Yu-Gi-Oh! 5Ds

Moonlight Legend

By Lucky_Ladybug

Notes: The characters are not mine and the story is! Any references to Sailor Moon are very intentional. Normally I don't care for the reincarnation trope in fiction, but the way Sailor Moon did it is so beautiful and so charming that I make an exception in that case. I'm not positive I'll have this fic really go that route or do something different, but in any case, it's a complete love letter to Sailor Moon as well as to these 5Ds characters I adore so much. This is post-series, and as always, Radley is a nice guy, the way I honestly see him. I'm writing it with the prompt #1 - Forever from the defunct 5Ds_100 writing community on Livejournal.

Chapter One

Being a prince was never easy. Being a prince with added, magical responsibilities was even worse. It was hard work honing the pendant's powers, and no matter how he tried, it always left him drained and gasping for breath. His parents always made the lessons stop at that point; they couldn't have him dying, after all.

He wished the lessons would stop for good. Obviously the pendant was never going to fully respond to him. It was futile and he was tired of pretending it wasn't. Even if the day came that he would need to use it to defend his people, it was clear to him that it would never even work. He would let everyone down instead. But all of his pleas to find another bearer fell on deaf ears. The pendant was passed down from parent to child in every generation. Only he could wield it, unless his parents had another child.

He had to get away sometimes or he would truly lose his mind. Today he was out of the grounds, practicing his fencing by himself on a hill. His black hair flew out with the lunging motion and then fell back into place against his neck. The day was warm, but only pleasantly so. He could finally relax and be himself here. Fencing was something he enjoyed. It wasn't all about brute strength, but about clever moves and calculations. He had to know exactly when was the right moment to lunge or to parry. It had nothing to do with magic or forcing his body on when it just couldn't go any more. He could stop whenever he wanted.

It was impossible to shake the feeling he was being watched, however. He had tried repeatedly to catch the culprit in the act, to no avail. Now he was pretending he had given up any such ideas and was going about his practice. At the slightest rustle of brush, he whirled, pointing his sword at a tree.

"I know you're there," he said easily. "You might as well come out."

The blue-haired young man was quite unexpected. He stepped out with a slightly mischievous smirk. "Hello."

The fencer withdrew his sword in surprise. "You're . . ."

"Prince Kalin, at your service." He did a little bow.

"Yes, I remember. And do you remember my name?" The other folded his arms.

"Of course. Prince Ramon." The blue-haired man walked over closer. "We met when our families tried to co-host a ball to smooth over relations between our kingdoms."

"Yes, I remember. Unfortunately, it hasn't helped much. Our kingdoms are still locked in a cold war, you know," Ramon mused.

"That's all foolishness. Don't you agree?" Kalin said.

Ramon finally smiled a bit. "Yes, I most certainly do."

"Neither of us wanted this war. We shouldn't have to take part in it. Why don't we do something constructive instead, like sit and talk?" Kalin gestured to the hill.

Ramon smirked now. "Oh? How do I know you're not just trying to get the drop on me so you can stab me in cold blood?"

Kalin sobered. "Truthfully, I've been watching you ever since the ball, but always from farther away."

"I'm really that fascinating?" Ramon quipped.

"I don't have to tell you that the life of a prince is lonely." Kalin looked a little embarrassed now, but still determined. "At the ball, I saw the same sorrow in you that I've felt."

"So you want to commiserate?" Ramon asked.

"Something like that," Kalin said. "It's common ground to start with, at least. Perhaps we'll find more."

Ramon smiled a bit. "I really shouldn't, but somehow I believe you."

Kalin smiled too. "I'm glad."

"So am I," Ramon mused. "I would like to have a friend . . . a real friend who isn't just excited by my title and wealth."

"That's what I want too," Kalin said.

"Well . . . we're certainly the most unlikely of friends," Ramon commented. He smirked again. "But that makes it fun."

Kalin smirked too. "We're going to get along just fine."

The weather in Satisfaction Town was heading towards winter. Most leaves had fallen and the temperatures were bitterly cold, usually below freezing at night. Radley didn't typically like to be out in it longer than necessary. Thus it surprised Kalin when late one night he found Radley standing on their porch and staring out at the starry sky.

A bit confused, Kalin came closer. "What is it?" he asked.

Radley kept staring off into the distance, unusual for him. That sort of behavior was more common to Kalin. After a moment of silence, Kalin was tempted to ask whether Radley had heard him, but then Radley spoke, his voice soft in the cold night.

"Do you remember when you asked me if I believed in reincarnation?"

Bewildered, Kalin went over next to him. "Yes. You were adamant you didn't."

Radley sighed. "I didn't, and I still don't want to. But . . . that dream you had, of us in a garden? I've been having some real loco dreams lately, and they feel like memories the same as the garden scene did for you."

Kalin was stunned. "What are they like?" he asked.

