The Magicians' Realm Chapter 26: The Tour, a yu-gi-oh fanfic

Chapter 26, everybody! In which we get the first of several references to the Ray Bradbury book Let's All Kill Constance—when I read that book, I kind of had a Joe from Wishbone moment: hit the last page..."What did I just read? What just happened?" I need to reread that book. -_-

Teana's experience by the river there is based on an experience I had in the Outer Banks a few years back—a sea turtle surfaced near our boat, snorted, and by the time I spotted it and registered what it was, it had gone back down. It's on my list of really awesome experiences. :D

Angiembabe, thanks for the review! Yes, we're weird over here and use Fahrenheit and the English Measuring System (I think America's the only holdout for those? I'm not sure). All right! :D Unfortunately for us, the weather finally broke—we had to start our fireplaces. T-T Oooh, tempting—although I think right now Yami's more focused on learning something new; he needs constant distraction. :) Yes, Teana doesn't seem sold on having Yami around—it must be that hair….

Fromtheashtrees, thanks for the review! That I had to get from my e-mail because FanFiction is being weird….Anywho! We may be answering your question this chapter or next chapter, so stay tuned. :) Heheh, I suppose the stairs were easy to miss because they were treated as a normal thing—I figure since Kels and Yami live there, those stone steps aren't as arduous as the ones in Harper's Ferry were to me. ^^; The steps are at the end of the last chapter. :) I suppose the only thing keeping my Mom from heading over there right now is the cloudy-with-a-chance-of-spiders thing and the fact that it would be an extra-long haul—going to Hawaii was nerve-wracking enough (about halfway through the six-hour flight we realized that if we crashed we'd be stuck treading water in the Pacific Ocean with a very slim chance of retrieval D: ). Tis true…and now I want to find something not named after a person….I'm actually surprised that it took us a month to put everything up but only two days to take everything down…it's weird (and you should decorate more—especially outside).

References:

Original characters + setting © Kineil D. Wicks (myself, not the girl in the story)

Teana decided that this was going to be one of her better days.

It was a rare event—she had the day off. The full day off.

She kept the information to herself—she had wanted a day where she could keep her own council, and nutty Magicians did not factor into that plan.

So she got up early, spent the first hour after breakfast tooling around the Delvaire Public Library, and then checked out a book that she thought was satisfactory.

"Let's All Kill Constance," the librarian read—she was an absolutely beautiful woman, one that made Teana feel plain by comparison; she wondered why this lady worked at the library. "Interesting. Have you read it before?"

"Not yet," Teana admitted, accepting it back.

"When you finish, would you mind telling me what you think of the ending? I need a second opinion on that one."

"Okay," Teana said slowly. "I'll let you know."

"Splendid. Enjoy."

Teana nodded and left, reflecting that she shouldn't be surprised that librarians read the books they sorted.

But she couldn't help but feel that was odd somehow, as she left the relative coolness of the library and hit the hot mugginess that was high summer. Wow—already it was hot. She amended her course so it took her to a corner store in the Commoner's section.

No way was a Magician ruining this day.

*/*\*

The next day, Yami risked it and went to the Administration Building. It was either that, or walk to Massenborough in an attempt to keep his mind off things.

Of course, considering what he was walking into, walking that far might have been the better idea.

The Administration Building was kept a constant seventy degrees. After the increasing heat of outside, it was pleasant. High summer meant it was getting warmer earlier in the day and staying toasty long into evening. But soon it'd be fall, with the smell of dying leaves filling the air and complementing the scents of harvesting and preparing for winter.

Yami reflected that he would have to pick up poetry—that was actually pretty good.

One of the Administrators spotted Yami as he loitered in the lobby, letting his eyes adjust. "What are you doing here, Yami?"

"I thought I'd walk with the museum tour today," Yami said, easy with his excuse. Confidence is what sold a lie, he knew.

The Administrator nodded and continued on his way, allowing Yami to do so as well.

Yami had expected such resistance, and had come up with the museum tour as a good excuse to wander the Administration Building unaccosted. Unfortunately, it also meant that he had to walk the tour anyway. Yay. Like he hadn't done so a million times before when attending Hallowed Fields.

As he walked over to the small tour group, he realized he was possibly overreacting. He could have said he was heading for the library to make sure he stayed sharp. But at the same time, he had a sneaking suspicion that the Administrators were keeping an unusually close eye on him for some reason.

