Shadows That Bleed

by YamiYugiPuzzleshipper

Pure-Bloods are said to be myths, not even well-known within stories. "A specialized genetic coding of the moon and the dire," their spoken lore proclaims. They are creatures beyond the power of mortality, gifted by the gods themselves. Known as the Eternal Ones, their existence once extinguished, resurrection foretells a powerful omen.

60. Challenges

Disclaimer: I do not own Yugioh

Update schedule: UNKNOWN; GOING ON A NECESSARY TEMPORARY HIATUS

Chapter Warnings: Mentions of Mental Instability, Mentions of Death, Mentions of Starvation, Reference to Past Character Death, SLIGHT Homophobia, MILD Bloodshed

Okay, so, Honda is slightly homophobic in this story. It's not to the point that he'd abandon Yugi or get upset with him about it or anything like that. He's just nervous about the subject. And he's got extremely limited understanding towards it, which makes him even more nervous when he thinks about the idea of another guy liking him. But I can't picture him as a character that would freak out and say something derogatory about it or anything like that instead of becoming just slightly nervous about it and perhaps more likely to ignore it (pointedly) if he were ever to see it face to face.

Also, there is a brief mention of Yugi's sexuality. He's not actually bi. He's not even homo or hetero either. He's actually pan in this story. Or as close a representation of pan as I can give seeing as I'm not pan *shrugs* But he's more what I imagine pansexuals are like from my research, which is they are willing to love whoever it is more for their personality than their gender or anything superficial like that. He's actually the milder archetype of the wolves' sexuality as a whole, by the way. They're attracted to whoever they want, no matter the gender or looks or possibility of reproduction. I just wanted to say that because it explains a little more why he started falling for Yami when he was clearly head over heels for Anzu before him (cause I'm not entirely sure I portrayed that as well as I could have? But eh live and learn).

Ploy: I can't answer that without ruining a huge part of the story lmfao But I will say it probably won't be a happy ordeal. Yami is a flight risk, what more can I say? Yugi is a worrywart when it comes to Yami, although now he definitely has more of a reason to be one. Thank you~! I'm glad you think so!

Chapter LX: Challenges

Work Log Entry LIII: September, 2005

September 15

His strange behavior has continued.

Atem has begun to simply wait for the door to open and for the guards to move for him.

Then he will lead them to the room he is required to go.

He has not used his voice in over two months.

All of us are confused and concerned about the way he is responding at the moment.

The boss has suggested that perhaps he is simply broken in spirit.

But whenever I see him when he is alone with me for blood tests, he seems more cunning than worried. His stare is intense and powerful and he often simply sits and waits for me to perform the tests requested of him. I do not believe for even a second that we have broken him.

His eyes are dull, yes, but there is always something in his aura which suggests otherwise.

It is more that he is biding his time.

But I do not know what he plans to do when he finally stops.

Yugi was exhausted when Yami finally showed up again. It was almost midnight when the red-eyed teen appeared in his window. He slipped into the room as if he had never been unhealthy in the first place, a fluid action that Yugi watched with wide eyes. He looked almost as graceful as he had when he'd been stronger and at an ideal weight. He was not nearly as fast now as he was then, but Yugi could see the way the red-eyed teen was watching more where he stepped than anything else in the room. His sneakers were soaked, the bottoms capped with a huge cushion of ice elongated at both sides, inches beyond the width of the rubber there. He shivered and licked his lips as Yami slipped his sneakers off and leaned out the window to dust it away with his fingers.

"You don't have to do that," Yugi said quietly, watching his face for a single moment before reaching up and running a hand through his hair when Yami glanced at him in something akin surprise. Had he really not expected him to wait up? "I mean, we can just put them in the tub instead if you want? It'll do better to drain properly and then the air vent is right above it so we can turn up the air and it might help dry them sooner…"

The other teen blinked bright red eyes, surprised by the consideration, and then he shook his head slightly and tilted his head in surprise. "I suppose that might be a good idea," he finally commented. His voice was still scratchy, but now it seemed incredibly strained, abused and raw and inflamed rather than merely exhausted. He frowned and swallowed hard, watching the other boy closely for a moment or two longer. Then he lowered his eyes and grabbed the other shoe in his hand. "I'll go ahead and put them in the tub then."

It was a somewhat dismissive action as Yugi considered the other boy again. And he could sense the way Yami seemed almost bashful for a split second, as if he were distressed rather than relaxed any longer. He wondered if his own state of panic had caused this reaction. But then he found himself feeling sick to his stomach as another thought occurred to him.

Had he left the house when his mom had begun to fight with him?

How much had he heard?

Had he heard something like when she had mentioned his crush on him?

Had that been what had caused him to run so quickly and without warning?

Yugi hesitated for a moment, swallowing hard and ducking his head to look towards the floor uncomfortably when the other wolf returned to the room. The taller teen was almost silent in his movements but for the softest brush of the carpet beneath his feet as the fibers collapsed under his weight and sprang forth again. Yugi shivered and swallowed hard, trying his hardest not to think anymore on such a subject. He reached up to run his hands through his hair and then down to the nape of his neck to scratch gently at the soft skin.

"Are you okay?"

Yugi blinked and raised his head, flushed for a brief moment as Yami stared back at him with darkened eyes. The taller teen was considerate and curious, red gaze growing the smallest bit concerned as well. Then the small teen rubbed the back of his head again, feeling more flushed than ever as he kicked his legs with a lick of his lips. "Yeah, I'm fine. I guess I'm just a little…surprised right now…" he said with a small shrug. He offered him an awkward smile and licked his lips again. "I guess I thought maybe you might have gotten hurt or something while you were out and about like that?"

Yami looked away, something flashing in his darkened eyes. He looked abruptly pained or perhaps laden with enough guilt that it was making his breath tight. "I know I said I would not leave the house but I got hungry and I did not want to have to bother you for food," he admitted, reaching down first to scratch at the inside of his left wrist and then to run his fingers through his hair. He frowned and chewed the inside of his cheek, the muscles bunching and dancing beneath his skin with a strength that belied his thinner frame. "And it did not seem safe to grab food when your grandfather was still in the living room. I did not want to risk exposure if he did turn around and see me. So I thought it best to simply try to hunt instead."

Yugi nodded slightly and his shoulders sagged as he looked at him. He looked so thin and worn out, as if he might collapse at any moment. He had the urge to go to his side, to help him back to the bed. Instead he grimaced, swallowing hard and resisting the urge to knot a handful of his shirt in his fingers. "You look tired. Did the Change do that to you?"

The other wolf blinked in surprise before shaking his head slowly. "I did not change. I did not have to. Slifer found me when I was about to and offered me a rabbit instead. She said that I had business with Obelisk and that it would be best for me to eat before I went to see him. And so I went about doing that. She spent some more time with me and caught a couple of other things for me. And then Obelisk came to find me. He said that you had just asked Jonouchi to relay a message to him. And then we went for a walk."

The smaller teen tilted his head in silent prompting, searching his face. There was no blood left on his skin anywhere. His face was completely cleaned of it all. He wondered if he had wiped it away on a handful of snow or if he had used his hoodie sleeves. He did not know, but he realized that he could smell no hint of blood on the other lycanthrope either. And he wondered at the thought, but shrugged it off entirely as he looked at him more closely.

"Obelisk wished to speak to me about my rank within the pack."

Yugi nearly cursed out loud, flustered by the very concept. He hadn't wanted the deity to say anything about it, as he'd planned to have a conversation about it first. He felt dizzy thinking that the other might have taken it upon himself to do such a thing as that. Then he forced it away, frowning and swallowing hard and feeling almost sick again as he shook his head slightly. Yami was studying him, no doubt wondering at the expression he wore on his face now.

"He told me that he would rather me take my rank back as soon as possible. He said that it was always destined that I be your beta rather than him or Slifer, though they were both willing to do so again should anything else happen."

Yugi snorted somewhere between cynical and extremely relieved. Yami was standing in front of him. And he was okay… "Yeah, let's not give them a reason for that to happen, okay?"

Yami smirked at him, but it seemed tired and its teasing edge was lost beneath the weight of his weariness. "Right. Anyways, so he asked me to take my place as beta again. He wanted to know if I had any issues with doing so. When I agreed with him that I did not have an issue, he said that the announcement would be something that you would have to make at some point."

The smaller teen nodded, grimacing slightly. "Right…"

"He said that I would likely have some issues healing myself later, as I already knew was going to happen. He caught a couple of rabbits for me like Slifer had and then he said that he wanted me to know that the pack has basically tripled in size. He mentioned that you have neglected to truly meet the other wolves within the second and third packs to join." He tilted his head. "I am under the impression that you then learned the names and appearances of the other wolves from the original pack then?"

"Yeah, I did. I think I could try again to learn their names and everything better, but for the moment I've got it well enough to figure it out just enough," he answered with a small shrug and shake of his head. "I mean, I think I can name all of them if they're in front of me, but as far as their scents go, I don't remember them at all for the most part. And I'm pretty much at a loss as far as everything else goes."

Yami nodded. "That is understandable. I suppose now we can both take the chance to identify the other two packs. I've heard that one is American and the other is from Sapporo?"

"Yeah, and then this new one is European."

The wolf nodded again, frowning faintly now. "Three packs," he muttered, nodding slightly once more. "Right, but I suppose I have four rather than those mere three, hmm? I do not imagine that it will be too easy a task to take care of."

"Four? But I thought that you had known the pack members from the original one, right?" Yugi said awkwardly, swallowing hard and feeling sick for a moment. He frowned and tilted his head. "I mean, I figured that maybe you would have known them…?"

"The wolves of the original pack? I did not wish to meet them. Their mannerisms made me sick. So I was never willing to meet them in a proper manner. Names were swapped. But I did not care long enough to do more than that."

Yugi nodded. So it was similar to his own treatment towards them then…

"Obelisk mentioned that you'd attacked Marik because he spoke ill of me?"

The smaller teen blinked, eyes widening, and then tilted his head and considered the other boy for a long moment. Yami seemed more amused than anything else, but there was something unreadable further in the darker red around his pupils. Yugi swallowed hard, looking away again quickly and reaching up to rub at the back of his neck nervously. "He said that you deserved to die and I got pissed." He awkwardly swallowed again and fought the urge to grab at and knot his shirt again. Then he tilted his head, narrowed his eyes slightly, and slowly rocked back and forth on his heels. "I lost my temper on him and just flipped out. And then I told him and all of the other wolves in the pack that if anyone were ever to speak badly of you that I would beat them into submission."

Yami nodded slowly, considering him for a moment before smirking and shaking his head slightly. "It's rather surprising to hear such a thing," he admitted softly before raising a brow at him when he glanced over from his peripheral. "It hardly seems like something I would expect to hear about you of all people. I guess I had assumed that your pacifistic nature would not have allowed you to have such a reaction."

Yugi blinked and scanned his face for a long handful of minutes before lowering his eyes and looking at the carpet again. He ruffled the nape of his neck and pursed his lips with a shake of his head. "I didn't want anyone to believe any of what he was saying about you. It was disgusting and I hated him for it."

The red-eyed wolf considered him with a tilt of his head and narrowed eyes. "You hated him for it?"

"I was extremely unhappy and hateful, yes. He infuriated me because of the way he was saying things like that. And I was so upset that you were hurt and I didn't know where you were so I…I just lost my temper and outright attacked him." The small teen shrugged after a few long moments, grimacing and looking away with a small flicker of his eyes. Yami looked so incredibly surprised and bewildered that it made his lungs feel tight in his chest. "And then I told all of them that if they were stupid enough to say anything about you that I would kill them just like I might with Marik."

"That's still surprising to me," the other boy commented with a raised brow. "You are so pacifistic and the idea that you might have done this is incredibly strange to me. Did you never worry that they might have challenged you for such a thing?"

Yugi tilted his head and swallowed hard as he pulled his fingers through his hair and licked his lips. "No," he admitted quietly. "But if they had, I probably would have tried to kill them at that point. It was just enough to make them all freak out instead. I guess I just assumed that they would take me at my word and hide away from opening their mouths about you again."

"And that worked?"

"Aside from Mai occasionally mentioning you to explain my attitude to some of the other wolves, yeah," the small teen stated simply with a shake of his head. He frowned and ran his fingers through his hair again, searching his face for a moment before closing his eyes. "My attitude was pretty foul when you weren't there."

"Obelisk said something to that effect, yes."

Yugi shrugged slightly and narrowed his eyes. He wished Obelisk wouldn't have said anything about it, truthfully. "Yeah, it wasn't a very good thing. I don't think I've ever been so angry with and violent towards anyone else before. And I was ready to attack and kill all of them if they had been brave enough to open their mouth." He shook his head. "I was planning to kill any of them that spoke about you like that again. I was honestly just going to do it regardless of any reason that they brought you up again, Yami."

"You truly think that you might have killed them?"

"Oh, I know I would have done it. Marik threw me over the edge with my hatred and I knew if any of them had been stupid enough to press on it anymore than he had, I would have torn their throat out." He paused and shrugged, shaking his head and crossing his arms. "It hurt too much to let them just open their mouths and say whatever they wanted. It was ridiculous to let them do that when I knew you well enough to object to all of the things that they had to say."

The wolf narrowed his eyes and tilted his head slightly. "You have changed."

