Yu-Gi-Oh: A Past and Future Pharaoh
Written By: Lady Lunar Phoenix
Beta By: Lady Lunar Phoenix
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Meanwhile, in the dreams of others...
Azure skies stretched across as far as the eye could see.
It was cloudless and pure, with solid towering granite gray skyscrapers that strove to reach the lofty heights of the sky. Tinted glass denied direct sunlight into those numerous buildings, the street was busy with suited people on their way to work. Cars of all makes and models moved along with the traffic or sat on the sides of the roads next to meters that timed their presence. A meter maid stood at one such meter with a pad of paper in hand.
But this wasn't Domino.
It wasn't any one place on the map that Isis could narrow down. A small Japanese flower shop was across the street from a shop with a decidedly foreign written name. So she tried to focus on the voices of those speaking around her. She didn't hear her own language, but there was Japanese mixed with a host of languages she had yet to encounter. Some words she faintly grasped from her time working above ground, or at least she 'thought' she grasped.
A city utterly out of place in every way yet somehow, some 'way' was making it work, becoming united and whole. No language was common or unified, the buildings could have been generic block pillars of stone. Yet she could just barely see differences when she walked by them, be they shapes of windows or the names over their front doors.
Over the sounds of a city that couldn't possible exist she heard a distant, yet powerful, sound. Heavy weighted beats high above that brought her attention up towards it as well. With the precision guided lines of a city, it was only a moment before she saw a Blue Eyes White Dragon sailing across the sky. She glided easily across the azure dome, from left to right, assuring Isis that this 'was' a unique vision of sorts.
Isis 'had' been trying to pierce the veil and see the future past the present with Yugi in a coma. Multiple attempts at visions had failed, providing her nothing save the same foggy void. This was literally her first 'vision', completely unexpected and out of her norm. And it was this strange city. 'If Blue Eyes is here, than she would be serving as a type of emissary for Set I believe...' she mused as she moved down the sidewalk in a vain effort to see if she could follow Blue Eyes.
Buses rumbled by, stopping behind her to change out its passengers, while over the sound of their engines and motors a heavy sound captured Isis' focus. The Blue Eyes had reappeared, wrapping her frame around a building, her thick, lethal talons dug into the building to hold her up as she perched. Her long neck curled down so she could look down at Isis from her lofty temporary perch.
Sunlight reflected off her sheet metal style skin in such a way that she appeared to glow silver with a golden halo just barely visible. Its glass smooth blue eyes stared down at her with a feral snarl on her face. Reminding Isis that Blue Eyes, even in a dream world, was still a wild dragon. Perhaps if she was Seto the dragon's temperament would ease up, but that was neither here nor there.
Beyond the Blue Eyes another soared along, its head tilting as though noticing its fellow having perched. Curving around it became increasingly clear that they were going to start surrounding Isis until she started moving. The only remaining question being 'where' was she meant to go? The second dragon moved to land on another smaller building behind her, leaving both left and right sides of the road bearing the presence of the Blue Eyes.
Despite their presence, the people continued their days seemingly completely unaware that there were massive dragons above them. Both arching their necks down so to block off one way of the road. 'Well they're too big to navigate the road easily...' Isis thought, when in the back of her mind she recalled that this was the first Ka beast that Set ever saw.
Shining in the night sky, awash in the light of the fires that were burning down his village. A draconic savior held aloft in the air by desert winds and its own majestic wings. 'Is that why its so big? Is it matching the size that Seto recalls it as?' this wasn't Seto's dream, she was confident on that. More over Isis wasn't capable of hopping into people's dreams to start with, so there had to be a purpose for her to be here.
Given the dragons' presence she could believe that this was a sign from Seto, or maybe Set, that there was a message that was meant to be conveyed. Now that Seto had regained control of his life perhaps this was how Set was trying to communicate? More the pity that he was so staunchly resisting it. As Isis turned to walk where she could only speculate that the dragons wanted her to go, she found her thoughts going to the conversations she held with Set.
Not hers alone, as he spoke to her and Rashid with a surprising amount of candor. The truth of his absence during Bakura's assault on the palace, the Pharaoh's death. A recollection of moments that were recounted with all the sterile apathy of one without emotions. While the part of him that had the emotions had been shut away inside his own mind trapped in grief. Yet despite the apathy he still told them the truth unprompted. A promising sign of healing if there was one for his situation!
Shadows fell over her once more, as the last dragon appeared above her right side. The other two were taking flight as she walked, while the sun began to slip down the sky. Either it was oddly fast or unnaturally accelerated given what she had seen so far. The 'people' around her were still moving about at the same pace, yet their directions were beginning to shift from the office buildings to the cars.
