Previously on MyAibou's Revival series : Professor Hawkins advanced age brought incipient signs of Alzheimer's which was sadly accelerated through exposure to Shadow Games.
Previously on TLA: Yusei and Rebecca attempted to perform a search computer search of cards unfamiliar to Yugi's era. His computer, ninety years more advanced, overloaded the penthouse systems with explosive results. In the interim, Joey recommended putting Yusei in the public eye to act as bait and there are signs that he may have been noticed.
A natural lull exists in civilization at that point of night bordering dawn. Even a city as dominant as Domino fell prey to the nocturnal emptiness. Night workers viewed it as similar to the Spanish siesta. Yusei certainly did, taking advantage of the lull in activity to rest mentally where he couldn't physically. Not to say that he stopped entirely, more like slowing from a jog to a walk. Work nights would be occupied with administrative tasks. Private nights went to his fancy.
On a night like this, he was taking advantage of a precious opportunity to enjoy the long-lost view of Domino City. He'd seen the view from Industrial Illusions nearly ninety years ahead and could see hints of that future embossing into this present. KaibaCorp a tidy enough distance away to keep professional boundaries intact and egos from abraising. Poppo Time would be in that area over there, already a clock store in good standing with the local community.
What he couldn't get past was how big it was. At least, that was how he saw it. New Domino was vastly larger in both buildings and population but it lacked one factor: cohesion. Yusei couldn't exactly picture where the divide between city and Satellite would be but he could hazard a guess. A raw crescent of destruction kilometres in diameter, carving part of the landmass away from the mainland, peaking about where that park currently lay. Gone his yesterday, here their today.
"Whatcha doing?" Being fluent in three languages (and passable in another few) still didn't help Rebecca translate the garbled noise of confusion and pain as Yusei simultaneously smashed his knee into the thick glass and sent his phone hurtling through the air.
"That's classified." In his line of work, that was nearly as bad as screaming 'nothing!' while slamming the laptop closed.
"Uh-huh." A thumb was already scrolling through his phone. "Taking pictures of Domino?"
"Don't tell anyone." He held out a hand for the device. A copy of his data had already been handed over to the ICC while they investigated Abi, which helped because anyone smart enough to realise the pictures were genuine would know how serious the matter was and how to make life very, very difficult for him. "It's a lot different from how I remember it, and I thought it would be nice to show my friends."
"Take some postcards when you go." Rebecca yawned. "Cheap as anything now but they'd love the retro."
"You're brilliant." Even a couple of coins from the street could produce enough gifts to sate his entire family. "What are you even doing up at this hour? Couldn't sleep."
"Haven't slept." She corrected testily. Now that he looked closer, Yusei realised she was still wearing the same outfit as the last time he'd seen her, albeit a bit more dishevelled. "Don't tell the others, they'll only say I'm pushing myself too hard and try sending me to bed."
"And don't think I won't try the same." While Abi had yet to hit her truly rebellious phase, enough petulant scientists roamed the SRC that Yusei had perfected the parenting tone. "Bed, young lady, or do I have to get Duke involved?"
After a sullen glare, Rebecca gave up with a heavy sigh. "Okay." She admitted. "I'll go to bed and let you get on with Joey's plan to run around the city and hope someone recognises you behind your disguise, instead of showing you what I've been working ooo~n." She stretched out the last vowel like someone truly exhausted.
"Do you honestly expect me to fall for that?" It was a more obvious plot than Din readying a grappling hook outside the library. "Get some rest, I mean it."
"Isn't it true that a state of mental relaxation is conducive to a restful sleep?" A tiny hand blearily rubbed her eyes. "Wouldn't it be better to let me emotionally unburden myself first before I turn in?"
Insomniac to insomniac, the pair spared a moment to glare past their respective pretences. "Do I have to physically move you or are you willing to go quietly?" Stretching to his full height, he stared down over folded arms.
"Are you willing to risk me screaming for help?" Huddled you like that, she looked even more diminutive than before.
"Please," He snorted. "That might work anywhere else but everyone here knows your tricks - this is the one place in the world where they don't work."
"O-ho?' She snarled. "But wouldn't they be more irritated that you wouldn't simply listen to me for five minutes after all the work I've done? Or would they prefer being woken up in the middle of the night over your moral high ground?"
Another glare finally broke the stalemate as Yusei conceded the point. "Fine." Better to let the prodigy show off her work and stay awake another few minutes than to wake everyone in the penthouse who was already asleep. "But I'm getting snacks. It's difficult to keep an even temper without sleep."
