'Anesan?' Yugi, who had retaken control when she had gotten to her seat, quietly asked over the bond as she felt her older sister snap to attention and mentally turn towards the bathroom.

'I need to check something.' Without another word the Pharaoh took the ghostly form and moved towards the bathroom. Yugi watched her phase through the wall and tried not to frown, since no one else would know what she was looking at.

'What's wrong?' She pestered her twin, wondering what the Pharaoh had sensed that she had not.

'I thought I sensed Shadows.' Meisa informed her, 'But the only one around is Katsuya.'

The teen in question looked stressed as he entered the classroom and Yugi's heart dropped when he would not look at her. She tried to get his attention, to ask what had happened, but he blanked her and headed straight for his seat, where he started quietly grumbling to Honda.

Yugi could not help but be worried that he was mad about what had happened between her and Otogi. She had not planned for the other teen to kiss her, and while she was not entirely comfortable with his actions, it certainly had not been as objectionable as the kiss Hirutani had forced on her. She would prefer to get to know Otogi better before it happened again, but if her friends got angry at her about it, maybe it was better if she stayed away from the other shop owner.

She felt the Pharaoh return to her place within the Puzzle and sighed, aware that her twin did not trust the new guy either. Not that it was an entirely unusual state of affairs. The older twin was highly protective of her, so anyone new who wanted to get close to her had to earn the Pharaoh's trust before the spirit would relax around them.

She did not really mind. Anesan was only looking out for her, and it was a level of protection from people who wanted to hurt her that she had not had before. However, as the Sensei walked in, she could not help but wonder what her friends were seeing about Otogi that she had missed.

Her nervousness did not improve when halfway through the morning, while the teacher's back was turned, a note went flying across the room from Honda's table to Anzu's. When the dancer read it, she glanced at Yugi, then pursed her lips and looked at Honda before nodding slightly.

'Okay, now I know something is up,' the Queen of Games whispered to her dark half, who separated out from her living half and tried to see at the note on Anzu's desk, only to find that the girl swept it off the desk into her bag before she could get a look. Anzu did glance up, startling the Pharaoh as she mouthed, 'later,' while directly looking at her.

The surprise from that hit Yugi hard, making her turn quickly enough to look over that her chair scraped on the floor, causing the teacher to turn around to tell her off. She ducked her head, pretending to focus on the classwork so she did not get detention and miss the first duelling club meeting.

Now aware that she was not necessarily as invisible as she was used to being, the Pharaoh contemplated seeing if she could listen in on Katsuya and Honda's conversations and decided against it. Trusting Anzu to keep her word regarding telling her later, she returned to the Puzzle to reassure her twin. 'Sorry for making you jump. Anzu saw me. I didn't realize she could, or I would have been prepared for it. She promised she would tell us what's going on later, so I doubt they're mad at you.'

She felt the worry inside her Imoto fade away at that. She knew Akhenaden's words still bounced around her younger twin's head. The threat that all of her friends would abandon her now they had what they wanted out of her frequently tormented the light-soulled girl, who was almost as afraid of being alone again as her dark-soulled twin was. Not that their friends knew that. While Katsuya and Kaiba, of all people, had heard Akhenaden's snap after the duel, the blonde seemed to think that Imoto had shrugged it off, while Kaiba had not actually been to school since Duelist Kingdom, so they had not had a chance to talk to him.

Not that they particularly wanted to talk to the former World Champion, but both she and Imoto were fully aware that Kaiba had wanted to discuss 'payment' for their assistance during Duelist Kingdom, and she could not help but wonder if the CEO had forgotten. Not that it mattered right now, when their friends were acting so weird.

When the lunch bell rang, Katsuya, Anzu, and Honda shot out of the classroom before Yugi could get further than getting to her feet. The Spirit of the Puzzle followed them, able to ghost through walls and people to keep up, but Yugi quickly lost them in the lunch rush between the time it took her to get out of the classroom and into the hallway full of students on their way to the canteen.