He snorted softly and turned his attention back to the tour—his conversation with Kels and Balthazar yesterday had put him on edge, that's all. He forced his attention to stay focused on the guide, who was currently describing a statue, which apparently depicted a dragon king.

"Brutus Kaiba could reportedly summon dragons at will," the guide was saying. "His age was impressive even by Magicians' standards—some say he dated back to the Age of Chaos, before the Great Dearth."

Yami examined the statue as the tour guide drifted away, the group with her. The detail on the statue was ridiculously incredible—he could almost believe that Brutus Kaiba, the Dragon Emperor, would jump right off the podium right then and there—

And there was something very unnerving about the eyes.

Yami shuddered and ran after the tour group.

*\*/*

Sitting in the sun, enjoying the nice cool breeze off the river, reading a book while nursing a soda—now this was how to spend a day.

She was deep into the mystery now, the nameless narrator worried about his titular friend. Thank goodness she had picked a relatively isolated patch by the river to read—she'd hate to have this interrupted now that it was getting good—

Snort!

"What?" she said automatically, looking up sharply. Okay, that wasn't human, which made her regret her decision to be out here by herself—

She froze, staring, when she realized what she was looking at.

"Hello," she decided, since she didn't know what else to say to the smooth blue-white head barely poking out of the water. It reminded her of an alligator, but with infinitely smoother skin, and…human…eyes….

"Hello," the thing returned without preamble.

She stared. She had to be honest, she wasn't expecting an answer from the thing.

It snorted again. "And here I thought you were intelligent, actually greeting me instead of running while screaming your head off."

"I'm sorry," she decided to say. "But I wasn't exactly expecting an answer. What are you, the Loch Ness monster?"

"You're in the wrong area for that."

"What then? A dragon?"

"Getting warmer," it—he, she supposed; the voice was masculine enough—said, drifting downstream a bit before hauling himself out of the water and onto the rocks.

She hoped that it was true about staring not being rude, because she couldn't help but do so. From his nose to his haunches, he was as long as a horse and carriage, not counting the long whiplike tail he curled up around his selected boulder. That same bluish white from stem to stern, with some darker armor on his arms, legs, and waist, spikes tipped with red poking up from his back in twin rows….

The longer she looked, the less convinced she was that she was looking at a dragon.

"Like what you see?" he asked flatly—not quite caustic; just mildly irritated that someone had infiltrated his preferred sunning spot.

"I'm not sure what I'm looking at," she said.

"You're looking at me—congratulations."

"Are all dragon-things as stuck up as you?"

"Yes. We're quite aware of what a big deal we are."

She rolled her eyes. Jerk.

It slid one of those blue eyes over until it was looking at her. "What do you think of that book so far?"

She glanced back down at her nearly-forgotten book. "It's all right…."

"Tell me what you think of the ending when you reach it—I need another opinion on it."

"You make the second, uh, person to ask me that."

"It's an interesting story."

Silence, because she wasn't sure what else to say to keep the conversation going. Why she was even having the conversation was beyond her—her day had become very surreal in less than ten minutes.

"I've decided I like you," the dragon said suddenly. "You're not like most people who would try to keep the conversation awkwardly going—you sense an end and you stop."

"Thank you?"

The dragon nodded and settled to arranging himself for optimum sunning, effectively terminating the conversation. Teana decided to see if she couldn't get back to her book, now that her solitude was thusly interrupted—

"Don't move."

"What?" she asked, looking up.

The dragon was suddenly coiled, fixated on a spot about a foot away from where she was—

She looked, screamed as she leapt up, running from the absolutely huge snake—

And the dragon lunged, crunched down, and flung the snake away.

"I hate those things," the dragon said simply as he returned to his sunning spot.

"Oh good, it's not just me," Teana noised, rubbing her chest. "Thank you, by the way."

"Don't mention it—I have a nap I need to get back to."

She gave it some thought before sitting down next to his rock. If she was going to get lost in a book, she wanted to be near the snake-killer.

She read a full minute before the dragon spread one wing a bit further, shielding her book from the glare of the sun.

"Thanks," she said, glancing up.

The dragon simply made a content noise, eyes closed.

Maybe she didn't have to be alone by herself, she decided.