Hey kiddos! So much this chapter… Enjoy!
Chapter 15: Formulating Finales
"Shall we gentlemen?" Amar inducted throwing his arm conspiratorially round Yusei's shoulder. It was purposeful Atemu was sure. Morphis was dreadfully comfortable with Amar, as was Atemu by now given the Champion's long standing kindness, but still a little stiff with his own newness Yusei needed a little more fostering to feel wanted. Atemu remembered feeling like such an odd end in this world.
"Indeed!" Atemu quirked, "it would be an honour to train with you. Morphis and Yusei I'd ask you to go hard on me. I'm far too behind in my training. How shall we do this?"
"That's our Atemu," the redhead chuckled, "always full of spirit. Now considering how shy you are about duelling with your allies Morphis I purpose this solution: I'm going to turn my spells on the three of you. The object is to work together and disarm me, if you can, while the others fight around us. You will feel the backlash and rumble of their battles but you must not let yourselves get distracted nor must you allow yourself to be thrown off by falling into someone else's battle."
"Right!" Yusei was expectantly keen, brittle with that fierce determination.
"Morph you're the most experienced and the most powerful right now," Amar reminded unhanding Yusei to step back and place some space between the three of them, "better take charge."
"Oh don't stay that!" The Knight withered. "I'm dreadful at this sort of thing!"
"Follow Atemu's lead then!" The Champion laughed, raising his arms, "three, two…"
"Me?" He baulked glancing between the Specialists. "Oh no-"
"SEISMIC RUPTURE!"
The three of them scrambled as Amar ripped up the earth between them. Yusei ducked, Atemu darted, but quicker on his feet Morphis was the only one of them who seemed to escape without being hit but a flying clump of stone or soil.
"DEFEND!" Yusei cried, drawing up a wall of sheer stone and skidding behind it Atemu fumbled for breath. "Atemu, what do we do?"
He was so strict, grabbing Morphis by the collar and hauling him in closer as the Knight slipped in beside them, that Atemu hardly knew what to say to the younger Reaper.
"Uh…" He floundered briskly. "Morph is quick. He distracts we take the back?"
"Good," Yusei commanded, "go!"
And with that, plan decided on the fly, the youngest Reaper took charge and hiking up his leg kicked a panicking Morphis out from behind their defence as they regrouped and Amar flung a battery of attacks against the surface. Atemu laughed, in awe of Yusei and thrilled with this turn crouched with him as they waited for Morphis to lead Amar off momentarily.
The Champion was stationary Atemu noted ducking his head round the corner. Holding his position steady and giving them what was probably a fairly sympathetic chance at victory by being careful but bland with his attacks. The Champion was giving them his least imposing attention for now but Atemu was sure he would adjust when having sussed out their abilities Amar found a more appropriate level to assault them.
For a soft spoken Reaper Morphis was quite skilled at dodging and when he hit the ground running, fell into the rhythm, Atemu could spot the experienced focus creeping across his features. Grinning Atemu garnered his own well-worn courage and nodding to Yusei threw himself back out with his arms extended.
"WHIPLASH!"
"TUMBLE!"
Yusei was not the sort to take the back seat and let them do all the work apparently. Atemu found he couldn't make a move without Yusei either clinging to his side or sprinting ahead.
They drove the Champion in, corralled him against a wall, but Atemu was convinced by the easy smile upon Amar's face that the Champion was playing with them and that batting away their attacks was a matter of reasonable ease. What would it be like, Yami wondered, to see Amar and Seviticus in full combat?
Amar diverted them but an understanding of each other's movements was developing and ignoring the barrage of attacks fostered around them Yusei, Atemu and Morphis drove in together for a triple assault. They would have, most likely, made some kind of impact but all at once the entire nature of the arena altered.
The sky blossomed to a soft baby blue overhead, the never ending sun obscured, and awed the three of them were thrown to silence as lush grass emerged into being under foot heavy with daffodils. Atemu could just taste the scent of the seeds, the lavender, rustling in the wind at the back of his mouth. Not so far to their right in this emergent field a glass dome had struck up and lightning crackled within it viciously as Atreyu, Nephele and Drea did battle.
"UNDERTOE!"
Yusei, Atemu and Morphis shrieked slapped off their feet into a puppy like heap amassed in the grass. Painfully thrown over each other they slumped, defeated, Amar regarding them with a sympathetic chuckle.
"I warned you not to get distracted." He teased resting his broad palms against his hips appraisingly. "This is an illusion Atreyu must've created. You'll need to hold your focus better in battle but you were doing well. Shall we try again?"
"Atreyu made this?" Yusei mumbled.
"It's amazing what Faens can do," Morphis laughed, finding his feet to offer his hands to Atemu and Yusei. "My sincere apologies for falling on you."
"The kids always like that?" Yami chuckled.
"Don't even get me started. Drea will be the death of me. He and Nephele are such Daddy's boys they never listen to me." Yugi groaned over the stove. "You guys looked like you were having fun with Amar though?"
"It was awesome. Yusei's an incredibly fast learner and Morph is pretty cluey too if he can just keep his focus."
"Oh Morph," he giggled. "He's hopeless isn't he?"
"He's not that bad," Yami snorted, "he's is a spaz though."
Yugi cackled. The Faen had decided Yami needed an early morning today for whatever reason had stirred Atreyu Damestaire at six or seven on a Saturday. It seemed ungodly to Yami after another long night of training. Yami truly didn't feel like he'd gotten any rest even after sleeping. Using so much magic must've been draining upon his physical body by extension. It didn't hassle him really, as panicked as he knew he should be he and Atemu were fairly soothed by the nature of their reality.