Radley finally managed a weak smirk. "Let's go inside while I talk about it." He opened the front door and led Kalin into the warm living room. "It's like something out of Sailor Moon or Shakespeare. I'm a prince, and my kingdom is on the rocks with another kingdom. But . . . the prince of that kingdom is a nice guy. We end up meeting and wanting to be friends, even though it's forbidden. He's you."

Kalin stared. "That's out there. Did you dream about the garden I saw?"

"I didn't see a garden," Radley admitted. "But that doesn't mean there wasn't one. The scene changed. Some big evil sweeps across the land and I have to fight it, banishing it to a dimension of evil with my pendant. Only . . . something goes really wrong. The evil infects almost everyone from both our kingdoms. We have to combine our strengths to seal it away, but it kills us both in the process. As we're dying, our parents are crying and saying they're going to ask God to give us another chance to live and be happy, even if it's in a different lifetime."

Kalin let out a shaking breath. ". . . Wow."

"I know, right?" Radley shook his head. "I know I probably just saw too much Sailor Moon when Scotch was binging it the other day, but . . ."

". . . What if you didn't?" Kalin said. "I mean, what if that isn't the reason? What would you think?"

"I'd think . . ." Radley pondered. "I'd think maybe we were given a special gift that isn't given to everyone. And I'd think . . . if reincarnation was true for us, and it was to give us a happier life together, I could deal with that." He smiled.

Kalin smiled too. "So could I." He drew Radley into a sweet hug.

Radley hugged back. "It could just be a weird dream, though. I mean, you and I looked the same as we do now. Oh, we had different clothes, but our hair, our eyes, even me wearing jewelry, that was all there."

". . . What were we wearing?" Kalin suddenly sounded leery. "It wasn't those ridiculous tights with . . . puffy shorts, was it?"

Radley laughed out loud. "Thankfully, no. I was dressed in a black bolero jacket with matching pants and a white shirt. You were wearing a white coat with medals and red pants. Actually, you looked like Prince Charming. Literally, like from Cinderella."

Kalin grunted. ". . . I guess I can live with that. But I still say white isn't my color."

"Oh, you looked very dashing," Radley smirked.

"Maybe it really was just a dream. You've been wanting to see me in white," Kalin remarked.

"Maybe it was," Radley agreed. "I honestly don't know. I would have scoffed at the thought of it being anything else in the past, but when it felt real . . ." He gave a helpless shrug.

"That makes it harder," Kalin agreed.

". . . There's also the weirdness of this past me also having this pendant, and it still having powers," Radley noted.

"That's the sort of thing that would happen in a dream," Kalin agreed.

"Yeah. I mean, I found this pendant in an antique store! Could it really be something I used to save the world in another life?!" Radley scoffed.

Kalin shrugged. "If it is, then fate led you to it in this one," he said. "That isn't the strangest thing about this."

"No, it isn't," Radley sighed in agreement. "The strangest thing is this whole thing."

". . . What were our names?" Kalin asked.

"I was Prince Ramon," Radley said. "You were still Kalin. Prince Kalin."

Kalin grimaced. "It doesn't fit. I would never be prince of anywhere."

"If you were born to royalty you would be," Radley quipped. "You know . . . just to try to satisfy my own curiosity . . . it wouldn't hurt to find out if there was a Prince Ramon in history who looked like me. A Prince Kalin too."

"If there was really magic and evil beings involved, it probably wouldn't be in the history books," Kalin said. "And maybe it will end up they're more ancestors of ours instead of us in a past life."

"I would be okay with that," Radley said. "I'd just like to know. Wouldn't you?"

Kalin gave a half-hearted shrug. "I guess." He sighed. "I can't say I'd be thrilled to know we died before, though. It's hard enough dealing with the times it's happened in this existence."

Radley gave a sad smile. "It sure is. I don't really like to think about that part of it either. But . . . if we find out this is all baloney, that would be comforting on that level, wouldn't it?"

". . . It would," Kalin admitted. "Alright, let's try to find out. And depending on what we find out, we'll try to deal with whatever it is."

Radley nodded. "Yeah."

Seeing no reason to put it off, he went to the computer and booted it up to run some Internet searches. "Let's see . . . what should I try? 'Prince Ramon in history'?" He typed that and leaned back.

Kalin grunted, looking over the back of the chair at the screen. "It looks like there's a lot of results for a lot of Prince Ramons."

"And some that are just about Prince," Radley quipped. He clicked on a link from a university.

The painting that loaded at the top of the page nearly floored him. It depicted a young man who looked very much like himself, dressed the way he had described in his dream, wielding a powerful sword as he charged what looked like sentient darkness. To the side, a young man who looked like Kalin was rushing to his aid.

Kalin gripped the back of the chair. "That's . . ."

Radley immediately saved the picture to the computer. "It's just like I saw," he rasped. "I know I never saw this painting before! It couldn't have influenced my dream!"

"You're sure your family didn't have it?" Kalin asked, even though he knew the query was ridiculous.