Yugi let out a deep breath, staring at him pointedly. His voice came out slightly sharp as he licked his lips and raised his chin the smallest degree. "Did you think that I wouldn't?" he asked softly, frowning at him with darkened eyes. Yami stared at him unblinkingly, their eyes locked as he scrutinized him. The usual sense of challenge did not well up in the smaller teen, though he continued in the same somewhat frustrated tone. "Did you honestly think that I never would have changed? You left for a while and I had to deal with the aftermath of what had happened. I was distraught and so I forced myself to adapt and work with what I had in order to recover and keep my head on straight long enough to deal with it all."

The red-eyed teen blinked, tilting his head and narrowing his eyes faintly. "I never said that it was a bad thing, nor did I mean to allude to it. I mean merely that it is a surprise." He was quiet for a moment, then lowered his voice further, nearly exhaling the words as they stared at one another. "I am not sure whether it is a good thing or a bad one. And I suppose my opinion on the matter of it does not truly matter. The fact remains that I am simply curious as to the fact that you had changed and adapted like this."

"I…I'm sorry." He grimaced and lowered his eyes to the ground as he ran a hand through his hair. "I didn't mean to snap at you or anything. I just…I'm not very proud of all of it. And I'm not the happiest with the result. It makes me feel like I'm estranged to myself at times. And I don't like to think of things like that. I feel like I'm completely different sometimes and it's upsetting."

"Growth and change can do that at times." Yami was silent for a long moment. Then he moved to take a seat on the bed beside him, narrowing his eyes and putting his elbows on his knees. He leaned forward and grimaced, shaking his head slightly. "It's a strange cycle of destruction at times. My cage mate had done me well to ground much of my change, to prevent me growing into something I would have regretted later. He kept me from turning in on myself and reverting to a more feral state than I could ever hope to recover from."

"A feral state?"

"Yes. I wavered between life and death more often than I care to admit. And I was pressured to do more than I was capable of. Between my own personal disappointment and the various stresses which were pushed upon me, I had become rather violent and disdainful. My cage mate was put in the metal and glass cubicle about a month or two before we were able to run." He narrowed his eyes and shook his head sharply, gaze darkening further. He leaned forward again, chin in his palms and cheeks oddly cold against his fingertips. "The experiments were scrambling my brain to the point of being incapable of thinking properly more often than not. I attacked several of the guards and they were killed soon after, because my erratic health scared them to the point of destroying any who could have been infected by me. I was considered violent and unnaturally vicious and so they kept constant tabs on me."

"So then…why would they put him in there with you?"

Yami looked over at him slowly, red eyes glazed. "Because they thought I would kill him."

The small teen stiffened, blinking as he stood a little taller and moved to take a seat on the bed as well. His mouth was dry and his stomach was curling as he stared back at the other with wide eyes. "They thought…?" Yugi drew in a deep breath, searching his face and wondering at the idea. Yami was by far gentler in nature, even if he was vicious and rather hateful at times. He killed by necessity, could draw the line between threats and a petty desire for bloodshed.

It was amazing to him that they would have ever considered that Yami would be the one to kill another wolf like that. Even if he was erratic and feral then or within the woods… Yugi shook his head. Yami had perceived himself and everything around him as a threat. He knew that. And he'd launched himself at anything that breathed or moved. He'd killed Obelisk that day out of fear and hunger rather than the fun of doing such a thing.

Yugi had the smallest impulse now, to reach out and maybe touch his face. He wanted, for only the tiniest fraction of a heartbeat, to perhaps run his fingers along his cheek and draw him into his arms. There was something inside of him that almost demanded he do it, but he forced it away. Yami would hide away from him again if he did that.

"He had apparently killed someone upon being captured. And he was incredibly erratic in his behavior. They were worried that he would be uncontrollable. And they thought that if I killed him, I would eat him since I was starving prior. So they threw him into the cage with me." Yami fell silent for a moment, grimacing and turning away again. He peered out the window, thinking that perhaps he should rise to his feet and try to close the window and flip the locks shut. The impulse to do so was almost enough to make him feel sick. "So, when they put the two of us in there together, they monitored for hours on end. They wanted to see if I would kill him. And they were frantic to see the bloodshed."

"You didn't kill him though."

Yami shook his head slowly. "No, oddly enough, his presence there and his weakened state made something else in me react to him. I guess I was struck with the social need that all lycanthropes and natural born wolves possess." He shrugged slowly, not bothering to look over. "So I wound up drawing the poison out of his blood when he was still writhing on the floor. And he bit me in a panic. I guess he reacted to my blood or something of that nature. Because he recovered a few hours later, with just a series of seizures and a terrible fever."

"He…reacted to your blood…?"

"I am not as powerful as you, I am sure, but my blood must be almost as pure as yours. And, I suppose, my blood slowed some of the effects of the poison in his system. The wolfsbane and silver was sweated out and puked up and when he bled, it always seemed like it came in clumps instead of natural liquid and beading. So I…believe that maybe it helped him. I don't know for sure. But I get the feeling that his exposure to my blood when he was laying there almost dying in front of me did well to isolate the poison and heal him." Yami shrugged after a small moment, shaking his head and reaching up to run his fingers through his hair reluctantly. "I think that he healed due to this and the fact that I checked on him as often as I could around experiments. I was… I honestly expected that one day they might drag him out when I was unconscious and kill him. I was prepared for it, I suppose. And I was constantly horrified by the idea. But I tried to just keep him happy in the time that he was still alive there."

Yugi swallowed hard and lowered his eyes. "You must have cared for him a lot."

Yami blinked. "More than anything at the time, yes," he admitted with a cold gleam to his eyes. "I cared more for him than I ever had anyone else, I admit."

The small teen nodded slightly and swallowed hard again, frowning and searching his face after a moment. He licked his lips and leaned back on his arms uncomfortably, tilting his head after a few seconds. "Did they ever take him from you after he healed? I mean, when it became obvious to them that you would not kill him, did they ever…?"

The other boy shook his head slowly. "I do not think that they had accounted for the fact that he might heal me as well. My emotional state leveled out. My colder temperament began to melt away. He was able to get me to speak again, to open up at times when I did not want to. They saw it as a sense of therapy, I suppose. They watched the two of us more than ever, and Ryou would constantly check on us. He seemed to have the idea that something was happening between us that was never acted upon." Yami glanced at him sideways now, curious as he considered his face. "He seemed to believe in something that I did not care to consider."

Yugi felt his heart race for a moment, mouth drying further than ever as his eyes widened drastically and his tongue seemed to become soaked with bright red blood. It was harsh and metallic but the sense of relief which crashed through him made his entire body almost tremble with shock.

"It came to the fact later that they believed that perhaps he would trigger the lycanthropy in me again and cause me to react as they wanted." He fell silent for a moment, then shook his head and bore his teeth as he looked at the smaller teen pointedly. His gums were speckled with white, the stress apparent but his emotional state more or less stabilized on the brink of overwhelming anxiety. "And perhaps it would have happened otherwise. But then the escape happened. Someone sent out an alarm and the wolves began to attack the humans. And he managed to help me escape before he got killed as well. I fled and hid away. And then I changed due to the full moon and did not once change back until I ran across you."

Yugi blinked. "Me?"

"I came across your friend and you alone in that alley. And I ripped his throat out when he was trying to stop you from bleeding out. At the time I thought he was trying to finish his work in killing you. So I attacked him. And I tore his throat out. And then I realized that you were still alive. I could just barely hear your heart and the gurgling every time you breathed." Yami narrowed his eyes into slits, tilting his head and considering his own words. He saw a light tan-blond wolf with wide brown eyes and a face slicked with blood. He saw the way the canine was pressing his paws, bright red and slicked entirely down to the flesh, into his chest. He saw the frantic way he stared down at him with those terrified eyes. And then he remembered the pure terror that had crossed his eyes when he had turned to Yami. "And I almost left you there."

The smaller teen startled at the statement, eyes widening drastically. He had almost…?

"But, as I was looking at you and you struggled to breathe, I realized that you were not dead yet. And, despite my hatred for humans because of the experiments, I saw this little spark in you. I saw this…this tiny little light in you that I realized had the potential to grow. And I realized that you were not unlike the wolf I'd saved beforehand in the labs." Yami stared at him now, eyes blank of expression but somehow hollow and shallow and carved away of any emotion or sense of passion to have once existed there. He looked as if he were staring into something he could not fathom, an abyss with no end which swallowed him whole and scared him more than he cared to consider. "I looked at you and I thought of what you could become. And I realized what could be lost if you were to die there. So I bit you."

Yugi blinked, swallowing hard and staring back at him with wide eyes.

"And I wandered away when I got you home. I dragged you there but when you began to wake up, I panicked. I didn't want to see your reaction when you realized that I'd murdered your friend. So I turned and ran before you could see me. And then you went inside and I didn't bother to try to find you again. But I hunted Ushio down. And I crushed his skull because I was hateful and I found him as a human and I wanted nothing more than to destroy him. So I bit through his head and crushed the bones and pressed upon his brain and ruptured the organ. And then I left him there on your doorstep, because I had no idea if you knew how to find food properly or if you were starving. I did not know enough to make a judgment. So I left him there."

The small teen nodded slightly, feeling sick to his stomach. He remembered the state that Ushio had been, the way his face had been so heavily mutilated and his body broken in such a terrible way. He shivered and licked his lips as the other stared back at him with those same dull brick-like red eyes.

"I did not change into a human again until the time that I realized the full moon was coming again. I knew that you would have to change soon. And I knew that you had never been a wolf before so I…I changed back. But after I'd done so, after stealing clothes from a human of similar size to me, I ran across you in the woods that day. You found me first." Yami shrugged, uncomfortable as he shook his head and opened and closed his mouth with a disdainful expression. "You found me a few hours after I initially changed. And then I fled because I couldn't find it in myself to speak to you. But I…I watched you, sitting up in a tree and keeping guard to make sure that you were okay. I was worried that maybe something had happened prematurely to make you change ahead of time. I didn't know if that was possible, but I had never been very stable genetically so I thought that I would keep watch just in case."

"What would you have done if it had been triggered prematurely or something like that?"

Yami shook his head. "I don't know. Maybe I would have bitten you again or I would have tried to help you through it. I didn't truly think it through more than being curious. And I didn't want to think about it more than necessary. It made me too uneasy to remain if I thought about it for longer than…" He shrugged again, letting out a deep breath. "It does not matter what I would have done then. What matters is the fact that you were okay at the end of the day. And when I went back to follow you to the festival, I realized that my voice was too damaged to be able to speak to you so I changed back. But then I'd forgotten what my own voice sounded like and I didn't know how to speak as a wolf any longer. So I projected images when you were in the midst of the Change."

"Right," Yugi said softly, licking his lips. "I remember that."

"I suppose it does not matter much," Yami answered with another small shrug and shake of his head. He looked exhausted again now. His hands rose to tug lightly upon his hair as he narrowed his gaze. His red eyes were blank again, staring at the carpet as he tilted his head slightly and his lips curled back briefly. "It is not something that you truly need to worry about."

Yugi blinked and swallowed hard, eyes widening before he let out a small breath and reached up to run a hand through his hair once more. "Are you disappointed in me?" he asked after a long moment, scratching at his wrist until it felt the skin might break and the blood would soak into his fingers.

"Disappointed…in…you…?"

He wondered at the pause in his words. Because, when he looked over again, Yami had not done more than blink. But now his eyes had shifted and they were locked on his face again, studying and cold and distant like mountain peaks. His lids were lowered the smallest fraction, so minute in detail that Yugi was amazed he noticed it in the first place.

"That I changed…l-like this?"

Yami blinked and shifted to sit up straighter. But the effort seemed to exhaust him, so he simply slumped back into his position, narrowing his eyes and closing them again moments later. He tilted his head and kept his chin within his palms. "No," he answered slowly. "I am not disappointed in you."

Yugi swallowed hard, the truth of the words making his heart almost race with desperation. He wished there was a way to link them into something more powerful, more passionate. But with the dull tone and the way he stared back at him so blankly, the wolf felt sick to his stomach for a moment. He licked his lips again, reaching up to run his fingers through his hair once more.

"I am not disappointed in you," Yami repeated himself, pausing for only a moment longer. Then he narrowed his eyes into slits and closed them a second later, his head tipping slowly and minutely to the side. "I am rather proud of you, as you're doing as I had initially thought you would. You're growing up. You're trying for your potential. I do not believe for an instant that you've reached it entirely, but you're going to one day realize it, I know."

Yugi blinked, startled by the words. His mouth opened and closed twice before he swallowed hard and his mouth grew dry once more. "You think so?"

"I would never have said so had I felt uncertainty towards it," he stated simply. But his expression had grown somewhat darker and Yugi had the startling thought that perhaps his questioning him had been enough to upset the taller teen. "I would not say such a thing if I considered it to be anything less than truthful."

The small teen shivered, swallowing hard.

Yami moved to sit up again after a long minute. He rose to his feet, stretched his arms in front of himself, dusted his jeans off as if it might get rid of the water which weighed them down, and turned to him with a more considerate expression than he had previously worn. "I will tell you something that most people do not wish to say as they cannot always understand."

Yugi blinked, sitting up a little taller, eyes widening at the very suggestion.

The other wolf was silent for a moment before he considered him more pointedly. "Change is necessary, Yugi. You cannot survive in a world that constantly adapts around you if you are not willing to match it step for step," he said slowly. But then he narrowed his eyes and his lips pulled back into a grimace as he shook his head. "Anyone will tell you that. But what they will not say is that oftentimes, as you do this, you find that you cannot always recognize yourself by the end of it. Sometimes you change so much that you cannot feel comfortable in your own skin. And it makes you think you are no longer who you used to be."