The smaller teen tried her best to catch up with the others, darting and weaving between her schoolmates, wanting to catch up so she could find out why her friends were acting so oddly, but only made it as far as a couple of classrooms down before she was barged into hard enough to go tumbling into the wall, where someone grabbed her hair and yanked her into the girls' bathroom.


The three teens and the ghost chasing them slipped outside, to somewhere they could talk privately, and then and only then did they stop.

"Okay, I think we lost Yugi." Honda grimaced, not particularly happy about having to do so.

Anzu's eyes flickered briefly over towards the shadowy specter who was leaning against the nearest wall, watching them, then nodded. "She's probably back near the classrooms, so what's this about?"

"Before I start, you can't tell Yuge." Katsuya ran a hand through his hair, worry clear in every millimeter of his body language. "Not yet anyway."

Meisa frowned slightly as Anzu gave him a confused look. "Why?"

"Because if that… that asshole finds out she knows, he's going to ruin her and Jii-san." Jou's fist slammed into the wall.

The Spirit of the Puzzle scowled at that, unhappy about someone threatening her family, as Honda cussed and Anzu let out a soft sigh.

"I promise. Who is it? Kaiba again?" the dancer asked, her tapping foot the only sign of her irritation as she watched the shadowy form of the Spirit of the Puzzle straighten suddenly and turn towards the school entrance but not move otherwise.

"No, Otogi." The duelist shook his head, his tone full of venom. "He's up to something and he needs Yugi for it."

"What did he say exactly?" Honda pressed, thinking.

"He wants to ruin someone's life, and apparently it's not mine or Yugi's," he huffed, "but he threatened to get me kicked out of school and in trouble with the cops if I interfere, and if I turn Yuge against him, he's going to screw her and Jii-san too. Apparently he's a rich prick and he knows how to use it."

"Okay, so do we know who he's trying to ruin?" Anzu pressed. "I mean, the only person we know who's rich and regularly antagonizes people is Kaiba, and…"

"It's Jii-san," Jou growled. "I'm pretty damn certain that Otogi's trying to mess with him through Yugi."

"Why would he mess with Ojiisan?" his right-hand huffed, pacing up and down, trying to think.

"Jii-san told me that he and Otogi's Otosan don't get on," he shared, still wishing he had an idea of how to deal with the asshole, "and Otogi's been buying Yuge gifts. Expensive gifts. That N64 in the living room?"

"He bought that?" Anzu squeaked, aware of how expensive games consoles were.

"Yeah. I'm thinking he's trying to get Yuge to like him so he can mess with Jii-san through her."

Anzu and Honda did not respond to that right away. It would make sense, and both of them were fully aware that the Mutous would do anything for each other. If Otogi messed with his granddaughter, it would upset Ojiisan greatly.

"And why can't we tell Yugi?" Honda snorted. "If he's going to mess with her and Ojiisan anyway?"

"Because there's a difference between messing with them and Otogi buying out the land the shop stands on and having the shop bulldozed." Both Anzu and Honda winced as Jou spat that out.

"Domino City belongs to Kaiba Corp," Anzu said slowly, thinking out loud, "so if he wants to buy it out from under the Mutous, he'd have to speak with Kaiba."

Jou ran a hand through his hair. "Yeah, and Rich-Boy hates Yuge."

"Kaiba owes Yugi a favour," Honda corrected Jou. "If we tell him what Otogi is up to, he's probably going to intervene, at least on that front, if only because he currently owes her for saving Mokuba's soul, right Anzu?"

Anzu did not answer, having been distracted by the Spirit of the Puzzle turning, looking at her and saying something, not that she could hear what, and then taking two steps towards the school before vanishing. "We need to get inside."

"What? Why?" Katsuya frowned, confused.

"Because something is wrong with Yugi." Anzu started in the direction of the doors.

Honda, who was aware she could sometimes see the Spirit of the Puzzle, suddenly realized that the blank spot on the wall Anzu had been keeping an eye on was in fact the ghostly half of their friend and started shoving Jou towards the doors. If Anzu was following Meisa inside, it was likely urgent.