"I'm not a child!" She flared up despite following behind.
"Never said they were for you." Came the testy reply as Rebecca stuck her tongue out in a surprisingly petulant display. "I swear, if I ever figure out a workaround for the commute, there's someone I really want you to meet." Din was remarkably polite with anyone young enough to be honest to his face and Yusei would give half his Deck just to put him in the same room as Rebecca for an hour and listen to the conversation.
Leading her into the kitchen, he began rummaging around in the fridge for ingredients. "Out of curiosity, how is Joey's plan going?" Rebecca hopped up on the side with practised ease.
"Inconclusive." Which was scientist talk for 'waste of time'. "Mai took me on a shopping trip and, I can honestly say, it was a traumatic experience." Ah, the Valentine PSTD: Post Shopping Trauma Disorder. It left a certain look in the eyes. Speaking of eyes,
"You look more exhausted than I feel, and that's saying something. When did you last get some sleep?" While far from being a neurology expert, the bitter reality of having a genius-level IQ and a grandfather with Alzheimer's meant that she knew more than the average citizen. No matter what condition Yusei had, he still needed rest as much as the next person.
"Couple of days ago." He waved aside her concerns. "All I need is a few hours this evening and coffee brewed thick enough to paint with and I'll be good as ever." A spark of joy in recent memory dispelled that comparison. "By the way, Joey took me to meet Yugi's grandpa." He paused in the middle of slicing lettuce. "Did you know he's the Legendary Gambler?"
"Of course," She shrugged while drumming her feet on the side. "Grandfather met Mr Mutou in Vegas at a conference in '63. Lost his entire budget but Mr Mutou charmed him with all that talk about gaming history and they kept in touch." Yusei scowled the slightest touch and she instantly honed in on the emotional leakage. "Awww, was it meant to be a seecwet?" She adopted a deliberately babyish tone.
"Not to anyone in my time." Yet his tone remained surly as he slid a plate of sandwiches beside her, grabbing one for himself.
"I said I'm not hungry." She reminded him.
"Do you think you can give a presentation on an empty stomach and a sleepy head?" He gave a sharkish grin, payback for her earlier blackmail.
Inevitably, she gave in to the logic of his argument and reluctantly nibbled at the top triangle. "Seriously, have you made any progress your way?"
Yusei mulled over his own half-sandwich. "Maybe you have a point." He said halfheartedly.
"I usually do." She grabbed another sandwich and began wolfing it down in turn. Brain power hoarded both calories and attention until both were lacking.
"Don't I know it?" Blue eyes rolled dramatically. "But it was the best plan we could think of at the time. Yliaster will be looking for Yugi and I'm their next target - they'll know me on sight and I can hold my own."
"Right. Because your muse looks like a wedge of cheese and is about as mature." They spared a conspirational giggle in the dawning hours. "Don't worry," She held up a finger as her jaw dislocated in a yawn. "I've got a much better plan."
"Glad to hear it." Yusei smiled wider than a shark this time. "Do you think you can give a presentation on a full stomach and a fuzzy head?"
Rebecca tried to glare at him but it was difficult as exhaustion forced her to yawn again. "Awww, did you think it was special that you knew the Wegendawy Gambwer?" He adopted her earlier mocking tone. "Did wou forget I was the King of Gwames?"
"You cheat!" A sandwich on an empty stomach could make anyone sleepy. Throw in mild fatigue and professional standards essentially barred her from the big reveal.
"Hop along to bed." He nodded towards the door. "You can 'wow' us all later." Scowling all the while, she moped towards her room with such outrage that Yusei automatically believed she was going to throw something at his head. Too much time around Din would do that to a person.
No sooner had she gone than he buried his face in both hands, grinding the palms into his eyes. Truthfully, it wasn't professional decorum he was craving but solitude. Rebecca Hawkins was as sharp a mind as any he knew yet came with the additional complication of having to avoid future knowledge. Even that exchange, he couldn't remember if she already knew the name of Yliaster or if he'd let it slip and that one word could be all Rebecca needed to send the future on a new divergent path. She was, quite literally, a terrifying intellect.
"Fudo!"
Then again, Yusei mused hours later, she was also plain terrifying.
"Dude," Joey wasn't wide enough to hide someone by himself but their guest had played human shuffle to swap Mai and Serenity out to pair him with Tristan. The resulting barrier was thick enough to protect him against nearly anything. "What did you do to her?"
