Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Jounouchi dashes down the sidewalk, even though it’s not like he has any idea where to go to fix this. But it’s being frantic in the general direction of the universe that he crashes bodily into Yugi.

The other guy was shuffling along with his gaze on the ground in front of his feet, holding onto his overstuffed backpack looking like it was about to topple him over where it was slung over one shoulder, and he doesn’t look up until his nose is squashing up against Jounouchi’s ribs.

Jounouchi sputters an undignified non-word and catches Yugi by the shoulders before he can faceplant. Yugi weighs almost nothing, but when you add the backpack, Jounouchi is steadying about a million pounds, if you want his expert estimation. But boy is it good to see Yugi.

Yugi looks up, looking dazed, recognizes who he’s bumped into, and flinches.

“Ah, Jounouchi-kun!” he stutters out, voice high and panicky. “I-I’m sorry!” He waves his hands in desperately placating denial. “I didn’t mean to walk into you!” His eyes cast around like they’re being repelled from Jounouchi’s face by a magnet. “I-I’ll just go.”

Eyes focused somewhere across the street, he hunches up his shoulders and starts a hasty slouch away.

Jounouchi calls out to him. Maybe he shouldn’t, but he just can’t not. “Hey, wait!”

Yugi turns around with a fearful look that hurts.

Jounouchi takes a breath and steels himself. He’s faced worse than this, barely, and done things magnitudes less easy. “Do you want me to take you out for a burger?”

⏳

It took Jounouchi most of the morning to figure it out. He woke up on Thursday, a bit late, pelted through his paper route and then down to school, then got turned away at the doors told it was Sunday and he wasn’t supposed to be there. (His father hadn’t stopped him; he was always passed out in the mornings.) So that was weird, but people get confused sometimes, right? It was funny, and yay, no school. But slouching outside of the high school gates where he wasn’t supposed to be, he finally had a minute to acknowledge that the weather was weird. Like, summer-in-winter weird. He hadn’t brought a jacket or anything because none of his winter stuff had been where he’d thought it was, but it wasn’t looking like he’d need one.

He hadn’t seen any of the guys on his way either, which should have at least tipped him off that it was Sunday. But...

It was still weird. He just had this weird feeling, like. Hollowness. Like he was missing something.

And then he actually checked the dates on some of the papers he had left over from his route and.

Well.

Fuck.

The weather wasn’t weird. He was weird. A couple years weird, what the heck was happening, was this before he’d befriended any of his current friends but Honda?

And that had been about as far as he’d got in thinking through this when he took off for the sake of it and smacked into the vintage version of his best friend.

⏳

At first Yugi is twitchy and confused, but he warms up quickly the longer things go without Jounouchi springing a trap. He was always trusting and optimistic — that’s what makes him so easy to trick.

He looks — Jounouchi hadn’t even noticed before — tired, strung out in a way Yugi hasn’t in long enough Jounouchi barely remembers it.

Matter of fact, there are a lot of things different about Yugi that must have shifted so slowly he never really noticed, held up in plain contrast now. Jounouchi catalogues the little changes he hadn’t noticed. Yug’ was definitely a high-voiced guy, but it wasn’t this high anymore, for sure. His hair is in its usual incredibly distinct style, but his bangs look kind of loose and greasy.

But one thing hasn’t changed: Yugi is the smartest, most reliable guy Jounouchi knows. Not even losing their friendship could change that.

“Say, Y-Yugi? I’d like your opinion about...uh, a game.”

Yugi perks up immediately. “A game?”

There’s not a trace of suspicion this could be a trap anymore. Which it isn’t, but...geez. From Yug’s perspective Jounouchi had been whaling on him probably yesterday.

“Yeah, so um... In this game. After he wins, the protagonist — well, I guess he’s a side character, if I’m honest.” And that hurt to admit. “He gets sent back to the start of the game.”

Yugi’s eyes are wide. “Is this a video game?” He thinks and before Jounouchi can answer amends, “A tabletop campaign?”

Jounouchi shudders at the memory of an all-to-real TRPG or two. “Yeah, something like that. So, everybody else is the same as they were when the game started.... Er, before, really —”

Yugi is nodding in comprehension. “So the player character has to decide how to act on his foreknowledge! Wow! That’s a really cool premise! But what did you want my help with, Jounouchi-kun?”

“Um, I’m just not sure...what would be the best way to play a game like that? Like, whaddayou even do?”

Yugi blinks at him. “Was it a good game? Would you mind playing through it again?”

Jounouchi feels his expression melt into something warm and soft and sappy. “Y-yeah. It was the best game. I don’t regret a second of it, except that I couldn’t do more.”

Yugi nods more, with such enthusiasm that he topples the table’s mustard bottle and the ketchup packets he grabbed and was stacking into some kind of tiny maze and sends condiments squirting over the table. “Well, if it’s like that, you should spend your second playthrough making it even better! Make contact with allies sooner, set it up so you can get more artifacts.... You know, for bonuses!”

“Pfschh, yeah. Hey, Yug!”

Yugi flinches at the other boy’s sudden boisterous tone. “Uh, y-yes, Jounouchi-k-kun?”

“We should do this again sometime! Make a thing of it!”

“A, a burger thing?”

“Yeah, and talking about games. Hey, how about you bring one next time?” Did he already know Yugi lived in a game shop at this point? Yeah, he definitely had. Not that he’d need to to assume he’d have something; Yugi used to bring small games to class all the time before things changed so that he always had people to talk to. (And then he’d bring things in to share with them.)

Yugi lights up like Jounouchi made his whole world.

Jounouchi flutters, but also feels guilty at making his bud’s day like that, with something so small.

⏳

It’s sunset, gold beams lancing through gaps between buildings right into the eyes. Jounouchi walks Yugi home. (“There are toughs and gang members all over the place! Trust me!” And you don’t have your other self — ah, Atem — to help you right now.) Yugi mutters excitedly to himself and skips around in happy little gambols. Man, Jounouchi forgot how he was before acquiring some of the poise and balanced calm Atem brought to the table.

At no particular cue, Yugi spins around to walk backwards and ask Jounouchi, “So — did I help?”

Jounouchi smiles at him. “Yeah. More than you know, buddy.”

Hey, he’s got something to remedy here, hasn’t he? “Hey, Yugi!” he says. “We’re friends, right?”

Yugi stares at him slack-jawed. “W-w-we are?!”

Of course we are. You decided that, when you told Ushio not to hurt me. He leans down to look Yugi in the eye, because he has to make this good. “I mean, I’d like to be if you’d like to be. Listen, I know I haven’t always been great to you, but —”

Before he can finish, Yugi tackles him with a hug that hits him in the stomach. “I’d love to be your friend, Jounouchi-kun!!”

A massive knot that was settled and twisting in Jounouchi’s chest unwinds.

Alright. He’s got Yugi back in his corner. There’s no way this is going to be a total disaster if they’re working together.

Chapter Text

Honda is dubious about Yugi at first, again, and about Jounouchi’s sudden 180 flip, but Jounouchi refuses to even pretend to be dubious about his best friend just for appearances. Yugi couldn’t take that, not now when he still really has no reason to believe in Jounouchi. Honda will come around again.

Anzu is deeply suspicious, and it’s exactly like the first time except now he knows her well enough to read that that’s what’s driving the unsubtly barbed banter and way she inserts herself into conversations between him and Yug’.

Jounouchi sees that creep Ushio eyeing his bud and recruits a baffled but compliant Honda for a preemptive strike. And he’ll admit, that is satisfying. Like he’s gonna let this creep hurt his buddy again. If he’s gotta chance to fix something he’s always regretted, he ain’t gonna take it for granted.

Right after that come the TV assholes, and they’re pretty easy to deal with too, with a little forward planning that makes Honda give him a weird look.

Until he starts bragging about his tactical prowess, which apparently convinces Honda that he’s still normal.

Then he settles back to wait.

