Light Amongst Shadows Part 24

“Oh not now.” Honda growled as he realised he recognised the voice and that it belonged to Kaiba Seto. The brat had changed drastically after recovering from the Mind Crush that Oneesan had inflicted on him, but that did not mean the majority of the group liked him. They tolerated him, for Yugi’s sake, but he was not normally welcome in their group.

The only two who really knew how to deal with him were Yugi and Oneesan. One of whom was not available to deal with the stuck up, arrogant prick. The other of whom really was not in any fit state to play nicely.

Still, for some reason Ojiisan invited the elder of the Kaiba brothers in, and Kaiba shot up the stairs, passing Honda without a word and glowering at everyone in the living room until he spotted the person he was looking for.

“Yugi.” His posture gave away nothing, but the irritation in his tone was obvious, “I would appreciate it if you kept whatever insanity you’re dealing with at the moment away from me, away from my company and out of my office.”

“Oh I’m sorry, Kaiba.” Oneesan replied, sarcasm obvious, “The next time a group decides they want to sacrifice the city, I’ll let you know in advance. Is twenty-four hours enough time?”

Anzu frowned slightly as Kaiba’s hands clenched for a moment, having not realised before this point how much of Oneesan and Kaiba’s civility towards each other was induced by Yugi.

“I don’t care about what was going on.” Kaiba snapped, shoving a box at her, “Just take this and keep your crazy out of my workplace. It’s bad enough when you let it invade my tournaments.”

Oneesan blinked at him and took the small box, opening it carefully. The glow was obvious the moment that she lifted the lid and she could not help the huge grin that spread across her face as she pulled the final piece out of the box.

In hind sight it was obvious. Yugi had wanted to be Kaiba’s friend from the very start, it had been the boy’s own actions that had prevented it from being a possibility. However Yugi had never seen Kaiba as anything but a friend after the fiasco with Pegasus J. Crawford. The elder brother himself might deny he needed friendship, but Oneesan knew that he often looked after her in his own way too.

She should have realised that a fragment of Yugi’s soul would go to the other estranged friend of the group. After all if Bakura had had one, it should have been obvious that Kaiba had one. They had been or were both enemies of the group who occasionally aided them and Yugi had insisted that Kaiba was a friend for almost as long as she had known him.

“Thank you.” She breathed as the orb of light that had been floating around the living room came down to her hands and she merged the last fragment with the orb.

A bright light exploded out with a roar, blinding and deafening everyone in the room, then just as quickly as it appeared it was gone.

“Yuge!” Jou bellowed as he tried to clear his vision, “Yugi!”

“Look!” Anzu’s exclamation forced him to open his eyes, despite the sunspots clouding his vision.

There, stood in front of them, was Yugi.

She looked exhausted and ill and the bruises that had been inflicted by the bad guys on the way to their hideout were beginning to come up, along with the injuries Bakura had not been completely able to heal, but it was Yugi. Completely, unmistakably Yugi.

“H...Hi guys.” Yugi stammered, embarrassed and a little shocked.

“Yugi!” Anzu reacted first, glomping her friend and holding tight for a few moments. “Oh thank Kami you’re alright.”

“I’m oka...” Yugi did not get to finish her sentence before Jou had swooped in, dipped her backwards and kissed her. When they came up for air, Yugi smiled gently and chuckled as she asked, “I thought we weren’t doing the kissing after near death experience thing?”

“I’m leaving if this is going to get mushy.” Kaiba growled in the background.

“No, wait.” Yugi yelped, her gaze shooting over to the CEO of Kaiba Corp, who had turned his back on the scene, “I wanted to say thank you.”

“Don’t mention it.” Kaiba’s growl was hiding something and his posture was deliberately rigid and unreadable, but she could not understand what was wrong with him.

“I’m serious.” Yugi tried to reassure him, “You didn’t have to come down here, so thank you.”

“I can’t claim to have beaten the Queen of Games if half of her isn’t there.” Kaiba retorted, “You don’t get out of a rematch with me that easily.”

“Tomorrow?” Yugi offered, understanding he was ticked off about something and wanting to make it up to him. “After school?”

“I’ll find time.” Kaiba’s reply made the gang grin amongst themselves. Yugi could have named any time of the day or night and Kaiba would make time for a rematch with her. Jou was tempted to try and get Yugi to demand a midnight match just to see if he would go for it. “See you tomorrow. I’ll send a car to the hospital to get you.”

“Not outside the school?” Yugi asked, confused, trying to work why she would be at the hospital.

“No, you’ll see why in about ten seconds.” With that he left. Before the ten seconds were up Yugi let out a pained groan, her eyes rolled back in her head and the collapse that Jou had been expecting since Oneesan had gotten to her feet, happened.

Jou caught her before she fell too far, letting out a heavy sigh as he did so.