They would face the Seers as prepared as they could be. Their coalition would give it's all and what would happen would happen one way or another. It was fairly out of their hands but all things considered Yami had no interest in staying at home during this fight. He would stick with Yugi, with Atreyu, till the bittersweet end. He would make sure that if nothing else he could proudly return the Faen to his rightful Champion and say: I did a damn good job protecting him. I was there through all of it and I gave everything I had.
"Couldn't you sleep?" Yami guessed gently.
It was reasonable. Some realization or feeling had driven Yugi to raise so early a wander through Yami's front door this Saturday morning. Yami had awoken to Yugi ringing his doorbell, in an embarrassingly sweat soaked pair of PJ pants, and been ordered to sit at the kitchen counter and let the Faen whip up a batch of pancakes. He supposed it was Carolyn Smith, Yugi's inner fifties housewife, that came through in these little gestures or maybe it was just that being his most recent lifetime she had left an effect on his mannerism.
"Not really," Yugi sighed ladling the mixture into the pan as the butter sizzled, "I haven't been sleeping very well in general since we got permission to storm the nest."
"How come?" Yami prodded, chin in hand. "Are you scared?"
"A little," it was surprising that Yugi would admit as much. "I worry that I won't wake up. What if Jenzar isn't there? What if someone I love gets hurt? What about the kids? I keep wanting to scream out and ask to go alone. If something happens to any of the guys I don't know what I'd do. It would be my fault."
"We'll be fine," the Reaper insisted stubbornly and pushing out from the counter made his way round the island to throw his arms round Yugi and squeeze him close. The Faen felt plush with new morning sleepiness and smelling of cotton, fresh and soft, Yami could have kissed him but would rather had done anything to comfort him. "I'll be there. I won't let anything happen."
It was a lie really. Atemu could hardly do much given his weaknesses but Yami would do his best regardless. Being reincarnated because of some disaster during a Seer rumble didn't sound like a bad way to go really. It may have filled him with cold, dreadful, anxiety to contemplate his own death but in a way he was almost ready to face that inevitability.
"We're all pretty good at taking care of ourselves too," he assured further, "everyone we're taking with us is fairly clued in on not getting their asses kicked."
"I just…" Yugi heaved in his arms, throat clogged, flipping the pancake and stealing another moment by doing so twisting round a little to try again. "I…"
"What?" He pried, stomach dropping.
"We're going tonight." Yugi swallowed tightly gazing into Yami's clavicle rather than his face. "I can't put off missions much longer and…yeah…"
Yugi's fingers curled into the waist of his pants but would've grasped his shirt if he'd been wearing one and jerky as the Faen was Yami felt there was more left to say. How he replied was dependent upon what was left unspoken because for that moment Yami was too heavily submerged under the reality that he might not wake up tomorrow morning.
"If anything happens to me I want you to leave," Yugi ordered. "You're in charge of the coven here. Ryou's too unstable and Kaiba's too stable and…I want to be with you today."
"Shouldn't we prep or something?" He supposed wary but hoarse with dislike for the idea.
"It's just…if we find Jenzar then today's your last day as my Reaper." Yugi admitted miserably. "I'm going to miss it… I'd…I'd rather be here with you today than panicking at home."
Yami moaned through his nostrils and tangling his arms squeezed the fairy close. Thrown together Yugi's arms looped round his chest and burying his face in the other's clavicle the Faen let the Reaper rock them a little.
"We should do something special," Yami snorted weakly, digging his nose into Yugi's hair. He might lose this smell, be unable to map out his body, very soon.
"I know," Yugi croaked, and it took Yami a second to realize that, hiccupping, the Faen was on the precipice of crying. "But I can't think of anything good enough and stuff's closed today and…I don't know…"
"Shh," he preened gently, hand cradling the Faen's skull as Yugi sniffed against him. "It's okay."
"I don't want to ruin today," the Faen fussed, fingers grabbing for his bare shoulder blades round Yami's chest. "I know it's stupid. I want Jenz home but I don't want to give you back. I'm retarded."
"No, you're not," Yami chuckled.
It was surreal to Yami. He may as well have been right back at his laptop, staring down the screen, capping off the last page he would ever write of the Trance saga and apologising, farewelling, Atreyu and Atemu. Now Atreyu was in his arms, tangible, like Yami had plucked him into existence through sheer will power and he couldn't contemplate letting this end. His mind wasn't ready yet to submit this reality and go back to normal. He couldn't let go of these characters and this world for fear he might break his own heart. Then again every story had to end sometime.
"I want to kiss you," Yugi confessed, batting at his eyes with the heel of his stubborn palm, "but I know it'll just screw things up."
"I want to kiss you every second," Yami admitted unhelpfully, "but I won't okay? I don't want you thinking about it when Jenz gets back. I do adore you though, alright?"
"I know," he murmured, turning back to kill the heat on the stove. It was so Yugi somehow to refuse himself the right to cry and then at once be back on top of the practicalities, to move on, a human being stealing Mills and Boons moments between segments life. "Stay here, I just want to go grab my bag."
"Yeah sure," the author released him, turning the pancake out on the plate leaving it forgotten. Neither of them felt much like eating he guessed and really he felt awkward starting without Yugi. So this was why the Faen had rushed to him so early in the morning so he could steal every last second of being a team.
"Here," Yugi sauntered back in to rest one hand on the counter and reach out to Yami with the other, still sniffing as he attempted to secure his expression. "I didn't have much time to think about it or anything, just threw everything on there this morning and came over so its crapily edited."