So time ticks by, and Yugi...

Doesn’t solve the Puzzle.

Jounouchi realizes, with all the speed you’d expect from his D average, that Yug’ solving the Puzzle was catalyzed by danger and trauma, the pharaoh stepping in right when Yugi needed him and not a moment sooner. And Jounouchi sent Ushio packing.

At this point, he starts to sweat a bit.

“You should take it with you everywhere!” he insists when Yugi finally shows him the disassembled Item. “Haha, what if you get bored, right? And!” He grabs Yugi around the shoulders and swings them both around, half-kneeling and doing a pose with one fist in the air. “You never know when inspiration will strike!” Yugi looks baffled (and a little dizzy), but pleased. Which Jounouchi gets from him a lot.

But that doesn’t seem to be enough, real shocker there, and Jounouchi is coming up against a real conundrum. ‘Cause Yugi has to rescue Atem, who is their friend, but on the other hand Jounouchi isn’t gonna, like, throw his bud off a bridge or something. So he’s kinda at an impasse, yeah?

⏳

One day, Yugi comes to school with bruises. — Jounouchi hadn’t missed that sight.

Jounouchi grips Yugi by the shoulders and offers him retribution. He doesn’t know what happened and that pisses him off, but if he wasn’t any good preventing anything, he can at least offer revenge!

Yugi just smiles and says, “Thank you, Jounouchi-kun, but this is something I have to deal with myself!”

His best friend stares resolutely at him, and Jounouchi catches a glimmer of the strength of will that will come to characterize Yugi.

So he backs off.

Okay, “backing off” might constitute following him after school a couple times. Yugi’s like a magnet for rough types; Jounouchi actually bruises his knuckles on a couple of them. After one stalk-and-spar session that runs particularly late he sleeps through most of the next morning in class. But hey, at least he was still on time!

The next day he’s right as rain again, which is lucky on account of how that day turns out to be important.

⏳

 “Look, I solved it!” Yugi says, and holds up a chunka gold it’s still been weird seeing him without. The eye on the chunk of metal glimmers.

Holy shit, Jounouchi realizes, my friend’s in there.

Jounouchi tears up, just barely, and then has to look like he hasn’t because why would he? He’s overwhelmed suddenly by how much he missed Atem, and wants to see him right now.

Well, he’ll show up. Yugi rescued him from that thing, even if he doesn’t know it yet.

Geez, where was the pharaoh exactly when he was in that Puzzle? Was he, like, dormant, or was he awake the whole time? Was it like the Shadow Realm? The Items are made with Shadow magic....

And — Jounouchi got a little bit lost at the end when things started getting seriously loopy, but wasn’t the pharaoh locked up with Zorc?

“Jounouchi-kun? You look pretty serious! Is something bothering you?”

Jounouchi forces a jolly grin. “Not at all, buddy!” He reaches over and ruffles his bud’s hair, making Yugi sputter and dance away, the Puzzle swinging around on its rope and winking in the classroom’s artificial light.

⏳

He hears muttering inbetween classes that same day.

“Did you hear about that criminal? The one with the face tattoos.”

“Uh, the one the teacher was talking about yesterday? No, I somehow missed that.”

“Not that! They got ‘im! Well, sorta....”

Oh man, did Jounouchi miss the escaped criminal this time? Shit, no wonder Anzu looked so deep in her head this morning. Is she okay? Can he give her a hug right now without her punching him? ...He can’t. This Anzu will definitely take a swing on reflex. ...He’s gonna hug her anyway, might still help.

He leans back to get closer to the chatty kids. “You mean the guy who set himself on fire?”

“Yeah!” says the gossiper, twisting around to face the fuel for his story Jounouchi has provided. “In that gas station.”

Jounouchi raises an eyebrow. “Uh, you mean in the burger joint?”

Gossipy guy — Toyama? — rolls his eyes. Which Jounouchi takes umbrage to, since he was actually there. Sorta. Like, in a way. “No, man, he took somebody hostage in the burger place. He bit it in some gas and gulp, one of those places that sells booze and bread and everything.”

Is this Jounouchi’s fault? Is this because he wasn’t there? But he didn’t do anything! He didn’t even get to see!

He really doesn’t get chaos theory.

⏳

“Were you still th — uh — were you there?” Jounouchi asks Yugi. “At the thing at Burger World?”

“Um, yeah.” Yugi’s expression goes very, very clouded. “I’d been wanting to try it out, it’s new.... But then Anzu....” For half a second the clouds become a stormy thunderhead. Then his expression clears completely. “But it’s all fine now!” He waves his arms over his head. “Did you hear about what happened?!”

Then Yugi tells him how he heard the guy was immolated, and all about Anzu’s dreams to dance. Which is lucky, because Jounouchi totally would have forgotten to pretend he didn’t know about that.

Chapter Text

The first time Jounouchi contrives to be somewhere he wasn’t for the first go-around after that, he ends up getting terrified by one of his own best friends.

See, he smells trouble in the air, quashes his sense of propriety and his ability to mind his own business, and follows Yugi. But he can tell when he gets there that he caught up too late to be any use anyway.

He gets there while the pharaoh is in the middle of dealing with the trouble Jounouchi caught wind of. Dealing with, like, scarier than Jounouchi has ever seen him.

A lot of things click in Jounouchi’s head at once. The awful circumstances he was visualizing Atem in. The fact that the guy hadn’t known anything about himself at first. The fact that Jounouchi hadn’t met the pharaoh before he had been around for a pretty long while, considering. The way that bad types around Yugi had so often just seemed to take care of themselves while he was looking the other way.

The number of them who weren’t like Hirutani or the impossible Kaiba brothers, and hadn’t come back for more. Ever.

Aw, man, buddy, Jounouchi thinks, at the end when you said you learned compassion from Yugi how little were you implying you started out with?

The pharaoh — the other Yugi — laughs, and the low, smooth chuckle sounds like an impending murder.

Jounouchi realizes, at this point, that he didn’t just forget how Yugi was before Atem — he also forgot how crazy and dangerous Atem was before learning from Yugi.

And really, wasn’t Atem kind of — eurgh — a ghost? A vengeful ghost?

Well, no, that was Bakura’s little parasite. That dick.

Okay, these guys aren’t so great, but he’s gotta stop his bud from doing anything he’ll regret someday. Once he’s learned how to person again from living in Yugi’s brain.

How much of what they all loved and admired about Atem was from Yugi? Not for nothing — he was still Jounouchi’s friend no matter what — but.

“Hey, Yug’.” (He’d said he’d always be Yugi, and he’d meant it.) “I think they’ve had enough, don’t you?”

Yugi turns that crazy stare on Jounouchi. It’s like looking at a predator, and not a tame one. For a second Jounouchi wonders if he’s going to turn on him next just for being there with the rest of the prey.

The other Yugi nods. “You’re right, my friend. I got carried away.” He gestures to the gang on the ground just like a monarch waving. “They aren’t worth it.”

Jounouchi claps him on the shoulder. “Great! Burger?”

The other Yugi eyes him with that fond but detached cat stare. “I would like to try elote.”

Jounouchi thinks he saw a stand that said that on his dash here, in big yellow katakana. Which the other Yugi apparently...took note of? During his vengeance spree? Or Yugi noticed and the other Yugi just knows about it? Argh, this stuff gives him a headache. Maybe the other Yugi was keeping it in his back pocket in case he needed to murder somebody with their stove. “Elote it is!” declares Jounouchi, and steers his bitty ghost pal off to find the stand.

By the time he plunks him in front of it, it’s Yugi, staring around blinking dozily like he just woke up there.

He stares at the stand he’s sitting in front of in confusion. What the stand serves is apparently this spicy-smelling corn thing. And also plain old tomorokoshi, which, like, okay, why not.

“You said you wanted elote,” Jounouchi provides, not able to think of any better way to catch him up.

