Sixteen's Story: Part 2

I have no idea how long I was out for. There’s no way of keeping track of the time here. All I know is that when I came around the other Yugi was sicker than before and my chest hurt.

I tried reaching down the link for my other self, recognising the pain of having my other self torn from my heart and praying I was wrong. Unfortunately I wasn’t. I couldn’t feel the comforting, protective embrace of my darker self. Which meant he wouldn’t be able to reach me either. Or use the link to locate me.

Still he’ll find a way to come and get me. He’s Yami. He doesn’t lose and this was just a game of Hide and Seek, albeit one with huge stakes. Yami had won games with greater prizes than just my safety before. I have faith in my other self. He won’t abandon me.

I have to wonder if the Pharaoh’s got some way of keeping tabs on what we’re doing, because it wasn’t long after I woke up that he somehow came through the door. Not the door frame. The door.

Glowering at him had no effect. In fact all it did was amuse him. The Pharaoh moved further into the room, looking between the pair of us and chuckling. Not a mirthful sound, more one of vicious amusement. He introduced me to the mage Yugi, and vice versa. Apparently I’m not Yugi anymore. I’m ‘Sixteen.’ At least according to the Pharaoh.

When he started draining something from the other Yugi, a pained whimper escaping Fifteen as light drained from him to the Pharaoh, I couldn’t stand aside. I tried to pull him away from the other Yugi, only for contact with the Pharaoh to turn the spell on me.

There was a sharp pain as part of my soul tore away and the light I’d only ever willingly shared with one other person was pulled into the Pharaoh. He shoved me away as I was reeling from the spell’s actions and took a little more from Fifteen, finally stopping when the other Yugi almost passed out.

Then he made a snide comment about me ‘waiting my turn’ and stalked out of the room. Once again going through the door quite literally.

It took a while for both of us to pull ourselves together. I recovered long before Fifteen, as he recommended I call him, if only to prevent confusion. It took Fifteen much longer to recover than me, partly because the Pharaoh had taken so much more from him and partly, he explained, because while my soul was already recovering his had stopped healing a while back. The Pharaoh had been taking too much from him for too long and it wouldn’t be much longer before he was gone completely.  

I tried to reassure him. If he just hung on a little longer, his Yami would be here and then we’d both get away. After all there was no way a real Yami would ever abandon his light.

Fifteen’s response was a bitter chuckle. I had been lucky when I had been taken. My Yami was alive. Fifteen’s Yami had gotten into a battle of magicks with the Pharaoh and been destroyed while trying to prevent the kidnapping.

There wasn’t much I could say to that. If anything I envied his fortitude for hanging on this long without the hope of his Yami coming to rescue him. When I asked him what had kept him going, Fifteen just smiled at me sadly and said I’d understand later.

Instead of letting me dwell on it, he offered to tell me stories about himself and the previous Yugis who had dwelt in the cell. It was, he explained, part of a promise he had made to Fourteen. That if he didn’t make it out, he would pass their stories on to the next Yugi to come along. It was a way of making sure none of them were forgotten. Almost all of them had secretly hoped that their Yami was still looking and they had wanted to be able to give their other selves some closure. Even if they couldn’t return themselves.

I promised Fifteen the same. It was the least I could do.

A Dream or A Nightmare? : Part 1

I have been many things over the years, a Summoner, a Keyblader, I’ve even been the reincarnation of a five thousand year old Pharaoh.

This however, this was a new experience.

Going to sleep as a girl in cosplay and waking up in a very male body to an obnoxiously loud alarm clock was not the most ideal way to see the dawn.

Now normally I’d hit the off switch, roll over, go back to sleep and get woken up by my furry snooze button. After all my cat has learned that when my alarm clock goes off, I get up and she gets fed. So she head butts me until I emerge from my covers.

Today however my alarm clock wasn’t in reach. In fact nothing belonging to me was. It took me a moment to register the fact, as me and mornings normally go about as well as cats and water. Sitting up provided enough information to make me decide that this was all a dream and very shortly I would wake up again. This time on my very comfortable sofa.

The room itself was plastered in posters about the ‘Pokémon League,’ the alarm clock, which was still merrily buzzing away on the bedside table looked like a pokéball, there were very familiar clothes laid out for the room’s owner and on the end of the bed was a certain unmistakable red and white hat with a green ‘L’ on it.

It wasn’t until I managed to work out how to shut up the beepy thing that I took a proper look at myself.

Then, embarrassingly, I screamed.

On the one hand I at least sounded like a girl, even if the body I was in was male. On the other it brought someone running. They burst through the door, panic on their fact, only for the sight of them to cause me to flee under the blanket.

Delia Ketchum. The woman who had entered the room was Delia Ketchum.

So did that make me Ash?

Oh god I hoped not.

It was a fool’s hope as Delia settled on the bed and pulled the blanket shielding me away, watching me with a concern that should have been aimed at her son, not some imposter.

“Ash?” She asked, worry obvious, “Are you alright?”

