This chapter is ridiculous. There is no clearer way to put it. But I had more fun writing it than I have in a long time, and I figure that counts for a lot.

Since the last time I worked on this project, my grandmother died, I began my last semester as an undergraduate—I'm set to graduate magna cum laude from my university, so I thank you preemptively for your patience—I bought a new computer, started a new blog, re-watched half of Fairy Tail, sent my first piece of original fiction to a paying publication, and ended a 22-month internship with my congressman. In short, shit be cray-cray up in this bitch.

Yeah. I'm street.

This particular chapter marks a first in my work with the YGO universe. For the first time in ten years, I tried my hand at describing a duel. Now, if you're anything like me, your first impulse upon hearing this will be to click the back button and (maybe) wait for the next chapter. I don't blame you for this. I've always thought that recreating the card game in fanfiction form was a disservice to the medium. There are so many duels in canon, what could a fanfiction author possibly offer to augment that?

I beg patience, as this particular duel is handled in what I hope is a painless, entertaining fashion. I'm not going to bog you down with rules and twists in logic. I tried to make the scene as cinematic as it should be, such that everything moves quickly and easily, because I'm not in the business of boring people.

Hopefully.

Verse One.

The auditorium into which Kay was ushered by her new friends, with reverent gusto, was the sort of place where she might have expected an indoor concert to be held. The bleachers rose up like the sweeping walls of the Colosseum, and the lighting caused the shadows of the incoming audience to dance and shimmer around them, leaving Kay feeling like she'd stepped into another world.

When she, Renie, and Katie had all sat down, there was an indescribable sense that she shouldn't break the spell woven over the place with her voice. She sat somberly, like she was in some sort of church, and waited for cues from her companions on how she should be acting. There was something intoxicating about the energy that flowed through the crowd; Kay realized quickly that she was about to bear witness to an astronomical event. She might not have known much about the Kaiba family, or its reputation, but it was obvious from the reverent grins on everyone's faces that they were clear and honest celebrities in Domino City.

Roughly twenty minutes passed before a spotlight shot itself on and locked, dead-center, on a figure as it made its swaggering way into the center of the arena. The young man had light brown hair that looked somehow green from where Kay was sitting; he was dressed in purest, blinding white, and even from her spot several levels up from the floor she could tell that the grin on his face could only be described as "shit-eating."

The young man adjusted something on the lapel of his suit jacket—likely a microphone—and thrust his arms outward. "My lords, ladies, and gentlemen!" he declared in a clear, strong, hypnotic voice, and Kay's breath caught in her throat. "Welcome, one and all, to the dueling event of the century!"

The crowd cheered like an army for its general before heading out onto the field.

The young man let this go on for some time before gesturing for silence; the din hushed immediately. Softly, quietly, he continued: "Never before in the history of Magic & Wizards has there been a player quite like Seto Kaiba. You who are sitting here, privy to this historical happening, might know him as the Chief Executive Officer of the Kaiba Corporation. You might know him as the madman who turned half this glorious city into a battlefield for his own amusement. You might know him as an inventor, as a scientist, as a philanthropist, as an insufferable reincarnation of Narcissus himself."

The low rumble of the expected chuckle emanated through the silence as the speaker took a pause. Kay looked over at the other two, with a question in her eyes: Who is this?

Neither Katie nor Renie seemed to know.

"Say what you want about the man, there's no denying that the name Kaiba will be stamped forever onto the history of the professional dueling circuit. What started as a kids' game has grown into Domino's own personal blood sport, and Seto Kaiba was the first to step up and give it the loud, proud, angry devotion it deserves! Before we get on with today's program, why not stand tall and give a round of applause to the man who took every nerd stereotype by the balls and stomped them into the dirt! Give it up for Seto Kaiba!"

The light swept over to one side of the arena, and out strode the man of the hour; Seto Kaiba was resplendent in a pitch-black suit, covered by a billowing black trench coat. The only splash of color on his entire person was a navy blue tie. He did not wave to the crowd; he didn't need to. He simply let his lofty, imperial gaze cover each of the spectators as though personally inspecting them. The people roared.

If the man in white was a general then this, surely, was the king.