“Uhhh, yeah!” agrees Yugi, beaming at him. Oh, buddy.

Jounouchi orders them two of the special anyway, and Yugi eats his with a considering frown on his face.

Looking him over, it looks like Jounouchi only caught the end of the action in the first place because the other Yugi took a detour back to the game shop to like, change? His shirt? And shoes, maybe, because Jounouchi thinks he would have noticed if Yugi had worn dress shoes instead of the big blocky white sneakers today. But the other Yugi kept the rest of the Domino High uniform, because apparently Yugi’s closet is leaving him that strapped for options right now. Those big ankh things Jounouchi forgot existed are belted to his wrists.

The guy’s such a diva, it’s incredible. The pharaoh is probably completely to blame for Yugi's re-burgeoning incredibly questionable fashion sense. ...Dammit. He’s right here, but Jounouchi’s still remembering him walking through that door and now he’s missing him.

Man. What does Yugi, master tactician, think is worth letting this go by? Does he really think they’ll all ditch him for being crazy, like he had last time?

The idea is depressing. “Hey, Yugi!”

Yugi jumps at Jounouchi’s sudden declaring voice, but, progress, doesn’t wince or flinch. “Yeah, Jounouchi-kun?”

“You know you can tell me anything, right? I won’t stop being friends with you, no matter what!” He keeps going. “Even if you turned out to be possessed, or a crazy murderer! Not talking about anything specific, just saying!”

Yugi blinks at him nonplussed for a sec, then Jounouchi sees rapid reasoning flickering in Yugi’s eyes. His expression flickers reassured, then guilty, then what Jounouchi is pretty sure is self-critical.

Then Jounouchi can’t see Yugi’s expression at all, because Yugi’s looking down at his shoes, the counter, his food. Just down. “Actually, lately...”

Jounouchi bears the silence patiently, waits for Yugi to whisper, There’s another me.

He accidentally pushed the timeline back by giving Yugi somewhere to land, a support besides an ancient magical artifact, so he has to mediate between them, fast, otherwise they won’t be ready when Pegasus comes calling. Man, Pegasus is still alive right now. That’s weird. Should Jounouchi try to keep him that way? But he doesn’t know how he died in the first place....

He wracks his brain for clues. Everything had been really high-adrenaline and crazy and they’d won and then Pegasus had mysteriously turned up dead.

Nope, he’s got nothin’.

Guess he’ll keep an eye out when the time comes, if it still comes the same way. It might not, cuzza chaos theory or whatever.

“Jounouchi-kun,” starts Yugi, finally getting his spine straight and his thoughts in order or whatever he was doing. “When we became friends...”

In the alley? Oh, in the burger joint. Their first food and game meeting.

Yugi looks up at him with that knowing look that’s purely Yugi. “When you asked me about a player who travels through time — were you talking about you?”

Wow, Yugi is so smart; this didn’t even occur to Jounouchi as a possibility. He’s honestly blindsided.

He scratches his cheek. “Ehe... What gave me away?”

Yugi’s eyes widen, like he’s shocked his guess has been confirmed, and then they narrow and, oh, it’s Atem who’s staring up at Jounouchi.

“How did this happen?” he demands, picking up the conversation like he doesn’t expect Jounouchi to notice. Or maybe like he hasn’t noticed.

Jounouchi has a brief crisis of sanity and scoops Atem up in a crushing hug. The pharaoh makes a surprised little oof sound as he’s crushed against Jounouchi’s chest. It manages to sound suave, somehow. That regal gravitas must be coming back to him already. That was most of Atem’s deal — so much confidence it’s practically a superpower.

He lets him go and brushes off his coat for him.

“Jounouchi-kun,” Atem reminds him.

Jounouchi answers him.

“...I can’t hear you when you have your face in your hands.”

Jounouchi throws his head back and howls, “I said I still don’t know, okay?!”

There’s a pause, and then Jounouchi is brought down from his melodrama by a tiny hand awkwardly patting him on the shoulder.

He sighs. “Eat your corn.”

Atem, weirdly obedient, mercifully drops it for a second to gnaw on his corn. They both trade gossip trying to figure out what the cheesy stuff on it is.

Jounouchi guesses he won’t push the Puzzle thing. After all, he isn’t in any rush to hustle Atem on to the afterlife.

He and Yugi have at least got a lot to learn from each other! These versions of them... There’s no way they could beat Zorc. The big one. The DnD version they could probably swing.

Chapter Text

The Yugis both keep trying to workshop his whole future-brain thing, and it’s going...weird, as brainstorming sessions with Yug’ go. It seems like the other Yugi knows everything Yugi knows, but Jounouchi has to repeat everything he’s already told the other Yugi for Yugi. Which is difficult to keep track of, because Yugi will pretend he knows what he missed even when he doesn’t. And he’s smart enough to more or less fill it in, so that it’s not until the structure of logic has been built up a few stories that it becomes apparent there’s a missing foundation.

Jounouchi is kind of baffled by how much attention Yugi is giving this before realizing that, hilariously, his time problem is hands down the most interesting thing going on in Yugi’s life right now, at least as long as he’s not aware of Atem. See how long that lasts once Bakura shows up.

Jounouchi’s gotten so used to the wacky magical BS of the week. He has a total disconnect from reality as most people see it in that area.

⏳

Jounouci half-entertains the thought of trying to help Bakura earlier, but he has no idea how to go about finding him. All his thoughts end on dead ends. Can’t call him, the number he has memorized is for somewhere he doesn’t live yet. He thumbs through a phone book without luck — no Bakuras of any kind, even though Jounouchi was on the lookout expecting that if he found anybody it’d be Bakura’s dad. He’s not around, but he must own Bakura’s leases, right? — He doesn’t know his address, even what prefecture he’s in now, can narrow it down to maybe three that are more likely — doesn’t know how to find anybody who knew Bakura before. It always seemed like Bakura’s life before they met him was mostly full of dead and gone people.

So he’ll probably have to wait for him to show up organically. (And sue him, nearly sabotaging Atem there left him a little gun-shy.)

He’s still sure as hell going to be keeping a closer eye on that Spirit of the Ring this time, though.

When you get down to it, he doesn’t know so much shit he never thought he’d have to know! What is Otogi doing? Is there anything he can do about that? Hell, probably not, it’s not like he could ever help himself any....

And ho hum, ho hum, who else has a shitty dad? Only future billionaire Seto freaking Kaiba.

Or had a shitty dad, because Jounouchi is so busy juggling all the magic stuff he’s probably forgetting that he doesn’t actually remember this until he sees the headline splashed across the Thursday paper.

CEO FALLS TO DEATH

In his own defense: Jounouchi is not used to thinking of Kaiba as someone who might need any kind of help.

He skims other coverage as he runs into it — “weapons manufacturer” “engineering mogul” blah. “Untimely” “mysterious circumstances” blah. Nobody’s got a lot to say about Kaiba Seto, the new owner, and what there is isn’t putting much stock in him, him being fifteen and likely havin’ a “future in R&D” or, less charitably, bein’ “slated to be a mere figurehead”.

Ha. Shows what they fuckin’ know.

⏳

Jounouchi’s first thought when he sees Kaiba is...

Short.... he thinks, weirded out. Was Kaiba seriously this short still when they met him? In his mind Kaiba Seto has always been a giant. Not a lot of people are taller than Jounouchi. So it was, like, memorable, or something.

Another thing he’d forgotten in the wake of Kaiba being Kaiba is how much bad crazy there was in his eyes back...now. If their Kaiba’s eyes are a clear lake, this one’s are filthy bilgewater.

Also, he keeps smiling. Creepy.

He thinks hard about warning Yugi off Kaiba, but then remembers how steering him away from Ushio put off the arrival of the pharaoh. If Jounouchi steers Kaiba away, him and Yugi may never fight, and...

Kaiba Seto has been a real pain in the butt since the minute the gang met him. Jounouchi doesn’t like the guy, not one bit. Kaiba rubs him the wrong way in every way.