The small teen blinked again, heart in his throat at the words.

"But you need to remember that, while it may feel like this, the truth of it is that you remain the same at your very core. You have not changed so much as to be unrecognizable when it is all said and done."

Yugi tilted his head, watching him for a moment. "You sound…almost bitter."

Yami flashed him a smile that looked almost as if he were in too much pain to truly want to answer him. But then he snorted and turned away, voice low and cold as he muttered, "I do not like the person I am."

The words made Yugi's heart freeze in his chest.

---

Yugi passed the plate over to the other teen. Yami blinked and raised his head, confused for a split second before he lowered his eyes to the pancakes once more. He took the plate hesitantly, then reached for the fork that he offered him seconds later. The two of them glanced at each other for only a moment as the smaller teen drew in a deep breath and looked away again. He remembered briefly the way that the small teen had considered the wolf's declaration from the night before.

He did not like the person he was.

He did not like the person he had been before.

He did not like himself now.

He grimaced and narrowed his eyes, shaking his head slightly and working to grab another plate to flip a new pancake atop it. "I have to ask you something," he announced after a moment, drawing in another deep breath which made his stomach knot and his mouth ache.

"What is it?"

He noticed that Yami had not taken even a small bite of his food when he glanced over his shoulder. The other teen was not looking at him either, however. His eyes were on the tablecloth and his expression seemed colder and displaced more than anything else. Yugi drew in a deep breath once more, reaching up to tug lightly on his choker, swallowing hard and searching the other's expression.

"I don't want to have to ask you to do this."

Yami slowly raised his head and eyes, peering at him blankly with a darkened gaze. "But you need to."

"Yes."

They were quiet for the longest minute of his life, Yugi swore. He tugged harder at the choker and Yami's eyes fell upon his fingers, narrowing briefly before flickering up to his again. The way he looked at him now told Yugi that he had noticed his indiscreet actions, that he understood them and did not like it in the slightest.

"I want to know if you could possibly go back to the camp for a few days," he said slowly. His fingers twisted and knotted the fabric within reach, but the grip was not enough to make his breath falter and snap beneath the pressure. "I'm not going to be able to go back there until the end of next week, on Saturday. And I…I can't protect you here as well as the pack might be able to at the camp. I know that if my mom and grandpa find out that you're here before I can figure out a way to tell them, things are going to basically explode. And I don't want that to happen. I'd rather you were safe with the others and you had enough food when they caught something…"

Yami blinked and stared up at him, considering him for a long moment. "I can do that, yes," he said slowly. "It is not a terrible idea. They can catch more food than you might be able to provide me at times. And I am aware that I can regain more health there than I could here. You are correct in that assessment. But this is a good idea for the rest of the pack as well, I'm sure."

Yugi bit the inside of his cheek. He didn't care that much about the damn pack. He cared about the wolf in front of him. The rest of them, he could not find the need to feel concern for them in any manner. He shook and tilted his head after a long moment, eyes narrowing as he looked at the other teen.

The red-eyed teen peered at him curiously for a long moment. His gaze had sharpened briefly, his expression mild and cold, before he looked back at his plate of food and poked at it halfheartedly with the utensil in his hand. "The wolves will do well to have an active beta again. I suppose it will do me well to make my stance as second-in-command. They have grown restless. I suppose they sense the change in the air, that you have drifted from your original role, if only slightly."

"You think that they need you there?" Yugi murmured in a low voice, swallowing hard. "You really think that the pack needs you there? I mean, you don't worry that Obelisk is going to fight you for the rank? I mean, from what you said last night, I highly doubt it. But I'm still kind of worried about it. I mean, you did break his neck and… Just… Are you sure you'll be all right if you go there? That they won't hurt you in any way?"

Yami shook his head, narrowing his red eyes. "No," he said slowly. "I do not think for even a moment that they will fight with me. Not when Obelisk steps down. I am sure there will be challenges down the road, but not for now. And I don't believe that they will be stupid enough to try until much later. Not only that, but I have the feeling that the pack is divided enough with the fact that there are four of them amongst themselves now. I am not worried at all that this will happen."

"You think that everything will be okay then?"

"Yes." The wolf poked at his pancakes again. "I think I can recover faster there as well."

Yugi nodded, heart clenching in his chest and his throat almost closing up beneath the weight of the pressure that threatened to swallow him there. He licked his lips and narrowed his eyes, lowering his gaze to the ground for a split second. Then he turned quickly away again to pour another pancake into the skillet and worry at it with the spatula in his hand.

"I need to cut the potential challenges in half now," Yami said abruptly, eyes sharpening as he looked towards Yugi again. But the small teen was still working on his pancakes rather than willing to turn and glance over his shoulder at him at the moment. The taller boy narrowed his eyes and shook his head with a small grimace. "If they wish to fight me for rank later, I might be able to dissuade them from doing so now. It is not something that I care to have happen. It is not a good thing to allow them time to think of ways to do so. It would be a foolish idea for me to ignore the possibility of a fight."

Yugi stiffened and flipped his pancake, the sizzling noise making him tilt his head and draw in a deep breath. "You don't think you'll get hurt if you fight them now?" he asked slowly. "I mean, if you had to actually fight them over your rank…"

"Rank battles are not to the death. Most often they can be ended the moment you knock the other off their feet. And I do not believe any of the wolves in the pack are as malicious as Marik was before. I do not think that they will fight me in any manner that might cause true damage."

The small teen put the pancake on his plate and looked over at the metal bowl with a dry mouth and his stomach curled painfully. "I don't want you to get hurt."

"I don't even think that any of us will draw blood."

Yugi shivered. "And if you do? What if you get hurt?"

"Then I will deal with it as is necessary. But I do not think that it will come to that."

"But what if?" he pressed in a tightened, more infuriated tone. "I want to know what would happen if you get hurt."

Yami was quiet for a long minute. The truth of the matter was that weakness during a battle for rank was dangerous. It was more dangerous than he truly wanted to admit. If the wolves sensed weakness from one of the combatants and chose to take advantage, any one of them could challenge him in an instant. They might come in a rush. They might hold off in a singular unit of battle to hide potential weakness from the other wolves as well. He had no idea what might happen. Obelisk or Slifer might intervene if he was lucky and it came to that. Perhaps even Jonouchi might come to his aid. He did not know.

But he had the sharp clarity to understand that the wolves would not kill.

Rank battles would not be something that they would kill each other over.

It was territory that caused wolves to rip the throat out of another.

It was war that would cause them to murder one another.

He shook the thought off.

"If I am to be wounded, I will have Jonouchi contact you," he answered in a quiet exhale. He looked back at his plate and poked at the pancake on top of the pile again. Then he swallowed hard, lowering his eyes, and began to cut small bites away from the breakfast pastries. But his stomach was curling and churning and he did not know that he could truly eat it at the moment. "I will have him tell you what has happened."

Yugi was quiet again. "What about healing yourself?"

"It would take longer than I would like, but it will happen all the same."

That wasn't what he wanted to hear in the slightest. His mouth curled downward, his stomach churning harshly once more. He narrowed his eyes and shook his head after a moment. Then he bore his teeth around placing another pancake down once more. "If it becomes too bad, you'll need to come here so that I can clean the wounds and everything necessary," he said softly, frowning and narrowing his eyes. "I want you to come back and I can clean and bandage them and then you and Jonouchi can…leave again if you want."

Yami nodded. "Yes, and I will come to you should anything else happen as well." He paused. "You are worrying for no reason."

"I don't want you to get hurt."

He sighed. "I do not want to get hurt either."

Yugi swallowed hard and looked down at the carpet for a moment, his stomach in knots and mouth too dry as his tongue was glued to the roof of his mouth. "Just…be careful, okay?" he finally muttered. "I know you're not really making progress right now here eating like this and I haven't quite gotten everything under control again, but…I just don't want to find that I've finally gotten you back into my life just to have you disappear from my life all over again, you know?"

The wolf was quiet for a moment. "I understand, yes. And I swear to you that I will not allow any harm to come to myself or any of the others." He narrowed his eyes again, shaking his head slightly. "I will protect myself."

Yugi nodded and licked his lips. "Good."

Yami stayed silent for a long minute or two before shaking his head slightly and frowning. He tilted his head and put his elbow on the table, laying his chin in his palm and closing his eyes. "When would you like me to go to the camp?" he asked after a moment, opening his eyes again. He put a forkful of pancake into his mouth and began to chew thoughtfully as he considered the smaller teen slowly. The other boy blinked and turned his head, considering the wolf curiously for a moment as the words connected in his head. Then Yugi's eyes grew wide, startled, and he turned around completely with a shocked expression.

"When would I like you to…?" He narrowed his eyes. "I'd really rather you didn't have to altogether."

"I know, but what time would be best?"

Never, Yugi wanted to snap before he shook his head again and huffed with his eyes closed tightly. "If you really plan to go to the camp, I think you should…go as soon as possible, I guess. I mean, there's no reason for you to wait unnecessarily, right?"

Yami was silent for a moment, then began to swallow a few more bites of his food. He tilted his head and looked towards the other wolf slowly with a frown, considering. Yugi was staring at him blankly, eyes wide and lips twitching faintly with what looked to be frustration. He licked his lips and shook his head as the smaller teen lowered his eyes to the tile flooring and reached up to rub at the back of his head.

"I suppose you are right," he said quietly. "I will go in a couple of hours then."

Yugi nodded, swallowing hard and running a hand through his hair again.

---

Is he still okay?

Yugi narrowed his eyes and paced, shaking his head as he looked back at the homework he'd ditched to lay on the mattress. Yami had left the day before and he'd been texting Jonouchi since, asking him first to tell him when he got to the camp, then to record who it was that challenged him. Then he demanded to know if he was concerned in any way, hurt or tired or too exhausted to stay powerful as necessary.

He's fine so far. Not much has changed. He's still just munching on the rabbit that Obelisk got him.

Yugi relaxed at the idea, nodding and feeling his cheeks heat faintly as he ran a hand through his hair. Jonouchi had said that the gray deity had come to give him a rabbit a few minutes before, that Yami had accepted it and taken a spot near the center of the camp to eat. Other wolves were watching him. Others were hiding away from his sight altogether. Some of them looked extremely nervous and confused. Others were bristling with alarm, unsure of what to say or do with him.

Okay, good.

I'll tell you if anything changes.

Yugi huffed and moved to the bed again, hesitating before he took a seat and settled for a second on the mattress. He pulled his textbook and spiral into his lap, reading through some of the information he'd copied down before he quickly looked back at the text for a moment. The words were nothing short of nonsensical, he realized, flustered, as he glanced at his own writing. His stomach knotted as he stared at the words he'd written there.

He rolled his eyes at himself, shook his head, and put his pencil's eraser to the paper. He grimaced after a moment, then rewrote the information there. His eyes narrowed faintly, his eyes widening, and looked briefly to the textbook and back to the paper again.

It was thirty minutes before he got a new text, one which made him immediately bristle.

Yami just beat the shit out of Aki, holy crap!

Aki would challenge him, wouldn't she? Yugi hadn't even considered her for the smallest of seconds when he'd sent Yami there again. It had not occurred to him in the slightest that such a thing might happen. And he hated himself for not having thought of such a thing to begin with. He should have known that she might turn on Yami in such a fashion. She was bitter, after all, even if she did not outwardly express it at all times. He had known it the moment that they had crossed paths after the events of the first two disastrous hunts. She was not happy with him in the slightest.

And he could see her wanting to attack him simply for the fact that Yugi had chosen him over her prior. He would never be surprised by the idea of her retaliation in such a petty fashion. She would harm Yami for the sake of knowing that it would anger Yugi in turn.

Obelisk and Slifer are not happy with her right now.

And? Is Yami okay?

Yami's fine, Yug. But he looks pretty tired—and worse for wear. Why didn't you mention he was going to look so bad?

Yugi bristled. Just because he's skinnier than usual doesn't mean anything.

Skinnier than usual? Yugi, he's basically a toothpick with four legs!

His teeth ground together as he shook his head angrily. Is he okay though?

He's fine, Yug. He's literally just eating again. I think the others are kind of freaked out that he's here though. They look kind of nervous right now. There was a soft vibration in his hand a second later, making him startle for a brief second. That dark gray one with the blue eyes is talking to him now.

Yugi blinked, eyes widening. Yusei? he sent back immediately, swallowing hard. He wondered if the younger teen was curious about the darker-furred wolf or if he was simply inquiring about what the other canine was thinking in coming there in such a state. Was it possible that he was trying to find out why it was that Yami had come there to begin with? Or had he perhaps grown concerned that the black wolf was a threat or something of that nature?

Yeah, I think that's him. Yami doesn't seem too worried about him.

The smaller teen ran a hand through his hair, relieved as he licked his lips. He could not imagine what might have happened had Yami turned on the yearling as he could have. Had he turned his teeth on him in any fashion, he was sure that the gray wolf would have been unable to keep from being hurt. He doubted that Yami would have done much to him, but blood would surely have been drawn…

He's not bleeding or anything, right?

Who? Yami or Yusei?

Yami. He nearly spat the response before rolling his eyes. If he were brave enough to call him, he might have at any moment. But he did not care enough to speak as it was. And he did not want to risk the pack hearing him either. And so he bypassed the thought altogether and turned to make his way towards the bed again. He had the idea to close his notes and textbook and put them both into his backpack. He shivered and zipped it shut again. School was in a couple of hours. But he'd been awake for a while.