"Absolutely not," Radley said. "If we did, I think Grandma would have tried to hide it. She wouldn't have wanted me to get any ideas about the guy in the picture being me."

". . . You're probably right," Kalin said. "Especially after meeting me."

"But by then we all would have seen it before," Radley said. "I would have recognized you looking like the other guy in the painting if I'd seen it before you came to town."

"That makes sense," Kalin acknowledged. ". . . What does the article say?"

Radley scrolled down to it. "This is something posted by a professor at this Spanish university," he said, unable to fully keep the tremor out of his voice. "He says Prince Ramon is a legend, a myth from Spain, but that he believes the guy was real."

Kalin grunted. "Why?"

"Well, he could be loco, but maybe not," Radley said. "He talks about how legends often have truth behind them."

"Is that his only argument?" Kalin wasn't impressed.

"No, he also says there's people in real-life who look enough like the prince to make him think there's something to it," Radley said. "Maybe he's seen my picture in the paper. Only . . . if he really thinks I'm proof of his theory, why hasn't he ever contacted me about it?"

". . . What about the painting?" Kalin asked. "Is it really old?"

"You mean as opposed to being something the guy had painted himself?" Radley smirked dryly. "That's a good question. Let's try to find out."

He opened the copy of the painting he had saved. At full size, it was much easier to see all the intricate details in the art, and it only served to emphasize all the more that the people in it looked like Radley and Kalin. Radley only spent a moment looking at that before focusing on the signature at the bottom. With that name in hand, he went back to the browser and opened a new tab to explore the artist's name.

". . . Well, the guy's real," he said after a moment of studying the new results. "And most likely, so is the painting. He was a little-known Spanish painter who focused on painting scenes from legends like Prince Ramon and Prince Kalin. He lived in the 18th Century."

". . . This is just bizarre," Kalin flatly remarked. "You dreamed of it and these things are backing you up."

Radley nodded. "We need to find a copy of this legend. I know I've never heard of it before."

"Is it even in print?" Kalin wondered.

"Not here, but maybe in Spain?" Radley suggested.

Several more searches brought them the news that it was out of print everywhere. Radley scowled.

". . . Maybe we could find a copy in a used bookstore if we went over there," he mused.

Kalin shrugged. "I'm up for it. And I know the Bunch would be. Do you want to tell them?"

Radley chuckled. "I wouldn't plan on going over there for something like this without telling them. Yeah, let's do that tomorrow." He pushed back from the computer. "I'd have to book us on a flight, but first I'd need to know how many were going."

"I'm sure they all would, if they could," Kalin said.

"And can you imagine how Scotch will gush?" Radley laughed.

"Yes, I can," Kalin intoned.

"I really don't know what to think now," Radley said. "Obviously I wasn't just having a dream. But . . . are those people really us, or more ancestors?"

"I wonder if we'll ever really know one way or the other," Kalin said. "We might never find any concrete proof of the truth."

"I kind of hope we will, though," Radley said. "I still want to know."

". . . I do too," Kalin admitted. "Even though I also still dread some of what we might learn."

Radley laid a hand on his shoulder. "Yeah." He hesitated. "Are you going to tell Yusei, Jack, and Crow?"

Kalin paused. "Yusei, definitely. I don't know about the others. Jack would just snort and say we shouldn't be worrying about the past, that only the present is important. Crow . . . he'd probably think it was a weird coincidence. Actually, Yusei might feel that same way. No matter what evidence he's brought, he still refuses to believe in destiny."

"Could he really deny this too?" Radley mused.

Kalin cracked a smirk. "If he's as stubborn as Seto Kaiba, yes, he could."

"And here I thought Mr. Kaiba was in a class by himself," Radley giggled.

"He is, pretty much," Kalin said. "But on the matter of destiny, he and Yusei might find they have a lot in common."

"Interesting," Radley remarked. "Well, for now I'm ready to try to go back to bed. I just wonder if I'll sleep."

"Me too," Kalin deadpanned. They had been sleeping in their separate rooms tonight, but after all this, Kalin wondered if they would rather stay together for the rest of the night. To say they had a lot to take in was a vast understatement.

Radley looked like he was pondering the same thing. But he said, "I don't want to keep you awake if I end up unable to sleep."

"I was thinking the same thing about me," Kalin said.

Radley chuckled. "Well, we can try drifting off in our rooms again and whoever gives up first can join the other?"

Kalin considered that and shook his head. "I know I'll be thinking about the times I lost you in this life. I'd feel more comfortable if we just stayed together."

Radley gave a sad smile at that. "Let's do that then."

They settled in Kalin's room under the warm covers. Kalin was used to the cold, but Radley always made sure he had enough bedding. He was a Papa Wolf that way. For a while they both stayed awake, thinking about the past they knew as well as this strange legend that had entered their lives. But that still felt like an unreal dream, and, safe in the knowledge that they were both alive and happy, they finally did doze.