But can he risk leaving him to languish like this, rotting inside, so far from that clear clarity of purpose he’s used to? Leave him the way he was before he bothered the other Yugi enough times that Yugi decided to fix him?

⏳

Yugi gets into Duel Monsters. He brings a few stacks of cards to school, and Jounouchi plays a few games on the desks with him. Figures he’ll take it easy, nontournament skills, right, nothing too suspicious.

Then he notices Yugi’s eyes are practically bugging out of his skull. “Whoa, Jounouchi-kun!” he exclaims, practically vibrating with interest. “I didn’t know you were so good at Duel Monsters!”

Jounouchi blinks down at the desks they’ve shoved together. Yugi was keeping pace with him without appearing to think about it much harder than usual, so he didn’t think it could have been...that good?

“When did you get so good at it?” puts in Anzu.

“Well, I uh. I used to —” Play it when he was a kid? No, it was too new, uh — “I got good from watching Yug’ and his gramps! Duh.”

He’d feel bad if he couldn’t give credit to his teachers, after all.

Yugi, who as far as Jounouchi can tell has been peripherally aware of Duel Monsters for some time but has only just become actively interested in it, blinks blankly at this declaration, and Jounouchi grins an enormous smile at him and hopes its force is strong enough to keep him from commenting.

“Eheh?” offers Jounouchi.

Yugi’s eyes widen to saucer size. So he gets it, great, but Honda is glaring at them both suspiciously.

“I didn’t know you were already into nerd junk like this,” he finally says. “Huh, guess you and Yugi were always two peas in a pod after all!”

“You’re just jealous because you suck at this game,” snipes Anzu, who is still glowing from her own winning streak. She could have a backup career in this if there were any reality where she’d ever settle for one. She’s sure better than Jounouchi was supposed to be at this time, and on no practice, too. But while she’s plenty smart she doesn’t love it, he’s guessing, same as not every person who could becomes a scientist or whatever.

“Hey!” exclaims Honda, rounding on her, and that’s him distracted. Thank everything for Anzu, ready to fight everybody and everything at any time.

⏳

Kaiba wanders over to their table, which stands out on accounta how since he transferred in Kaiba hasn’t exactly been spending lunches socializing. He’s been spending them looking over weird shit he brings with him, reading — not always uppity shit, a lot of it’s weird magazines — or staring vacantly into the middle distance like he wants it to die.

His mouth is bent to approximate smiling faintly at the general assemblage, but he’s staring at their game like he’s trying to burn a hole in it. Jonuouchi suppresses the urge to cover the cards with his hands to protect them from Kaiba’s laser magma vision.

Jounouchi doesn’t remember this happening last time when he came over to watch them play, but Kaiba’s creepy lizard stare skitters over to Jounouchi, down to his side of the field, back. “Are these even your cards?” he says.

“No,” grits Jounouchi. He’s lost his cards, asshole.

Mini-Kaiba scoffs, and then turns away from him to Yugi. What the hell.

Jounouchi stares at him as Kaiba fake-beams at their group in general, but mostly Yugi. Behind the smile, it looks like he hasn’t slept in — ever. The creases under his eyes are intense.

Having extracted a promise from Yugi, Kaiba notices Jounouchi’s staring. He turns his regard back on him, and then, oh god, more fake smiling, at him.

“Is there something on my face, Jounouchi-kun?” he asks, his face...crinkling. Into shapes.

Can Jounouchi help it if he grimaces? Don't call me my name with a cheerful honorific, you bastard! That's the ultimate insult!

Kaiba’s “pleasant” face remains “pleasant” at Jounouchi's inability to muster up a fitting answer for this twisty upside-down bullshit. It doesn’t seem very responsive, restricted to being on or slipping off. It’s like dealing with somebody in a literal mask, any genuine expression out of sight and eyes that you can just tell don't match the rest.

“Hnh,” Kaiba says, through that tiny smile-shaped thing. “You’re not bad, I guess. But you need stronger cards.”

Jounouchi’s gonna wring his creepy neck.

Chapter Text

Jounouchi knows that bastard Kaiba, and also he likes to think his instincts are pretty good, thanks. So of course he smells the rat. Its source: the malignant aura emanating from the pits peeking out from under Kaiba’s hair where your eyes are supposedta be.

So knowing there’s gonna be trouble, Jounouchi...deliberately lets Yugi wander off, says goodbye to Honda, starts a goodbye to Anzu before he remembers she isn’t expecting one, sigh, and starts off for home with his head down.

“I’m not gonna interfere!” he announces to the street. A little old lady sweeping her front porch squints suspiciously at him. He flips her off.

“Not gonna interfere, no siree, not me,” he chants, picking up the pace and hopping to avoid breaking his neck tripping over a skateboard some kid left in the middle of the sidewalk.

“Nope! Not gonna interfere! I ain’t no meddler, not today,” he grits, stomping maybe harder than is necessary.

“I’m nooooot...” He pauses, rocking his weight on one heel, then spins on it and takes off back the way he came. “— Dammit!”

He kicks a can. It goes crashing into a shop window, bounces off, and nearly wings him for his trouble.

Here’s hoping that’s not a metaphor or something, he thinks as he speed-walks back the way he came, cursing all the way.

⏳

Jounouchi gets back to the school, gasping, literally just in time for Kaiba to take a swing at Yugi with his briefcase.

Leave it to fucking Kaiba, he thinks, even as he catches it on his arm. It stings, motherfucker. Doesn’t Kaiba know that’s not what briefcases are for?

Actually, Jounouchi wouldn’t put it past Kaiba to have picked this thing out with an eye to which material would make the best blunt weapon. “Ah ah ah!” he chides, and summons up a shit-eating grin. “Mind your manners, kiddo. Don’t do something you’ll regret later.”

Though when he says that, he’ll admit: He’s kind of thinking about Kaiba’s delicate card-player’s hands neatly ripping a card in two. Which is the kind of transgression Jounouchi wouldn’t even imagine, as an option, if he had a card in his hand. Any card.

Right now those fingers are clenched around that card, pressed hard enough that they’d crinkle it if the hold were any different.

Well, that’s no way to hold a card! So Jounouchi grabs his wrist.

Gently.

Kaiba hisses in pain and his hand spasms. Okay, well, maybe not that gently. But forget the means, the end is that Kaiba loosens that deadly grip, and Jounouchi snags the Blue Eyes from his twitching fingers. Mission accomplished. He ducks neatly out of Kaiba’s grabbing range. Which is easier than he’s still expecting, ‘cause Kaiba isn’t a towering praying mantis man yet. Jounouchi actually skips back a couple feet too far and probably looks pretty stupid, but eh, them’s the breaks.

Pre-growth-spurt Kaiba looks wrong in a way nobody else really does. Anzu’s a little ganglier, Honda’s not quite as broad, and Yugi obviously has almost no idea who he is yet in a way that throws off his bearing like anything, but Kaiba looks stunted. His hands are perfectly normal but they’re Kaiba’s hands and they should be like menacing murder spiders so normal they look chunky.

Also, Jounouchi plain shouldn’t be able to see the top of Kaiba’s head. It’s unnatural.

Though Jounouchi knows that when he ran up he was looking at Yugi, the eyes watching Jounouchi approvingly now already have the hard glint that means they’re the pharaoh’s. Yugi’s scrawny shoulders in his uniform shirt are too straight. Atem nods at Jounouchi, a gesture between warriors. Jounouchi tucks the card into his breast pocket, knowing Atem, despite not saying anything, has entrusted him with it.

(Heehee, Jounouchi got to touch an ultra-rare dragon card with his bare motherfucking hands. He’s having a religious experience right now, no wonder Kaiba is practically married to these things.

His Red Eyes is better though! Naturally.)

Atem turns on Kaiba. “Kaiba... You sought to pilfer something dear to my grandfather’s soul. For that, I shall punish you!”

