Author's Note: Wow...guess who's embarrassed that this took so long!...I am SO SORRY! You even hit the number of reviews and I was slow... /sobs/ As compensation (I hope) I'm going to give you the epilogue free of charge! Tomorrow I'll post it up and then that'll be it! Until my next story anyways, which should be up shortly!
Chapter 16
-:Chaos End:-
You can only activate this card when 7 or more of your cards are removed from play. Destroy all Monster Cards on the field.
Yami let the dagger slip out of his hand and into the ground. Suddenly he had no strength at all. How had this happened? How had everything gone so horribly wrong? Atop him Ieb laughed dryly, the sound gaining a telltale hysterical edge to it. Slowly the ancient spirit looked down to his stomach and touched a hand to the blood red rose that was blossoming there around the knife stuck firmly into his abdomen. Yami just stared, completely in shock at the knife, his knife, that was sticking grotesquely into Yugi's stomach.
Flashback
Yami stretched his fingers out to reach for the knife but it was just a little too far away. Ieb was talking but Yami was hardly even listening to what the spirit in Yugi's body was ranting about. He couldn't loose, he had to win to save Yugi. Just an inch or two and he would have it, the cold steel of the pommel in his hand, and with it an escape.
Atop him Ieb shifted and licked the knife that was shortly to cause the Pharaoh's demise. It was that shift that swung fate in Yami's direction. In that moment the ancient Pharaoh managed to pull himself a little closer to the knife and latch his fingers around it. Ieb hadn't even noticed.
"Ready to loose everything? Your pride, your life, your soul and your best friend?" Ieb smiled coldly and Yami hefted the dagger in his hand, just out of Ieb's eye line. "Good." Then everything happened at once. The two daggers plunged downwards and Yami flung up own knife in defence in a thrust to take the power of Ieb's swing. That was when it all went wrong.
Yugi's body had had enough and finally being human was about to come back and haunt Ieb. Suddenly the muscles in Yugi's wrists were on fire, not used to being utilised so harshly. Ieb screamed in pain, not expecting the sensation and dropped the knives to the floor, narrowly missing Yami's chest. But of course that left him wide open and Yami was still thrusting his knife forwards for the defence.
Steel met flesh and Ieb's eyes widened slightly. Yami was immediately struck with the weight of what he had done and a wave of nausea washed over him making him feel sick and shaky. He had killed Yugi.
Flashback
Yami was pulled back from his shock induced replay when Ieb let out a tight sounding sigh and fingered the pommel of the dagger that was a few inches from the flesh of his stomach.
"The less interesting option." Ieb sighed disappointedly. "I was hoping to destroy you both, but I can settle for half of the whole." With that Ieb ripped the dagger from his abdomen and let it clatter to the floor, the blood flowing more freely because of it. "Goodbye Pharaoh." Ieb whispered, "Goodbye cousin, Goodbye Yugi." Ieb grinned wickedly and then his face was blank. Slowly like tea diffusing in water amethyst leaked into the emerald green that had been in Yugi's eyes before.
"Y…Yugi?" Yami stuttered out, still horrified. A moment later the green was gone and Yugi's eyes were back to his regular colour. Yugi looked pale, but a small smile graced his lips.
"Hai Yami, it's me." Yugi's breath hitched a little and Yami let the tears that had been threatening him slip over the edges of his eyes to run down towards his temples. "You won." Yugi smiled, though he was obviously in pain. Typical Yugi, looking after Yami before himself. "You freed me." Yugi, with huge amounts of effort raised a hand and wiped a tear from the side of Yami's face. "Thank you." With that Yugi's eyes rolled into the back of his head and he collapsed to the side, falling off of Yami in the process.
Yami got up slowly, any hope left in his body fading out like Yugi's life was. Yugi was dying and it was all his fault. He had walked straight into Ieb's trap; the man had planned for this ending all along. Why kill Yami's body when getting to Yugi would kill half of his soul. With mounting dread the Pharaoh dropped to his knees next to his best friend's prone form and looked at the ruby lake that was flooding from his own handmade incision.