“Yes, no, yes...” I didn’t know. If I was actually dreaming this was no big deal. I’d wake up soon and probably forget all about this. “I’m okay.” I finally sighed, knowing where I was supposed to be going and what I was supposed to be getting today if the plot continued its proper course, “I just realised I’m running late.”

It was a little white lie but it did the job. Delia took one look at the clock and yelped, shooting to her feet. “Right, right!” She shot over to the pile of clothes and shook them out, then grinned at me, “You don’t want to be last to choose.”

“Charmander all the way.” I grinned, though it was half-hearted. Charmander was my favourite Kanto starter, it always had been. I just remembered what Ash’s Charmeleon and Charizard had been like. I had theories about why they’d been like that, but still, getting chargrilled regularly enough that I should have first degree burns was something I could not bring up the energy to be enthusiastic about.

That and ever since watching the Celebi movie, I was convinced that no matter how early I got to the lab, Pikachu would be the only choice available. Professor Oak would want to preserve the timeline after all.

Delia seemed pleased by response though, obviously up until this point Charmander had been a favourite of Ash’s too. She shot out the door in order to let me get ready.

Getting dressed was not a fun affair. While I knew the outfit like the back of my hand, it had been the cosplay I had been going to wear after all, it took me a while to get over the blush I gained when changing underwear. This wasn’t fair. If I had to dream about the start of the Pokémon Anime, why couldn’t I have at least been a girl?

And worse I was ten. Ten! I hadn’t been ten in about fifteen years. I didn’t remember how to be ten.

Still I was up, washed, changed and ready to be out the door in about forty minutes. I had taken less before when getting ready for work when I was running late. However it’s a lot more difficult to be fast when you don’t know the layout of the house. Delia had ‘my’ backpack waiting for me as I rushed down the stairs, pulling my cap on and having to resist the urge to pull a ponytail I no longer hand through the hole at the back.

I admit I kind of zoned out on the whole, ‘I’m your mother and I love you, but it’s time for you to see the world’ speech she gave. She wasn’t my mum. My mum didn’t live in the Pokémon World. She lived in my world, the REAL world. Admittedly she’d probably give a similar speech and then burst into tears when she knew I wasn’t looking. I remembered being told about how emotional she had gotten when she had left me halfway across the country for university after all and I had been eighteen then.

I tuned back in to Radio Delia just in time for her to point out a brand new set of running shoes and wish me luck, before retreating into the kitchen.

It shouldn’t have taken me long to pull on my trainers, get out the door, get to the lab and pick up my starter Pokémon. It really shouldn’t. Except for one minor detail.

The Pallet Town in the games involves a grand total of four or five houses, the Pallet Town in the dream was much larger and I successfully managed to get lost.

In the end I arrived at the lab just in time to catch Gary’s gloating and him zooming away in a convertible. That he was driving. That still made no sense to me. The boy is ten. How does he have a driver’s licence? It hadn’t made any sense in the anime and it made no sense here.

Being late meant no Charmander, I didn’t even bother trying the pokéballs for Squirtle and Bulbasaur. There was no point. I was obviously going to get Pikachu. I didn’t mind, having Pikachu was kind of like having a ‘win button’ unless the plot demanded otherwise.

Sending the critter out was a delight. Ever since playing the games and watching the show I had dreamed of having real Pokémon and this was as close as I was ever going to get. Warily, remembering Pikachu’s first reaction to Ash, I reached out to touch the electric mouse.

And got my first taste of Thundershock for my troubles.

It took me a minute or two after the electricity died down for me to pull myself together. Ash made it look so easy on TV. That had hurt.

Wait. That had hurt...

Oh shit, this wasn’t dream. I was trapped in the Pokémon Anime.

Sixteen's Story: Part 1

I have no idea what I should be writing, but I found this notebook in the corner of my cell and if I don’t do something I’m going to go nuts, so here we go...

My name is Mutou Yugi. This shouldn’t surprise you. The last three people who wrote in here were called Mutou Yugi too. Hopefully I’ll be the last because when Yami comes for me, the Pharaoh won’t stand a chance.

There’s another Mutou Yugi in here with me but he’s sleeping so I don’t want to disturb him. The Pharaoh introduced him as ‘Fifteen’ but he told me his name once our captor had gone. The other Yugi’s been here a lot longer than I have and the Pharaoh’s been draining him of light for far too long.

I suppose I should explain my situation a bit better, though you could probably skip back to the other Yugis’ explanations. ‘Eight’ tells it a lot better than I could but I’ll try.

To make a long story short, I’ve been kidnapped.

I was with Yami, the other half of my soul, getting ready for our trip to the museum to regain his memories, when someone snuck into my Soul Room. He looked like Yami, so at first I didn’t question it. I mean Yami comes and goes from the Soul Rooms all the time, it’s no big deal. I mean it’s not like just anyone can walk into a Soul Room without the Millennium Key, right?

It wasn’t until I tried to start a conversation with him that I realised something was wrong. Something about him seemed off, his aura was wrong and I couldn’t properly sense what he was thinking or feeling. So I made the mistake of getting closer, concern clouding common sense.