For whatever reason the pack had bypassed challenging Yami the day before. But now they seemed to be doing so with a vengeance. He bristled as he paced about himself for a moment. Then he narrowed his gaze and reconsidered the text as the phone failed to vibrate again.

When it finally vibrated, he looked the message over briefly, eyes widening slightly.

A small video, a handful of seconds long, startled him. The thumbnail for it was that of Yami getting to his feet. He looked bone-thin and tiny, but his fur fluffed outwards with a bristle and the strands gave him the illusion of health. He squared his shoulders, raised his head, peeled his lips back, pricked his ears forward, and snapped his teeth. Yugi did not see the other wolf until the last second, but froze as he noticed the American she-wolf. Eurea had drifted closer, bristling herself, but she did not seem to be snarling. She was sniffing, curious rather than angry, he assumed.

The video stopped there.

What's she doing?

Just sniffing him. He's pretty pissed, though. Not sure why.

Yugi nearly grunted. He'd probably be pissed too if everyone wouldn't stop sniffing him. He snorted and reached up to rub at his arm lazily. He shook his head and turned away to look back towards the door. It was going to kill him to wait for school to start and then to make it back to the house again. It was frustrating to even consider that he would have to find his way back to the house after school. The thought was annoying in every sense as he paced again.

This was going to be a long day, he realized with an annoyed feeling in his gut.

Today was going to be longer than he cared to even consider, he was sure.

He chased her off. She's pretty freaked out.

Yugi rolled his eyes. Good.

There was a long minute and a half that nothing had happened. The small teen pulled his sneakers on after a few seconds. He'd been awake, had taken his shower hours before. Yugi sighed softly and shook his head. It was frustrating to wait it all out. He'd been desperate to take on the task of getting back to school so that he could get back to the house. He'd been desperate to go to the camp during the middle of the night to see the wolves again.

He was breathless at the idea.

He had wanted to see if Yami was okay. He had wanted to make sure that the wolves took to his reappearance well. He wanted to make sure that the red-eyed wolf was accepted again. He wanted to be there to protect him should anything more serious erupt. He wanted to be able to help him should he become wounded. He wanted to be there. He wanted to see him. He wanted to make sure he was okay. He wanted to check on him and make sure that he was not hiding any wound that he might have had.

He wanted to simply know that he was okay. It was all Yugi cared to know. It was all that he wanted to know, as it was all that had haunted his thoughts for hours. He had been exhausted upon the realization that he was not going to get any sleep anytime soon. It was ridiculous the level of power that the very thought had held over him all throughout the night. He felt sick and tired as he paced the room again.

I don't think any of the others are brave enough to fight with him again.

Yugi grimaced. Good. They don't need to challenge him anymore.

It's fine though, Yugi. He's not going to get hurt. All of them are handling him with kid gloves.

The smaller teen rolled his eyes and shook his head. Jonouchi, just because they're doing that now doesn't mean they'll keep going with it later. It's not something that you want to see if they turn on him, trust me. It's going to be ridiculous if that happens.

He didn't get another answer until he was on the way to the school. He'd noticed Honda and Anzu at the end of the street ahead of him. Both of them were chatting quietly, standing closer together than he'd ever noticed before. But the thought was second to anything else when his phone vibrated once more. Yugi turned immediately to it, unlocking it and staring at the text that read, Aki challenged him again. She got her ass kicked. But she managed to get Yami's leg pretty bad.

He stopped walking as the last few words connected. A picture was loading on the screen in front of him now, his heart in his throat. His mouth was dry as he looked at the image that showed there. The black fur was slicked along his right forelimb, the paw held slightly off the ground. The skin was stripped white and flecked with bright red, large amounts of which made his limb look incredibly bruised and gangly.

What happened exactly?

His two friends blinked at him curiously as they looked up and spotted him. Yugi hadn't realized he was trembling until the screen seemed to blur in front of him. His blood was hot in his veins, his jaw clenched and aching from the pressure. He bore his teeth, narrowed his eyes, and shook his head angrily for a brief moment.

"Yugi?" Anzu asked hesitantly, startling him enough to make his head snap up. But his phone vibrated immediately after and so he turned back to it instantly.

It looks a lot worse than it actually is, I guess. He's using it again.

Or he's just not showing how much it hurts.

"You okay, dude? You look pretty pissed. What's going on?" Honda tried, cutting into the crisp air between them that caused the smaller teen to blink and glance upwards again. The brunet frowned and tilted his head slightly to the side as the two of them considered each other.

"Yami went back to the camp," he answered without thinking it through. He faltered only after the words had left his mouth, then felt his mouth grow dry for a single second before he forced himself to continue. "Jonouchi just sent me a picture of what's going on over there. Apparently he's already gotten into a fight with one of the other wolves."

Honda furrowed his brows. "The camp?"

"What fight?" the brunette asked in confusion. "Did he get hurt?"

I don't think he's actually hurt. He's not limping or anything.

That's because he's a lot smarter and able than he looks, Yugi thought furiously. Then he drew in a deep breath and shook his head with a grimace. He turned away again before rolling his eyes after a moment. Then he looked up, blushing faintly as he saw the concern so clearly on his friends' faces now. "The camp is in the mountains. The pack kind of…lives there. Yami came back a couple of days ago and I was helping him take care of himself again. He's extremely emaciated and tired most of the time. And I was checking on him to make sure he was okay because he hasn't been around the pack for a while now. But Jonouchi just sent me a picture of his leg."

"Because he got hurt?" Honda guessed, raising a brow curiously for a moment. "I mean, is it bad?"

"He's bleeding, but he says he's not sure how bad it is. Apparently he's walking normally."

"That's good, right?" Anzu tried, clearing her throat awkwardly and searching his face. When had Yami come back? Why had Yugi failed to tell any of them? How long had he been there before Yugi had said anything to anyone? "I mean, that means it can't actually be too bad, right?"

Yugi shook his head. "No," he answered with a huff. "Yami is good at pretending that he's not in pain. Even if his leg is broken, he might be able to force himself to use it and pretend that it works properly. He's smarter than you'd think."

"That's not really a smart thing to do," Honda commented with a frown. The smaller male blinked and turned to him with a raised brow and a withering glint to his eyes. His hands had tightened around his phone, his eyes narrowed slightly. He looked flustered more than upset, however, and the other boy tilted his head. "I mean, if you think about it, he's going to be damaging it a lot more if he keeps that up."

The smaller male grimaced. "Yeah, but at the moment that might be a lot smarter for him than showing that his leg hurts." Yugi ran a hand through his hair. It had only occurred to him then that he might manipulate such a situation in order to show simplistic physical strength to save himself from further abuse. He had not considered it before, and now he felt sick as he thought about it. Because he should have simply made him stay home with him. He should have asked him to remain at the house. Because then he could remain healthy and safe rather than being harmed as he might have been formerly. "If he does that now, they won't gang up on him because they'll think he's weaker than he is at the moment."

"Right…" Honda had the sudden thought that perhaps the wolves acted like a pack of regular dogs. When they sensed weakness, most of them would turn on each other. He knew that kind of thing happened at times. He knew that dogs were incredibly likely to do such a thing at times such as those. He knew that sometimes, even when they had grown up together all their lives, dogs still turned on each other. They still might turn and sink their teeth in the moment that they sensed a weakness of any kind.

He remembered hearing once from his uncle that his elderly dogs had turned on each other when one had gotten hurt and had a seizure. He had found them half-dead from the mauling but screaming and trying to fight back around the various spasms. He had been put down a week or so later when the seizures worsened, but it had become harder to keep them maintained after the attack.

"Do you think that he's going to be okay?"

Yugi glanced at her almost dismissively, thoughts forming behind his eyes. Honda watched the way his blue-violet gaze seemed to darken faintly for a brief moment. "He'll be fine when things calm down a little at the camp," he said quietly. "I'm sure once they calm down again, Yami will be okay."

"You think they're going to just keep harassing him for a while?"

"Definitely. He's going to be the biggest thing for them to pay attention to for a little while." Yugi sighed and Honda was abruptly aware of just how exhausted and worn out he looked. His shoulders were sagging, as if a huge weight had been introduced to them at the mere thought of the fights and potential bloodshed. "He's just going to have to find a way to hold them off for a little while longer."

"You could always leave school early if you really think you need to…"

"No," Yugi said quietly, shaking his head slowly and narrowing his eyes. "No, I have to stay here until the day is over. And then I'll go ahead and go home again and wait for some more news. My mom knows that I've been skipping and she's not happy with me about it."

Honda grimaced. "Yeah, I probably wouldn't be happy with my son doing that either," he commented wryly, ignoring the way the smaller boy snorted and rolled his eyes with a purse of his lips. "You didn't do well in hiding your absences either, Yugi."

He shrugged. "I know. I haven't bothered trying to hide it." Yugi sighed and shook his head. "I was more worried about Yami than I cared about hiding my absences with school. I didn't even try at all. It was just kind of stupid to think that it was worth it to try while trying to help Yami at the same time. I would have been spreading myself a little thin trying to juggle both those things."

The brunet eyed him for a moment, and they both knew the thoughts that were flickering behind his eyes. Yugi saw the shadows there and almost smirked. Honda felt the gears racing, twisting and writhing and clanking together before dropping away into nothingness. For a split second he tried to remind himself that Yugi would have done this for any of his friends.

But there was something different within his eyes that made his intentions clear.

And it shocked him to see such clear devotion and passion there.

Yami was not just a friend.

He might not have had any of the details, but he understood that much at least.

Nothing in the way Yugi spoke of the other boy or the gleam in his eyes spoke of mere friendship.

Honda stared at him awkwardly, the realization something almost embarrassing at the moment.

He hadn't even considered it.

He had seen them in the warehouse like that, the way that the two wolves had paid such attention to each other. He had seen the way Yugi had worried so much about him and failed to care any longer than that. He had noticed the way they had stood so close together. He had noticed it when Yami had responded to Yugi when he'd been angry enough to snap at Jonouchi seconds before.

Honda shivered, feeling almost sick and disgruntled for a brief second.

He had never considered it before, for what it truly was. And, though he would support Yugi doing whatever it was he wanted to, it was enough to make him feel disdainful towards himself. How could he have missed it to begin with? How could he have possibly overlooked it like that? It made no sense to him that he had not noticed and had missed such obvious signs.

Yugi was still watching him, the challenge clear in his eyes. Honda stared back at him, unable to do more than look away after a moment. Anzu shifted her weight awkwardly and the brunet had the abrupt clarity of understanding. That night that they had tried for the last time to have a proper date…

She had known since then, hadn't she?

And Honda knew immediately then and there that Yami had been what had caused them to fall apart.

That was an odd thought to consider. She had known for a long time what had happened. She had known for a while that Yami was the obstacle between them. And, for whatever reason, Yugi had not glanced at her in that manner since the moment that he'd come clean with her on the subject. He wondered at the idea, remembering briefly the way that he and Jonouchi had once sat around laughing about the two of them weeks prior to the failed date.

They had been laughing and making jokes about Yugi and Anzu, more so sexualities than anything. Jonouchi had said that maybe Yugi was bisexual. Honda himself had argued that he was definitely straight. Then the blond had pointed his finger at Anzu being more like a guy which Honda had slugged him in the arm for. There had been an odd exchange afterwards that maybe Yugi was already having sex with someone else. They had laughed and made little jokes about who it could have been—from him and Anzu having somehow hooked up ahead of time and hiding it from them and then even Rebecca Hawkins.

When Jonouchi had suggested that it was maybe even Honda who had hooked up with Yugi the brunet had sputtered and grown annoyed with his friend. And he'd hesitantly wondered if the blond knew something that he did not, if perhaps that Yugi did have a crush on him somehow.

He had wondered with slight worry and hideous bewilderment that the blue-violet-eyed teen might have some kind of awkward affection towards him. It made him want to vomit to think now. Because he could not imagine for even a second that he could be with another guy. And the idea that Yugi could feel that way about another guy without seemingly even a hint of hesitation scared him.

How was Yugi able to simply feel so warm and affectionate towards Yami of all people when he'd formerly been all but in love with Anzu? The idea that he could turn his feelings toward the red-eyed teen so abruptly was dizzying.

How was it that he could love someone so simply?

How was it that he could simply fall for someone on the opposite spectrum like that?

How was it that he could even turn his affections from one person to the next so easily like that?

Honda felt dizzy looking at him now.

Was Yugi in love with Yami?

Was that even possible?

He knew that a lot of gay guys hid behind the girlfriends they'd had formerly. They tended to simply shield themselves entirely behind the fact that they'd slept with and dated girls long before they ever had anyone else. And then, eventually, they might slowly point towards the idea that they were gay only when they felt safe enough to do so. They might come out in high school, or later in their adulthood.

In Japan it was frowned upon, though most were smart enough to hide it away behind closed doors. They knew to duck away and never speak to others about these things. They would not speak about their relationships as others might have in other parts of the world. He knew in the states that a lot of them were relatively accepted. There were still hate crimes, he knew, but they tended to be rather isolated from what he understood. And it was much unlike Japan in the manner that they also showed public displays of affection there as well.

If the smaller male had fallen in love with another boy, Honda was not sure what to say about the idea. He was not sure there was anything he could say or do. And he doubted that anything he said or did at the moment would make a difference for the smaller teen. Yugi was a free spirit through and through, he knew. Even if he said he was worried for him, the smaller boy would simply smile at him and wave it off and do as he wished. But Honda had to wonder…

Was it possible that Yugi was simply attracted to him because of the lycanthropy? Was there a possibility that this was what had caused the entire thing? Was it something to do with that?