"Wha?" Yami took the usb between his fingers dazed and fumbled. "Is this your stuff?"
"Copies," the Faen mumbled, tucking his hair back again. "Thought I'd get you a copy of all the shit I've written. It's about four hundred pages of nonsense and gibberish. I don't really like it but if you think I should do something with it I will."
"I get to look at all of it?" He baulked stumped eyes darting between Yugi and the thumb-stick.
"Yeah," Yugi diverted embarrassed, "let me know what you think later. Breakfast?"
"Fuck it," Yami snorted. "Let's have ice cream?"
"Yes," the smaller laughed despite himself as if Yami had just sprouted sheer genius. "Let's do that. I want juice too."
"We're ordering in tonight too." The author swore.
"Fuck yeah." Yugi answered stoutly packing the mix back in the fridge.
000
Nutrition was the last order of the day. Today was a day for stirring stomach pains and stoking sugary addictions and packing themselves full of energy to ward off tears. Yami could live with that. He could've sat with Yugi every Saturday morning cradling a tub of ice cream between them and tipping back orange juice in wine glasses. It was an eccentricity of Yugi's to refill their juice into such elegant glasses if only to stir something special in the atmosphere of the occasion. There was an exuberant luxury in ruining traditional formality and breaking out the glasses Yami wasn't sure he'd ever used.
He may as well have been sixteen. Yugi refused the movies in his collection and finding what the smaller dubbed the 'white trash channel' they watched nonsense till noon when they switched to the crime, sci-fi and supernatural shows of the Fox-esque networks. Yugi had an inner lecturer trapped inside him. Super Nanny turned into a parenting debate, Terrible Bodies and Wife Swap a cultural discussion with psychology text book quotes. The trivia information he could draw out of Yugi relatively easily was bizarre and fascinating the boy could always find some past nugget of info to link their current fascination too.
Buffy the Vampire Slayer was giggled at, quoted, by the Faen with a loving nostalgia. Supernaturalwas flicked past not because Yugi dislike it, he insisted he loved it, but that:
"I can't bear season five," he whined into Yami, "I'm too emotionally attached to Sam and Dean. Watching them fight just makes me cringe."
Charmed received a snub, a series of groans, because apparently it was so bad it hurt. The pair of them somehow powered into a discussion of how the self reflexivity of the humour within Buffy not only made it seem less ridiculous but more realistic by acknowledging what of its concept was ridiculous. All while Yugi rather passionately dismissed the Charmed sisters as the Bold and the Beautiful of supernatural TV.
"I love Dr Who," Yugi purred, settling down again as the theme song flared. "I'd have David Tennant babies."
Yami cackled.
Star Gate Atlantis was apparently trash compared to the original. Yugi was also of the opinion that Captain Janeway of Star Trek was far superior to both Picard and Kirk but Kirk was by far the most fun. Yami then received an interesting thesis about how Kirk's mission objective was not 'to boldly go where no man has gone before' but to systematically punch the males of every species he encountered and sexually conquer their women like a space aged James Bond. Apparently James Bond was quite a feminist icon in the sixties before the nineties reversed the score, another trivia snippet of history and cultural perspective Yugi didn't realize he was rambling into.
Yami loved him like this. Loved Yugi pliant and rambling and lush with ideas, intelligence, honesty and creative eccentric humour that mishmashed eclectic tastes in a mental blender.
Apparently Yugi watched a great deal of British cooking shows, Yami discovered to his own amusement, and a great deal of UK docos at that. He drew out what he could, switched them to one of the movie channels and wavering between Nightmare on Elm Street, Aliens, and Halloween was ordered by Yugi's cooing, bouncing, eagerness to move instead to 512 where Paranormal Activity was playing.
"I fucking love this movie." Yugi purred. "It's scary accurate."
"You think?"
"Well, not accurate accurate but it's like a training video." He elaborated eagerly. "It's just a perfect example-slash-summary of how people fuck themselves over when they play round with spirits. Every time I watch it it's a dissection of What Not to Do in a Haunting 101. If I ever wanted to give lessons I'd just throw this on and yell at the screen."
"Give me the whole layout," Yami ordered chuckling, "educate me."
"Oh god," the Faen cackled, "don't tell me that. I won't shut up."
"I've seen it before," he dismissed encouragingly, "rather hear you talk. Go on."
"I'm rambling, I eat conversations," Yugi snorted sympathetically.
Yami fell back into the old blue sofa, deeper and deeper as the reruns progressed, Yugi stuck snug between him and the backing of the couch and in the warmth of the afternoon sun he lulled sleepily. Yugi's hand on his chest, his arm round the Faen's body, Coco fat and heavy like a paperweight in his lap the discomfort and contentment nuzzled to weigh each other out.
He'd had girlfriends, boyfriends, and he didn't think of them distinctly by gender rather he thought of them by their names, their feelings, and their sensations. He didn't think about girls and boys. Yami thought of Anzu, Leon, Mana, and Mahado who hadn't felt like this.
Anzu when he'd been young, retarded and lusty filled with stupid urges had let him lather them in confusion and discomforting awkwardness till they sizzled to death. Leon had been too sweet for him, needy and nearly right but entrapping and cloying. Mana was another shade altogether the surfer girl, the bouncer, the flirty friend who couldn't quite transform them into Disney lovers but rather made Yami's queerness more starkly apparent. She'd been too much of a woman and he not enough of an ultra butch alpha male. She loved him, he loved her, but they were better listening to each other bitch. Finally he could count off Mahado most recently who might've been some escapist curiosity to reconnect with his long dead father. Mahado who had been so like him but too much so in that way till his loyalty, his protectiveness, made Yami feel less the man and more the child and they became too filial to be sexual.
