Italics indicate thinking


Yuki's POV

With our trip to The Arcadia Movement becoming a total disaster we were back to square one, with Akiza needing to go to the hospital I was starting to get stressed out, but now we had gathered most of the Signer in one place, we were just missing the unknown fifth and Yusei. I hadn't realized that Akiza was so important, apparently, she's the daughter of some senator so now that he was here things were only getting more complicated.

"Three Signers are in the same place, how cool." Leo said.

"We're the same…" Luna looked through the class as Akiza who was out cold and her mother crying over here "But there's nothing we can do. Nothing will get though to her heart."

"We're not all that similar." Jack said "Aside from these marks we know nothing about one another and we don't seem eager to learn either."

"Strange coming from you who's always been the most abrasive of the bunch." I commented.

He clicked his tongue at me "Still…if I know him, there may be a way to open her heart."

"Then let's stop sitting around and call him." I said "You wanna bring up the idea or should I? Let's send for Yusei."

I've read her memories…she's had a hard life not just because of her powers, Yusei is the only person she briefly opened up to when they dueled, even when I talked to her I didn't feel like we bonded as much as I would have liked.

The Senator, Akiza's father, took a helicopter to the Satellite to go plead with Yusei to try and help Akiza. I saw no reason it couldn't work, but getting Yusei here would be the easy part.

"I can't help but wonder." I walked around Akiza's room "Would she have been better off staying in a home she felt unloved in?"

"What do you mean?" Cleo asked me.

"It's just at least there she wasn't an experiment for someone like Sayer, I feel like this girl, no matter what path she had chosen, was never able to be happy." I frowned "It's sad…so sad."

"Our lives are a series of choices and moments that led us to this point, changing just one thing would make us different." Cleopatra said "There's no way to change the past so it's best to accept it as it is."

"Even know I feel like she's not living her own life, because she's always waiting on someone else to make a choice for her, her parents, Sayer…Yusei." I frowned "She's become so use to being dependent on others that she's poisoned her own free will. I feel bad, she's laid up in bed and all I'm doing is berating her."

"It's fine, it's healthy to vent frustrations." Cleopatra told me "Hmm?"

She turned back when the door opened and Yusei entered with the others.

"Welcome back." I walked passed him "You're up."

"Hmm." He nodded and went over to the bed "Akiza…"

All he did was wipe off a single tear and she woke right up.

"Yusei?" she sat up "You came to…"

She seemed fine until she saw her parents and immediately had another breakdown.

"Why are you here?!" she snapped "I don't need you, I have Sayer and-no he…NO!"

"Sayer said I wouldn't have to think like this anymore!" she yelled "He would do it for me!"

"Are you even listening to yourself?!" Cleopatra snapped at her.

"You aren't helping." I hissed.

"You don't understand, he gave me a place to belong, something people like them never did." She yelled "Now it's gone and you're all here just to laugh at me! FINE! I'll show you what I really am, just a monster!"

"Akiza stop it." Yusei tried to get her to calm down "You're not the only one hurting here."

"You're the one who said that Signers, friends, would show me the way right." She hissed "You must be my enemy too, just here to laugh at me like the rest! THIS IS YOUR FAULT!"

"HMPH!" I put my hand up to block a psychic wave that knocked furniture across the room.

"Fine, if the only way to reach you is by dueling than that's fine with me." Yusei strapped his disk on.

"That's right, we're destined to fight." Akiza glared "We're not friends."

"No…this duel will prove we are friends." Yusei told her.

"Stay behind me." I told the others "If any attacks go wide I'll take care of it."

The duel started and Akiza had the upper hand quickly, before her second turn was over she'd summoned her Black Rose Dragon and boosted it with an equip card.

"See the way they look at me, it's just like back then." Akiza said "To them I'm just a monster!"

The one who really needs to get her to open her heart isn't Yusei…but her parents.

In the end it was a combination of both, but soon Akiza was freed from the shackles of her past and ready to work with the others.


AN

Thank you for reading. Feedback is appreciated. Feel free to message me any questions or concerns.

Till Next Time!