"I put her to sleep with a special sandwich." Visions of his own grave flashed before Yusei's mind as knuckles cracked deathfully in the foreground. "Chicken on brown bread, carb-heavy. She was already tired and digestion did the rest. Should have slept until tonight." That instantly won Joey over - one of his dreams was to sleep between every meal for a week. And Tristan had seen enough during his tour that he approved any non-violent methods of attack wherever possible.
"Where is he?!" The blonde whirled into the living area as fury incarnate.
A youth of delinquency and a tour in the JSDF compared notes through the looks the two stocky men shared and casually brought up the notion of acceptable losses. Yusei agreed with the notion, which is why he stuck with the dirty blonde when the pair parted before him. "Rebecca!" He oozed admiration as she came in close.
"You no good, dirty, double-crossing," She was winding herself up to such a degree that Duke instinctively moved to back her up.
"Why don't you show us what you've been working on!" Yusei shouted over his human shield. "I know you'd love to prove how ridiculous Joey's idea was."
"Hey!" Joey protested.
"Get me through this or I'll tell Tristan he's due to be a father in a year." Yusei hissed back. The pair had thrown him under the bus but hadn't counted on him dragging them along.
"Is that true?" Perched beside her partner, Mai gave Serenity a cautionary glance. She was incredibly mature in many ways but having a child was never an easy journey.
Catching her eye, Yusei gave a barely perceptible shake of his head and she got the message. Whatever knowledge was inside his head would remain locked there but he was willing to lie to Joey to save his own skin.
"Fine." Professional pride won out in Rebecca. "But only because I want to show how much of an idiot you were for going along with his plan in the first place."
Uttering several quick thanks to chase up his earlier round of prayers, Yusei released both his human shield and tense breath. "Wow." Téa was only ever Rebecca's target due to her winning Yugi over the younger girl. "You're really scared of her."
"I know exactly what she's capable of." Would any of it be used for evil? Certainly, no records existed to prove it was but Yusei was smart enough to recognise that 'no evidence' wasn't a 'no'.
"Are you coming?" With his fate in the balance, Yusei hurried after the departing prodigy and her bodyguard. All but two followed him, Joey 'tripping' through the air to tackle Tristan by the neck.
"Prepare yourselves," Duke whispered mysteriously as he guarded the library door.
"I told you not to do that." Rebecca used her vast knowledge of physics to shove the much taller figure aside. "Behold!" She swept the door open as Duke looked like a kicked puppy.
The burnt-out racks of computer equipment from their apocalyptically bad first attempt to track down the Yliaster agent were still in place, albeit safely unplugged. Every surface was covered in dozens of sheets of paper, the computer towers were covered in labels and sheets, and artistic string linked them like ancient telegraph wires.
"Do you think that they'll want me to pay the printing costs?" Maybe the humanitarian ones. Tribes of indigenous peoples must have been misplaced to harvest the amount of trees required for this immense undertaking.
"Aren't you the computer whizz?" In a way, it was impressive. "Couldn't you have kept all this on your laptop?"
"Sure," She shrugged resignedly. "But this is easier to keep track of." A stack of paper lazily tumbled towards the floor as they watched. "Systems analysis from last year. Not important."
Maybe she was in command of the barely controlled chaos. Crawling under the desk and ducking beneath a few pieces of string, Yusei joined her in the centre of the network. "Okay, where does it start?"
"First, mmm." She slurped from her new mug as Yusei looked in sadness at his suddenly empty hand. "That is nasty. You'll have to tell me how you do it. Anyway, first, I had to figure out how your Duel Disk could connect to modern systems when your laptop couldn't." A strip light overhead flickered in fear at the memory of the last power surge. "Ada over there has the full technical workup for a Duel Disk and Charles is holding the publicly available information on the KaibaCorp network. Don't worry," She smirked while getting another hit of caffeine. "Tim has the details they wish I didn't have."
Twisting around the exhibit, Yusei helped himself to a few sheets. Rebecca had pinned pictures to the indicated machines to identify them; Ada Lovelace, Charles Babbge, Tim Berners-Lee. "Kaiba is a lot smarter than I thought. Suppose that their servers are down for updates: how are you meant to use their shiny frisbees to Duel? More importantly, how does he keep the customer happy enough to give him all their money?"
"I know how it works in my time." Too many of Din's plans had made him a cynic to obvious questions. "Cached data."
"Exactly." Smiled the computer prodigy. "You're smarter than you look."
"I wasn't called a 'Shooting Star' for nothing." Two meteoric rises to the top of fields had more than earned him the moniker.