It was a glance at one face that startled Isis as she realized they were losing their features! The white and color of the eyes of the man were now the same color of his skin, though the eye lids and lashes still existed. Concern mounting, she turned her gaze upwards to confirm the appearance of the Blue Eyes. Thus comforted upon the sight check as she saw it as clear, smooth, and bright as it had been moments ago.
More over the buildings appeared to be stable, the stonework and words upon them unchanged. She found herself glancing from face to face, checking for any other faces to bear such changes. Only they were all as normal as any person in the waking world. A dragon landed on another building, her head craning down to look in Isis' direction, then it turned to the east. Whatever she was facing was lost to Isis due to the buildings around her obstructing her view.
Only as the woman stood there the echos of the dragon's weighted landing faded off into the distance. Echoing off the buildings, instead of drowned by the noise of a city, leaving Isis to look around once more. Footsteps, talking, machines running, vendors hawking, all of it was gone, leaving only the powerful flaps of the dragons' wings and her own quiet sandal foot steps for background noise.
But the message was as clear as it was going to get.
There was something here that the Dragons, and Set probably, wanted her to reach.
She brought her gaze down from the elevated perch of the Dragon when a careless glance at a random passerby child missing a whole face caused her pause. Once more she began to study the passerbys, and the unsettling increase in absences of features. She gazed from one face to another, but not by gender or race, age or build could she find a 'type'.
All the while the sun continued sinking further to the ground, the shadows were reaching out and a chill was starting to rise up from the concrete around Isis, snaking around her ankles and up her priestly robes. Lights around her began to glow, softly at first, recognizing the approaching darkness. While the greatest light wasn't the sinking sun, instead the silvery pure light of the Blue Eyes White Dragons. Darkness was repulsed by the dragons, pushed away and leaving patches of golden sunlight around the dragons where they were.
"Is this night time real?" She called out to the nearest dragon in futility. The beast could not answer her, even in this dream world. But a frown began to cross her face as a darker possibility started to arise. "I need to find the person they're setting me on the path of..." she decided as she glanced in the window of a bakery that she was passing by. A group of teenagers ran by in the reflection, Malik and Ryou among their numbers.
Turning quickly she couldn't see the group in the street she was on, yet they had been in the reflection. A group of teenagers that she had never seen before, had it not been for her brother and Ryou she would have thought less of it. Rumbling through the air was the sudden ring of a payphone, a sound that was sudden and jarring in the unnatural silence.
Scanning the sidewalk she looked about for any phone booth that would have a phone that would even ring. There were blue booths that she had seen, now all of them becoming blacken shadows in the growing evening. Only one was lit with a soft glow through the opaque glass a bit down the sidewalk from where Isis was standing.
'I haven't heard any other sound...' she thought to herself as she studied the payphone. Yet the phone kept ringing, leaving Isis indecisive even as she began walking towards it. Perhaps it sensed her indecision, as the echo of more phones began to touch her hearing. Cellphones, business phones, if there was a phone, they went off, pausing only long enough so they could synchronize with each other. Followed by the horns of the cars and buses that started honking their horns...
An escalation of noise that brought back to mind when Malik was young and wanted her attention. Or when Yugi had been a baby prince and wanted something while lacking the words for it. Squaring her shoulders against the noise that was beginning to over take this dream world, Isis walked to the open phone booth and picked it up the phone.
With that act alone, the ringing and honking was swallowed up into the air, carried off without another beep. Echoing off into the distance as Isis put the phone to her ear, "Hello?"
"Isis!" A cheery sounding young woman replied. "I swear you're getting as bad as Seth about answering the phone." She sounded frustrated and blew out air before containing on. "I told him to wake me up if he needed me. But of course he wouldn't, so I need you to know that I'm..."
"I... forgive me," Isis interrupted with a quick series of blinks. The voice was unrecognizable, with an accent she didn't know, yet the young woman spoke with a familiarity that implied awareness. "Have we met?"
"... What?" the woman asked, once the silence of her response passed, unamused she sighed. "Its me, Yomaris? Who else can you think of that can call in other people's dreams?"
"I... I know of no one by that name, how would we have met?" Isis replied, confusion seeping into her voice.
A massive pregnant pause passed and Isis could hear the other woman beginning to mutter to herself. While in the absolute silence of the dream she could hear movement on the other end of the phone. Mutterings about 'Quantum Physics sucks' and grunts could be heard before a weighted object clattered down. Followed by rapid page turning, giving Isis the peculiar feeling that 'Yomaris' was flipping through a phone book. "What's the name I go by for you?"
"No, I..." Isis shook her head in confusion, unable to figure out where this dream was even going.