It was shades of stumbling along in life that graced over his memory but evaporated now in the current. These were people he'd known and fallen out of touch with over the years. They were part of a boring slated history that seemed vague and not his own anymore. Anzu might be off in America like she'd dreamed or else hauled up playing Mummy by now after giving up. Mana still called, Leon sent Christmas cards, Mahad was an acquaintance who came to every birthday and asked about his mother but Yami could forget they all existed.
Yugi wasn't like that. Yugi gelled into him and Yami could imagine they'd done this every weekend for all their life. He could imagine them here at forty with kids sneaking out and then at eighty like biddies where this kind of cuddle stopped being romantic enough to put on a Hallmark card and started being geriatric. He could see the end of their time, their moment passed, but beyond that he could see how in another life they could last forever enfolded. He wanted that.
This grandeur of being a Reaper could all fall away and he would still want Yugi. The greatness he longed for, the adventure, was negated by the happiness and the perfection of how Yugi slipped and slotted into his world. That joy, this contentment, erased his longings for more till like a drugged bear he would have been satisfied to never be anything special in exchange for always being perfectly loved.
His romantic history vanished around Yugi. They were blank slates. Their worlds met and nestled up rightfully. They had an easy potential. Yugi pulled him in the right directions and Yami could feel with enough time to learn to coax him he could fill the voids Yugi yearned for. He could morph to fit Jenzar's spot, he could transform them, they could live together and love together and the rest would roll out like a movie as it should. Yugi would flash through university, Yami would publish, they'd travel to the same exotic places they both wanted to see with someone, they'd make love in hotel window seats and Yami would see Yugi's face light up when they found some ruin somewhere.
He could see that with his imagination. He could see his mother loving Yugi, thinking he was the perfect kind of boy if a bit too young for her son. He could see Yugi's Grandfather jabbering and slapping out old playing cards on a class counter in his store so Yami could play poker with him. He could imagine Yugi dragging him to face his father's history in Egypt and could imagine the pleasure that the ancient would wring out of the Faen. He could see Yugi tracing the walls, reading the Hieroglyphs and showing Yami in not so many words where he had lived in 48BC and 150BC and 1930AD…
At the same moment his mind split and Yami could comprehend an equally pleasant, if bittersweet, future where things would be less perfect but would nearly fit.
Jenzar would come back tonight and Yami would watch Yugi fall wildly in love tomorrow. They would be best friends, part of a coven, part of Yugi's tight knit family. Ignoring the minor practicalities Yami and Jenzar might take a liking to each other and flitter off to Las Vegas and laugh like he and Joey did. They'd come home and Yami and Yugi would live in separate homes, have Christmas parties together, call each other when they were sick and with a clicking tongue Yugi would urge him to better boyfriends and easy happiness.
Jenzar and Yugi would be the watermark of success, contentment, and Yami would never be able to properly hate either of them. Bakura and Ryou would be the pair their social group gossiped about. Joey and Seto would build something in their own funny way. They'd all watch Mokuba grow up as the faux extended family the boy needed and had to generate without enough blood to naturally possess one. Yami, in the end, would be the one who was lovely but never quite found his way to the perfect romance despite the love of the social circle who would form his lifelong friends.
In that continuity Yami would be a Reaper, get his memories one day, search out those people from his past with varying degrees of success and be reasonably mundane. Coaxing Yugi to talk about the Supernatural, he imagined, would be harder then. They'd play at being adults and talk about bills or mortgages or publishers. They'd meet in the Hive, depend on each other, and share tid-bits of advice like work colleges.
Yami wouldn't wake to Yugi's cooking, Yami wouldn't hold him every night, and Yami would never know how the tender skin behind Yugi's knee tasted.
That would be alright. They would be alright. By next lifetime this adoring love would have faded softly to filial devotion and it would never regenerate. This, today, what they almost had would end.
Yugi startled, jumping, as if that strange feeling of falling had come to him when his eyes were closed and panting pushed himself up a little.
"You okay?" Yami croaked.
"I almost fell asleep," Yugi whispered, seemingly afraid to slump back down but torn by the desire to remain close, "I don't want to fall asleep yet. If I do we'll have to go fight. I'm not ready."
"Hey," he muttered, taking Yugi by the biceps. "You're probably the only one who's ready to walk in there. You're who I'm putting my money on. I don't care how powerful Cassidia is I still haven't seen anything that's ever come close to knocking you off or slowing you down."
"I hate not knowing what to expect." He trembled. "I kind of hate time too. I just wish I could stay stuck sometimes."
"Can't," Yami sighed, turning playfully to suggest: "besides I thought you were going to wreck righteous vengeance on the Seers?"
"Oh I'm going to kill that bitch." Yugi promised. "I'm going to rip that place apart. I know that. Still doesn't mean we'll win. We still have no idea how they stopped Jenzar. It just means I'm going to take a whole lot of the fuckers down with me."
"Any ideas what they did to Jenzar yet?"
"A few," the Faen admitted, "but nothing solid. I'm still missing enough to go off. Doesn't matter. I'll find out tonight but first things' first I guess. Listen, Yami…"
"Yeah?" He replied trepidatiously.
"I'm going to use the Lance of Lazarus." The Faen explained drawing Yami's eye over the pendant the Reaper had avoided for so long. "I want you to use my Needle."
"The Veil's Needle?" Yami baulked. "That'd be a waste! I won't know what to do with it!"