Oh, thank god Big Yugi is easily offended. He’s basically gonna start a shadow game over offended sensibilities, but whatever! Just kick off the fixing Kaiba Seto domino chain! The guy always pisses Jounouchi off but right now he’s creeping him out.

“A game,” Atem continues. “Your game. Duel Monsters.”

“Why should I play a game with the likes of you?” Kaiba asks Atem, looking only a bit put off by Yugi’s unexplained change of countenance. “I saw your game. It was barely worth watching.”

“Oh, it will be worth the winner’s while,” says Atem, watching his someday-rival like a snake charming prey. He holds out a hand to Jounouchi.

It takes him a second. “What, seriously?” he hisses at Yugi, trying to talk to just him. Kaiba is like four feet away so it doesn’t really work.

“I am certain, my friend,” says Atem, finally turning to him. For just a second he flicks his commander-of-men vibe on full.

Jounouchi, still not very happy about it, tugs the Blue Eyes card back out of his pocket and slips it into Yugi’s waiting hand. It’s kind of like handing over a baby. Does that comparison make him a bad person? It’s not like he means any disrespect to human babies.

Yugi brandishes the card with a flourish, fully aware of, if not its full value, the worth it holds in Kaiba’s eyes. “If you win, naturally you can have my rarest card.” He fishes the deck Yugi brought to class out of a his pants pocket — and Atem in Jounouchi’s mind is like, the ‘I have a pouch for this, also it’s on a belt, and I keep my belts on a belt’ guy, even more’n Mai, so that’s bizarre to see. He slips the dragon into his deck and shuffles it in with a brisk but thorough overhand. Kaiba’s eyes follow it the whole way, the greed visible on his face.

“Well, in that case...” he says.

“But if I win, Kaiba, you’ll come to understand my grandfather’s words!” the other Yugi declares, fixing Kaiba with a pointed finger.

Kaiba stares at him like he doesn’t really get it, snapped only halfway out of his covetous reverie. Which, yeah, but also, seeing him not look at Yugi (or Yugi) like he’s by default one of the most important things in the vicinity? Hella surreal. Even when Kaiba is dismissing Yugi, Jounouchi is used to, like. It being obvious how important he thinks declaring Yugi’s unimportance is. Hell, the Kaiba he’s used to even dismisses Jounouchi with more care and attention than this Kaiba is putting into vaguely humoring Yugi.

“Fine,” he agrees, completely lacking appropriate gravity. But who wouldn’t be, without seeing for themselves what a declaration like you’ll understand means coming from the other Yugi?

⏳

Jounouchi really lets Yug’ go then. There are a few hours of radio silence, which Jounouchi tries to pass chilling, because what else can he do? Periodically he considers the merit of trying really hard to send Yugi good vibes, because it’s not like it hasn’t been helpful before. Mostly he ends up finding a balance between those extremes by fretting, Finally, the other Yugi comes back, triumphantly flourishing the Blue Eyes card.

He just hands it to Jounouchi when he sees him peering at it, which is a sort of ridiculous display of trust since Kaiba tried to steal it, today, within the last twenty-four hours — possibly multiple times? But that’s Yugi for you.

Jounouchi smiles at it. Yeah, it’s Kaiba’s signature card, but Jounouchi can respect a good monster when he sees it.

He frowns, as Yugi’s attention drifts elsewhere. It’s fine now, but Kaiba ripped this up, didn’t he? He’s so fucked up and twisted inside he’s forgotten what he’s all about, and he doesn’t see a reason not to do something like that.

Jounouchi stares at the card, melancholy now. They’re like, magic, right? So even though in the end it was just a card, destroying one, especially when there were only four, was just...not on.

“You deal with the jerk alright?” Jounouchi asks Yugi, shoving this thought to the backburner to let his brain work on it.

Atem nods firmly. Looks like it’s still him! The spirit’s not peacing out the second trouble clears up quite as fast lately, but it’s still like dealing with a skittish cat.

“Cool,” says Jounouchi, falling into step beside him in a slight slouch. “Wanna grab burgers? Or, wait.” Huh. “What kinda food do you like, buddy?” He doesn’t know if Atem’s favorite is the same as Yugi’s, and he feels like he’s gotta ask in case it isn’t.

The other Yugi looks pleased but somewhat lost at being asked. “...There’s a place that serves tamiya nearby,” he says, gracing Jounouchi with a perplexed smile.

Jounouchi doesn’t know what that is, but sure. “Then I’m buying!” he announces cheerfully.

“We should split the bill,” declares Yugi.

“Like men!”

They fist bump. Dorky stuff with Atem always feels super cool to participate in: It’s such a perk of knowing him.

Atem seems to know where they’re going, and trots a couple steps ahead of Jounouchi with his hands in Yugi’s pockets until he stops in front of an itty-bitty basement-level establishment. Its depressed door is tucked down a half-flight of stairs practically out of sight, where you’d totally miss it if you didn’t know it was there.

Jounouchi follows Atem through a flap — which he has to push aside to keep it out of his face and the other Yugi just strides right under; honestly, only this guy could make being tall feel like the awkward thing. He’s immediately hit in the face by air that smells like Middle Eastern spices and is warm from nearby cooking, nice but nose-prickling. It makes him think of being in the Memory World, honestly.

The other Yugi mutters to the girl at the counter, who beams toothily at them and brings them...

Jounouchi looks down at his plate. “These are burgers.”

Atem takes a huge bite. “This dish is vegetarian.”

Jounouchi takes a more conservative bite of his and gets a wave of spices and garlic. Definitely reminds him of the food from the streets in Egypt. It’s good, but there’s no denying it.

The other Yugi’s favorite food is Egyptian burgers.

“You’re a funny guy, Yug’,” says Jounouchi, laughing.

“Hm?” Atem hums around a mouthful of whatever this patty is, looking at him curiously.

“It’s nothin’,” says Jounouchi, smiling and shaking his head.

⏳

“So, dude,” says Jounouchi, unsure how to chew his way over to his question. “Can we talk? I’ve kind of noticed that you go hard as hell all the time. What’s up with that?”

Atem stares at him — the attention less danger, more dork. “Hard as hell,” he repeats. Kinda like what is this gibberish you speak, kinda like he’s making a note and saving it up for later.

Jounouchi waves a hand as he tries to find the words. “You know, really intense! Like how you’re always betting your life all the time.” And Jounouchi isn’t sure if he’s trying some sort of doublespeak since he’s already dead and isn’t really Yugi, or if he’s that confident, or...

That careless.

Atem for his part seriously considers this, and stares broodingly at his patty thing.

He puts a hand to his chest, attention turned inward. “I...fear that if I lose, I will lose my place in this world. That I’ll...disappear.” He nods. “And there is no reason not to acknowledge that in the stakes I set.”

Accurate (dammit, heart, you can’t grieve somebody you’re sitting next to), but not in a way that actually applies to how he’s been carrying on. “Uh, dude, do you have any reason to believe your presence is conditional.”

He wags a finger. “Ah, I have none to believe it’s not.”

“That’s not...”

What is Jounouchi gonna do with this guy.

Chapter Text

Jounouchi ends up being the last person holding the Blue Eyes card, and so is the one who gets to hand it back to Grandpa Mutou, though that feels sort of backwards to him. Nevertheless, he presents it with a bow and a flourish.

Sugoroku hums loud and showy and looks at the card, all leaning forward with his hand on his chin to examine it like he’s never seen it before. Looks up at Jounouchi’s face, HUMMMs even more aggressively.

“Hold onto it,” he declares.

Excuse me, what.