Katsuya, a little out of the loop and rather confused, wisely just followed.


'Imoto!' Yugi heard her twin's worried call as the pain of being yanked about by her hair spiked through her and sensed the spirit was ready to jump back to her and take over but mentally shook her head.

'Stay with the others,' she managed to send across the bond before she was shoved from behind by whoever had grabbed her, causing her to stumble into the sinks. Her hip collided painfully with the ceramic before she bounced off, landing on the ground.

'You sure?' Worry, protectiveness, and anger pulsed along the bond as Meisa's desire to guard Yugi from harm warred with the younger twin's order to stay with their friends.

'We need to know what's going on.' The light-soulled girl tried to sound firm, despite the fact she was shaking physically as she stared at the ground, knowing far too well from far too many previous bullying incidents that if she looked directly at her attackers, they would consider it an act of defiance and make this so much worse then it had to be. 'Anzu…'

She cried out as suddenly a heavy, wide, high-heeled boot drove into her left ankle, hard, and pain seared through it. She tried to shuffle back, away from the girls, only to get dragged painfully to her feet by the biggest of them and slammed against the lavatory door.

'Anesan. Don't…don't come back yet.' The weight on her injured limb hurt drastically, but she tried not to show it. Having suffered worse in the Shadows against Pegasus, she found it easier than it once had been, clearly disappointing the heavy-set, brown-haired girl holding her in place and the tall, willowy, dark-haired girl that Yugi recognized as being from the classroom one over from hers and had been in the corridor when Otogi had kissed her this morning.

"Listen, slut." The willowy girl was clearly the ringleader, as she gestured and a third girl deliberately spread water over the floor, making it look like she had slipped. "Otogi is mine. I've already claimed him. Whatever you have with him, this ends now."

"I…" The Queen of Games did not get to speak before a fist drove into her stomach, winding her.

"I don't care what you have to say, Mutou." As she gasped for air, she felt her twin return to the Puzzle. She pushed back at the angry spirit, preventing her from grabbing control, not wanting to have to explain how these girls had gone nuts, even if it was in her defense. "Keep trying to steal Otogi from me, and I'll spread it around that you've been sleeping with him to get gifts."

Confusion pulsed through Yugi, then her eyes widened as she remembered that the willowy girl had been amongst those stood outside the clothes store next door when Otogi had brought her home on Saturday and dropped the huge bag of gifts off. "I haven't…"

A second blow to her stomach caused her to cough and gasp, breaking up any denials she could make and shattering her focus. The Spirit of the Puzzle seized control, deciding that this ended now, and she managed to break the bigger girl's grip by applying pressure to the right points on her wrists.

It was partly a mistake. The sudden need to put all of her weight on her feet caused the injured ankle to try to buckle, forcing her to try and catch herself as she tumbled. She managed to slip out from under the huge girl's attempts to re-grab her because of that, though, and was just starting to weave a Shadow Game to punish the three girls when the girl who had been planting water on the floor swung her school bag, at speed, directly into Meisa's head. The heavy, book-filled bag hit hard, driving her to the floor, dazed. The threads of the Shadow Game went skittering out of her grasp as she tried and failed to focus on the magic enough to finish her spell as the world spun around her.

"I'd say she wants to know how much worse it could be." The big girl snorted as she dragged her up by the collar. "What do you think?"

"I think you're right." The willowy girl smirked before turning to their accomplice. "What's the corridor like now?"

Yugi forced herself into control as the co-conspirator stated the halls were clear, and she managed to kick the bigger girl in the shin, causing her to let go. She stumbled out of the bathroom, instinctively trying to bolt for her friends despite the screaming protests of her ankle. Her body was lethargic and slow to respond through the ringing in her head and the pain spiking up her leg as she headed for the stairs, trying to get to where she would be safe.

She had just reached the top of the stairs when something shoved her from behind, hard enough to send her off balance and tumbling down the stairs, bashing head, back, and limbs repeatedly all the way down, the impact with the steps causing agony to spike through her left leg and arm as she tried to curl around the Puzzle, protecting it as best she could.