"Well that's a first, you never told me 'no' before," Yomaris retorted, sounding almost amused. "Look, purple eyes, red hair... or black with red tips if your ability to discern color is weaker, blond bangs..." she began...
"Yugi?! You're Yugi?" Isis blurted out in shock before trying to center herself.
"Who? Wait is that..." The flipping of the pages intensified even as Isis stared at the Blue Eyes waiting for her in the distance.
Leaving Isis almost swaying before she forced words out of her mouth. "You're a girl... You were reborn as a girl?"
"Huh? I've always been a girl, this life and past," Yomaris retorted in a distracted tone. "Wow wait 'Yugi.. Mouto Yugi...' Japan huh... Wow lucky, I bet Seth isn't half as bad as he is in mine," she commented in passing amusement. "Ok I get it, I guess I 'dialed the wrong number' sorry for the confusion! Bye!"
"Wait!" Isis cried out desperately!
Only the click of a disconnected phone answered her leaving her standing in motionless shock. Alone in a dream, and yet looking up at a dragon in some vain attempt at recapturing some semblance of reality. Pulled by an unseen thread, her gaze was returned to the window where she saw those teenagers running with her brother and Ryou. She hadn't recognized them at all, but... but could they have been 'Yomaris' friends?
With the weight of that already on her shoulders, she recalled the start of the conversation. That 'Seth' was meant to wake 'her' up... but Isis had foolishly cut the conversation up so she didn't know the message in full. Was she saying she was about to wake up on her own? If she was also in a coma for the same or similar reasons as Yugi...
Or was it another message all together? Isis had never seen a version of Yugi as a girl. In the distance the dragon began growling, lowering her own head closer to the road towards Isis. Gaze narrowing, in a display that she was becoming irritated by something. Be it that Isis was taking too long standing at the payphone or because she was becoming too distracted.
The ground felt as though it shook under the weight of the growling, but that could have been Isis' own shock on the matter. Darkness had taken over and the people were now fully faceless, and the details of their own clothes were lost to her sight. Only Blue Eyes radiated her full detailed form and for that Isis was grateful.
And once the woman resumed following her, the Blue Eyes took flight once more.
By the time Isis had caught up, she found the roads abandoned of every person and car, all that was left was a Blue Eyes in the road, a hideous jagged scar that crossed her body as she lumbered after something. Her size made it impossible to see who she was following, but behind her was an array of women dancers.
They were dressed as warriors and priestesses, they spanned different races and their foot steps were stomps and wide arm twirls. They passed by in a seeming parade, with the dragon at the front, though each woman had a face and details to their presence. While in the light of the Dragon, Isis noticed bird wings in the shadow of several women. Calling to mind Mai's harpy deck and the realization of who was dreaming this to start with.
While further ahead, Isis could see a mounting frustration from the dragon, as her head was bobbing up and down, swaying as though trying to strike something and missing. Granted the dragon was moving quickly, given her size. Isis began to give chase, needing to confirm who it was in front of the dragon causing such ire.
Jogging along allowed her to see in greater detail the wide scar on the dragon, and Isis couldn't imagine who had the strength to inflict such a horrible scar there. Causing her to ponder briefly if the dragon was walking because the damage meant she couldn't fly anymore. But in the distance she could see a blond woman running. More than just running, the darkness was trying to lash itself to her. A vile corruption of darkness that brought to mind the Sennen Items. With the reminder that Mai had suffered a Penalty Game under it.
'Yet Yugi saved her... was that not enough?'
Mai was running for her life, yet she never looked about her as though the dragon was the cause of it. Instead she was looking around shouting to know where everyone was, the fear of absolute abandonment was evident in the nature of the dream. Everyone just fading or disappearing, the world fading into darkness. Yet she couldn't see Blue Eyes, or hear Isis' own voice calling out to her. While the dragon was trying to smack and, at times, bite the blond, her head darting in as a viper would.
An action that would be horrible if Blue Eyes could actually 'make contact' and Isis feared that was the issue and why she was here. Something had gone wrong, Mai wasn't free of the corruption and was still trapped in a sense to the Penalty game that Malik punished her with. Yugi or Seto could help her, but Isis was out of her element. Yugi could now destroy the problem easily with his duality of Divine Light and Divine Darkness, only Seto was not associated with Light.
But Blue Eyes was, and if he granted permission she probably 'could' do more to help Mai in this state.
'If' He granted permission.
'Perhaps that's why I'm here? Did Blue Eyes want me to take notice and give Mai help? But why? Blue Eyes is Loyal to Seto only...'
Isis' ruminations were interrupted by the other three Blue Eyes White Dragons taking wing. Overhead they soared off, roaring a song of challenge towards a churning sea of storm clouds that was starting to generate off in the distance...