"It's a reflection of my heart," Yugi elaborated, "it won't let anything happen to you. I won't need it tonight. I don't need to fix any tears I need an offensive weapon like the Lance. Besides that: you still don't have your core powers yet. Without them you've got about as much juice as a Reaper. You'll run out of power way too soon if we don't back you up somehow. You won't have stamina. The Needle's connected to my core, I have an endlessly regenerating supply of energy, if you use it then it'll keep you charged. I wantyou to use it."
"Are you sure?" He frowned.
"Very." The Faen insisted. "Without it you're not getting through the battle. So if you don't use the Needle I'm making you stay behind. Alright?"
"I'd follow you anyway." Yami snorted stubbornly. "You can say that but I'd find a way to follow all of you. You're not doing this without me."
"You're using the Needle." Yugi warned firmly. "If you don't I swear to God…. You won't be going on any Hunts for a while. I want you there, I want need you there, but you're not going all Brave Heart on my watch. So use the fucking Needle, okay?"
"Okay, okay," Yami sighed chuckling weakened at Yugi's frown. "I know. It's serious. I'll use it. Will you manage with the Lance?"
"Between it and my magic I'll be fine."
"But your magic will be supplying me as well," he warned, "can you keep both of us going?"
"I have more juice than I know what to do with." Yugi scoffed. "Trust me Yami. Giving both of us power? I'm not going to break a sweat."
"How do I use then Needle then?"
"Just don't think about it." Yugi shrugged. "It's like how the Lance reacts to me. If you just trust it and don't try and overthink it then it'll look after you all on its own. If you use it it'll be whatever you need it to be and it'll hit whatever you need it to hit and it'll come right back to you if you call it. It's practically alive."
"Okay," he considered, just like the gun then…
"Don't have anything planned for tomorrow do you?" Yugi nearly chuckled on the door step that evening reactant to turn home alone Yami was sure. "It's going to be a long night."
"No way," Yami heaved.
"Hit the hay early and Amar will grab us all up." The Faen muttered. "We'll have to leave quick before the youngsters get cold feet."
"Thank fuck its Sunday tomorrow." He chuckled morosely.
"The Day of our Lord," Yugi sighed vaguely superstitious, hands in his pockets through the chill of the breeze. As much as the Faen wanted to be Yami figured Yugi, from the dazed heavy look in his eyes, was more in his head than really with him today. Yugi's whole heart hadn't been in this afternoon as much as they may have longed for it to be. He couldn't seem to hold eye contact with Yami, to grab solid ground, when his head was buzzing so heartily with work to be done.
"I'll be there." Yami swore. "Don't leave without me."
"Wouldn't dream of it," Yugi smiled but something about the thought pained him and his eyelashes twitched, expression wavering in tense frustration. Yami knew that look, knew Yugi was biting back a tear, but wouldn't push afraid that would send the frazzled Faen into a defensive rally. "Bye Yami."
It was gruff at first then weaker, more sincere, than perhaps the Faen would've liked and making no promise to come back Yugi was very brisk in turning down the steps. Yami supposed he wanted to go before he made himself turn back, wanted to go home to his lonely house and his fears and make himself face them through the hesitation, the panic, with that bravery Yami envied.
"Bye Yugi," he wanted to cry too, it was instinctive. This was almost over. He could feel the sun setting, he could feel death in the darkened corners of his house lapping sharply at his heels, he could feel the weight and it took what he had left not to run after Yugi.
He wanted to jump a plane, naively, never fall asleep again and just leave. It was a stupidly human thought. Reapers couldn't run away. This danger was inside Yami's head, in his soul, and no matter what country or time zone he settled in Yami would have to face it sometime. He had to sleep. Thinking he could run away so easily was naïve. Thinking Yugi, with all his pride and his love, would run away was worse it was stupid.
Yugi was scared because he knew he would do this, he would fight tonight without anyone if he had to, and that was why death felt real and imposing to him. Yami was scarred of the choice but tangled by the Reaper's honour, gallantry, which told him he would bite the bullet. Atemu was worried, they both were, but real Reapers went. Real Reapers did their job. Real Reapers fought even against Seers who might be able to destroy immortal souls and break eternal vows.
Yami may as well have had a curfew but he lingered, pushing it, terrified to be left behind but unable to lay himself down. There was a bitter coldness in his stomach. What if the whole world was different tomorrow? Should he text his mother? Joey? Someone? Tell someone he loved them? No, maybe that was as bad as giving up or letting go. Irrational as it was Yami didn't want to admit he might be in danger. Not physical danger but real danger. Danger which threatened the soul.
He retrieved Yugi's usb from the kitchen island, propped his laptop on his thighs in bed and checking the clock every few seconds found the files.
It was definitely more than four hundred pages.
YR 7, YR 8, YR 9, YR 10, YR 11, YR 12, UNI 1…
Files, jumbles upon jumbles of them at that, from Yugi's first awakening at thirteen onward through his schooling career till the present. Yami had been right about one thing: the Faen was prolific.
He was tempted to go back to the beginning, before he knew Yugi, tempted to go back to when they met as Atemu and Trey but was sorely driven to the more recent past. To the inside of Yugi's brain now he might have an insight into if he scoured the most recent files. He hovered over Uni 1 and scrapping his restraint entered the folder. There must've been another ten files within it: Malleus Malevolent, Book of Shadows YR 7, Memory Bin, Yami Sennen…
He fought off his first instinct to enter his file first and dipped his toes in to scroll through the others. Yugi was organised.