It was not enough. Once one piece jolted loose, excruciatingly tearing her soul and causing her to lose the bond with Meisa, the rest scattered, leaving a trail of golden pieces behind her as she finally came to a crashing halt against the ground floor's cold tiles, bloody, bruised, and broken.

The sounds of a familiar male voice shouting barely reached her through the constant buzzing in her head as she tried to push past the pain, past the feeling of a soul ripped into pieces, past the darkness trying to claim her, to see through the fog her vision had become and scoop up the scattered pieces of her most precious treasure despite the fact her left arm would not move.

She needed to put it back together. She needed to get her twin out of the Shadows. Nothing else mattered…

She could feel her entire body trembling as she tried to stand and her left leg objected viciously and shifted the wrong way at her ankle and just below her knee, causing her to swoon and nearly hit the floor again, only to find a trouser-clad leg interrupt her fall as she slumped into the side of a dark-haired male student.

"O…Otogi?" She barely made out, fading fast.

"I'm here." The concern in his voice was clear as he wrapped an arm around her, supporting her so she didn't fall further.

"P…Puzzle. Need… to complete… Puzzle…"

"I'll get the pieces. I promise." At his words she let herself slip into the painless black, trusting him to keep his word.


'So Duel Monsters started as Diaha, back in Egypt, and Crawford tapped into the power of the old Ka beasts that were used for Diaha when he created Duel Monsters?' Amane asked as she checked her bank account on her phone, noting that the check from Crawford had cleared, securing her future financially for about a decade.

'That's right. Ka beasts came from a part of people's souls. The stronger the soul, the more powerful the Ka beast. The Dark Magician was so powerful because he merged his full soul with his Ka beast so he could continue to serve his Pharaoh even after…' The Thief Queen stopped dead as she felt the world shatter around her.

She had only ever felt the world break into a million pieces once before, and she started swearing quietly to herself in Egyptian as she got to her feet quickly enough to send the chair clattering to the floor, then headed out the door, putting her hand over her chest as she entered the empty corridor. The Millennium Ring phased through the school uniform and into her hand and she grinned at the realization that her control of its powers had gotten so much finer since she had gotten into an alliance with her other self.

"Find Mutou Yugi," she ordered it as she held it out horizontally, wanting to know where the Pharaoh's Brat had disappeared to and what the hell had happened to cause the Puzzle to shatter. Thankfully the points on it all headed in the same direction, allowing her to hurry towards the brat without too much issue.

Noting the three girls that were heading away from the stairwell, she rushed over and glanced down to find gold pieces scattered everywhere and the Runt, bleeding, unconscious, and white as a sheet where she was not bruised, with her left leg bent at the wrong angle in two places and left arm hanging oddly, leant into one of the other students. Briefly ignoring the screaming of the demon to pick up the pieces, claim them for herself, and murder the brat, since a shattered Puzzle was completely worthless to her and she needed the girl to put it back together, she swept down the steps and knelt down by the boy.

"Who are you?" the teen demanded, watching her warily.

"I should be asking you that," she hissed back, not really caring but displeased with being questioned when it really did not matter who she was right now, "Go start gathering the Puzzle pieces, I'll sort her out."

There was a wariness in his expression, but once his eyes passed over her Ring, he nodded and shifted his grip, passing the injured girl to the spirit.

"Bloody hell, Runt. What did you do? Jump?" she grumbled as she laid the runt on the ground and straightened out the brat's limbs, many years of experience of having to heal her hosts pre-modern medicine allowing her to know when the joints were in alignment. Then she glanced at the boy. Since he still had his back turned and was not looking, she reached for her deck.

Under normal circumstances she would avoid being so blatant, but she needed to at least ensure the brat was going to be functional quickly if she wanted the Puzzle put back together any time soon. If she let the brat get rushed to hospital, there was a good chance she would not be coming out any time in the next couple of weeks. There was not much in her deck that could heal, but she knew her Landlord had put one card in. Pulling out five cards from her deck, she was pleased to see the card in question and confident that she could utilize the card she had pulled effectively. "I activate Emergency Provisions."

