Author's Note: … Wow. Twenty-seven chapters. Can you believe it? I can't.
I have been reading some fanfics lately that begin with a quote of some kind, which I think is kinda interesting. So I'm gonna start this chapter with a quote. I probably won't make a habit out of it, but ya know, whatever…
"Am I the only one who fears she's losing her marbles? The shrinks all say, 'If you think you're insane, you're not. Crazy people don't know they're crazy.' I hope the shrinks are right, but sometimes I wonder…"
-BJ Gallagher
I think it's a fitting quote for this chapter. You're about to see why…
And… begin.
Chapter 27
It was pretty safe to say that nobody slept a sound minute that night. Especially not Yugi. Every time her eyes closed, her mind swarmed with the image of Yami's eyes, full of betrayal, as he was led down the dungeon. The memory was fresh and raw, making it all the more painful. And even when she somehow banished that haunted look from her mind, her imagination assaulted her with all kinds of scenarios, the worst involving Yami chained up below her feet, his mind probably racing with escape routes. Not that there were any; Yami was guarded more heavily than a first-degree murderer, which he probably was one.
And, when the sun finally seeped into the horizon and the courtroom came to order, not a soul in the room did not have dark circles lying beneath their eyes.
Yugi felt Atem's fingers burrow into her hand, and she grappled for them gratefully.
The morning had been quite the opposite of the night and had gone by in a whirlwind. And now, just as the sun was reaching its highest peak in the sky, Yami was being led into the center of the high-ceilinged room, put on his knees just before the Pharaoh.
Yugi tried desperately to read her brother's expression, but it was to no avail. The lone thing she could decipher from him was that he was that he was the only one in the whole palace that looked well rested at the moment. No dark circles marred his features, and he didn't look nervous in the least. In fact, he looked quite calm, unmoving and unconcerned.
How could this be? Did he already have a plan in mind?
"First of all, I'd like to begin this court by separating the facts from the myths," Akunumkanon's voice suddenly boomed, making the entire room jump. The Pharaoh's piercing gaze moved down to Yami, and he told the Motou, "I will ask you a series of questions. If you are found guilty of lying when reciting the answers, you'll risk facing worse consequences. Do I make myself clear?"
Yami nodded almost too easily, not a word of dispute coming from him.
"Very well." The Pharaoh shifted his position in his throne and stated, "First question: Have you ever murdered someone?"
The room became quieter if that were possible.
"Yes, I have."
"Intentionally or unintentionally?"
There was a pause. "Both at one time or another."
Atem's father narrowed his eyes at the mocking tone but gave no comment. "Are you in association with the Thief King?"
"I have been for a long time, yes."
"How would you describe your relationship with him?"
A second pause. "Business partners. But not for much longer."
"What do you mean by that?"
"I mean just what I say; I was going to cut my ties with him as soon as I finished up here."
"Meaning?"
"Kill him."
The Pharaoh tried to make it appear that this didn't faze him in the least, but it obviously did, as he was taken aback. "Why?" he finally questioned.
"He's getting too comfortable with our business arrangement. He knows too much about me, and he's careless as well, which I cannot afford."
Akunumkanon growled, "And you think you could just get away with casual murder?"
"I'll be doing you a favor, Pharaoh. If my calculations are correct, you've been after the same goal for a good ten years now. And I can have that problem solved in one night."
Akunumkanon coughed, buying himself time to think over his next question carefully. After a moment, he finally announced, "Let me ask you a simple question, Yami: Who is Lady Yugi to you?"
"She's my sister." But he didn't stop there. "She's also my only remaining family, my compassion, my integrity, and my sanity. Without her I have none of those things and can barely be considered a human."
"And does that view of her change now that she possesses her own eyesight and is no longer in need of anyone's help?"
Yami thought about this for a minute, Yugi barely breathing as he did. Finally, he declared, "No. I see her still as the only thing that can keep me connected to this world."
"And if you weren't allowed to keep her for your own selfish reasons, what would you do?"
"Yugi and I can't be kept apart for long."
"How do you know that?"
"I've been collaborating with a famous group of prophets as of late, and they have confirmed that Yugi and I will always be associated with each other our entire lives."
"'Famous group of prophets'? Whom are you referring to?"
"Why, none other than the infamous Valon, Raphael, and Alister."
"The three prophets from the north that prophesize on the stars and not the gods?" the Pharaoh asked angrily, his eyebrows furrowing his eyebrows dangerously.
"The very same." Yami went on to describe, "One knows the past, another knows the present, and the last knows the future. I had the pleasure of running into Valon, the future prophet, and he told me just what I told you."
Murmurs and whispers sparked in the courtroom.