The Malleus Malevolent was a pun on the old witch hunters' manual from the 1600s and contained what seemed to be details of not only soul types but demons from Seers, Ghouls to otherwise. It was a menagerie, a glossary, an encyclopaedia of where Yugi had been and what he had fought and how he had fought it.
Book of Shadows YR 7 must've been another joke at the Neo Pagan belief that witches' should have personal coven spell books called 'Books of Shadows' and Yugi's was exactly that: how to's for everything from Protection Boxes to silver bullets.
Memory Bin seemed to be pages upon pages, at least three hundred, of nearly complete prose which sometimes wandered off into other formats detailing what must've been Yugi's past lives. At times there seemed to be more than one author, at times voices broken through in different fonts sporadically and seemed to argue with each other.
Yami Sennenwas, for the first thirty pages, fairly dissatisfying. Personal details, copies of interviews, copies of emails… everything Yugi had used to watch him, to find him and to torture him like some dreadful supernatural Private Investigator. Then he found notes:
He kisses just right. He holds me right. He smells kind of like Morph. I think he's giving me brain damage. I haven't kissed someone for centuries. I shouldn't have kissed him. I liked it.
I miss you Jenz. Fuck I miss you. Yami reminds me of how happy we were. I wish you were here. I wish I could apologise for whatever happened. I wish I could just kiss you. Really, truly, feel you again. I so sick of dreaming about you. I think… I think I'm losing myself, my true self… I can't reach that limit anymore and shine like I used too. Amar won't say it but I know it… I haven't been alone before, not since the first life, and then I didn't have a name. When I met you I didn't even have a sense of self. There isn't a me without you.
I need you. I like him, a lot, but Yami's going to find someone. He belongs with a family somewhere like the one we built, the one I don't want to give up, and if he goes too I'm not going to cope. He's not mine though. He's not just a puppy I can take home. He's got his own life, his own destiny, and I'm stuck with mine. I've lost you and if I lose him too… I'm not that strong Jenz. I know I thought I was, I tried to be, but I'm not.
Please come home. If I could just see you, if I could just know you were okay maybe I could be selfless enough to let you go.
If I tell Yami who I am he'll hate me… Do you hate me too somewhere? I don't blame you. I'm so selfish. I'm so stupidly stubborn. All those times I wouldn't let you help. I never wanted you to think I didn't need you Jenz… I just want to say sorry… Hurting Yami doesn't even help. He makes me too happy.
Am I even the same as the Atreyu you knew? Am I Atreyu Damestaire anymore or am I all Yugi? I can't tell, I can barely remember myself, and I'm so scared I'm going to forget your smile. I want to have a family with you again. I want those days, I want your songs, I want your smell and your hands and your stupid laugh. I want something to keep fighting for. Without good what am I doing? I'm selfish, fucking crazy and selfish. The Veil needs me, billions of people need me to keep fighting, but I just don't see the point if I'm alone. There's not joy in winning, in being the best, I'm not a soldier.
I'm starting to hate you a little. Almost. Maybe. I think. It's hard to decide. Yami makes it hard to think like myself. He's here with me and you're not. Even if he doesn't know who I am and even if he's a traitor. He's here and that's better than nothing. Have I sunk that low? I've never fallen in love like this before. It's strange to think of letting someone else into my heart when I'm so old and bitter. What a nasty thing to think in this nice young body eh? Please come home Jenzar. I love you so much. I've never stopped loving you. I don't think I can if I try even if I want to.
The garden, that kiss, this almost love letter which sat nestled and forgotten in Yugi's ramblings must've been written sometime after that and before Yami discovered the truth. This was what he knew, in Yugi's own words, the Faen felt when unchecked and confessional to some distant ghost out of reach at the far end of the universe.
It took a moment to swallow it.
"We better go get him back," Yami snorted, softly assured, contented even he found himself smiling in a way that was resolved and fanciful.
It killed him but there was mild consolation. Whatever happened Jenzar would never have these memories which would be just his and Yugi's. In another four billion years Yugi would remember nearly falling in love with Yami. He could be content with that. Yugi would never forget kissing him and for a time that no one could ever steal from him Yami, Atemu, had been the one Yugi knew would come to save him.
"I'm waking up tomorrow." He told himself. "I'm bringing Jenzar home for you Yugi and no matter what I'll have loved you perfectly, or at least as well as I can, and done the best anyone could've."
Saying it aloud was like tying a knot, securing a vow, in a weird way.
He hoped Jenzar was as good as Yugi believed, worthy of all that love, because if he wasn't Yami might just have to start a war he'd probably lose. Jenzar would make Yugi, Atreyu, peaceful and what more could he want? Jenzar Fraveous had best appreciate it though, best adore his Faen, or Atemu promised they'd show him what a Specialist could do with the right motivation. Yami would probably never be as powerful as Jenzar but he felt, in his own naïve way he supposed, he'd loved Yugi just the same and he wouldn't be put off from fighting for Yugi's happiness.
"Let's go get em tiger." He laughed, half to himself or Atemu because really he couldn't find a line to draw the difference anymore. Either way as he clicked the laptop shut and kissed the usb that Yugi had entrusted to him with all its honesty he finally liked himself.
"Greetings Atemu," Amar grinned wary but conspiratorial as the Reaper enter their rally point. "Are you ready?"
"Always," he purred, "I haven't kept you all waiting have I?"
"No," the Champion sighed, "not at all. Drea's just phasing in now."
"He is the delinquent of the family," Atemu teased lightly, "but thankfully it means I'm not the last one here."