Tossing two magic cards away for the equivalent of 2000 life points, unwilling to let the Runt be taken down by anyone but her and to wait longer than necessary for the answers she had been promised, she felt the girl in her arms shudder and twitch as the magic started to heal her up.

"What the hell happened?" The Thief Queen's head snapped up at the sounds of the rest of the Pharaoh's Court arriving. Thankful she had not bothered to initiate her own illusion, allowing her to pretend to be Amane, she put on a worried expression as she answered.

"Someone pushed Yugi down the stairs. I don't know why." She put a waver in her voice and noted that her act had worked when Honda and Anzu started collecting Puzzle pieces without another word. She could not help but note the dirty look that Jou gave the boy who had been holding Yugi before he joined in.

As the brat settled down and the healing magic faded away, having fixed the broken limbs and stabilized the girl but left enough injuries to cover for the blood on the floor without taking Yugi completely out of action, she reached for one of the Puzzle pieces and closed her hand around it, focusing her own magic and soul to insert a piece of herself into it.

She knew the stubbornness of the Puzzle's Bearer. The girl would not rest until the item was whole once again, and now, once the Puzzle was whole, a piece of her own mind would be inside it and able to traverse the soul sanctuaries of the spirit and her host. She was of the opinion that somewhere in there was the Pharaoh's true name, and once she found it, she would no longer need to keep the brat alive and would be able to push her down the stairs herself.

Yugi's eyes half-opened, glittering with barely suppressed pain, and she tried to back away as her fight or flight instinct kicked in, only for Bakura to grip her arm tightly. "Describe your attackers."

The Pharaoh's Brat hesitated for a moment, then her hand went to the one piece of the Puzzle still attached to the rope around her neck and she glanced up at Ba-Khu-Ra, far too aware of which Bakura she was talking to. "I don't want you two to get in trouble."

"If I hadn't stepped in, you'd be looking at a prolonged hospital stay, runt," the Thief Queen hissed out. "If you even made it that far. And they've sent your precious 'Oneesan' back into the Shadows. Possibly for another eight years of suffering. Describe them."

That hit home, though the Thief Queen was pretty sure the Runt was only surrendering the information because she was still not entirely with it and was terrified for her older twin. When Yugi did give her description of the three girls who had jumped her, the same three girls she had seen heading away from the stairwell, Bakura pushed the Puzzle piece she had picked up into Yugi's hands and let go, allowing the child to back away as the Ring spirit got to her feet and stalked upstairs.

The only reason she gave a shit if the Pharaoh was imprisoned in the Shadows again was because she needed the bloody cow in order to break the goddamn seal. Otherwise 'Oneesan's' soul could rot in the Shadows for all she cared. However, she needed the brat alive, and anyone who was willing to push her down the stairs like that needed to be firmly dealt with.

Checking classroom 3-F rewarded her with the three girls in question, excitedly talking about their plans for after school, which, apparently, included harassing an 'Otogi' for his phone number. She was probably doing the boy a favor in getting rid of the girls, she decided as she stepped into the otherwise empty room, silently thanking the offers in the canteen for the lack of witnesses, and shut the door behind her.

The Shadows would feast well this lunch time.


Yugi hurt badly as she started collecting the Puzzle pieces nearest to her, the scraped skin and bruising from her fall nothing compared to the sharp edges of her soul where her sister had been ripped away when the item had broken. Her chest was tight and her heart pounded as the sight of the scattered gold reminded her that it had taken her eight years to complete the Puzzle before, and it could very well do so again.

She prayed that it would not. She would be absolutely heartbroken if it did. She swore to herself that once she had collected the scattered pieces, she would start right away and would not stop until she had managed to free her twin from the Shadows.

She just prayed that they could find every piece of it. If she was missing even one, then her sister would be trapped for good.

Panic startled rising within her as the other students started returning to the hallways, running the risk of the Puzzle pieces getting kicked everywhere as they headed back to class. Thankfully most of them seemed to be careful as they headed up the stairs, not wanting to slip on the scattered fragments of her pendant.