Katie and Renie were standing; Kay rose slowly to her feet, unsure if she had the right to.

This time it was Seto who called for silence, with a single lifted hand. The silence seemed to shake with anticipation, and Kay marveled at such a simple, effective command.

The man in white began to speak again: "I would be doing a disservice to all of you if I didn't mention Yugi Mutou, the humble prodigy who dethroned this living legend standing in front of you today. But the time has come for a new era, an era built not on sheer competition but one built on ties of blood! Let Yugi Mutou flaunt his good fortune at someone else's tournament! We're here to talk about Magic & Wizards as it was meant to be played: with strategy woven into strategy, with calculation and devotion. Blind faith has no place in this arena!"

The cheers at this declaration were decidedly more polarized; there was a great outcry of enthusiasm, but Kay realized that there were apparently a great number of Yugi fans in the audience who weren't keen on this apparent attack.

The man in white gestured, and the spotlight shot into the crowd. "There's the man his own self!" the man cried, and Kay saw that Yugi Mutou had chosen to attend this match; he was leaning back in his seat, one leg tossed over the other, arms crossed over his chest; he nodded amicably at the acknowledgement. It looked like the dominant personality, Yami, was in charge. "Look on our works, ye mighty, and despair! Let's show this world champion how it's done!"

The man in white laughed as the cheers rang out anew, and Kay had to admit that his attitude was infectious. And all throughout his animated introductions, the elder Kaiba brother stood solemnly, patently ignoring his old rival. He wore a device on his left wrist that Kay didn't recognize. Some sort of portable computer? She couldn't tell from this distance.

"What's that on Mister Kaiba's arm?" Kay asked Renie.

"Called a Duel Disk," came the quick, breathless reply. "You'll see."

The man in white said, "And now…the challenger. Pay attention, because you're all about to witness history. You've seen him grow. You've laughed with him, cried with him, you've marveled at how ungodly adorable he is. Personally, I think it's witchcraft." Another pause for the expected bout of laughter. "But here, now, I invite you to witness another side. There's a reason he can stand side-by-side with a legend without the faintest hint of irony. There's tenacity in his blood, there's steel in his spine, and you're about to see that today. Join me in ushering into the arena, to face his brother in open combat for the first time…the one…the only…Mokuba Kaiba!"

Kay had thought the reception for Seto had been thunderous. What followed Mokuba's name was an event such that the very foundations of the building shook. Renie tucked two fingers into her mouth and let out a piercing whistle.

Out walked the prince. Mokuba wore a black t-shirt tucked into black jeans, a dark purple over-shirt, and white sneakers. He looked tiny, but by no means vulnerable. His radiant face was split in an excitable grin, and he waved enthusiastically at the crowd. He wore a device identical to his brother's on his own left wrist.

"The voice of thy brother's blood crieth unto me from the ground," said the man in white, apocalyptically. Another, unsettling, hush settled over the stands. The man in white gestured to Seto, then to Mokuba, and the brothers looked at each other for the first time.

Seto's expression did not change. He held out his left arm, and the device on his wrist extended outward, flipped and snapped until it resembled a shelf that ran up his elbow; a pair of tiny things shot out to the sides of the arena. He reached into a pocket and held up a deck of cards.

Mokuba nodded, then mimicked the gestures of his sibling. His own Duel Disk unfolded into position, and again, a pair of projectiles shot out of it. The boy displayed his own deck.

They began to shuffle; Kay glanced up at the large screens hanging from the ceiling and saw a close-up of the pair's hands. Mokuba's shook slightly, and his movements were jerky. Seto shuffled with speed, skill, and confidence.

The man in white took both decks when they were presented to him, and he exchanged them so that Seto and Mokuba could cut their opponent's cards. Once each deck was in its owner's hands again, they slid them into a compartment of their Duel Disks. Kay saw the number 4000 appear at the bottom corners of the screens, and she realized that the game had started.

The man in white said, "Begin," and stepped out of the arena.

Verse Two.

Kay had no damned clue what happened throughout the course of the match. Even though the Kaiba brothers shouted out each card as it was played, and lifelike holograms of their creatures sprang up from the arena floor like Athenian kings, Kay could no more follow the gameplay than she could have parsed ancient Latin.