Akunumkanon held up his hand, and everything became silent again. "Prophesying without the gods approval is just as bad if not worse than blasphemy. How do you know that their predictions are accurate?"
"To be honest, I don't." Yami shrugged nonchalantly. "But I trust them."
The Pharaoh hummed at this, leaning on his hand and contemplating. "Now let me ask you a more complicated question:" he transitioned, "Where is Priest Seto?"
"Gone, just as I told Yugi. I'll spare you the details of our duel for time sakes, but he is now currently residing in the Shadow Realm."
The court gasped as though Yami had spoken in a foreign tongue before their very eyes at the mention of the Shadow Realm.
Yugi clawed at Atem's hand, letting out her own gasp. Gone. Lost. Abandoned. Because of her! Yugi felt tears cascade down her cheeks, dropping gently onto her lap.
Really, truly gone.
-transition-
Seto opened his eyes with slight difficultly, a moan of exhaustion passing through his thin lips. He blinked a few times, but the room he was in was pitch-black. Either that, or he was as blind as Yugi…
He lifted himself off the ground, shaking his head lightly. What had happened? He remembered searching for Yugi, and then Yami had appeared from nowhere, and then—
Every explicit detail of their duel rushed at him. He remembered everything. Especially how he had lost…
Seto looked up and saw a purple mist was guarding the shadows, lurking just above its victims.
"Well, it can't be like this throughout the entire realm, can it?" he asked himself aloud. It echoed into infinity. "There must be a way to return back."
He had said these things to persuade himself and not the shadows circling his feet. They were a lost cause, but Seto was still sure there was a glimmer of hope. His pep talk didn't seem to convince him fully though, because his hands were shaking as he looked at them through the ever-present black smoke. Trying to distract himself from this fact, he began to head off in a random direction.
Seto had heard stories, horrific ones about the Shadow Realm. Of course, no one had gone to the realm and back to verify if any of the ghost tales were true, but that in itself was enough to drive fear into any normal man's heart.
The Royal Court avoided the subject of the Shadow Realm like the plague, because it was only a real threat to those who harbored DiaDhanks, which they did. But the Servant's quarters was always ablaze with midnight horror stories told around a mutual roaring fire.
Most included the Shadow Realm at one point or time in the story.
"I swear on my life that the story I'm about to tell is completely true," Seto once overheard an elderly male servant tell a group of young children. "I once saw the Shadow Realm with my own eyes."
"You did?" a servant boy no older than the age of seven inquired fearfully, his little calloused hands running over each other nervously. "Was it as terrifying as they say?"
"Oh yes; they didn't lie," he man assured and dove into his story: "I went with some other servants to accompany the Pharaoh on an important diplomatic trip once. And during the night I was to keep watch outside the Pharaoh's tent, and something horrible happened." The children bunched together nervously on the opposite side of the bonfire as the man told them, "I heard a shriek from across the dunes. Of course, I had to go investigate, so I took up my knife and followed the awful sound to a nearby hill not a small stroll away from where we had set up camp." The servant took a dramatic pause. "On the top of that hill, there were two figures. One was dressed head to toe in black, and the other was just a young man with golden hair and kohl spread carefully around his eyes. His hair stood on end, and I am still convinced to this day that he was possessed by a demon. Anyways, the two men were fighting an epic battle, but by the time I had arrived at the scene, the platinum blonde boy had sent his final attack on the cloaked man.
"The boy's monster was certainly something to behold; it was a golden dragon that's wings were blazing in colorful flames but were not burning. It lit up the entire sky, though it had long since been dusk. And as soon as the young man had called out his concluding attack, the flaming beast swooped down and took the remaining life out of the cloaked man.
"The dark figure collapsed to the ground, and I watched as the dunes became shrouded in shadows. The man slowly disappeared into them, until he was no longer visible. And once the shadows had consumed him completely, they scurried away, not leaving one piece of evidence to prove that the man had ever existed in this world."
"But the blonde boy was all right, wasn't he?" a servant girl with long braids inquired hesitantly.
"Of course he was!" the storyteller exclaimed as if it was the most obvious thing. "The shadows believe in the rule of one: one winner and one loser. Say what you will about them, but they'll never cheat you out of your life if you deserve it.
"But that's not the worst part I'm afraid. The worst is that after the platinum blonde won the duel, he returned to the side of another cloaked man atop a midnight black horse. It wasn't until the masked man helped the victor up onto his horse and they had began riding off that I saw a tuft of white hair peaking out of the mystery man's dark apparel. And I'll give you one guess as to who that man was."
"The Thief King!" the young servants recited in chorus, letting out their pent-up anxiety in the exclamation.