The sounds of someone upstairs yelling for someone to get the school nurse did not even sink in as her friends handed their pieces to her and she counted them, her face paling and her breath quickening as she looked around, frightened. "We're missing one."

"Shit." Katsuya swore as he scrambled to check the hallways and stairs over again.

Anzu and Honda joined him, but Otogi knelt down next to her and counted them through with her again, confirming that yes, she was, in fact, missing one. Specifically the second biggest piece, the one with the Eye of Anubis on it.

She could not help the tears that flowed and the sobs that escaped her as panic overwhelmed her. Fear for her twin and guilt that she had been unable to protect the Puzzle hit like a truck, causing her to tremble and struggle to catch her breath. She was about to surge to her feet to join the search when an arm wrapped around her shoulders and suddenly she was pulled into a male chest.

Not even bothering to check whose chest it was, she wept into them, releasing the emotions that had been choking her as she felt a hand on her back, rubbing it, trying to be supportive.

As her tears slowed down and she regained her focus on the world around her, she finally heard the voice of the teen holding her. "Easy, easy. It'll be okay."

Yugi just shook her head at Otogi and glanced around, hoping that her friends had found the missing piece. When she saw the dejected look on their faces, her heart fell further and she put the Puzzle pieces in her pocket before staggering to her feet, refusing to return to her classroom until she had found it.

Several students who were returning to class stopped to help her look, but as the bell went for the end of lunch, there was no luck. The last Puzzle piece seemed well and truly lost. Yugi tried to stay longer to keep searching, but after getting shut down by the teachers when she tried to explain what had happened and that she had lost something really important to her, she just went silent and went unwillingly.

They did not want to hear that she had been pushed, nor did they care about her broken Puzzle. Instead, they told her off for trying to blame someone else for her own misstep, reminded her that if she was going to wear gaudy necklaces, the school was not responsible if it got damaged, and forced her to return to class, pushed by the teacher's hand on her shoulder and the threats of detention if she was caught out of class. Her unhappy friends followed her, and Otogi headed for his own classroom.

Once he was safely ensconced in his seat, his hand slipped into his pocket and brushed over the icily burning golden piece that he had pocketed just after Yugi had slipped unconscious.

He had been furious that his plan to acquire the Puzzle had failed on Saturday, when he had pointed those students in Yugi's directions and offered them a large paycheck for the Millennium Puzzle, but now he was kind of pleased that it had. If the one piece of the golden treasure he had was reacting this poorly to him, the whole item would probably have reacted much worse to having been stolen from its true holder. Plus he had a feeling that those boys would have tried to scam him for further funds because the Puzzle was made of gold.

Not only that, but from the way Yugi had panicked when she had realized she was missing a piece, he knew that as long as he picked the right moment to return it to her, he would have her wrapped around his little finger.

That did not mean he was not going to try to win the item from her in the future. He was not daft enough to think that he would be able to get Yugi on his side when he went after her Ojiisan in order to make him pay for what had happened to his father. But he was certain he would be able to win it from her in the long run.

He did not understand exactly why the item was so important to the girl. He knew about its magic powers. He planned to eventually turn those powers against Mutou Sugoroku, but the way she had broken down suggested that the Puzzle was something more than an item of power to her.

Guilt trickled through him. He almost did not want to take it from her, or withhold the piece that he had in his pocket, but he had promised his own Otosan that he would take revenge on the man who had stolen so many years of his father's life away using a cursed game. He could not break that oath, not to his own kin. Not even for a girl who trusted him enough to break down in his arms.

Still, there was one very important thing he knew now that he had not known a few hours ago.

There was another Millennium Item within the school. One owned by an ally of Yugi's who was not afraid to guilt trip others into doing what she wanted and who had clearly healed the Puzzle Bearer, considering that there was no way Mutou would have been getting to her feet on her own otherwise.

The questions he now had were who was this girl, and was he going to have to worry about her interfering?