She simply sat back and watched the monsters bite and tear and rend into each other, soaking in the fact that it didn't really matter that she didn't know the specifics; something deep in her, something dark and primal, responded to the atmosphere of this place and was exultant. She wasn't nearly as exuberant as her friends, who shouted themselves hoarse and laughed uproariously, shaking their fists in the air, but Kay Mayer realized sometime around the 1800 mark—the brothers were roughly even, trading blows with equal flare and audacity—that her mouth was open, her eyes wide and glistening, and her heart was fluttering.

When Seto announced that he was sacrificing two of his monsters, the very air crackled with anticipation; and when he called out the words that illuminated his legacy more than any others—"I summon the Blue-Eyes White Dragon!"—the roof seemed to shatter. People began stomping their feet in time with some ethereal drumbeat, and when the gleaming white serpent sprang up into the air, lounging godlike above its summoner, Kay felt tears spring from her eyes.

This was a children's game. These creatures were merely CGI manifestations of artwork on little slips of cardboard that were sold nine to a pack at any comic shop in the country. A pair of brothers were playing a game together.

So why was she having a religious experience?

This was ridiculous. Absurd. Laughable.

And yet…

"…your field is open!" Seto was saying now. He had a meager 800 points left by the point that she actively paid attention again; Mokuba had 230. The man's voice was a quiet thunderstorm, so powerful and with such conviction that he almost didn't need a microphone. "My deepest apologies, little brother, but this is checkmate! Blue-Eyes! Attack directly! Burst Stream!"

Far from looking resigned, defeated, or even fearful, the younger Kaiba's face was triumphant. Kay could see, up on the screen that was dead-center on the boy, that a kind of thrumming excitement was making him tremble.

Mokuba hit a small button on the side of his Duel Disk, and one of his facedown cards, the holograms of which were longer than he was tall, lifted up like the lid of a coffin. Mokuba said, "Sorry, big guy," with a cheeky little grin. "I activate Word of Diminishment. Your little burst stream? Done! Don't make me laugh."

The beam of crackling white lightning that had sprung from the dragon's jaws thinned out and vanished, and the creature looked nothing if not mystified.

"A pitiful delay of the inevitable!" Seto declared. Kay had realized some time ago that he was playing the crowd. He probably would have been perfectly content to play in absolute silence. But that wasn't what the people wanted. They wanted war. They wanted theater.

They wanted a show.

"Oh, but I'm not done!" said Mokuba. "Next up! Meritorious Alacrity! One of my monsters has been waiting for this! He's done biting at the bit! Are you ready for him?!"

Mokuba took out his deck, sifted through it, and summoned a huge, hulking creature that looked like the king of some demonic chessboard. Its skull-like visage seemed to grin savagely as it clutched a golden sword in its mammoth fists. Mokuba called it the Vengeful Swordstalker.

Seto chuckled. "You'll have to do better than that!"

Mokuba shuffled his cards, slammed them back into his duel disk, and drew. He grinned devilishly, and said, without preamble: "Rune of the Final Act."

A blast of purple-black lightning shot down into the center of the battlefield; a wicked, jet-black, six-bladed mace had embedded itself head-first into the floor. The Swordstalker switched the grip on its blade and slammed it down between its feet, where it sank down six inches and stood there like a sacred monument.

The demon sidestepped its sword and took up the mace. The same dark lightning that had announced the thing's arrival crackled up the Swordstalker's left arm. The beast reached out its right claw and drew a bright purple run into the air: a pentagram with the skull of a goat at its center.

Taking the mace in both hands, the Swordstalker swung it into the rune, shattering it like a stained glass window; its jagged, fang-like shards sank deep into the Blue-Eyes White Dragon's flesh. The great wyrm let out a sky-shattering roar that sent a superstitious shiver down Kay's spine, and exploded.

The crowd held its breath.

The numbers that represented Seto's score—his life points—slowly, agonizingly, counted down to zero.

The match was over. Mokuba had won.

Verse Three.

Kay wondered if she would still have functional hearing by the time she left this building. This time, though, she couldn't help clapping and cheering right along everyone else. Katie and Renie were embracing each other, jumping up and down as they laughed hysterically. Renie reached over and threw an arm around Kay, leaning her head against Kay's shoulder and crying.

