Fanfiction: Shadow Games
TITLE: Shadow Games
CHAPTER: oneshot
AUTHOR: Argent Shadows
DATE: 9-23-09
FANDOM: Yu-Gi-Oh
DISCLAIMER: I don’t own Yu-Gi-Oh, or make any money from it.
PAIRINGS: Yami x Seto
TYPE: Drama
RATING: PG
WARNINGS: no warning
OCs: none
BETA: Seti
WORDS: 955
SUMMARY: Yami’s repeat opponent is someone he knows, from somewhere… [Yami POV]
NOTES: Written for a list of writing prompts ( http://yaoigirl.com/?p=373 ) – this prompt was “something long forgotten”.
* * *
Shadow Games
I know you.
The cards are different, the place is different. But I know you. Why do I know you, Seto Kaiba? Why do your blue eyes, so hard and crazed, speak to me?
You are not yourself. I can sense this… feel it in your moves, in the monsters, in the shadows. I know you are not yourself… this is not you. This is the madness that controls you.
Why do I know that?
I remember nothing before the Puzzle, and waking up here, with Yuugi. But I am Yuugi… part of him. His second heart, his second soul.
Aren’t I?
The shadows are mine, the monsters in Grandpa’s deck answer my call. I know them and they know me. I can bring them to life. And that is strangely familiar, strangely right.
When you call your dragons, Seto, I feel your true soul. They are yours as the Dark Magician is mine. The rightness to it fills me. Yet… this is wrong. We have done this before, in some long forgotten time. A past life, perhaps. A time before the dark.
Is there a time before the dark?
No… Don’t cheat, Seto. Don’t show me the ugliness of your soul. I don’t want to see that… though I must. That is the way of the shadow games, after all. I must see it. But your soul is not all ugly… some of it is beautiful, shining bright, but covered in terrible muck. Tainting it. Who put it there this time, Seto? Who cast darkness over your light?
I suppose it doesn’t matter. I know the end of this game. Grandpa’s Blue Eyes will not serve you, Seto. I destroy your monsters, and leave you vulnerable.
I could destroy him. I have so many others, for lesser crimes than stealing my grandfather’s card. But not this time. Not this time… I will not destroy you. Know death, Seto, that you may know life. May your punishment cleanse your spirit and make you the true gamer, the true sorcerer, the true person I know you can be.
_ – =*= – _
It didn’t work. Why did the shadow game not work? Instead of cleansing your soul, it only focused it’s aimless hatred on me. Why?
Your hatred is so deep, and it spills over onto everyone. You’ve even poisoned your brother with it. He is only a child and he tried to murder me and Jounouchi last night. For you.
Perhaps he sees something more even than I can in you, trying to rid the focus of his vengeance from the world before it consumes him. A valiant effort, if misguided.
So much time, effort, money. Built into a theme park of death, a twisted reflection of something that should be good and pure.
Like your heart.
Honda may be dead, trapped in your room of falling blocks. Your minions hold weapons to the heads of my friends. I should have no mercy on you. I see the madness, focused across the table from me. Twisted genius. And that haunting familiarity rises again. I have danced this dance with you before, and perhaps I will again, through the twisting loops of time.
But this is now. And for now, you must pay. For your brother, and my friends, and your own soul. Do you know, Seto, how deep the payment will be for your redemption? I do not… I will not, until the shadow game shows me your soul again.
So dark. So twisted, and frightened. You cling to power because you must, it is all you know. But it’s not true power, Seto. I… I almost remember this… no cheering crowds of children who do not know the true meaning of this game. No… it was silence and ruins and madness and darkness. I wish I could remember why I know this to be true.
Play with me. Show me your heart. Show me your heart so I may show you mine, and let the game decide whose is stronger. Though that is a foolish conceit. You could be as strong as I am. The depths of your conviction are staggering, and would be nigh unstoppable if not for the clinging darkness that chokes it, the madness that infects it.
Can I do this? The card of my grandfather’s deck seem uncertain. Two dragons.. three dragon… my mage is gone. Still, I cannot give up. For Jiichan, for Honda and Jounouchi, for Mokuba and Yuugi… and for you, Seto, though I doubt you would believe it.
Come forth, Exodia. Come forth and open the way.
_ – =*= – _
My boots make no noise as I slip onto the balcony where Seto’s nurse has left him to get some air. Not that he knows it, locked as he is in his own heart. Blank and peaceful, your face. Why do I know you, a dream of a dream? It’s stranger even because my lighter self does not. Does that mean that there is a difference there? Are we two faces of the same soul, or two different souls trapped in a single body?
So many questions. And you, sitting there in your chair as you rebuild the heart I shattered, will you know the answers when you wake? Will you know why I am drawn to you? Why I know you? Will there be answers on the other side of your waking, or only more questions?
Silently I pace to your side, looking down at your blank features, and lean forward to place a slow kiss on your unresponsive lips. Sometimes the heart knows what the mind forgets; perhaps this is a thing which my twinned soul has imagined. Whatever the case, when you wake up, I will be waiting for you.
~end~
Tags: Atem (Yami), drama, oneshot, pg rated, Seto, Yaoi, Yu-Gi-Oh (series)