"Yugi I'm so sorry." Yami sobbed helplessly, "There's nothing I can do, your going to die and its all my fault." He was a broken man, no longer what he had once been, relegated to a crying wreck unable to save that which was most important to him. But in the darkness that threatened to pull Yami under once again, there shone light, a faint pinprick but a flash of light none the less.
-----
Yugi laughed. Something was tickling him and he couldn't work out what it was. Turning around quickly he noticed that there was nothing there.
"Who are you?" Yugi giggled, looking around in the darkness again for his attacker. "Please come out, I want to see you." But there was nothing there. Yugi felt a veil of disappointment wrap around him and he sighed, sad that whoever it was didn't want to play anymore. "Please come out." Yugi asked quietly, "I don't want to be alone." There was silence again for a moment and then a flicker of light far in the distance. "Hello?" Yugi asked again and was rewarded by the dot of light drawing closer and closer. Eventually it was within a couple of meters or him, and there it stopped. With his usual innocence Yugi surveyed the floating sphere of light that was bobbing in front of him. "Was it you that was here before?" The light didn't reply, but instead floated closer to him on the level of his stomach, illuminating the vicious injury his real life body had received. "Oh, that." Yugi smiled sadly. "It looks bad doesn't it." Yugi commented to the light. "It's killing me you know. I felt it when I got my body back. I didn't want to tell Yami, he was so upset I didn't want to destroy any hope he had left." Gently Yugi put a hand on his stomach and looked at the now bloodied palm. "I don't want to die." He sighed and the light responded by buzzing a little. "I promised Yami we'd always be together and now I'm breaking my side of the bargain. But I guess its time." The light buzzed a little more insistently and Yugi tilted his head. "What is it?" Then, suddenly everything was happening. The sphere of light rushed at Yugi's stomach and Yugi gasped out in the darkness. The light grew brighter and brighter until there was no darkness left. Yugi felt himself collapsing, falling backwards into the pure whiteness of the light and then, nothing.
------
A flash. Yami's head snapped up suddenly and he looked to Yugi. What he saw drew a gasp from him in awe and amazement. A bright light was glowing over Yugi's stomach and the blood was gone. Immediately Yami's tears stopped and his common sense rushed back like the Nile in flood. Yugi was healing. But of course! The deal he had made with Ieb before the duel! Yugi had to be returned unharmed if Yami won, and he had! A moment later and the light was gone. Immediately Yami rushed to Yugi's side and pulled his friend into his arms.
"Yugi?" Yami asked desperately. "Yugi say something! If you can hear me open your eyes." Then, as if by magic, Yugi Moto's flickered open, beautiful, innocent amethyst met caring, relieved ruby. "Yugi!" Yami exclaimed happily and pulled his friend into a tight hug. Groggily the smaller boy returned the hug. "I thought I'd lost you!" Yami smiled, holding Yugi at arm's length to look at him.
"I thought the same thing." Yugi returned the smile, so happy to be back with his Yami again. "Thank you." Yugi continued, "For everything, I knew you could trust you."
"And you'll always be able to partner."
Both boys stood, helping each other up off the leaf scattered woodland floor. They did not speak again. There was no need for words. Yugi smiled at his darkness as the made their way out of the clearing and into the moonlit domino park, trees dappled with ink like silver splashes and benches cast under veils of marbled moonlight. It was all over, they were together again at last, side by side where they should be. Yugi smiled to himself as they made their way back to the game shop in the darkness. His trust in Yami was never betrayed and he only hoped that it would stay that way forever, just the two of them. Darkness and Light in the world's shades of grey.
"Yami," Yugi said quietly as they stood on the game shop doorstep.
"Yes aibou?" Yami asked with a smile. He was so happy to have Yugi back and was savouring every minute of their being together but separate, as he knew it could not last.
"You'll always stay with me won't you?" Yami's smile increased a little and he moved to hug his best friend.
"You shouldn't even have to ask." Yami replied, holding his hikari in his arms and making him a promise, eyes glowing with the warmth of pure sincerity. "You shouldn't even have to ask."