⏳

“I ain’t building a deck around you,” he says to it firmly as he walks away from the game shop, which Grandpa Mutou genially shooed him out of while going “ho ho ho” a lot. Even though he’s also kinda thinking to himself when was the last time he didn’t build a deck around a big-ass dragon at least a little, and that here Ryuzaki has still got Red Eyes. And is totally failing to use it properly by not otherwise changing his theme deck, Jounouchi might add. Or he’s going to get it soon, maybe? Ew, if he tuned into DM news right now everything would be coming up dinosaurs and bugs, wouldn’t it. And Bandit Keith! Just. It is a dark time right now.

The Blue Eyes in his hand does not express an opinion on Jounouchi’s reticence. Dunno what he was expecting.

⏳

With Duel Monsters being a thing again, present with increasing regularity, he keeps forgetting and then remembering, more often than before and every time like a shock of cold water, that he doesn’t have his deck. And Gramps’s dragon? Not helping. More like salt in the wound, than anything.

⏳

Jounouchi handles the brewing Hirutani problem with what feels like less effort than he deserves. Hinsight is really better than 20/20. 20/15 at least. And then the next thing he knows they’re coming up on what Jounouchi likes to think of as The Incident With That One Fucking Guy.

He guesses he turned out to have his heart in the right place in some incredibly obscure and convoluted way in the end or whatever but also? Fuck that guy. Ghosts.

G h o s t s.

U  g  h  .

⏳

The tomb excavation hits the papers, and Jounouchi presents Yugi with a new game: How to Restrain Somebody With Inhuman Drive Without Hurting Them.

“We could go there beforehand, rig the place up with traps or something,” says Jounouchi.

He adjusts where the kitchen phone is jammed between his ear and shoulder. The cord stretches dangerously away to where he’s almost completely shut his door on it, his shifting around sending it wobbling wildly. It’s pulled so far the coils are almost completely unkinked and it’s parallel to the ground, but he ain’t havin’ this conversation in the kitchen. He’s at home at all with extreme reluctance, casing his own place for anything useful or inspiring. He drags a pile of stuff out from the back of his closet just in case he does own some sturdy rope, and just doesn’t know about it.

“Like Home Alone....” Yugi says through the receiver, more meditatively than the observation probably deserves. Then a rushing noise — If Jounouchi had to bet he’d say he’s whipping his head back and forth to clear it. “No, no, Jounouchi-kun! We’ll never be able to pull that off in a public place like a museum; we’ll get caught. We’ll have to bring all our supplies on the day of.” He hesitates. “And maybe stash some things there beforehand, but nothing we’ll need to be sure we can count on.”

“Do we know anybody who knows, like...cool kung fu,” Jounouchi posits listlessly. They’ve been talking this over for fifteen minutes and haven’t come up with anything that actually sounds any good yet. “Like, where’s ya just chop somebody in the neck and they go straight down. Vulcan nerve pinch? Is that real?”

“I think sleeper holds are real?”

“Nahhh, if hitting the guy in the head a bunch didn’t do nut’n’, I don’t think that will.”

“Then why... Why would a Vulcan nerve pinch?”

“Because that’s, like, a super move!” Jounouchi chops aggressively at the air to demonstrate, even though Yugi is not physically present. “It’s like magic, or whatever!”

Yugi starts laughing on the other end of the phone. He sounds like he doesn’t want to but can’t help it. Jounouchi grins to himself.

He pushes a pile of socks out of the formation they’ve been in since middle school, which reveals — yippee, a half a deck of playing cards held together with a rubber band. That’ll disable the good professor right quick. “C’mon, man, we gotta thinka somethin’.”

“Knock him out...” mutters Yugi, barely loud enough to be picked up on his end. “I —...”

He hesitates for, feels like five minutes. Jounouchi can tell the call hasn’t dropped because he can hear Yugi fidgeting. He nudges a sweatshirt that doesn’t fit anymore out of the way, and unearths — ooh, an old superball. He palms it.

“Yugi?” he prompts eventually.

“I...probably know where to get some chloroform?”

That was genius, actually.

“Well, that’s great! — Wait, why.”

Yugi hesitates for a long moment. After long enough, Jounouchi realizes the hesitation is the entire answer, and decides to stop torturing his friend and chalk it up to ‘other Yugi shenanigans’. Heck, maybe Yugi doesn’t even know the full story to tell.

Just as likely Atem doesn’t know he needs to tell it to Yugi, putting aside how he definitely still doesn’t know how to. And it’s not like Jounouchi can help; it’s not like he understands how that works. (Maybe the pharaoh could take over and write Yugi a note to find in his pocket or something...?) You gotta roll with stuff like this sometimes! Even if it gets frustrating!

And oh!

It gets so! Frustrating!

“Jounouchi-kun? You’re breathing kind of hard.”

“‘M fine! So, awright, this is perfect! If we can just put the poor bastard to sleep, things’ll be all wrapped up, one two three, easy.” Maybe he shoulda been looting from enemies too, like this is a video game. He coulda dragged out the Hirutani thing long enough to steal their tasers. Those are supposed to be a safe way to disable people, right?

He considers the sensation of being tased. Eh, pass.

“But that stuff is dangerous! Dangerous!” insists Yugi, then weakens it with, “...I think. — Y- you can really hurt someone with it!”

“...Y’ think.”

“...I think.”

Okay, Jounouchi concedes, because that sounds like it’s probably right. “So we just need to find out how to administer it safely, right?” He digs up a butterfly knife. Now that ain’t safe. Why does he even own this? He puts it back under the book it was under, then puts another one on top of that one. Under the second book is a dead beetle. He definitely cleaned that up once already like a year from now, but here it is. Haunting him.

Yugi makes an anxious but consenting humming noise. Jounouchi can vividly imagine the expression he’s making, cheeks squishing as his mouth flattens, lower lip making a climb for his nose.

“So, lesgo then!” declares Jounouchi, pumping one fist.

He wings the superball at the ground. He catches it out of the air, but only after it’s carved a terrible path of destruction that knocked over basically everything that was left set in a deliberate place in his room. As it should.

⏳

A librarian tuts and eyes them suspiciously as she makes her sixth “coincidental” pass past the table they’ve laid claim to. Yugi cowers and tries to hide behind his open copy of 100 Street Drugs. It’s a big ol’ hardback that is easily large enough to cover his face, but not his hair.

A few minutes later sees her glaring at them as Jounouchi squints over a translation of The Anarchist’s Cookbook, which maybe wasn’t strictly relevant but had looked interesting. Yugi is trying to memorize an illustrated compendium of knots. He sweats every time anyone looks at him. They look. So shady. Even if this weren’t the worst parts of Domino and they both didn’t have disreputable-lookin’ hair they would probably look shady. Yugi looks like he’s expecting to be caught personally planning to assassinate the prime minister more with every minute.

⏳

Some sort of shift must pass by the time Jounouchi finally finds a med book with instructions and way too small columns of text, because the stinkeye librarian’s been swapped out for a different one. Jounouchi for some reason finds her placid smile infinitely more threatening than the last woman’s suspicious glower. At least with people who’ve decided they just don’t like your face, you know where you stand, you know?

Jounouchi’s gut feeling is rewarded when she drifts over to their table, still all smiley. She brushes past Yugi, who eeps and jumps, and comes to a stop next to Jounouchi, who twitches even though as far as he knows he’s doing nothing wrong. Isn’t like they brought any chloroform here.

(They did smuggle in a bag of seaweed flavored chips that they’ve got open under the table on the chair between them, but that’s gotta be a strict warnin’ kinda offense, surely.)

She leans down and nods to Jounouchi’s book, then their collection at the table. “This isn’t really appropriate material to be sharing with a child you’re babysitting, is it?”

“A what!?” screeches Yugi, dropping his book and hopping to his feet. (This is barely noticeable, elevation-wise, but allows him to smack both hands on the table.) “I’m not a child!  I’m fifteen! He and I are the same age!”

So that’s how they get kicked out of the library for causing a ruckus.

Jounouchi cannot believe.

“Don’t laugh at me,” grumbles Yugi.