Or was Yugi simply bisexual as Jonouchi had suggested before?

Was that possible?

Honda supposed it had to be. It was always a possibility, was it not? So many people were in the closet about their true sexuality, hiding away behind regular relationships in order to keep away from the scrutiny of others. Perhaps it was possible that Yugi had always felt this way about other guys.

Honda swallowed hard, wondering again if it was perhaps possible that Yugi had had a crush on him formerly. But then he knew that Jonouchi liked to say things to make him flinch and squirm at times. He liked to get back at him for some of his jokes. He liked to laugh and push at his buttons. He liked to snicker and smirk and tease him relentlessly. Their friendship had always been like that. And, truthfully, Jonouchi would say just about anything to get a reaction out of Honda at times.

"What's the camp like?" Anzu asked quietly, trying to ease some of the tension that seemed to be flaring between the two of them at the moment. Honda hesitated, glancing at her sideways, and then quickly turned back to the lycanthrope in question. Yugi blinked and looked between them for a moment, then lowered his eyes to the phone in his hand as it vibrated.

"It's a kind of clearing, I guess. It's on the side of the mountain, near a waterfall close to the nature preserve. It's like a clearing with a single den for the alpha to sleep in. Beyond that, I don't really know how else to describe it."

Because he couldn't say that the entrance was to jump through a waterfall. It was not as if they would ever jump through the water and crawl through the tunnel and into the camp itself. He knew that would never happen to begin with. But he wondered and considered and it made him nervous to even talk about it further than this brief description. Yugi licked his lips and glanced at them from beneath his lashes.

"It's not that great, I promise. It was just kind of weird, I guess. You wouldn't be too impressed with it. Maybe I'll take a picture or two and show it to you guys some time."

Honda nodded and glanced over his shoulder. A couple of other students were walking nearby, laughing about something or other that he did not care to wonder about. When he turned back, Yugi was looking in their direction as well, listening for a long moment. His wide blue-violet eyes had darkened faintly. His long lashes made his eyes seem almost black with his enlarged pupils, his expression somewhat clouded and dazed as he looked beyond them to the schoolyard.

"I guess we should go ahead and get to class now, huh?"

---

Yugi picked at his choker for a moment, running his fingers over the buckle. It was odd to him how eerily cold it felt beneath his touch. But he did not care to think any longer than for the simplicity of such a sensation. The small teen glanced over his shoulder towards Jonouchi a seat diagonal of him. He'd assumed that the blond would stay at the camp with Mai, but the tall teen had showed up after third period. When Yugi had managed to corner him for an explanation, the other boy had said that Yami had dismissed him to go to school and that Obelisk and Slifer had turned their attention to lying with him. He'd said that the two of them had made a show of doing it to make the others less likely to challenge him again.

Yugi still was not sure that he could count the efforts for much. But he'd been unable to argue about anything else. So the teen had not bothered for much more than to hope that the day would pass quickly and he could get ready to see Yami again. He felt sick for a moment, guilt lacing its way through his blood, then reached up to run a hand through his hair and put his elbow on the desk as the clock ticked quietly. He would need to get out of the classroom as quickly as possible.

His mom could be upset with him all she'd like. He needed to know if anything else had happened in the time he'd been gone. He would never be able to forgive himself if Yami were to be hurt irreparably or possibly even killed while he was simply taking notes at school. His stomach lurched at the thought, but he forced himself to stay in his seat. The day would be over soon enough…

When the bell rang for the end of the day, Yugi leaped to his feet before anyone could say a word. His friends startled, scrambling to catch up with him as he hurried into the hallway and towards his locker. The small teen was struggling to think of a way to perhaps ask Jonouchi to go back to the camp again, to check on the black wolf's health once more. Maybe he could get him to update him once an hour or something—anything that he could possibly convince him of Yami's health and wellbeing in that pack at this rate…

Because he didn't want to see the disappointment in his mother's eyes again. He didn't want to hear her voice become hash and cold again. He didn't want to deal with it all as he had before.

"Wait, Yug, where are you going?"

Yugi didn't glance back, shouldering his bag before slowing his steps only as he made his way out of the school building into the quad. He frowned and looked back only when he heard the door close once more, eyes widening drastically as he spotted the blond rushing after him. Honda and Anzu were a step behind him, their eyes wide and bewildered. He hesitated, swallowing hard, and then looked over his shoulder.

"Be careful, guys," he muttered softly, tilting his head. The small teen blinked and frowned as he turned away again, searching the quad for a moment. His eyes narrowed and his lips pulled downward into a grimace as he stepped forward again. The blue-violet-eyed male frowned and looked over his shoulder again, then back towards the other end of the quad. "I don't know…"

Jonouchi blinked and looked around as well. He was tense and stiff in front of Honda and Anzu now as well. The two wolves were glancing about the quad in alternating sweeps, confused by the wave of tension in their bones. It was a collective feeling, something that made them both cautious as they began to slowly move forward. Yugi hesitated a couple of steps ahead of him, then paused and turned around again. For a brief moment he seemed to consider his trio of friends, then he looked away over his shoulder again and frowned.

Had he been able to concentrate, he might have tried to hear how many heartbeats he sensed at the moment. But he could not do more than blink and narrow his eyes in confusion. The wolf blinked and reached down to scratch at the inside of his wrist nervously. He could sense someone there—well, multiple people, he realized—towards the end of the quad. But he could not see them and, as others began to pour out of the building and happily make their way towards their houses or the arcade, Yugi found himself further unable to properly detect or spot them. He frowned and tilted his head, then looked over his shoulder.

"Anzu, Honda, I think it's best that the two of you use the crowd to get out of here, okay? I don't know what's going on, but I'm pretty sure there are a bunch of wolves nearby." He drew in a deep breath, glancing over his shoulder once more and narrowing his eyes. "You can use them to get out of the quad and then walk home. I don't think it's safe to go to the arcade or anything like that today."

"You think you'll be okay in the meantime?" Honda asked quietly, frowning. "I mean…"

"We'll be fine," he dismissed them, making it clear that Jonouchi was meant to stay there with him. The blond nodded when he glanced at him sideways and the other two mimicked him and began to make their way past them using a handful of people to get out of the quad altogether. Yugi watched them for as long as he was able, then turned away again completely to turn back to the other wolf. "I don't know how many there are, so be careful, okay?"

"Got it."

Yugi nearly snorted at the thought but then shrugged it off, shaking his head. He shivered and reached down to scratch at his wrist again. He frowned as they looked at one another, curious and bewildered. The small teen started forward a few steps, allowing Jonouchi to follow at a rather brisk pace. They slowed when Yugi paused minutely, his head snapping around. His nose was working now, the blond noticed, startled by the way that he drew in ragged breaths and exhaled rapidly. He searched the quad again, then bristled faintly as he looked around for a moment longer.

"They're at the gate, near the little frozen garden creek," he announced, bristling. "I can't tell how many there are, but I can tell that they're there."

"So, what do we do now…?"

"I guess we'll approach them. I think they're here for me, after all." Yugi blinked and looked at him for a split second, swallowing hard and shaking his head slowly. "I have no idea if they're going to be violent or not. I don't know how I'm supposed to deal with this."

Jonouchi snorted. It was somewhere between scornful and amused. Yugi blinked and furrowed his brows before glancing immediately towards the blond but the taller teen was no longer paying him any attention. Both of them stopped short now, heads snapping around and stiffening as they looked forward. The two of them could see the frozen man-made creek towards the edge of the quad, slowing their paces and stopping short entirely.

They were standing on the other side of the little spot, wolves of different genders and heights. They stared back at them blankly and Yugi bristled as he stepped forward. The blond blinked at him, glanced at him sideways, and then turned away again towards these new lycanthropes. The sight of them was both exciting and alarming for the tall blond. He'd never considered that a large group of them might come to the school like this and he was surprised by how well they'd actually taken to camouflaging themselves. They were dressed in the neighboring city's school uniform. And they stood there in almost exact replicas of their clothing had it not been for the missing emblems in the corners of each of the collars.

There were twelve of them, Yugi noted wryly. There were twelve wolves, all of varying ages, but definitively older than the members within Echo's pack. And he bristled as he considered them for a moment. He looked about them for a moment, then sighed quietly in order to draw himself together again, and turned back to them once more. "And the alpha would be…?"

The wolf in question began to open his mouth, but was interrupted immediately. Yugi found his head snapping around, the disdainful words shocking him as another male spat, "You're not Atem. That's bullshit."

The statement was met with a few small snickers from the others amongst their group. Yugi blinked. Jonouchi felt his eyes grow twice their usual size, flickering immediately to his smaller friend. The alpha blinked, narrowed his gaze, stared for a moment, and then snorted, "Is that so?"

"You're too small and weak to be a god. You're not strong enough to be Atem at all."

"You don't realize that you're facing a wolf that's killed quite a few times," Yugi snapped, bristling now. Jonouchi shifted his weight beside him, glancing around nervously as he noticed that a few other students had stopped a little down the street and were watching them with interest. No doubt someone had seen their outfits and was curious about what was going on with what looked to be the neighboring school's students. "I don't mind adding someone else to that count."

The blond stiffened, surprised by the thought. He'd never been able to picture Yugi as a violent person. And when the small teen had punched him in the face so hard outside the hospital like that, he'd almost thought it was simply a fluke. The realization that he could do this now and threaten such a thing was amazing to him. He shivered and looked at the other pack curiously.

The boy in front of him was almost as tall as him, perhaps shorter by an inch or two, with mildly spiky hair with fell in a jagged formation across his face. His hair was a singular shade of brown and his bangs were long and thick there along the left side. Yugi blinked and looked at him, then towards Jonouchi and back again. The boy looked hotheaded, he realized, though the words that had come out of his mouth were implication enough. The small teen suppressed a shiver, then turned to him with darkened eyes again.

"You're not the alpha. Why are you talking to me?" he challenged slowly, narrowing his gaze and making his voice low and calm in order to stop himself from snarling. Yugi turned back to the male that had begun to open his mouth. "You came here looking for—"

"Why are you even addressing my alpha?" Yugi turned his head again, startled by the sneering tone. He bristled again as the other wolf glared at him spitefully. "You aren't Atem and you're wasting our time pretending to be him."

The small teen felt his shoulders rising, hatred swelling in his stomach. "Are you an idiot?" he snapped. "I am Atem. I have always been Atem. Now leave it alone. You have nothing further to say to me, understand? I didn't come here to speak to you."

"Then you understand why it's not you who should be talking to us," the newcomer stated furiously, stepping forward. He seemed almost to loom over Yugi for a split second. But the small teen thought of dark black fur the shade of the night sky, with red eyes the color of hellfire and Christmas lights and fresh blood and crushed rubies. He thought of the way the wolf had loomed up so viciously when he'd attacked him upon fighting Ryota and Haga and Ryuzaki. He remembered it and it made him feel incredibly small and surprised and almost weak just as it had before. Now this wolf's efforts to intimidate him did nothing more than frustrate him. "You shouldn't be here talking to us. We're here to see Atem, not some stupid impersonator."

Yugi wondered briefly if, had this boy seen Marik standing before him instead of the small teen, he might have considered the lavender-eyed male to be Atem. Would he have believed him to be the wolf in question? Or would it have been someone else entirely that he would believe in? Would it have been believed in even the slightest?

He felt sick for a moment at the idea.

Then he brushed it off.

"Do you honestly want to fight with me right now?" Yugi asked slowly, coldly. His eyes had grown sharper and he was abruptly aware of the eyes that were on him from down the street. He bristled further, then glanced over his shoulder. It was only then that he noticed that Jonouchi had left his side at some point and had wandered off on his own. The realization infuriated him but he did not say anything to draw attention to such a fact.

"We need to move this conversation away from here," he announced instead, turning back to face the other boy and baring his teeth in disdain. "I'm not too keen about having a bunch of people listen in on my private conversations."

"Why should I care if someone else sees us?"

"Because then your ass will get caught by a hunter and I certainly won't save you worth shit," Yugi answered in a tone that was disgustingly sweet before he turned on his heel and started moving along the edge of the creek's steep step. He ignored the way the pack followed him in a quick formation. There was a small snarl in the group, one he was sure regarded hierarchy more than anything, and he crossed the small raised bridge of the platform to the other side without a second glance. Yugi moved forward quickly and without a backwards glance, hurrying forward and ignoring the way that the rest of the pack fell into a single file line. He would need to get them to the mountains and find a little bit more of a secluded spot before anything else happened…

When he brought them to the clearing near the lake, Yugi found himself slowing instinctively. He had made sure that the others from his school had not followed, taking a detour around the city and then leading them back into the woods. The wolf blinked a couple of times, then quickly made his way into the center of the clearing. Some part of him momentarily mourned the loss of Jonouchi's presence at his side. If he had been there now instead of running off as he had, it would have looked somewhat more intimidating, he was sure. He shivered and ignored the urge to look over his shoulder.

"Are we finally far enough into the woods for you?" the newcomer sneered, making Yugi blink towards him briefly before his eyes narrowed into slits. "I suppose you're too afraid of people noticing to bother with bravery, right?"

"Bravery? Is that what you consider having potential hunters find you?" Yugi snorted scornfully. "You seriously think that's what that's called? You're an idiot."