Reviwer's Section
Cactus Bob: Lol! Yay there is a sim named after me! You'll have to describe her to me and I'll tell you if we look anything alike /winks/ As for my name, no, Trickana is not a common name in fact I've never met anyone with the same name as me...my parents must be hippies XD Now then, as regards killing Yami...gotcha! No I didn't, I just inflicted my final parting pains on Yugi instead. I couldn't let Ieb go without a fight now could I? Anyways, everything has settled down now, only one last plot problem to sort and then we're done! (Have I really mentioned the EPILOGUE that many times /winks/ It's cause I don't want people to leave before the story is over!)
Coco Gash Niccals: /Sneaks up behind Yugi, Yami and Ieb, shoving dwarf hats on them quickly/ Great, we have a snow white, three dwarfs, a prince er...charming and...me! I'm not short though so I'll just have to be the narrator. /Grins at Yami and Ieb who are growling rather threateningly at her/ So, lets get on with it! We've only got one more review to wrap this up in! Zane, get in there! (Hope you liked the chapter, I'm going to miss reading your reviews!)
Yami Yuugi: Climax resolution...here it is! I'm glad you liked the last chapter and I hope this one was to your liking also! As to Yami, don't worry, he's not suffering too much in this story... /Grins predatorially at Yami/ Anyways, yes Ieb is scary! But you can't help but love him lol! I scared myself a bit with the 'blood running like the nile so that I may catch it in cups' (blatent misquote) sometimes I get too into these things...See you after the epilogue!
Dragonlady222: Yami is the king of games indeed! Or is he...there's something I'll thrash out in my next story! But anyways, I hope you liked this chapter and that it answered all of your questions! Only one more plot devise to riddle out now!!
theNonExistantOne: Sorry about the not updating soon, and don't worry about your stories! If you like I'll beta for you from time to time /Is almost awe-inspiringly unreliable as can be seen by the speed of this update!/ My heart actually leapt a little when I saw that you'd reviewed under another name, I thought I may finally get to sample your stories...but apparently not lol! Anywho, hope you enjoyed this chapter and I'll see you for teh last review of this story shortly!!
Yimi Makuya: Now there is only one!!!
Kiyitai: First off I love your username, very pretty! Secondly thanks for reviewing/Huggles/ And I'm sorry I didn't update quickly, my life's been hectic, but now I'm in half term so ah...yay! It's nice to know more people are reading than just those who are reviewing so thank you again for writting in! Now then, about you doing something drastic... you can't know! Ha! I've shown you what happened and Yugi is A-OK! As is Yami...not that many people seem to care lol! I'm glad you've been theorising throughout about who Ieb was, it's nice to know I got people thinking, I myself am a theorist also, I always analyse the information revealed in a chapter (you never know what it might be setting up for the future!) So good for you! I hope to see you again soon (perhaps in my next story too.. /winks/) Until then, thanks again!!
Manyana: Lol, I deny that accusation! But I am horribly guilty of slow updating...sorry! Anyways, hope you enjoyed and if you want to see some Yami angsty-ness stick around for 'stalemate' should be some in there...
Masami Mistress of Fire: Konnichiwa Masami-Chan! Yugi is back as requested and for one of the first incidences in the story he's actually, genuinely, seriously OK! He's finally out of the woods for good...sort of...in this story... /cough/ Anyways, I hope you've enjoyed so far, we're on teh home straight now! And yes, I did enjoy your chapter!!
Crystal F. Flowright: New reviewer! Thank you so much for pressing the little purple/lilac/lavender button! Means a lot to me, so thanks again and I hope you liked this chapter and enjoy the next!
Tiger Shinigami: Another new reviewer! Thanks, reviews mean a lot to me so thank you! And as far as cliffhangers are concerned...you know you love 'em really!!
cheekyeyes: Don't worry about reviewing late, how about you forgive me for updating late and we'll call it quits hmm...? lol. Yugi's in this chapter again and the epilogue is mainly reflective Yugi so that should make you happy! (More Yugi in stalemate...and its kick-ass king-of-games Yuggi too... /winks/) See you next chapter and hope you liked this one!
Yami Val: Ah, stalemate isn't the next chapter, it's my next story (which I am shamefully plugging!!) As to making people addicted, thank you, I try! Nice to hear from you again and hope to see you next chapter for the last review of this story!!
Thanks for all of your reviews guys, they really mean a lot to me and I'm sorry for the slow update, damned AS levels...! Anyways, best wishes,
Trikki