Holeshipping (Marik Ishtar/Kaiba Seto/Yami no Yugi)

. . .

"All I'm saying is that if you activated that, you're just leaving yourself open to like five different staple traps that everyone runs..."

"Don't fucking exaggerate, Mutou, you and I both know three of those five you're thinking of are limited releases and most people proxy them—which you can't proxy during my tournaments so that's an invalid argument—"

"Okay, but that's still two different traps that people might have three each of and you're just leaving yourself wide open."

"Who the hell is going to run three of the same trap, what kind of bullshit deck building strategy is that?"

Marik took a long sip from his milkshake, eyes flickering back and forth between the two young men on either side of him, across the cafe table from each other. Wrappers and baskets now emptied of food balanced precariously at the very edge of the table, shoved aside to make room for a crumpled, overly creased duel mat from a structure deck on Yugi's side and a nicely laid out official KC playmat on Kaiba's side.

Cards were spread out on both sides as the pair of them glared at or examined each other's cards. Every now and then Yugi—or, rather, the pharaoh—would reach across the table in an attempt to point at something on Kaiba's side, and Kaiba would snatch the card away before the pharaoh could touch it.

"But if you're playing a casual duel, then people are gonna proxy; are you telling me you're not built to handle casual play too?" the pharaoh said, raising an eyebrow.

"There's no such thing as casual," Kaiba said. "My deck is built to win, and it will win."

"Except against me, right?"

"Shut up, Mutou."

Marik tried his best to keep his face straight, but honestly, he could hardly keep the grin from spreading. He tightened his jaw around the straw of his milkshake instead to try and hold his expression. This was the most surreal thing, he thought vaguely. Barely three months ago, he had been trying to kill at least one person at this table. Now here he was in a cafe in Japan watching them argue over deck building.

"Okay, but if you don't buff this set of cards with some support, then there's really no point in having them," the pharaoh said.

"Don't talk to me about support; you're the one who won't stick to a fucking archetype. How the hell are Celtic Guardian and Mystical Elf helpful?"

"Excuse you," the pharaoh said, crimson eyes narrowing. "Celtic Guardian and Mystical Elf are veryimportant, thank you."

"Oh really? And Kuriboh is too, I guess?"

"Of course!"

"How? Explain your almighty pharaoh reasoning."

"Aesthetic."

"Whatfucking aesthetic? Your cards don't even match!"

The laugh snorted out of Marik's throat with the taste of milkshake and suddenly both eyes were flickering towards him.

"What?" Kaiba said, glaring. "Have something to share?"

"Nothing," Marik said. "Was just thinking that the sexual tension's getting pretty thick in here."

He was not disappointed with their reaction, as immediately both faces went a perfectly bright red.

"Marik—how couldyou," the pharaoh said, looking actually a little bit offended.

"What the actual fuck, Ishtar," Kaiba said, his face even redder than the pharaoh's.

Marik just shrugged and went back to sipping at his milkshake. He just called it like he saw it, after all...

. . .

A/N: I'm not sorry. Next is Hikarishipping (Yugi x Marik x Ryo).