The other wolf stepped forward. The instant reaction made Yugi bristle, moving forward to match him now as well. The anger in his gut was harsh and powerful. They stared at one another, hateful and disgusted with the other, and Yugi straightened further. He could see the small flinch of shock in the other's eyes, the way he blinked and startled as if the space between them might protect him somehow.

"Chazz—"

"Is that your name?" a new voice interrupted.

Yugi blinked, eyes widening and a sense of warmth filling his gut before his head snapped around. Jonouchi had come from the tree line, jogging, and Yami was a few steps behind him with his eyes locked on the troublesome wolf. He did not glance at Yugi but he did incline his head subtly, a respectful little nod, as he came forward to stop in front of him.

"Is there a reason why you're speaking to my alpha when you clearly do not possess the same rank as the wolf in question?"

Yugi blinked in surprise, then smirked in amusement and turned his head with brightened eyes. Jonouchi stopped a foot or two away from him, eyes bright with anticipation, entire body tightened with a new thrum of energy. He looked more excited than Yugi had ever truly seen him, something that startled the small teen as he blinked and turned away again, confused.

"Who the hell are you?" the other demanded, eyes sharpening as he considered him. Then he smirked, momentary unease lost. "You look like a skeleton."

Yami rolled his shoulders and the way the bones popped was intimidating enough to make most of the other onlookers flinch in surprise. Yugi barely restrained from mirroring such an action as he turned his head and looked at him with wide eyes for the smallest of moments. The small teen found himself frozen in place when he saw that Yami's red eyes were locked on him from his peripheral, staring at him curiously even as he kept his focus on Chazz as well.

"I don't think you know what a threat is when it's standing before your face." He tilted his head to the side and watched him with a darkened expression to his gaze. He watched him for a moment, cold and dark and disdainful. But he did not seem hateful nor did he appear to want to truly fight, though Yugi could see the tension in his body and knew it to remain there beneath his skin waiting for an opportunity to release itself. "You should reassess the situation you've walked into."

Yugi bristled faintly, then nearly smirked. Chazz, on the other hand, sniffed as if Yami were not worth his time, turning to Yugi now. The small teen paused, eyes sharpening and becoming darker than ever. The two of them sized each other up for a long moment, searching the other's countenance.

"So, you have a guard dog to fight your battles for you then? Is that truly what Atem—?"

The impact made the newcomer yelp. Yugi did not even fully see the movement. His mind translated it rapidly for him to understand. His eyes were wide, horrified, startled. He blinked, turning rapidly towards the source of the collision. Yami had already lowered his hand again, however. And he was simply staring at him, unimpressed as his eyes became hooded and his lips drew into a thin line, his brows relaxed.

Chazz spun on him, startled.

"Speak to those within your own rank."

The words were simplistic and easy.

Yugi blinked.

Jonouchi gaped, eyes wide and full of shock.

Yami stared back at the newcomer.

And Chazz peeled his lips back to show off his teeth. "Mind your own damn business," he spat. "Before I teach you why you should."

The smaller teen tilted his head, red eyes flashing briefly. His lips tugged upwards into a smile. "My business is anything regarding a pup who steps out of line addressing my alpha," he stated simply. "You are a beta, are you not? Then speak to me."

The boy snorted loudly, eyes flickering to Yugi's. The small teen went to open his mouth, to sneer at him perhaps, but then Chazz snarled and yelped. Yami had caught him hard across the side of his head again. But the second blow came more forceful than the first, nearly knocking the brunet over. Now the red-eyed lycanthrope crossed his arms, nails showing brilliantly on his fingers as he examined them dismissively.

"I will not repeat myself. You speak within your own rank or you do not speak at all."

Jonouchi was trembling with excitement now. He'd seen Yami take Aki down in a few bites, eyes flashing hatefully and jaws opening wide enough to all but swallow the she-wolf's face entirely. He nearly trembled with the thought, amused out of his mind at the very idea. But then part of him shook harder and he nearly grinned in amusement as the two of them blinked and studied one another.

"Yami…"

"Hmm?" His red eyes fell on him now, curious. "Yes?"

Yugi blinked, unsure of what more to say. Then he opened and closed his mouth, felt a smile begin to form on his lips before he could stop it, and went at first to tell him to relax but then to thank him as well. He found himself caught between the two impulses and instead shook his head after a long moment. When his eyes shot back to Chazz, the teen was glaring at Yami with enough disdain to make him falter.

"Back. Off."

The red eyes fell on him again. "Are you going to prove yourself capable of understanding the hierarchy or shall I beat it into your skull?" he answered slowly. He did not uncross his arms, nor did he so much as blink. When he smiled, it was predatory and put a shark's gaping jaws to shame. His teeth looked incredibly sharp, as if he'd filed them to points, and Yugi shivered at the thought. Would that happen to his own teeth at some point as well? "You do not confront anyone above your own rank."

Yugi was silent for a long time, considering the two of them for a moment as Yami merely stared at the other wolf. His eyes had grown rather unimpressed, his expression cold as he stared back at the other wolf in an almost lazy manner. "I would stay down," he muttered after a second or two, staring back at this newcomer of a wolf, Chazz glaring at him with darkened and hateful eyes. Yami did not look over but the younger wolf gave the small alpha a sharp glance. Immediately he was hit upon the head again, nearly throwing him to the snow as he huffed for a breath and turned furiously towards Yami once more. "It would be smart to just stay there. Yami will beat you down if you keep getting up."

Yami didn't look over. Jonouchi was trembling with excitement once more. Yugi watched Chazz shoot him a furious glance. His beta knocked him across the head again. Chazz spun on him. Yugi detected only the smallest hint of tension in Yami's body. When Chazz lunged, Yami dodged aside from him in an instant. But, whereas Chazz looked enraged, Yami seemed indifferent. His eyes were still cold and blank in their stare.

The two of them studied each other.

Chazz moved to the left.

Yami moved to the right.

The tension was still relaxed enough to be all but nonexistent in Yami. But Chazz was balancing his weight on the balls of his feet. When he lunged, it was a surprise to no one. And Yami danced out of his reach without a second look. They faced each other, the younger wolf snarling. But Yugi found himself shivering. Yami was staring as indifferently as he had before.

Chazz was not a threat to him…

Yet the thought did nothing to stop Yugi from growing nervous. Chazz wasn't wrong. Yami was a skeleton. His skin was pulled too taut along his bones. He looked tired and ragged. His fingers were like five long claws, thin and lanky.

He swallowed hard, reaching up to finger at his choker. He narrowed his eyes, clicking his nail against the buckle there. The small teen lightly scratched, picking at the leather. Then he narrowed his eyes further. Had he been imagining it or had Yami's eyes flickered towards him for a split second? He shrugged the thought away, replacing it with a new one.

If there was even a second in which he thought that Yami was about to get hurt, he would launch himself into the midst of this fight. He told himself this repeatedly. Because, if he didn't, he would have simply attacked Chazz otherwise.

There was something small and ill inside of him. And it was desperately clawing for his attention. He wanted nothing more than to stop this fight here and now. But there was no need to. Yami was holding his own without any difficulty. And Chazz was getting infuriated but Yami still did not seem to think that he was much of a threat to him at that point. He was still watching blankly, did not seem tense in the slightest…

And, besides that, Yugi had no idea what the repercussions for stepping in might be. Would they turn on him? Would they see Yami as weak and turn on him? Would they maul them both to death? If Chazz already didn't believe that he could be Atem, then who else might have felt similarly?

They circled each other again.

Then Yami moved forward. It was not a true lunge. It was just enough movement to make it seem as if he might launch himself forward. But it made Chazz duck and weave to the side. When Yami tilted his head, the younger male lunged. Yami dodged again. But this time he stayed within reach. And, as Chazz overstepped, Yami's knee came up. The momentum of Chazz's own lunge sent him straight into the blow.

Yami lowered it again a second later. And Chazz landed on his face in the snow. It was clear he was winded. His face had been red, his mouth open and slack, when he'd gotten hit. Yami blinked and tilted his head. His eyes flickered briefly towards Yugi, then the new alpha. But the tall male hardly seemed to care in the slightest that his beta was being knocked around. If anything, he looked amused.

Yami pulled his leg back as Chazz started for his feet. The toe of his sneaker hit him hard in the hip. The boy yelped, rolling onto his back from the force. He flailed for a split second. Yami blinked and furrowed his brows. Then he dodged back as snow was sent through the air. He shook his head, puzzled, and then blinked again. The tactic had been useless but for one thing.

The younger wolf was on his feet again. He was glaring at him, eyes furious. His mouth was set into a snarl. His teeth were showing. His hands were shaking where they'd formed fists at his sides. Had Yami not been paying attention, he might have missed it. But he'd never been one to look away from his opponent in a fight. So he noticed it.

The dark gray eyes flickered slightly to the side. And then Chazz shifted his shoulders the same direction. His entire stance, tense and battle-ready, grew pointedly more so. His pupils, as they regarded each other, began to almost vibrate.

Yami blinked and dodged away again when he lunged. The action was effortless and fluid. And he swore his lungs didn't take on their usual pain as they should have. He stared again, eyes cold and sharp. And then he tilted his head.

There was a single loud popping noise. Yami tipped his chin up. In the corner of his eye Yugi was frozen in place. His fingers were around his choker. His eyes were wide and startled. His breathing was slightly shallow. He looked tense, as if he might jump in the middle of their little squabble at any moment. And Yami almost wanted to look at him and assure him otherwise.

But he would not take his eyes off of Chazz. The boy was hardly a threat to him in all reality. Even as weak as he was, the younger wolf hardly posed an opponent for him. In all reality it was mere instinct that kept him from looking away. But he was not willing to rely on his instincts alone for the moment either. He was too tired for that. And a misstep could cost more than he was willing to pay at the moment. So he kept his eyes glued to him, head angled slightly downward to ensure the sight of his shoulders.

Chazz might have been vicious and had most likely fought his way tot his position.

But he lacked knowledge.

He lacked experience.

And it was clear to Yami in an instant that Chazz had no idea how clearly he displayed his next move. He had no idea that he showed his opponents so many clues as to what he was going to do next. Had he not been so young and inexperienced, perhaps Yami might have been more inclined to take this as seriously as Yugi seemed to be. But the wolf was a pup when it came to battle. He had most likely won his rank by way of brutalizing his opponent rather than managing skill or cunning. Because Yami doubted any truly experienced lycanthrope would have been unable to pick up on the physical signs…

Chazz led with his shoulders and head. His body followed moments later. But he did it in a fashion that was far too obvious. Yami did not think even the blind could miss this clear display.

Yami blinked, red eyes glittering curiously. His lips twitched slightly, the left side pulling upwards into the beginnings of a smirk. Chazz did not have as much experience with an accelerated Change as he did either. He watched the other boy's spine pop and grind, shoulders hunching. But it was coming faster than Yami would have expected given another wolf. Chazz was attempting to hurry it, though it was clear he had no true idea how he was meant to go about it.

The red-eyed teen wanted to laugh for a moment. His eyes flickered and shot briefly to Yugi. The smaller teen was staring, standing stiff as if he might have turned to stone, and his eyes were glued predictably to Yami himself. The alpha smirked a little wider at him, a teasing quirk of his lips. And his beta blinked at him in surprise, startled from his shock. For a moment he still looked scared, but a second later he relaxed visibly. He smiled faintly in turn as Yami glanced back at Chazz.

The boy in front of him was shaking the clothes from his furred body now. Yami cast a single small glance back at Yugi in his peripheral. The smaller teen blinked again, drawing his eyes from Chazz, and looked to him again. When their eyes locked, Yugi nodded slightly, and Yami turned away swiftly.

It was not a permission he truly needed nor cared for. But it was an encouragement that made him feel slightly less alone at the moment. It was odd feeling like this in the middle of a fight…

Chazz stood on long white limbs, a massive body of dark gray and black. It answered another question of how he had managed to secure his rank. He had the raw strength to make up for the lack of experience. Raw strength in a werewolf body would go farther than most gave credit.

The wolf finally blinked. Then he drew his lips back to show off swollen, bleeding gums and new canine teeth. Yami did not blink in the slightest. His eyes narrowed and he stared blankly. Then he tilted his head slightly to the side the smallest degree. In the corner of his eye Yugi was staring at Chazz with an expression that was nothing short of murderous.

Chazz opened his jaws wide. Then he lunged. Yami blinked and looked down at him. His lips curled back. His eyes sharpened as he moved aside. The canine snapped his jaws shut on dead air. Then he turned again, bristling and furious. His mouth opened wide again. His eyes grew black with his hatred. He lunged.

Yami dodged aside again. His red gaze narrowed. Then his mouth twitched and his lips drew back into a sneer. He lashed out with a swift kick.

The impact was enough to make Chazz grunt. His eyes nearly popped out of his head. The wolf stumbled visibly. Yami aimed a second one, just as fast but harder than the first. A bone popped this time, clearly fracturing from the force. The red-eyed teen backed up a step, watching. Chazz was panting from the pain alone, eyes glazed and caught on him angrily.

Yugi was staring at him, Yami knew. The small teen was watching him with concern and surprise. He knew that much just from the way his face had twisted minutely. His eyes were glazed slightly and his mouth was open the smallest degree. There was the smallest tremor in his shoulders, something that almost made Yami look over. But he kept this impulse at bay.

Then his beta began to bristle. And Yami glanced at him sideways. Chazz leaped at him immediately. Yami turned back instantly, jumping. The momentum was enough to send him over the wolf as he landed a foot away from him. The canine turned quickly, teeth showing in his anger. Yami shook his head as he turned back to him. When he peeled his lips back, his gums were tingling and burning.