Perhaps at that moment, Kay realized that this wasn't just a children's game; to the people of Domino City, Magic & Wizards was just as much a vessel for competition as any sport. Here, the Kaibas were superstars. Kay thought of the way that big college towns rallied around their football teams—her own father, who'd gone to the University of Rhode Island in Kingston, still wore his Rams sweater religiously during each year's season—and something clicked.

A full two minutes went by before Seto raised his hand again, weaving a sudden but irrevocable spell of absolute silence.

He said, "When I was younger, as I was first learning the demands of my future career, I had no time for cards." The somberness of his tone cut through every observer, and Kay leaned forward unconsciously as she sat back down; it didn't seem right to stand. "I had forgotten my passions in a lust for corporate power which, perhaps, is all too common." Seto gestured toward the boy that stood across from him. "My brother reminded me. He sneaked my meager assortment of Magic & Wizards cards into a textbook one night, and gave it to me under the pretense of helping me study."

Mokuba looked stunned. His eyes, more than anyone's, were glued to his brother.

Kay stole a glance at Katie and Renie; they looked as clueless as she felt.

"Hidden in my little collection was a new card, made of standard-issue copy paper." Seto reached into a pocket and retrieved a little necklace. He opened it (clearly it was a locket) and slipped out of it a piece of frayed white paper. He lifted it, and on the screens Kay could see a young child's crayon drawing of the same radiant white dragon that had graced the auditorium at the tail end of the match. A low, but audible "Awwww…" reverberated through the stands. Kay saw that Mokuba was blushing, and she smiled.

"My brother gave me my first Blue-Eyes White Dragon," Seto said; he did not smile. He was, in point of fact, deadly serious. He put the handmade card back into place and pocketed it again.

He waited a while, seeming to ponder something. No one made a sound.

Then Seto turned back to the crowd. "Here, now, with you all in attendance, I am announcing my official retirement; this was my final professional match of Magic & Wizards. It is fitting, thus, that we should have used the rule-set introduced in the Battle City tournament, which many of you will recall as the first tournament that I, and my company, funded personally. Do you remember the conditions of defeat from that event?"

The question was rhetorical; somehow, everyone sensed this.

"The loser shall surrender to the winner his, or her, rarest card," Seto said. Mokuba stiffened. The man strode toward his young sibling, who suddenly seemed very small indeed. Seto took his deck from his Duel Disk, shuffled it, and drew the top card.

"Niisama…" Mokuba whispered; his microphone caught it, and the emotion choking his little voice.

"Mokuba," Seto said, finally allowing a smile to grace his face; it transformed him. "You gave me my first Blue-Eyes. Allow me to return the favor." He held out the card. When Mokuba wouldn't take it, Seto reached out with his free hand, took hold of both of his brother's, and pressed the card into them. "You've earned this victory, and this card. Exult in it."

Mokuba couldn't speak. Seto may as well have handed him the Holy Grail.

The black-haired boy burst into tears, and threw his arms around his brother's waist. Yet again, there was a reaction from the crowd; but rather than yelling and crying and screeching, they simply applauded. It washed soothingly like a cresting wave, and Kay found that her face was wet with her own tears. She wouldn't understand until much, much later why this simple little display of brotherly affection and sportsmanship should affect her so much, but at the moment, she didn't question it.

It seemed a sacrilege to question it.

Seto lifted Mokuba up onto his shoulders, and the cheers started again. The man in white stepped up next to the brothers and said, "Well, now! I do believe we've heard a most masterful speech from our retired champion. How about a word from the victor?"

Mokuba's grin split his face as he gazed out at the crowd. Finally, he composed himself, and turned toward the section of the stands where his brother's rival was sitting.

He said, clearly and decisively:

"…You're next, Yugi."

Verse Four.

Katie and Renie barely had voices anymore as they approached the Kaibas after the crowd had finally begun to disperse. None of the subsequent matches of the day's tournament could live up to the preliminary one, but that didn't seem to matter. It was all in the name of good, honest competition.