Jounouchi can’t help it. Yugi got them kicked out. It’s funny.

“Y’r just so quiet mosta the time,” he snickers into both hands, “and then —!”

Yugi throws a chip at him. He catches it in his mouth and then almost chokes from doing that while not really being done laughing. Yugi yelps and drops the bag on the library steps to smack him on the back with both hands.

⏳

Yugi idly kicks nothing as they walk aimlessly away. They have unanimously abandoned the sad remainders of the chips that tried to kill Jounouchi, leaving both Yugi’s hands free to abscond into his pockets. His sulky slouch is honestly eating at least ten percent of his already negligible height. “Well, that was a bust,” he grumps, a big ol’ pout on his face.

“We could go to a different library and this time try to load up their computer...?” floats Jounouchi.

“A different library...?” says Yugi in this wondering tone like he’s never thought about there being more than one before. Yugi’s bright but very narrowly focused, so him not having put a lot of thought into the overall existence of libraries is...plausible.

Chapter Text

They do go to the museum to scope out the territory, but the Egyptology exhibit hasn’t actually opened yet, so they can’t go to the section that’s actually gonna be relevant. There’s a big gray curtain blocking off the entrance to that area. Sometimes there’s thumping and whirring audible beyond it.

⏳

The real trouble with planning for what Jounouchi is going to call “the first time we all almost died in a museum (no Bakura edition)” is that he has...no idea...why any of it went down. It’s a big, dense, life-threatening mystery t’ him.

They all talked about it later a coupla times — after they figured out who the other Yugi is and then after they figured out who Shadi is — but it didn’t exactly clarify a clean cut timeline for Jounouchi. The Yugis were all talking over each other, which was hardta follow for even an attentive and in-the-know person, and straightening that out hadn’t been the point of the talking, anyway. They’d had too many new problems to puzzle out to be lookin’ over old and done ones.

At the time it didn’t occur to him when they hooked back up with Shadi to prod, Hey, remember that time you tried to kill us or something? What was that about?

⏳

“So basically there’s a dude, and a dude, and then another dude,” he tries to explain.

They’re holed up in the back room at the game shop. Jounouchi is sprawled on the ground, and Yugi is sitting on a box bigger than he is with a big I₂ stamped on the side, so Jounouchi is looking up at him for once.

“One of them uh, I guess doesn’t matter much?” he continues, “‘Cept he died... And one of them is a mook, but we have to help him.... And, uh... I don’t really know how to explain the other guy.”

He grimaces apologetically.

Yugi tilts his head and squints at him and oh, heya, Other Yugi. Good to have ya. “More specifics, please, Jounouchi-kun, if at all possible.”

Jounouchi sighs and buckles into the pharaoh’s impromptu war room.

What does he open with here? Putting it all in a row it still all sounds like a curse.

“People should just stop going into tombs, y' ask me,” he mutters. He hesitates. “Unless it’s your own tomb. Or your friend’s tomb.”

“...What?”

“Look, nothin’. It’s just fine if it’s your tomb, see?”

“...I see,” Atem lies gravely. He fixes Jounouchi with a considering look. “Just give me your best summary of what happened.”

He thinks back to those couple of days.

“Honestly, buddy... It was a lot of bullshit and I didn’t understand hardly any of it.”

Atem nods apparently unperturbed. “An exercise in guided questions then.”

⏳

“I don’t know that.” “I don’t know that.” “Yeah, I dunno that either.”

“What do you know?!”

“....”

⏳

 “So first there will be my grandfather’s friend.”

“Yeah. He’s a miniboss. The real nasty fucker is Shadi. See the thing about Shadi is, he’s on your side.”

“Ah!” The other Yugi looks very roused by this. “A powerful ally will —”

“But he doesn’t know it.”

“...”

Jounouchi isn’t sure if he should be like, Hey cheat code, tell him you’re the pharaoh. Shadi might just demand to know how he knows about that and blow his head up for being an imposter. Also probably a bad way to bring this up with Atem. “I’m pretty sure he attacked you.”

“...”

“But I’m not a hundred percent on that, honestly.”

“......”

Jounouchi could swear those ellipses are getting more strained.

Him too, buddy.

They share a pensive silence. Atem kicks his foot against the Industrial Illusions box.

“But he did turn out alright later,” Jounouchi offers. “So we haveta be gentle widdim now.” He grimaces. “Just be nice if he’d return the favor.”

Yugi blinks like he’s shaking off a dream, and it is Yugi, not Atem. “This guy — Shady?”

“Shadi.”

“Is going to possess Grandpa’s friend?”

“And Anzu, if we can’t keep her away. We need to put that into the plan.” She’d kill him for treating her with kid gloves, but the memory of her standing like a doll on that board, and it almost tipping beneath her —

Absolutely no way.

Jounouchi squints at Yugi, who is pouting up at the ceiling, brow furrowing. It’s easy to overlook being used to it and all, but this level of synchronicity at this point is crazy, right? And the only difference is, what? Jounouchi’s been playing psst psst here kitty with the pharaoh? He can see why Atem might pop in and out smoother, but why would that make Yugi stop losing minutes? Wait, was he faking that at this point or nah? Dammit, the Yugi collective is so confusing!

“What does that even mean?” Yugi asks the ceiling.

 “Ooooh, he got zombified,” says Jounouchi.

He pulls a ghoulish face, which he feels is completely necessary for effect. Yugi rears back, almost falls off his box, yelps, and windmills his arm frantically steadying himself. “Jounouchi-kun!” he whines when Jounouchi snickers at him.

⏳

See, the thing is. Jounouchi would like to save Professor Yoshinori from getting all zombified. But he has no idea how Shadi did that, and is actually only assuming Shadi was responsible at all from context. For all he knows, the prof randomly ran into a bonefied mummy curse. (Another conclusion from context: Given everything, those have got to be real, right? ...Actually, is the pharaoh technically — No, no, bad road, forget it.)

And if Shadi did it, what did he do? Did one of his Items do that? Jounouchi doesn’t even know anything about the ones he had, which Yugi had for the least time — the ankh thingy and the scale thingy. But zombification seems like something the Rod or the Ring could do, so like, maybe?

So yeah. Jounouchi has set for himself a smaller goal: Save as many of Yoshinori’s teeth as possible. Also, don’t die.

And he’s got a good feeling about it.

⏳

Yugi is mapping out events on reappropriated stocking papers. Jounouchi is settling for putting both hands on his head, screwing his eyes shut, and sometimes humming loudly while he tries to think like a phony psychic.

Okay. Focus, Katsuya. You got this. If he prevents Professor Yoshinori from going to the museum at all, Shadi will probably make somebody else into a puppet. He’s not 100% on who else was/will be in the building at the time, but he is 100% sure Grandpa Mutou and Anzu were, which is two big no-nos, even if they’d both respectively probably be easier to wrestle, if only for weight class reasons.

(Though Jounouchi has seen Anzu kick shit, and he does not have any secret wish to be on the other enda that. Can you say yikes.)

Jounouchi knows that other guy (what was his name again) asked to borrow Yugi’s Puzzle for the day, but that, inexplicably, didn’t seem to end badly. Unless...that was why he died? But Yugi wasn’t there, so — No, actually, there’s an unaccounted for period where Yugi stayed at the museum after the rest of them left to get it back. That follows the pattern of the gang turning away for a few minutes and people having vengeance rained down upon them while they aren’t looking.

Did Atem...kill this dude.

Auwgeez.

Well, Jounouchi would rather prevent a murder than help cover one up, if he’s got a choice about it, so.

“I don’t really know what happened but if a guy asks to borrow your Puzzle, don’t let him, probably,” he advises Yugi.

Yugi’s agreement is easy — He obviously doesn’t like the idea of letting go of the Puzzle in the first place.

There’s some shuffling and then the door creaks open. “Are you two still back here —? Hey, get down from there! You’re going to crush the games!”

“Eep! Sorry, Grandpa!”