He expected Chazz to be readying himself for another leap. But the canine was stuck, standing a few feet away staring at him. He was snarling, but he was also struggling for air. It was clear that the kick to his ribs had done Yami more than he'd initially thought it would. He backed up a few steps, putting just enough distance between them. His gums were bleeding more heavily. His tongue was coated in it. His eyes sharpened, his sight stronger than ever as it honed in on everything the wolf in front of him was doing at the moment.

Chazz crouched down and bore his teeth again. His muscles readied and he prepared himself. Yami braced himself, stepping back only once. Then the wolf launched himself. They collided in a tangle of fur and pale limbs. Yugi almost moved forward to intervene. Jonouchi stood up on his tiptoes, excited as he tried to see more.

Steam was rising in the air. The two of them rolled now. And then Chazz yelped and reeled back. He was bleeding across his cheek. And Yami was shaking himself out. His ears flicked. And, to Yugi's relief, the canine did not seem harmed in any manner. When Chazz ran at him again, the two rolling in the snow once more, it took only seconds later for them to disengage.

Chazz yelped again. Yami moved away from him for a few paces. The canine in front of him was struggling for his paws. Yugi stared at Yami in open shock. The black wolf glanced at him. His tail wagged in the most minute fashion. Then he looked to his challenger again. The gray wolf was bleeding hideously. His flank was torn. His throat was slicked with blood. Much of his white fur was laden with red. His ear was split and caked with blood. His muzzle was covered in red and brown. His eyes were wide, startled. But he looked infuriated more than anything. Yami raised and wagged his tail slowly.

There was a long minute of stillness.

The two of them stared at one another, stiff and frozen in the snow.

Yugi had the impression that, for the briefest of moments, the two of them were like large plush figures more than anything else. He could see the way they both sized each other up, however. Their eyes were mirroring in expression. They looked hateful of each other. The wolves blinked at each other. Yami appeared more or less amused. Chazz was clearly infuriated.

When the gray wolf lunged forward, Yami stiffened. His muscles locked beneath his dense fur. His dark muzzle was lowered towards the snow. His lips pulled back to show brilliant white teeth. His ears pricked forward. Blood made his whiskers cake to his cheeks. His dorsal cape rose with ferocity. He stood on long, thin legs. His shoulders became squared. And his haunches became bunched in preparation to leap as well.

Chazz collided with him in a full frontal assault. The impact knocked him a couple of inches back. But he had failed to throw him from his paws. Even where they skid through the snow, he did not falter. And, as Yami looked back at him, he wished he was capable of smiling as keenly as a wolf as he was capable a human. Instead he pricked his ears forward and watched him for a moment, perfectly still even as Chazz snapped at his cheek.

Yami was used to this deathly calm that claimed his senses, however. It was not a question of where it came from or what it was. He had always known this emotion, in all reality. Even when his mother had turned her teeth on him at a young age, so soon upon his eyes opening, he had known it. Even when he'd been initially attacked and viciously picked at by the boars while Fuwa and Marik watched, he'd known it in some way.

And he saw the clear alarm in Chazz now as he noticed it too. Fear was not something that came to Yami naturally in a fight. He had always strived—and succeeded more often than not—to keep his head clear. If he was calm, he had better control and no one got hurt too terribly. But he could see the growing fear in the other wolf in front of him. He understood that as well. Most wolves were fearful in fights—or perhaps more vicious than usual.

But Yami saw his own reflection in Chazz's enlarged pupils. His red gaze was clear, calmer than ever. His ears were pricked forward. He was statuesque in his reflection. And, as Yami studied it for a moment, a new thought occurred to him. Chazz was aware that Yami could kill him. That was why he was so scared and lashing out as he was…

The black wolf shoved this thought away. He would not kill him. He would not even truly cripple him…

He was just a young wolf that had come across something much more capable than he himself was. He was standing before an opponent at a caliber that he might never meet. As such, Yami would teach him a lesson that would not break him entirely.

Yami turned his head. His mouth opened wide. His jaws parted in a scissoring formation of bright enamel. And, as Chazz panicked and attempted to bite upon his scruff, the black wolf ducked his head. It was a rather dirty technique, he supposed, though he could not quite find it within himself to care too much about it.

Yami snapped his jaw shut. Chazz screamed. Bones popped.

The gray wolf released him. Yami shook his head, dragging him off balance by the shoulder. Then he released, allowing him to stumble forward and fall into the snow. The black wolf stared back at him. And then he shook himself out, stepped forward, and slammed his muzzle into his shoulder. Chazz teetered sideways, then fell into a heap of weak limbs with a piercing yelp.

Yami shook himself out again. Blood was a deep scar across his features. His cheeks were slicked with it. He could feel it caking his mouth. But Yami could not find it within himself to care as much as he might have otherwise. He licked his lips, stepped forward, and watched glass blackened eyes stare back at him in alarm. His pupils were vibrating, but Yami could see his reflection without problem. His eyes were still blank, boring into Chazz's effortlessly and without relief of any kind.

Chazz scrambled for his paws in a panic. His eyes were huge, his ears flattened against his skull. Blood drizzled from his shoulder and left leg where Yami had crushed it. He was holding it off the ground slightly, as if he could not bear to put weight upon it. It was a sign of weakness that another would have taken advantage of. However, the black wolf simply flicked his ears.

There was a stubborn ferocity in Chazz's eyes, however. As Yami watched, his eyes became colder and more aggressive than ever. The wolf stared unblinkingly and the gray wolf lunged for his throat. Yami might have commended his courage had he not been shaking so visibly. Instead the black wolf opened his jaws, narrowing his eyes. He blinked, wagged his tail once, and curled his lips back to show his teeth. Against the gray wolf's pupils, Yami's incisors and canines were like brilliant white swords.

They collided in a mass of dark gray and black and white fur.

Snow rose into and flew through the air in a rush.

They rolled for a long minute or so.

Then they snarled and spat at each other.

Blood flew through the air. A tuft of black fur fell to the snow. Yami felt a bitter sting in his cheek. But it was Yugi who reacted. The small teen had stiffened. His head was tipped up a fraction. His eyes had darkened. His fingers twitched. And then he shifted his weight as if he might come forward before pressing himself back. He steeled himself as if he might be unable to do more. And then another tuft of fur came through the air. A wide spray of blood soaked the snow. And then they separated again.

His cheek was stripped of fur behind his muzzle, Yugi noted. But Yami looked incredibly unharmed otherwise. The blood across his muzzle was not his own, he knew. And the way his red eyes glinted so emotionlessly was bewildering to Yugi for a brief second. But then the wolf shook himself out. The cut on his leg made the limb almost fold beneath him for a split second. And then he raised his head.

Chazz lunged.

Yami jumped over him.

Then the black wolf spun on him. He aimed for the shoulder as he might have before. Chazz was knocked off balance, falling into the thick snow. He rolled to his feet. And Yami lowered his head towards his throat. His eyes were locked on the younger wolf's. His lips were pulled back. His ears were pricked forward. He did not raise his tail. He did not blink.

Not a word passed his lips. Yet Chazz was frozen, terrified.

Neither of them moved but to breathe. Then Yami's eyes narrowed a fraction further. And, finally, he flicked his tongue over his nose almost aggressively. Chazz stared back defiantly, moving to growl low in his throat now. Yugi could barely hear the noise. His heart was too loud in his chest. And he stiffened when Yami peeled his lips back further.

"Yami," Yugi muttered.

The world turned to him before he had even managed to form his lips into the second syllable of his name. his head turned and his tail wagged parallel to his spine in clear friendship. He trotted over to him without a second glance at Chazz. The display was enough to make several of the other wolves look up with wide eyes. Yami ignored this, however. They were clearly confused and startled, stunned by the singular speed he had shown in his reaction. Simply the way that he had turned so swiftly upon hearing his voice had made it clear his loyalty existed solely in the manner of aiding the other male.

Yugi gestured him closer. Yami hesitated a few inches from him, then flicked and flattened his ears to his skull. Then he lowered his head and moved forward. He hesitated a moment, huffed loudly, and came to a stop a couple of inches from the lycanthrope in question. The small teen crouched down to part his fur to show his skin, digging through the long strands. He found the shallowest cut along his leg, near his large paw. The wolf allowed him to lightly prod upon his wound. The skin was just barely split, the blood soft and caked there.

The small teen nearly sighed with relief, instead looking the wolf over again for a moment. He seemed tired, the way the red-eyed teen blinked towards him. His ears pricked forward, then flicked back and forth for a moment. The wolf stared up at him curiously, wagged his tail again, and then searched his face with that same scrutinizing manner he always looked at him with.

Yugi smiled slightly, reaching out to ruffle the hair between his ears. He wondered vaguely if the others were shocked, if perhaps they might grow upset due to Yami's victory. And he prepared himself to leap forward should anything happen to make them inclined towards fighting him.

"Chazz, enough," the other alpha snapped. It was enough to make Yami's head snap around and his ears prick forward. He turned away from Yugi entirely, though Yugi kept his hands on his shoulders and ruffled his fur lightly as he straightened again. The gray wolf was struggling for his feet, bristling and upset. The clear disdain in his eyes made Yugi bristle, for a moment ready to lunge forward and attack him in retaliation.

But then the seconds passed. And the wolf seemed to look at Yami for a long enough time that he slowly lost his anger. He flattened his ears against his head, snarling, and took a seat with a pointed stare upon the snow bathed red around him.

Yugi was bewildered as he looked at his alpha again. Yami was not paying his challenger any attention, nor was he looking towards Yugi either. He had turned his head away entirely, sniffing at the air in the general direction of the pack. Then he snorted loudly and looked away to rub his muzzle against the snow. Yugi wondered if it was meant to be an intimidation tactic of some kind. It was a curious one if it was, though he considered the message was incredibly clear—Yami was not threatened by them. If they thought to fight him again, he'd do it with just as much ease now as he had Chazz.

He was so caught up in this idea that he missed the first handful of words when Yami turned back to him. When Yugi blinked at him, staring stupidly and unable to think straight for a moment, the black wolf tipped his head to the side. I think that they will request to see the camp soon, yes? He flicked his ear curiously after a moment.

"That's fine." Yugi was dismissive and somewhat curt when he said that. But then his head turned to Jonouchi, a slightly annoyed glare coming through his eyes. He watched him for a moment or so, then turned back to his alpha. "But you and I have to have a talk, you know. We have a lot that we need to discuss before we go back there."

Yami flicked an ear and tilted his head curiously. Is it bad? The black wolf hesitated, wondering if he heard the better translation of his true question—Did I do something wrong? The thought of having done something was bewildering to him. He did not know what it was that he could have done that was not required of him. He flattened his ears against his head when Yugi did not answer him.

"Jonouchi, go ahead and lead them back to the camp, all right? Get Chazz checked up on and—"

The blond shook his head with narrowed eyes. "But I—"

Your alpha just gave you an order, Yami spat at him, startling the two wolves enough to make them look at him with mirroring expressions of pure shock. You will do as he says and take them to the camp as directed, understood?

Yugi blinked, something in his mind clawing briefly at the surface. His insides felt cold, all but hollow, and he turned his head slowly towards his best friend with narrowed eyes. The blond had immediately cringed and nodded, turning quickly to the pack in question. The smaller teen glanced at his alpha, mildly bewildered, but Yami was glaring at the blond as if he might further argue and give him reason to bite his head off.

Yugi swallowed hard, stunned by the way Yami glared so openly. And then he shrugged it off. Sympathy came to him first, then avid frustration that made his blood hot in his veins. Jonouchi would have ignored him had Yami not spoken up. The realization made him want to snarl. Jonouchi was listened to Yami rather than him.

"Have Ishizu take a look at his cuts," Yugi said slowly, voice low with growing anger. "And make sure that no one does anything stupid. Tell Obelisk and Slifer that should anything happen, the two of them shall isolate it before it gets any further than a squabble. I do not care if it's nothing more than an argument. Have them put an end to it immediately."

Yami flicked his ears and turned to Yugi curiously. He craned his neck back and peered up at his face, tilting his head. But Yugi ignored him and the black wolf wondered if he had truly done something that he should not have. It seemed odd to him, however, that the small teen might be so upset with him and not explain himself…

Jonouchi scowled at him when Yami glanced between them. Then he nodded brusquely and turned on his heel to lead them away. In an instant Yugi turned back to him and Yami hesitated before considering him from the corner of his eye. Yugi looked frustrated, not angry enough to lash out or truly start a fight that might end terribly…

Yami tipped his muzzle up further and ran his tongue over Yugi's chin before backing away. A part of him was both anxious and flustered. But the other was calm even as he took a seat several paces away from the small teen. He only hoped that neither of them said anything that might lead to an altercation of any kind. But, as Yami looked at him, he had to wonder, because Yugi's eyes were growing further angry rather than calming in the slightest…

"Why the hell did he go to get you?" he demanded frostily, cutting through whatever friendly atmosphere might have been able to develop between them again. Yami flattened his ears and lowered his head slightly, hoping that the submissive stance might do well to help calm Yugi's anger. He did not think that they would be okay at the end of this conversation if Yugi did not calm somewhat. And, perhaps, if he were the one to take on a submissive role, Yugi would relax. "I could have handled Chazz on my own. So why did he go all the way back to the camp to find you like that?"