(Another pattern Seto saw in their ghost stories were that most of them were based around or at least mentioned the Thief King.)
"Yes, but don't mistake, children, I went after that notorious thief with all I had, running after him until my feet almost gave out."
"You didn't have your horse?" a servant boy that was probably the age twelve asked skeptically.
"Of course not; when you hear shrieking out in the middle of the desert and you're given the task to guard the Pharaoh, you don't think twice about going after the threat and leaving everything behind. You have to take action.
"Obviously, I didn't catch the Thief King, otherwise he still wouldn't be giving us trouble today. But when I finally had to fall onto the ground a pant like a dog from running after the thief and his blonde accomplice, I finally looked up at the sky and saw the remnants of the Shadow Realm above, swirling around the dunes like hungry vultures. It looked lost for a minute, and who knows? Maybe it was. But whatever the case, the shadows must have remembered where to go, because they suddenly grouped together and darted across the sky like a falling star.
"And what I learned from this experience frightens even me, children. I learned that the Shadow Realm isn't a place, but rather, another dimension."
"What do you mean?" an older servant woman, perhaps one of the mothers of the children asked.
"I mean that I witnessed the shadows reach the top of the sky and then disperse in a vibrating pulse. And then they were gone, vanished. The Shadow Realm isn't a place in this land; it's an entire different world."
"But the- the Shadow Realm doesn't take good- good souls, right?" a little girl stuttered uneasily.
The teller held up one finger. "The rule of one: One winner, one loser. It doesn't matter who you are. If you abuse the shadow magic, the shadows might abuse you."
A woman clapped her hands, making the younger servants all jump. "On that note, I think we'll get the children into bed. Say goodnight, children."
The children hopped up, all saying their goodnights as they were corralled to bed.
Seto tried to sway himself into believing that the story the elderly servant had told was just a fairy tale, a myth, a ghost story for Ra sakes! But he couldn't get it out of his mind as he had walked back to his chambers, and of course, when he finally tried to sleep after several hours of thought.
The children the narrator told it to weren't scared. Well, they weren't after they had said their goodnights and had disappeared into their bedrooms to be tucked in by their mothers. That must have been the key. Or maybe it was that it was not a legitimate threat to them. Unless they grew up to be part of the Pharaoh's court or the Thief King's cult, they'd never have the displeasure of having to face any danger of that degree. But since Seto had been both a member of the cult and then converted to a permanent part of the court, he had always been in around that level of danger. True, he'd never seen the Shadow Realm for itself, but the threat of it was enough to make him wish for once in his life that he could be a humble servant, being tucked in at night by his mother, never to face any threat of harm.
Seto stopped his wandering around in the shadows and began to wonder how long he had been walking. His feet were sore and his breath came out in uneven pants, so it must have been a long time. Even so, he convinced himself to keep moving. He only had two options: Give up and accept his sentence to the Shadow Realm with no chance of good behavior early release or rebel against his fate and meander around desperately until his feet gave out under him or he found something that would motivate him further.
He chose the latter.
-transition-
"I think it's fair to say you are guilty of all the crimes you have been suspected for," Akunumkanon told Yami, the Pharaoh's eyes almost pitying the older Motou. He declared, "Then I command that a Millennium Trial is held right away. Shada, come forward and look into the heart of Yami."
Shada stepped forward, the Key in his hands. "Of course, my Pharaoh." He held out his Millennium Item. "Key, show me the root of this evil."
The item began to glow an eerie light, and Shada saw that the inside of the notorious brother of Yugi.
"It's- it's incredible!" Shada's eyes were wide, raising alarm in the Royal Court. "The beast inside him- it's the size of a god! It's a blood red dragon with enormous wings and has fangs that would put the most venomous serpent to shame!"
"Whatever beast is inside this man, it cannot stand up to the Millennium Items," Karim assured, taking up the Millennium Rod that the court had retrieved from Yami when he had been arrested. "And I will prove it. Bring a sealing tablet forward."
It was done, and Karim held the Item out in front of him. "Now, Millennium Rod, in Priest Seto's absence, please give me your power to drive out whatever lies in Yami."
-transition-
Seto sucked in a sharp breath. His Millennium Rod was calling out to him. He could feel its familiar warmth taking over his feet and telling him which way he should go. With absolutely no hesitation, he followed the Item's signal.
-transition-
The Millennium Rod in Karim's hand glowed just as the Key had, and the monster possessing Yami's heart began to depart from him.
The court gasped. Shada did not over-exaggerate; the dragon was just as he had described, more so if possible.