"Hush yourself Reaper," Drea snorted shoving at the small of Atemu's back roughly, startling him. "I have miraculous hearing."
"Miraculous everything I had thought?" Atemu smiled.
"Ha!" The Sequester laughed despite himself, surprised by Atemu's light hearted nature, and something good, something innocent, seemed to creep out of that sensual soul that was unguarded and forgiving. Atemu could learn to like it if he could see if coaxed out more often. Drea, even as an often child of Jenzar and Atreyu, didn't seem to smile freely but to see it break his features even as the Sequester muted the expression was something Atemu took pride in.
Perhaps the dark Sequester wasn't, really, so bad for all his violent passions?
"Alright, gather up!" Amar ordered briskly to their collection.
They were a ragged bunch assembled round the ceremonial fires of the Hive. Their ten standard Reapers had assembled to their credit but many appeared to be on the verge of trembling as Amar shepherded them in. Timaeus was staunch, Cobalt sneering sickly and pallid at the concept of combat. Morphis waved low and brisk in acknowledgement as he took the reverse side of their circle. Seviticus stood close to Amar's mount, leaning into the earth, and behind him Nephele drew a bashful Yusei closer with a tenderness the Timer must've inherited from Atreyu. Where Drea hugged Atemu's side, Atreyu slipped against his opposing flank and for the first Atemu realized that they had all donned charmingly elaborate armour but Atreyu had neglected any covering from his shoulders to the wrists of his gloves as he took Atemu's elbow quietly.
Atemu's arm came round the Faen's shoulders and, thoughtful, Atreyu appeared to glance up at him from the bottom of a deep pool his lulled, docile, expression tender with favouritism as he rested more of his weight into the Reaper. Atemu was as resolved as Yami at that simple look. He would return Atreyu's happiness to him.
"Our mission isn't to storm all of Tartarus," Amar warned, "just the Nest of Cassidia. We're a recovery and extermination unit not an army so any of you with delusions of spectaculargrandeur best check them now. The nest has three structures: the outer ring, the inner ring and the sanctum.
Atreyu, Seviticus and I are going to phase our unit into the nest using Timaeus' guidance. Reapers man the exits in the outer ring. That's where the weakest of the Seer will be amassed. You'll be cloaked from their view by my magic till Atreyu sends up the signal and then they willpanic. Your job is to keep them inside, eradicate them and keep those exits secured. Cobalt you're supervising."
"Joy," Cobalt hissed mundanely.
"The rest of us will proceed into the inner ring. Seviticus will cloak us. Once we've hit the inner dome Atreyu will wipe out as many of them as he can. That's the signal. It will give away our position. The biggest, nastiest, Seers will be in that inner ring and they will attack. Our job is to keep them busy and keep them from reaching the outer ring. We secure the ring if we can. Timaeus will watch the inner ring and he will cover us. Atemu?"
"Aye?" He quirked erect.
"Atreyu's job is to find the sanctum and destroy Cassidia. Once she's gone we'll have the nest at our mercy. Chances are Jenzar Fraveous will be with her if he's captive. Your job is to make sure he gets there. Cover and guard. Think you can manage?"
"Sounds just my style."
"I thought so." The redhead snorted. "Good to go Trey?"
"They're not going to know what hit them." The Faen promised simply, the trident-esque Lance of Lazarus extended to its full form as Atreyu bounced its weight in the fingers of one hand by his side. Adjusting himself to it Atreyu drew a thin splinter of light from his clavicle and presented it to Atemu with his opposing hand releasing the Reaper from his weight. "The Needle."
"I understand," Atemu murmured, plucking the tiny morsel with his index and forefingers.
His hesitation gave way as he took the Needle onto his palm and, flaring, the weapon rippled to introduce itself to Atemu properly. It felt him with some kind of sentience and, purring perhaps, took a new shape for the Reaper to readily make use of. As reflection of Atreyu's heart, connected to his core, the Needle glowed candescent as it pulsed, thrummed, with a heartbeat of its own in Atemu's grip. It was a sword at once, something Atemu felt comfortable with, long and glorious if thin across. He was reminded, by Yami's childishness, of Excalibur which was not all together surprising given the Needle's rightful owner.
Atemu found himself securing his arms protectively round Atreyu as they phased. One arm hooked round the guarded hips, the other across his clavicle to pull the Faen's back to his chest, as the Needle battered Atemu's thigh in its scabbard. Mingled with discording sensations the Reaper had a minor spasm within his heart about the entirety of this plan. He was being depended on, as he had wanted to be, but was he good enough? Strong enough? Would he be able to defend Atreyu from the horde this one last time? He felt unprepared, fake, as if Yami was back at that dreadful high school trying to bluff his way through a speech for a book he disastrously hadn't read in its entirety.
When they manifested on the twilight planes of Tartarus Atemu was caught by their torrential, typhoon, quality. Amar, Seviticus and Atreyu had managed to place them just within the Nest at an entrance and cloaked as they were, visible only to each other, Atemu possessed the greatest urge to run for cover as he regarded the rather splendidly dreadful view.
Outside the arched entrance to the nest was a vast rocky shelf under a discontent and undecided sky that trembled with lightning and whipped up winds. The darkened, purplish and almost bruised, horizon revealed great black domes, a few hundred meters high, in all directions across the shared no mans' land that was in effect the space between trenches. They were inside one such nest and all round them, sleeping, chuckling and nuzzling were the spider like figures of at least a hundred Seers. They were thrown across the rocks, the twisting blackened modules of the inside of the nest, half atop each other with their gaunt faces, hair and elongated warped bodies that transformed them from white-blue women to spiderlike crawlers. The inside of the nest for its part was what Atemu imagined to find on the inside of a forgotten space ship: roots, blackened, ran through everything, and chaos had left the mechanical, black, disused structures overlapping everything in shambles.
