he heard it. But he swept it away, not knowing what it meant, nor hearing what it said. He was busy. Too busy to listen to murmurs from an angel.
And so Beautiful was the boy that lay in the snow, cold from exhaustion from the howling winds of the night before.
Beautiful.
Epilogue: You can say that Yugi was imagining things. He just wanted something more of his life. He might have been argueing with himself. One part of him wanted to let go but the other wanted to just cut the line. Atemu was the part of him who wanted to live on. Or maybe Atemu was a source of comfort to Yugi, before Yugi passed out. Maybe there wasn't even an angel.
It was really cold, because it was a snowstorm. Maybe he was already dead. Or he was hallucinating. He might have been reminding himself of happy times he had had. I don't know either. It's up to you. Merry Christmas, everyone.
JY: OMG I actually cried writing this. I took very long to finish this, and I kept on retyping it. If you didn't understand it, message me.
Yay for the suckage. I love it though. Review please!