Kay saw Detective McKinley approach from another section, grinning broadly, as they finally reached the brothers. Kay felt decidedly odd to be approaching these people who had seemed so much larger than life. She felt like she'd been invited onto the field after the Superbowl.

Seto shook the detective's hand, and received a boisterous pat on the back with quiet, but begrudging, acceptance. Katie came up first after her father, and declared in a harsh rasp, "That duel was amazing! Brilliant! Beautiful!"

Seto nodded beneficently like a god bestowing a favor. His bright blue eyes cut across to Renie, who squeaked; her usual brazen charisma seemed to have failed her. Then Seto noticed Kay, and those eyes widened slightly.

"All right, full disclosure," Detective McKinley said, smiling at Mokuba, who stood at his brother's side. "Did you go easy on him? Just a little bit?"

"Absolutely not," Seto said, and Kay might have expected there to be a hidden acquiescence in his tone, a bemused admittance that yes, he had, but to uphold his brother's honor of course he had to say no. No such thing was in Seto's voice; there was honest conviction there, and Kay thought she may have finally caught the full measure of this man for the first time.

"I think you did," Mokuba mumbled, staring down at his prize with glowing eyes.

"Now, now, kiddo," came a new voice, which turned out to be the man in white's, "feel the superiority! You won! You're a champion!"

"Actually, until he does beat Yugi," the detective said, "he's not quite a champion yet."

The man in white put on a sardonic, exasperated face. "Gimme a break. Mutou bathes himself in luck. There's no elegance to what he brings to the table. It's like bringing a bible to a knife fight."

Seto chuckled. He ruffled Mokuba's messy black hair. "You won, Mokuba. You should know me better than to think I would throw an honest fight."

"Mmmm…" said Mokuba, but he leaned his head against Seto's side and smiled quietly to himself as he continued to look down at the card still held reverently in both hands.

"Ah!" Katie said, and pulled Kay forward by the crook of her arm. "If I may," she said, gesturing grandly, "this is Kay. She's a newcomer to our fair city, and this was her first exposure to our, uh, blood sport."

Seto gave that kingly nod again. "Mayer?" he asked, but it felt like less a question and more a…condemnation. Kay stood tall and nodded. She held out her hand with a standard sort of greeting, and Seto shook it.

Something like electric shock ran up her arm, and Kay let out an involuntary little yelp.

Seto blinked, let go quickly, and stared at his hand.

"…Goddamn it," Seto whispered. "This is what he—"

He lifted his head again. Kay saw that his eyes—somehow, in the span of three seconds—had gone the cloudy, indifferent blue of icebergs.

END.

Noa makes a few references in his little spiel: the Greek myth of Narcissus, who was so infatuated with the beauty of his own reflection that he died trying to possess it; Percy Shelley's sonnet "Ozymandias," which is actually rendered: "Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"; and the biblical story of Cain and Abel.

Kay's musing on Athenian kings refers to the concept of autochthony; that is, Cecrops—the first king of the famous Greek city-state Athens—was according to myth born straight out of the earth, indicating his ethnic purity.

I'm taking a mythology class this semester. Sue me.

As to the duel itself, see? Told you it wouldn't be so bad. Right? Please? I suppose an explanation is in order; the names of the cards I mention throughout the last couple of phases (namely, 'Word of Diminishment,' 'Meritorious Alacrity,' and 'Rune of the Final Act') are actually taken from Dungeons & Dragons; specifically, from spells cast by my most recent character, a runepriest called Fairfax. So, a bit of license, if you please. I hope it made for an interesting read, or at least a non-boring one. Is that a phrase? Non-boring?

Could Mokuba beat his brother in an honest-to-goodness duel? Probably not. But I don't question these things as they come to me. I'm instinctive, and the scene dictated that the little Kaiba prove victorious. I figure that if Seto were going to lose to anyone in his final match as a professional duelist, it should be someone who would appreciate the gravity of that idea.

Someone who…well, you know…isn't Yugi.

At certain points during this chapter's creation, I doubted my vision. Thankfully, I got over that. The work is purer for it. Is it more correct? Maybe not. But it's honest. It is, in fact, true.

…I'm also taking an ethics class.

I'll show myself out.