Chapter Text

So they meet up with Mister Mutou’s Egyptology friends. His contacts from his criminal past? Jounouchi doesn’t think the old guy’s involvement with archaeology was ever strictly legit, even if he never directly addresses that part when he gets storytelling. Seems like when the dude went straight he just shifted what kindsa goods he was handling. Governments don’t care about trading cards like they do about curios of mysterious origin.

Yet. Seems like a mattera time back in the present, the way Kaiba carries on.

Nothing should happen on this trip, but the spoiler that something will next time has Jounouchi feeling all but ready to vibrate his soul out of his skin on command. Yugi doesn’t look much better.

The Puzzle stays around Yugi’s neck this time.

Kanekura is visibly sweating as he stares at it. “Oh, but, young man...”

“No,” says Yugi firmly. (Good for you, Yug’!!) In the tip of his chin and his level stare, Jounouchi sees a shadow — not of his other self, but of his future self. The Yugi whose core of steel is no longer hidden.

“It’s for archaeology, my boy,” wheedles Kanekura, wringing his hands. “...The museumgoers would love —”

“Hey, he said no, so it’s no!” says Honda, stepping in between Yugi and Kanekura and scowling. Behind and flanking them, Jounouchi and Anzu fix him with forbiddingly dead-eyed stares. Guilt-tripping motherfucker, taking advantage of nice people.

At their combined pressure the investor acquiesces, scowling.

After he’s gone Anzu rubs her hands up and down her arms. “Man, that guy gave me the creeps.”

“Tell me about it,” says Honda. “...I think you made the right call, Yugi.”

“Mm,” says Yugi, still staring after where Kanekura went consideringly. His hands are cupped protectively around the Puzzle.

⏳

Yugi draws Jounouchi aside not long after they actually enter the exhibit and hisses, “I think met him! The guy!”

“Yoshinori?”

“Shady!”

“...Shadi.”

“Whatever!”

Aw, geez. “And, man?”

“...He sort of spaced out staring at me and then collapsed?”

“What!?”

“And then he just...got up and seemed fine.”

“...What.”

“Do you know why?”

“...”

“You don’t.”

“...”

“Well, okay. But he said...uh...”

“Yeah?”

“Uh, a bunch of weird stuff.” Yugi looks down, uncomfortable, then back up, earnest. “Anyway, we gotta go!”

“Wha’? Why?”

“He said he was going to go judge someone! Didn’t you say somebody died today?”

Oh yikes. But, wait.

“You think...Shadi’s going to go kill Kanekura?”

“I mean, I don’t know, but he sounded pretty ominous! I think we should check.”

Okay, still sucks, but that means Atem did not kill him!

“I knew he didn’t have it in him, buddy!” Jounouchi crows, grabbing Yugi in a squishing hug.

“Mmkwrg?” says Yugi.

“I’m relieved; just gimme a second.”

“You and that weird Egyptian,” Yugi muffles into Jounouchi’s shirt. “You talk about the same weird things. You’re both crazy.”

“God, tell me about it,” agrees Jounouchi, putting him down. Oh, right. “Yug’, which way did he go?”

“I mean, somewhere?” says Yugi, pushing his bangs back into place. “He said —” Here, Yugi does a gruff impression of stoicness that involves scrunching up his whole face: “‘I must go, I have further business today.’” His eyes widen again, expression slackening back into gossip-relaying gosh, and he flaps his arms around for emphasis. “And then he left! He went farther into the exhibit, I think. Or maybe...towards paleontology...?”

“Yug’, buddy.”

“I don’t really know where anything is in here! There are a lot of corridors and it’s all all twisty!”

“Okay, whatever, we’ll figure it out,” Jounouchi says, and steers Yugi towards approximately where he remembers Yoshinori’s office being. (The memory of that hallway is both branded into his brain and blurred by past adrenaline.) His and Kanekura’s would be near each other, right?

“Guys!” Anzu calls over to them before they’re out of the room. She comes running up to them, one arm raised in a hail. “There you are! Come take a picture with this sarcophagus with us — Where are you guys going?”

“Uh, we heard there was some even cooler stuff around somewhere!” Jounouchi says at the same time Yugi says, “You know Jounouchi-kun is scared of mummies, Anzu! We’re just taking a break for him for a minute!”

Jounouchi turns to Yugi. “...Hey....”

And okay, it’s smart, because if they were actually looking for something cooler Honda and Anzu would come with them, but...

Et tu, Yugi?

“Ohhh, okay,” Anzu says. “Have fun.” Then she rolls her eyes and makes a face at Jounouchi, sticking out her tongue and winking.

Why — The gall — Can’t get no respect around here, of all the —

His indignant sputtering makes her laugh, so that’s something even if it’s at his expense. But they have very real and reasonable ghost hunting to do (fuck why did he have to think of it as ghost hunting), so he has to go back to not-quite-bodily-picking-up-Yugi and backing out of the room, and...

Jounouchi and Anzu are still uneven amounts of close to each other, but it’s been a tick or two now, and she’s catching up to him fast. He can see the moment she looks the two of them over and smells a rat.

She purses her lips, and then half-runs to catch up with them before they disappear from sight.

“Um,” says Yugi, “Anzu?”

“If you’re going to see something cool~, then I’ll come with~ you~” she says, continuing to walk at double pace to keep up with Jounouchi’s frog march, her expression poisonously sweet. Why is Jounouchi even taking these accusations against his character lying down if they’re not even gonna work? Sure, they’re true, but...

⏳

Even though him and Yugi came here a few times and Jounouchi’s been here before that, museums are seriously like mazes, so it’s not easy to systematically search for “we don’t know where we’re going”. Anzu follows along while him and Yugi scout around, watching them skeptically and getting increasingly fed up the longer they dart around without stopping on anything.

“Do you know where you’re going,” she asks flatly after a foot-hurting duration of time.

“I will know it when I see it,” Jounouchi assures her haughtily.

And he does, but he regrets it instantly.

Cuz then — There ain’t no easy way to put that they find the room they’re looking for, but it’s only obvious that it’s the right one because there’s a corpse in it.

Anzu screams. Yugi screams. Jounouchi, might, also, scream. He’s not admitting to — No, fuck that, he hollers like someone’s just ripped one of his toenails.

This poor dude’s face is gonna be plastered on the back of Jounouchi’s eyelids before he goes to sleep for months at least.

He tries to cover Anzu’s eyes, and misses because Anzu is turned away trying to cover Yugi’s eyes. Yugi is a difficult target because he’s trying to push both of them out of the room without looking away from the spectacle to look at them. They all pinwheel backwards into the hallway, then finally start to shout until this is everybody’s problem like sensible people. Anzu steels herself and then picks her way across the office to call the emergency line on the dead guy’s phone, on an elaborate grossed out face journey the entire way. Jounouchi coulda maybe done that instead but oh my god he is glad he didn’t have to. He is, how do you say, at the very far end of the hallway from that room by the time she hangs up.

They spill out onto the curb outside once there are enough adults fussing for it to seem managed and just sort of sit on it and huddle there.

Honda, who did not see a dead guy today, finds them in a traumatized pile, vanishes, and then comes back with paper cones full of roasted nuts.

“Got ‘em from across the street,” he says, jerking his thumb in a direction. He’s a standup guy, Honda. Jounouchi tosses him some of his share because the guy’s a dumbass and didn’t get himself anything. Or maybe he’s just overstretched his allowance enough already buying for three. The guy does all that babysitting for his sister and doesn’t even get paid for it.

Whichever way, that turns it into a food tossing frenzy Yugi gets immediately roped into, which doesn’t end until Anzu, who was watching and razzing them for the duration, swoops in at the last second with a catch so cool they have no choice after that but to call it quits and declare it her win, even though it wasn’t a competition. So, yeah, almost back to normal. Thanks, hot pecan vendors of Domino. Thanks, Honda.