Yami did not like the way that he stared at him so angrily. It made a part of him rear up in retaliation, upset by his anger towards him. But another part of him was quivering with growing distress. He forced himself to relax, pricking his ears forward as he tilted his head. I do not think that he believed that you would be able to deal with them if something should have happened, he answered reluctantly after a long moment had passed. The frustration in Yugi's eyes seemed to simply grow. I think that he believed that you would have succumbed beneath the pressure should it have escalated any further.

"Wow, that's great," Yugi said wryly, annoyed as he shook his head and narrowed his eyes. "So even Jonouchi thinks I'm weak then. That's awesome."

Yami stayed silent for a moment. Then he blinked and narrowed his eyes in turn. Many of the wolves are upset with your absence, he said slowly, reluctance biting at his insides. Yugi was most likely going to lose his temper with him before anything was resolved. He flattened his ears against his skull again, resisting the urge to whimper pleadingly. I think that they believe that you are not going to return to the camp anytime soon. Aki is furious with you for sending Jonouchi to relay that message and none of them are quite happy to see me instead of you. A couple of the others have begun to question whether you are truly Atem when they believe you simply hide away more often than not. And more than one has grown suspicious that maybe you are simply lying but Obelisk and Slifer have argued with them due to it. They have stood by you in regards of this argument. But I must say that my return has done you little justice. A lot of them are more interested in the fact that I have fought them in order to retain my rank among them. They are not interested in following you or anything that you might have to say…

"So, then basically, they're more likely to believe in you than they are me?" Yugi spat softly, eyes blazing. His head tilted towards him with darkened eyes, glaring at him after a moment. His expression was far more frustrated than Yami had ever truly seen it before, something that unnerved him more than he wished to admit. "So Jonouchi ran off to find you because he doesn't think that I can handle anything, huh?"

I did not say that.

"No, but you might as well have! Are you seriously going to tell me that that's not what you mean? Are you seriously going to tell me that you don't believe that that's why he went and got you like that?"

Yami flicked an ear. I do not know why you are angry with me.

Yugi faltered, head snapping towards him with his mouth opened for a brief second. Then he snapped it shut, reached up to grab at his hair unhappily, and shook his head with a flustered expression on his face. He turned away quickly, chin tucked into his own collarbone for a moment as he drew in a deep breath. "I'm not upset with you," he answered slowly. "I'm upset in general, because I didn't even think about how the pack might react to you or anything like that."

The black wolf flattened his ears after a moment and then pricked them forward again before curling his lips back uncomfortably. I am sorry, he said after a deep breath. He looked away and glanced over his shoulders and back with a somewhat mournful expression as if he were too uncomfortable to understand. I did not mean to upset you, Yugi. I was just answering your questions.

"I know. And I'm sorry, Yami. I didn't mean to snap at you. But I'm still pissed. I can't believe I overlooked it the entire time." He ran a hand through his hair and huffed out a deep breath. Then he shook his head and narrowed his eyes into slits. The lycanthrope reached up to scratch lightly at the column of his throat, eyes sharpening for a brief moment once more. "I didn't even think that they would start to doubt me if I was gone for a while. I…"

Yami did nothing more than shake his head. It doesn't matter. It will be sorted out again. It is easy to regain their trust. You will simply have to try again and reassure them that you are Code Name Atem now. You will have to make them understand and reassert your ability to lead them when the time comes. But for now there isn't a window to do such, he answered softly. He flicked an ear and then turned away again with his eyes on the snow once more. It was hard to face him when he looked so dejected now. I think that you will have the opportunity sooner rather than later. But I do not think that it will be today or tomorrow either.

"He shouldn't have dragged you out here though," Yugi said quietly, shaking his head and narrowing his eyes angrily. "You shouldn't have been bothered about the stupid thing to begin with. He should have let me handle it—"

But you are the alpha, not the beta, Yami interrupted, turning to him now with dark eyes. He flicked his ears, pricked them forward as he stared up at him, and then tilted his head slightly to the side with growing amusement. You do not know the politics within wolf packs, nor the implications that come with them, but the situation was handled as it truly should have been, Yugi. In the case of a beta challenging the alpha of another pack, it is mandatory that the beta go through the ranks in order to challenge them. If they do not do this, it is considered a type of treason that they are likely to be killed for in retaliation. It is something that could have potentially led to a lot more in the subject of punishment. Had any of the others within the pack been there, they could have easily simply attacked and killed him.

Yugi stared at him, then reached up to run a hand through his hair again. He shook his head and swallowed hard as they looked at one another. "So, if Jonouchi hadn't potentially singled you out to deal with it and the others found out later, they would have killed him?"

Yami nodded slightly, narrowing his eyes. Yes. He could easily have had his throat ripped out in penalty.

"Then why didn't his alpha stop him from doing it?"

Probably because Chazz is in the same strain as Marik himself was. It would not surprise me in the least to find that the alpha has grown exasperated with him for some reason that might leave him inclined to allow him to be punished by another pack of wolves. Perhaps he would not have let him die, but would have at least allowed him to be hurt and punished in turn. I do not imagine that he truly would have left him to die, however.

The smaller teen hesitated for a long moment, staring at the wolf in front of him. Then he faltered, mouth opening and closing once before he grimaced. Yami blinked up at him and narrowed his eyes unhappily.

"You think that that's what Annie did when I was fighting Marik that day in the woods?"

Yami blinked and flicked his ears lazily for a moment. I would believe so, he answered slowly, though then he tilted his head and shifted his weight uncomfortably. Yugi noticed him raise his wounded paw slightly from the ground. If I should know who Annie is?

The teen looked over in surprise, tilting his head and furrowing his brows. "Oh, you don't…" He ran a hand through his hair and watched his face for a moment. "Annie was the leader of the pack, the one who killed herself…for me."

The black wolf nodded slowly. I see.

Yugi tilted his head, watching him closely before he stepped closer. He moved to crouch in front of him, searching his face and studying him briefly. He reached his hands out to run his fingers through his fur, despite the way it seemed slick and stringy in certain spots and yet short and crusted in others. "Are you okay? You're holding your paw up."

Yami looked at it curiously for a moment. Then he flexed his toes to show his long claws and lowered the appendage to the snow again. He paused, shifted his weight again, and then slowly lifted it once more as he raised his head to look towards him curiously. I am fine. It stings a little, but it does not truly hurt beyond that. I am not worried about it. I will clean it later when I have returned to the camp.

Yugi shook his head slowly, flustered for a brief moment. "No, no, let me check it out. I can stop the bleeding right now," he muttered softly, searching the wolf's face for a split second and swallowing hard. "I can go ahead and pack it with ice. That might help it heal a little faster too, right?"

Yami was quiet for a long moment before shifting his weight and moving slightly forward. His red eyes flickered across Yugi's face and then lowered to the snow. If you would like to do so, then I will not object, he said slowly, staring at the ice crystals around them as he shifted his weight again.

When he lifted his paw as Yugi reached for it, the small teen looked him over for a moment. He had the sudden urge to pull the large canine closer, to wrap his arms around him comfortably and snuggle into his fur despite its coarse state. He didn't care for even a second about the thin bone structure beneath his taut skin or the way that he could feel every little part of his skeleton there. He licked his lips and took his paw gingerly into his hand, resting it within his palm comfortably for a moment.

"Do you mind if I touch it?"

In another situation he might have blushed and sputtered and been embarrassed that the words have ever left his mouth to begin with. In this one he simply felt stupid for his phrasing but did not care to say anything else. So, as Yami nodded and did not look over again, Yugi lowered his fingers to prod at the skin along his paw. He touched each toe, pulled and pressed upon them to make them flex, and then looked over the shiny keratin nails which glittered in his eye. He shook his head slightly, stretching his paw further before slowly sorting through the soft fur to find the source of the cut altogether.

"Any pain?"

No.

"Good."

---

Yugi flipped the page of his notebook and began to write a new note on the white surface. He frowned slightly and shook his head as he flipped his pencil back and forth in his fingers. He considered it and tilted his head, erasing the newest statement to rewrite the words there as well. He lay his notebook across his thighs and flipped his pencil again as he tilted his head and narrowed his eyes with a frown. The lycanthrope shifted his weight and reread the phrase he'd been copying down again. He began to write another note, grimacing slightly as he shook his head.

It didn't matter. The worksheet he'd been looking at before was hardly anything he cared for. The truth of the matter was that he did not have even the slightest care in the world for his homework. He had made it a point to do as much of his make-up work as he possibly could. He had gotten every single assignment and quiz that he could get from his teachers in the meantime. He had set about getting to work on it the moment that he'd come home.

He'd been late getting back to the house, because he'd examined Yami's paw instead of even considering coming back earlier than absolutely necessary. He'd searched every little inch of it, had studied it pointedly. And then he'd settled back and wandered home again. And when Yugi had come inside, his mom had looked up from checking on that dog in the kennel behind the desk. They'd looked at one another for only a second, but it was enough to imprint her disappointment in him. And he had quickly fled up the stairs in a panic to take a seat on his bed and work on recovering his schoolwork.

Now he had finished his first study guide but not the latter handful of assignments. He felt sick for a moment as he sat there, eyes locked on the white paper in front of him. He reached up to run his hands through his hair and narrowed his gaze. Then he flipped his pencil in his fingers and happily caught it again. His mouth was dry as he looked the worksheet over. The teacher had mentioned that he was not to write on the paper, that he would have to write the questions down on a separate sheet and then answer them beneath.

So Yugi had done just that, shaking his head in annoyance at the very idea. He frowned and flipped through his biology study guide once more. He did not care in the slightest to actually get it all done. It was hardly something he wondered about in the first place. The lycanthrope flipped his pencil again, quickly writing the next question in the notebook.

"So why were you late?"

Yugi blinked and looked up in confusion, head tipping upwards at the door. He froze in place, eyes wide and mouth half-open in shock at the sight. He had not even noticed for the smallest of seconds that she had come up from the clinic as it was. He was frozen for a brief moment, swallowing hard and staring at his mother with wide eyes.

"I…I was busy with something," he finally answered. He hadn't taken that long to get there in the first place. He had had to deal with Chazz's challenge. And then he'd checked on Yami and they'd spoken for a while longer. But it was not too long that it had taken him to return to the house. He frowned and tilted his head as he looked up at her. "Why?"

"I thought you were going to be trying to come home on time for a few days. I'm pretty sure I heard something like that when you'd spoken to Jonouchi on the phone before, right?" Kasumi stated in a somewhat cold, almost bitter tone. "Or did I just hear that wrong?"

Yugi was quiet for a long moment. "No, you heard right. I just wasn't expecting anything to have happened and something did."

She snorted and shook her head at him with darkened eyes. "Oh, so something came up then? Do you want to tell me what it is that happened?"

The small teen hesitated, then reached up and ran a hand through his hair after a long moment. He grimaced and tilted his head slightly as they stared at each other. "I had to help Yami do something," he answered simply, watching her and frowning. "He needed my help with a few things and I went to do that."

Kasumi was frozen in place for a long second. Then she narrowed her eyes and watched him with her head tilted and her mouth set in a firm clench. She shook her head and frowned at him with a shake of her head once more. "Help with what?" she demanded rather sharply. "I mean, why would you help him when he's already caused you so much pain as it is?"

Yugi blinked and shook his head. "He hasn't ever hurt me," he answered slowly. But he hesitated after a long second and then grimaced. He thought of the red-eyed wolf as he'd sat in front of him there, his expression patient and ears pricked forward as he'd tilted his head and watched him curiously. "And I would do a lot for him if he needed me to. If he needs help, I'll provide it. It's not a hard thing to understand, Mom. You would do the same for Dad."

She startled, blinking and then narrowing her eyes as she processed the statement. Then she drew in a deep breath, shaking her head slightly. "What do you actually know about Yami, Yugi?" she said quietly. "Because I don't think you know nearly enough to want to show him loyalty like that."

The small teen blinked, then tilted his head. "I know enough to know that I will always offer him help if he needs it." He paused and then snorted softly with a roll of his eyes and shake of his head. "You can't tell me that you know better than I do where he's concerned. And I don't care what you have to say about him if it's not something better than that."

His mother scowled at him, shaking her head more persistently. "You can't really believe that for even a second," she snapped quietly. "I don't understand how you could feel something for someone you barely know."

"You didn't exactly know Dad very well when you got pregnant. If I remember right, it was almost a one night-stand and the only reason it wasn't is because he followed you when you ran." He paused after a moment, opening and closing his mouth and then shaking his head slowly. "Look, Mom, you can say whatever you want. I'll even let you give me whatever advice you want, but I'm not going to listen to it. You don't know the half of what's going on."

Kasumi sighed loudly, reaching up to rub at the bridge of her nose. "You're being stupid about this, Yugi."

"Then I guess I'm an idiot. But it doesn't matter. I'm going to help him regardless of anything you say."

I am so sorry for this, guys. But things have changed yet again. This time, however, it is a lot more stressful and more involved than I would like to admit. Regardless, it impacts a lot more than just this story and its updates. A problem has arisen in my workplace and circumstances HAVE pushed me to focus more on this matter than anything else. So, because of this, I have NO IDEA when I will be able to post again. This story will especially be on hiatus, considering its longer and more complicated plot and various twists. I do not believe that I will even be able to post after the start of the new year. I may be able to get something up before or after that time frame, but I honestly HIGHLY doubt it. The hiatus absolutely WILL be temporary, but for now I can't make any plans on when to update or give definitive dates. Again, I'm super sorry about this.

Feel free to reach out to me via PM on or through comments on AO3 if you have any questions. I can't always promise to answer immediately, but I WILL try to do so as quickly as possible.