"Uh-huh. Whatever you say, Star Boy." Of course, Rebecca had no idea about either. "Anyway, a Duel Disk contains the recorded data of the user's Deck for use when main servers are unavailable. Sure, it means that you can't add new cards in the boonies while their servers are down. Boo-fricking-hoo."
"Language." He automatically admonished while examining a diagram. Seeing the massive advancements in person only increased his admiration for them.
"Hey, it's better than Joey's plan of putting him in the public eye. How's that going?" She waited patiently for a reply that didn't come. "Anyway, that's Ada's contribution. Charles and Tim are where it gets interesting. Imagine that you've got a weak signal: how does the server register this?"
"Probably as a failed connection." The display was more impressive than the presentation. "Junk data." Realisation struck him like lightning. "You beautiful genius."
"Thank you." She bowed mockingly in the midst of her work. "Anything that KaibaCorp doesn't understand, their servers will file away for later processing. Since your Duel Disk is probably too advanced to connect to the current servers, your little Duel with Joey will register from his side as an error. If another equally advanced Duel Disk was involved in a similar situation at some point in the past, it would have a similar error report somewhere in the mainframe. And all that data is processed for comparison on a nightly basis, meaning," She dramatically checked her watch. "All you have to do is convince a computer prodigy to crack open KaibaCorp long enough to run an error comparison and then track down anyone from that general vicinity at that exact time. Two days from now, and we're pouring out celebratory champagne."
"Nice try," Yusei said firmly. "But you're not getting drunk on my watch. I'll help you get Duke tipsy enough to start dancing with a feather boa but you'll get one flute that I'll swear I knew nothing about." The Queen of Dorks stared down the King of Games.
"Deal!" She grabbed his hand before he could figure out the age limitation. "Feather boa?" She raised an eyebrow.
A small glimpse through the curtain of time couldn't hurt. Particularly when he knew that Rebecca wouldn't be in a place to enjoy it. "Vegas, '05."
"What happens in '05?" The pair started guiltily. They had been so wrapped up in the scientific that everyone else had become mere background.
"Sorry," Rebecca placed a sorrowful hand on her chest. "What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas."
"Great saying. Can I borrow it?" Last time Yusei had been invited to Vegas, it had ended with a complicated mess involving three physicists, local police, and more chips than the casino down the road could cash without selling the building.
"Honestly, I want to see what Duke can do with a feather boa." Mai smirked at the stunned yet usually outgoing young man.
"What's this about a feather boa?" Joey lurched up with a swelling lip and nursing a couple of ribs.
"Wish you'd get eaten by a boa." Tristan growled through his pirate squint, courtesy of a shiny black eye.
"Can't you two get along for one day?" Serenity nearly teared up in disappointment and instantly had the two brothers feeling guilty. Their repeated argument was derailed by a heavy knock on the library door. Everyone turned with varyingly guilty expressions to see the building receptionist trying to fathom what he was seeing.
"Mr…" Can't blame the ladies, they were either smarter, outranking, or aggressively attractive. "... Kondo." Don't want to anger the bruised latecomers or the budding businessmen with a direct line to Pegasus. "What's all this?" When in doubt, pin the blame on the help.
"I'm going to take full responsibility." Yusei firmly placed a hand on his chest. "And pass it all to Rebecca, she's the one who did this." He gasped dramatically and fell to a knee as Rebecca elbowed him in the stomach. "She's a mad genius I tell you!"
Greg grimaced uncomfortably. "Miss Hawkins is the reason I'm here." That confused everyone. Officially, Rebecca was a guest of Yugi's while she stayed in the penthouse. "I tried to connect the call directly but it appears that there are still some residual issues with the phone lines." All eyes glanced over the burnt computer cases and were instantly struck with amnesia.
"Was it Mokuba again?" Rebecca sighed despairingly. "Gerry, I told him, I'll call when I'm done with my project." She frowned at the realisation of accidentally confessing to the overflowing mess on display. "Which this is not."
"It's not Mr Kaiba." Gerry swallowed painfully. "I had a call from your grandfather's facility a few minutes ago. He had a medical episode this morning and he's been moved to end-of-life care. The doctors," He cleared his throat past the instinctive discomfort. "The doctors don't expect him to recover. They've requested your attendance. I've spoken to Miss Gardner to arrange flights for you and Mr Devlin. You'll depart this evening."