Atreyu did not tremble in his arms. Amar murmured low to Cobalt and the first Reaper and, their group peeling off from the general Reapers, Atemu watched Cobalt begin, in hushed tones, to instruct the Reapers into their positions along the outer wall.
Atemu didn't envy them but nor did his understatedly brave comrades seem to envy him. As he watched them straighten their backs and part to take their positions he was reminded that a general Reaper, those who were not Specialists, were still part of a proud, noble, race of warriors and scared as they were the men and women who fell under Cobalt's command did so with a steely pride which while it did not mask their fear enabled them. These were not cannon fodder soldiers, these were not helpless souls, these were Reapers who, Specialists or not, were members of a proud linage Atemu shared and were resolved to fight.
Seviticus gestured to them and shuffling on Atreyu fell into line behind the verdigris Champion, toting his own weapon, leading them in a thin trail between the clucking Seers towards the cancerous regions of the inner ring. Atemu followed behind Atreyu silently, Drea behind him, then Morphis, Nephele and Yusei with Amar and Timaeus taking their rear so the strongest of their number effectively placed Atemu and their weaker companions sandwiched between them.
Atemu was wary of the spider Seers, the standard Seers, packed unknowingly around them with every step he took. Amar and Seviticus must've been straining massive amounts of energy to keep them cloaked and Atreyu's core being as radiantly powerful as the star it was Atemu could not fathom what it took to hide them amongst these creatures. He was wary of his voice, they were silent, and equally he was wary of his armour and his motions as he attempted to tiptoe through the tangled beds of Seers through another archway escaping the low hanging den of the outer ring.
The inner ring was the central structure under the massive dome which formed the nest Atemu realized as they entered it. The black structure arched up obscured overhead by columns and walkways as, up the sides of the dome, layers of levels stared down into the inner courtyard where they crept.
Where the outer ring was filled with a bamboozling amount of standard Seers this inner ring was a nightmarish hellion by comparison. Atemu had never seen Seers like these. They were in varying sizes and shapes: some with batlike wings on contorted limber bodies hung from the ceiling like barnacles on a ship's hull, others seemed plague ridden skeletons limping round, and one or two mammoth troll like beasts leant into a massive pillar to Atemu's right snorting and snoring. It was a carnival of Seers, a zoo, and the scent of decay and defecation was pungent.
Yusei seemed stricter in his stance than ever as they came to a halt. Atemu took half a step closer to Atreyu, who seemed to be grinning, and placed a hand on the scabbard of the Needle sword. Timaues was taunt over Atemu's shoulder ready, he guessed, to transform or else fight like a man. Seviticus stood at the forefront, Amar at the rear, of their circle and glancing between them Atemu waited patiently.
Drea seemed hardly afraid at all, bouncing on the heels of his feet, a wild, frenzied, grin controlled across his face as rolling his shoulders the Sequester prepared himself. Atemu did not doubt Drea would fight dirty. Morphis had gone into himself conversely, appeared to be mediating, as he inhaled carefully and expanding the air through his chest almost metamorphosed his stance to be firmly geared. At once Atemu could see the Champion roots in Morphis, the Knighted chivalry, the piece of him which would always be the eldest son of Jenzar Fraveous. Atemu could not be jealous but he could be surprised by the steel in Morphis' eyes. As for Nephele, the youngest, he inhaled carefully through his nose, eyes darting, and while he was clearly uneasy the Timer was not quaking but more or less he was resolved. All three of them, haphazard as they were, had been children of Jenzar and Atreyu in many lifetimes and for the chance to be so again, for their family, would fight and perhaps be destroyed here out of that fealty.
Amar nodded to Atreyu as the Faen glanced over his shoulder and turning his head back round the Faen likewise gave a curt jerk of his head to Seviticus who concurred.
Inhaling, Atreyu prepped in a taunt second like an opera singer preparing for the final note of an aria and punching his hand over his head let his voice ring out like the sound of Heaven's choir delivering divine judgement to bedlam.
"SHINNING NOVA ESCALATION!"
1 Morphis/Atemu/Yusei working as a trio is probably one of the biggest hints I'm going to give you about who exactly Morphis is. Get it while it's hot!
2 I don't know if any of you have ever had a moment where you've had to front up to save/protect someone or if you've ever had to face a day where you or someone you love might die but… yeah it's harsh. Hopefully I managed to capture a little of that.
3 Malleus Malevolent is a (bad) joke on the Malleus Maleficarum which was a popularized European witch hunters' manual in the 1500-1600s. I kid you not. It was literally a witch hunters how-to-do book.
4 A brief, clumsy, glance into Yugi's perspective this chapter!
5 As a senior Watcher Timaeus is the best guide to teleport/astral project yourself somewhere specific like say… a dangerous Seer filled nest. Not a great holiday destination.
6 Amar and Seviticus could, theoretically, have cloaked them longer but that would require a mass amount of power which would eventually be noticed (they have to attack sometime) and either way if this nest of Seers knows the secret to stopping Champions they need to be exterminated.
7 Excalibur was given to King Arthur by the fantastical Lady of the Lake with who Atemu obviously finds some similarity to Atreyu.
8 Atreyu's big attack "Shinning Nova Escalation" is sort of half Stardust Dragon and half a Sailor Moon throw back some of you will recognise.
I really hope you guys are having fun!
Ps- shit gets real next chapter