The moment I touched him I knew this wasn’t Yami, or at least not my Yami. He was twisted, his heart was sick and he carried Light within him. My Yami didn’t. I was my Yami’s light and he my Dark. We balanced each other out.

He was fast, fast enough that even before I could call for Yami aloud he had cast something that left me reeling. I couldn’t think straight, nor would my body respond to any call I would try and make. I didn’t need to think too hard to call for Yami over the link though. Yami was there in a heartbeat, able to tell something was wrong, just from my desperate plea.

I’m not quite sure what happened between my Yami and the fake one who introduced himself as ‘the Pharaoh.’ I know the Pharaoh challenged my Yami to a Shadow Game, but every time I tried to resist whatever he had done to my mind it just got worse. Before too long it was almost impossible to count to five, yet alone focus on what the pair of them were saying.

In hindsight I played right into the Pharaoh’s hands. With my mind fading fast, Yami was distracted and didn’t catch the trick phrasing to the terms of the Shadow Game. Because of that it didn’t matter that Yami won, the Pharaoh got what he wanted anyway.

He dragged me into the Shadows the moment the game was over. It hurt, a lot, but there was a benefit to it. It snapped whatever was suppressing my mind and spirit as the Shadows tore at it, trying to get at the light underneath. I didn’t get a chance to appreciate it though. Before I could recover properly, we’d shifted again, reappearing in what I thought was the inside of my Puzzle.

At least until the Pharaoh shoved me into a room and slammed the door shut, sealing it behind me and leaving me trapped with another Yugi.

I wish I could say I was calm and level headed about the whole situation, but that would be a lie. I screamed, I shouted, I tried to break the door down, I even tried a few of the tricks that Yami had taught me.

The door didn’t budge. I was well and truly trapped.

It wasn’t until I gave up and slumped against a wall, staring at the door and wishing I could open it with as much ease as I could the doors in my Puzzle, that the other Yugi spoke up.

The other Yugi was oddly dressed and he kind of looked like he was supposed to be a wizard from some fantasy game. That wasn’t what caught my attention the most though. He was tired, I could see that right away, and he looked really ill. However when I worried at him, he just shrugged it off as something I couldn’t help him with and started to explain what was going on. Who the Pharaoh was and why he’d kidnapped me.

We didn’t get far into the other Yugi’s explanation before agony coursed through me as the bond to my Yami was ripped viciously away.

And that was the last thing I knew for a while.

Clanverse meets Cannon

Fifteen year old Harry James Potter was certain he was seeing things.

He’d gotten back from Umbridge’s detention and bypassed Ron and Hermione to come up to bed, not really wanting to talk to anyone about the experience, only to find a fifteen year old who looked exactly like him, who, upon spotting him hadn’t shook his head in amusement and asked, “This is still Hogwarts then, I’m assuming?”

Harry drew his wand and pointed it at the stranger. “Who are you?”

“Harry James Potter, Son of Lily and James Potter, Godson of Sirius Black, Founding Member of the Domino Clan and a whole bunch of other things I can’t remember at the moment.”

“You can’t be Harry Potter.” Harry scowled, “I’m Harry Potter.”

“I kind of guessed.” The other Harry chuckled, rolling his eyes. “Fifth year student?” He asked.

“Of course.” Harry nodded, still not moving his wand.

“Look, how about I prove I’m Harry, then you can lower the wand and I can start trying to go home. No offence but one of us is a big enough trouble magnet as it is.”

Well the fake had that right. “Go on then, prove it.” Harry nodded.

“Until our Hogwarts letter came we lived under the stairs and did all the slave work for the Dursleys. Had done since we were four.” The other Harry said, without preamble, “We used accidental magic to change our hair, get onto the school roof and generally escape Dudley’s gang. The Hogwarts letter was addressed to our cupboard but we never asked why no one came to check up on us, if they knew. We met Draco for the first time in Madam Malkins. Ron was the first real friend we made and Hermione told him he had dirt on his nose, right here.” The other Harry pointed. “I think my universe must diverge after that, because we appear to be short a couple of beds.”

“Your universe?” Harry asked, lowering his wand slightly in shock.

“Two Harrys, two worlds.” Harry snorted, “Atem told me that the Shadow Realm was the gap between worlds, I’ll have to let him know that it’s possible to cross dimensionally travel using them. Once I’ve got Bakura back of course.”

“Shadow Realm? Atem? Bakura?” Harry was thoroughly confused now.

“People I know, but I’m guessing you don’t.” Harry sighed, “That’ll make things difficult…”

“Harry?”

Both boys turned towards the door at Hermione’s call. The teen was stood in the doorway staring.

“Who?” She asked, pointing at the Harry by the beds.

“Now I know things are different.” The weird Harry chuckled, “My Hermione would want to know what I’d done this time.”

“Who are you?” Hermione asked.

“Apparently he’s me.” Harry scowled.

“Tell you what, call me Wolf.” Alt-Harry sighed, “It’ll be easier then explaining which Harry you’re talking to.”

“Wolf?” Hermione looked amused.

“I have a good friend by that name.” Harry explained. “And I’d like to get back to him as soon as possible.”