Everything after that had happened in a blur. Rebecca had wailed as if the world had crumbled away around her because it had. Serenity had gently wrapped the prodigy in her arms and held her tight as they both sobbed brokenly. Yusei had been the only one numb enough to thank Gerry for delivering the message and lead him out of the penthouse. Duke had slammed about in his borrowed room enough that Téa had stopped working to check on him - nothing a trip to the furniture store wouldn't fix. Mai had gone to pack a case of Rebecca's belongings and hide the steaks in her mascara. Maybe it was their mutual beating but even Tristan and Joey were shedding a few reluctant tears.
Within an hour, they had gone from carefully optimistic to utterly desolated. Rebecca had the traumatic look of denial that people have in these impossible situations. "I'll try to send you some programs I wrote to break into KaibaCorp. Might not have a connection at the airport but I'll send them when I… when I can." She was shrouded in a lilac raincoat that seemed to be the only thing holding her together.
"I'm sorry that I didn't know this was coming." Even now, she was doing her best to be helpful to a complete stranger. Yusei wished he could have returned the favour. "I'll probably be gone by the time you get back but I know that you'll be returning to people who love and will take care of you."
Her face crumpled at the words and she began sobbing again. "I can't come back." She wept helplessly as Yusei looked around in confusion.
"Rebecca's other grandparents are more conservative than Prof Hawkins is… was." Duke swallowed the change of tense less readily than he would poison. "They believe that he forced her to keep travelling and apply to college at a young age. They want to keep her in a 'stable' environment until she's thicker than mud."
"Kaiba agreed to lend his lawyers to help out." Tristan still sounded doubtful about the fact, even after it had happened. "But they can probably get emergency custody of her as soon as she's back in America and it'll be hard to undo that. Add in that her… Well, the courts might not listen to her right now."
"Tristan and I are going to come with you to the airport." Téa had thrown on a padded jacket with too few pockets to store all the tissues moping up her tears. "Serenity too."
"We'll all be available whenever or whatever you need." Mai piped up reassuringly. There wasn't enough space in the car for all of them the blondes had reluctantly volunteered to man the fort.
"Don't be afraid to call for any reason." Joey wanted to mention that Tristan could probably call in some favours from his buddies in the JSDF to help extract Rebecca from the States but even he knew now was not the time.
The polite 'ding' of the elevator sounded akin to a guillotine blade slamming down on her future. "Sounds like my ride." She clutched the handle of a backpack in her fist. "See you later, Star Boy."
What he remembered most about that moment later on was how small she looked in the doorframe of the elevator. Yusei managed to wait for the doors to close before letting his legs finally buckle as he leaned on an armchair for support. "It wasn't supposed to be like this."
"It's not your fault." Joey gripped his shoulder reassuringly.
"It is." Came the heavy reply. "Prof Hawkins wasn't supposed to die today. 27th April 2005, he passes peacefully in his sleep."
"What are you saying?" That comforting touch vanished from his shoulder. "You said that you didn't know when he died."
"I said I didn't know this was going to happen." All the stress had worn away what little strength he had left and he could feel the need for sleep scratching away inside. "Either Yliaster did this deliberately because they knew I'm here or our coming to this time somehow changed events."
"Then why can't you use your future brain to even things back out?" A tiny thread of hope dangled tantalisingly before him.
"Even if I wanted to, I don't know enough to treat Prof Hawkins." He pinched his eyes. "I'm sorry." He took a deep breath and forced himself upright. "I'm going to get some sleep. Let me know if there's anything I can do to… anything I can do."
They watched him climb the stairs to the upper floors like a mountain. "Can this day get any worse?"
"Only if Tristan has actually gotten my sister pregnant and I have to beat him to death." They spared a moment to imagine that scenario.
"What makes you think it was his idea?" Joey's face turned red faster than a faulty traffic light. "No," Mai sighed sadly. "It's not making me feel any better." At any other time, Joey would have thrown his hands in the air and refused to speak to her until at least the next morning. Today, he gently wrapped his arms around her shoulders and pulled them together.
"I'll miss him too." They had a more passing relationship with Rebecca's grandfather than Yugi but the definition of a gentleman scholar had been the best example of a father figure that either of them could have ever wished for.
"Promise that you'll still love me when I'm that old and grey." She whispered fearfully.
"Of course." He tenderly kissed the top of her head. "Promise that you'll love me when I'm old and balding."
"Mmm." She sighed mournfully against his chest. "As long as it's not too soon."
"Joey!" Calling from the distance, Yusei sounded panicked by something. Not the recent bad news, something else. "JOSEPH WHEELER!" Like any good boyfriend, the Japanese National Champion knew that his full name meant trouble of unfathomable proportions if he wasn't there immediately.