Slifer the Sky Dragon levitated over Yami who had fallen limp on the courtroom floor, its serpent-like body reeling and its duel mouths opening up to release a earth-shattering screech. Everyone except Yami covered their ears to shield them from the noise and looked on at the monster, wondering just what to do with it.
"I'll handle this!" Karim declared loudly, though most of the court couldn't hear him being that the dragon was still releasing violent cries.
The Item Bearer held the Millennium Rod up again, and the dragon became covered in a faint golden light. He pointed the Item towards the tablet forcibly, and Slifer was thrown into the stone. But as soon as the dragon appeared sealed, the rock began to crack, and everyone waited for the monster to emerge again.
But it didn't.
-transition-
Seto stopped in front of a wall of royal purple shadows, seeing a terrifying creature being drove into the realm.
The red dragon was escaping, though. Its massive tail was moving back and forth rapidly and almost gracefully as it dug its fangs into the shadows, beginning to break through.
I can't let that monster into the world! Who knows what kind of damage it could release on Egypt?
By instinct, Seto grabbed the end of the dragon's tail, holding it back. Slifer looked back at him with pale yellow eyes but seemed more adamant about breaking through the shadows and did not shake him off.
It sunk its jaws deeper into the storm-like clouds until light pierced through the realm.
-transition-
The tablet broke away but only the front of it. Slifer's head showed through it, but it didn't make any progress in returning into the courtroom.
Something was holding the dragon back.
"Priest Seto?"
Yugi stood up on her tippy toes to peer behind the dragon. Yes, holding back the colossal beast was none other than Seto.
"Priest Seto!"
Before Atem could stop her, she leaped up and over to the tablet, calling into it.
"Priest Seto! Priest Seto!"
"Lady Yugi?" Seto moved his head to the side to gaze through the portal at Yugi, still a firm hold on Slifer's tail. "Lady Yugi!"
Atem was at Yugi's side in a heartbeat, and he called into the Shadow Realm, "Keep holding back the dragon, Seto! I'll come in and get you!"
"Prince Atem, you mustn't!" Isis cried after him.
But Atem already had a foot in the portal, carefully navigating around and past Slifer's head. He ran to Seto's side and hugged Slifer's tail just as Seto was, helping him pull the dragon back. Ever so slowly, Slifer began to be pulled further and further into the Shadow Realm, away from the portal.
Yugi looked down at the edges of the tablet and saw they were receding slowly as well.
"Atem! Priest Seto! The Shadow Realm is going to close up! You have to come back through!" she alerted them, panic entering her tone.
Priest Seto nudged Atem and told him, "Prince Atem, you have to return. I'll hold the dragon back until the portal closes. Egypt can't exist without you."
"I'm not leaving you here," Atem promised Seto firmly. "You've done enough. Now, we're going to be all right. We just have to think…"
"There's no time to think!" Karim yelled at them from the other side. "You have to come back now!"
Suddenly, a fireball bore into Slifer, and the beast was forced back deep into the Shadow Realm.
Everyone looked back to see who could have delivered such a devastating attack.
Yami stood across from the tablet, his custom-made DiaDhank strapped to his arm and Exodia's arm still extended from sending the blow into Slifer.
"Don't just stand there, Priest Seto, Prince Atem! Get out of the Shadow Realm!"
The two young men's eyes widened in shock from hearing Yami say this, but they scrambled out quickly like they had just been scolded by a teacher.
They exited the Shadow Realm with at least a few minutes to spare. Yugi went and hugged them, the three sharing a moment. But then all eyes turned to Yami.
Yami dropped his arm and clenched his jaw, irises the same shade of Yugi's shielded in a shadow.
Slowly, he began to walk towards the Shadow Realm portal that was sealing gradually, talking as he did:
"I fell unconscious when Slifer was released from me, and when I awoke, everything was clear. There was no more confusion, no more hatred. I only hated myself. While the Shadow Realm is still open, I think it'd be best for me to enter it and not cause Yugi, the royal family, or Egypt any more suffering. This is the only way I can redeem myself. I deserve even worse; I know. But this way is best."
He stopped in front of the portal and gave a halfhearted smile to Yugi.
"I'm sorry. And goodbye."
He closed his eyes and entered.
"Brother!"
A pair of pale arms wrapped around Yami's waist and pulled him back out into the courtroom, clinging to him like he was dear life. Yami's eyes opened wide in astonishment, looking down at the little girl who had brought him back from the edge.
"You don't have to do this! I forgive you! We understand! This isn't the only way! Please!"
Yugi's arms tightened around him, tears staining the back of his cloak. She continued to chant please over and over, and Yami knew he couldn't go against his sister's wishes. Never again.
The Shadow Realm portal closed.
Author's Note: … I think that about says it all. :3
Review.