"This is what I get for tempting fate." Reluctantly, Mai disentangled herself and gave Joey a shove towards the staircase.
Arriving at a flat sprint had him rebounding off the wall without noticing. "Yus? What's wrong?" A single glance revealed the room he had been given was roughly tossed and the occupant looking ready to start on the walls.
"Has anyone been in the penthouse in the last few days?" Too mentally and emotionally exhausted to notice his nickname, Yusei was focusing on the most pressing matter at hand. "My neural inhibitor has been stolen." A look of dumb confusion crossed the already grieving face. "Gadget thing that lets me sleep, it's been taken from my room."
"So?" Joey snapped. "Your mood ring isn't our biggest problem right now." Not with Arthur Hawkins hours from death and Yusei admitting it was because of his presence.
"Think about it." Yusei grabbed his shoulder as Joey turned to leave. "Professor Hawkins dies nearly two years early and the one thing that lets me sleep normally disappears at the same time?"
A faint sizzling noise came from between Joey's ears as his brain attempted to think. "My plan worked?" At any other time, this would be cause for celebration. But nothing would be celebrated for a long time now.
"Too well." Yusei admitted. They'd planned for a confrontation on equal grounds, not for Yliaster to sneak into the penthouse during the height of grief and force him toward s a slow death. "We've got about twenty minutes, maybe half an hour." Even now, the adrenaline was wearing off and the exhaustion was setting back in. "I need…" Shit, it had been so long since he had had to do this without any medical aids. "Three no, four belts, a bucket, and a gumshield, unused if possible but we don't have time to mould a new one. Get that and all the spare bedding and cushions you have." No matter how openminded Joey like to believe he was, the reason why escaped him.
"And this is strictly medical?" Few sights could convince Mai not to hold misuse of control over her boyfriend personally but she hadn't figured this to be one.
"What?" Yusei blinked owlishly. "Yes, yes. Probably."
"Probably?" Joey gave an experimental yank. "You never said this was a 'probably'."
"What was?" Came the bleary reply. Joey had exactly three belts to his name and Tristan another three. Considering the overlap in the number of actual belts, the pair would be rocking additions from the Valentine wardrobe until this little escapade was over as hers were more style-heavy than heavy-duty.
"Mmm, he's circling the drain now." Mai was leaning on the doorway eating from a tub of ice cream and relishing the spectacle more than the snack. The combination was nearly enough to pretend she could distract herself from the crippling grief if she lied hard.
"You could help me instead of standing there." Joey testily adjusted a couple of notches.
"I could." She stuck her tongue out to lick a dollop of sweet mixture from the spoon. "But I'm okay with watching from time to time."
Without the advanced (if unreliable) neurological inhibitor to mediate his seizures, Yusei had been forced to return to appropriately primitive measures. A thick belt was tightly wound around both shins, a partner to the one wrapped around his thighs. Two had been meshed together to keep his arms in place besides the elbows and he was trussed up like a turkey's wet dream under the fumbling control of an increasingly overworked Joey Wheeler struggling to control the drooping patient.
"I'm thinking soft music," Mai framed the pair with her fingers and panned the room. "Maybe a bit of mood lighting. We'd call it 'Wheeler Gone Wild' and market it exclusively to the over 30s."
"Wazzat?" Yusei was rapidly losing the ability to follow a normal conversation, never mind the archaic flirtatious banter.
"Nothing." Slinging the drooping form over a shoulder, he carried it to the thickly padded mass of duvets, pillows, and cushions that now smothered Yusei's bed. "You go to sleep." Cramming a mouthguard into place, Joey forced the head into the pillows. His patient was out before the hand was taken away.
"Right." Wiping his hands down his shirt, Joey was unexpectedly hungry from the ordeal. "I say we order takeout."
"Really?" She sighed dramatically. "A gorgeous man all over you and all you can think about is food?"
"It's not just for me." He protested too fast to recognise the innuendo. "Yus said he'd want us to make him some cremains if it went wrong."
"What?" Mai loved her thickheaded hero, she really did, but he was too good for his own good sometimes. "Joey, do you know what cremains are?"
"Thought it was some future word for leftovers." He admitted shamelessly. "Why, what's the dish?" Whether he was talking slang or food would have to wait for a later date.
Unlike her beloved, Mai knew that cremains were what was left after a vacated body was put through an incinerator. Yusei hadn't asked to have some food set aside, he'd been telling Joey how to dispose of his body if he didn't wake back up.
Dearly departed, we are gather here today to leave kindly reviews.