The celestial bows quiver
._._.
Domino City was blinded by yet another brilliantly sunny day, and Yuugi had taken the opportunity to seek out one of his favorite street vendors for some delicious ice cream. His favorite was a specialty of this specific cart – a bewildering combination of chocolate, the thin sweet chocolate of candy and happiness, and the unexpected shock of cayenne pepper. The flavor reminded Yuugi of many games and the hidden strategies within, like a forgotten pawn, or a trap card, or a discarded taser in a rainstorm.
The last analogy made Yuugi slow in his brisk walk, eyebrows knitting together in confusion. The weight of the Puzzle was heavy against his chest, and without much introspection Yuugi shrugged off his worrisome thoughts as being nothing worth concern and continued at his previous joyful pace.
The vendor he was looking for was an elderly woman with a kind expression in an unbeautiful face. She wore a tattered pink wig, had three gruesome scars running across one of her wrinkled cheeks, and was named Norie by her long-dead parents; Yuugi called her “grandmother,” and it always made her blush like a bruised tomato.
Yuugi saw his favorite ice cream vendor in her favorite spot, jutting out of the minuscule alleyway between the antique bookstore and the much more profitable liquor store. Grandmother’s face was hidden by an old hardback book of Russian poetry. Yuugi laughed as he approached.
“Grandmother!” he exclaimed, jogging the final block to her stand. The elderly woman peered over the cover of her book, and lowered it with a smile as kind and uninviting as the rest of her face.
“Good day, Yuugi-chan,” greeted the old woman, her voice no more pleasant than the sound of cracked bells hit too hard in carelessness. Yuugi’s grin broadened. “It’s been awhile since I’ve seen you last,” said the woman, placing her book atop the cart and opening one of its freezer-top doors. She pulled out a short sugar cone from its depths in her gnarled hands, her skin splotchy by age and genetics. (Yuugi always tried to read the shapes on her hands like tealeaves; today he saw the human eye, which boded well). “You look very happy. Would you like some ‘exactly what it looks like,’ ‘you’ve never had this, but good guess,’ or ‘you’ll regret choosing this one, don’t say I didn’t warn you,’ today?”
Yuugi laughed; Grandmother Norie changed the name of the ice cream every day she sold it, but she usually only carried two flavors, and both were chocolate. “You know what I like, Grandmother.” He said with a grin as she began digging out the ice cream, and Yuugi added, “and you’re right, I am very happy.”
As Grandmother Norie scooped the ice cream into its cone with her bare hands, so as to better pack and shape the treat, Yuugi told her all about how he was making new friends at school – friends who were strong, and who protected Yuugi from the bullies that were now dwindling from his life. He told her excitedly how it had started around the same time he finally completed the Millennium Puzzle, and he proudly pointed it out to her, hanging as it was from his neck. Grandmother Norie had finished building small spikes onto his ice cream – imitating his hair, no doubt – and handed him the confection; Yuugi took the cone, excited for the kick of spice that would assail him from within the calm of the chocolate.
Yuugi bit into two spikes simultaneously, flipping the confection over his tongue as the sweet chocolate melted in the heat of his mouth and slid down his throat. No spice. Yuugi swallowed, pulling the cone away from his lips, staring in mild disappointment.
Grandmother Norie laughed. “Oh, Yuugi-chan, it’s only ‘exactly what it looks like!’ ” Yuugi smiled at the joke, and shoving away his disappointment he handed Grandmother Norie the ridiculously few yen she would accept, and continued biting off the spikes of melting deliciousness.
“How have the days treated you lately, Grandmother?” Grandmother Norie smiled, sunlight reflecting dully on her yellow-and-black teeth and vanishing in the depths of her half-filled mouth.
“The days have been kinder than the nights,” she said, smiling but sad, “as always. Two more of my children have left me—” by children she meant customers, as Grandmother Norie had never married, “—and I fear that you will too, Yuugi-chan.” She smiled again, her wrinkles and scars bunching and stretching like the skin of a burnt pudding.
“I’ll come back,” Yuugi promised, finishing off the last spike and delving finally into the heart of the dessert. Unexpected, the sudden fire burned Yuugi’s tongue and eyes, Grandmother Norie’s braying laughter grating the air.
“Heh, Grandmother finally pulled a trick on Yuugi-chan, didn’t she?” she brayed as normal color finally returned to Yuugi’s smiling cheeks. “Yuugi-chan always expects the trick, it’s so hard to shock him now. I won!” Her laughter and grin were not beautiful things, and though others would find them distressing and would strive to avoid them, Yuugi relished in them and smiled in response.
“Maybe next time I’ll challenge you to Popsicle Chess,” he said with a laugh, grinning as Grandmother Norie made her excuses and shooed him away. With a wave and a promise to return soon, Yuugi left the old woman, continuing to lick the spicy cold of the treat.
The sun, still somewhat high up but sinking rapidly, cast his shadow upon the ever-changing storefronts to which he walked parallel, and Yuugi glanced over at his dark image, curious. Something had seemed off about the shadow, even though it followed his movements precisely as shadows do, but Yuugi brushed the thought off almost instantly. It must just be a trick of the light, he assured himself. After all, Yuugi was down to the rim of the cone of his ice cream – how could the shadow of his dessert look as though untouched?
._._.
“Hey, Yuugi, have you heard the big news?”
Jounouchi was sitting on Yuugi’s desk during lunch break, which unfortunately meant that Yuugi had no room on his desk to actually spread out and consume his lunch, so Yuugi was only slightly less than thrilled to be receiving the attention.
“No. What is it, Jounouchi-kun?”
Jounouchi, his shock of dirty blond hair in unusual disarray for its cut, leaned toward Yuugi with an air of intensity that made Yuugi recoil minutely from the attention.
“You know Domino’s full of homeless and crazies, yeah?”
Yuugi nodded. “Mm. And the crime rate’s really high, and sometimes kids get attacked by stray dogs—”
“Yeah, there’s that too,” said Jounouchi, his attention diverted momentarily by the entrance of Anzu and Honda, the latter carrying a surprising stack of textbooks, “but lately there’s been a ton of murders, and most of the bodies are going unclaimed – they’re saying a new gang is attacking anyone out past curfew, and you know those homeless and crazies.”
Yuugi frowned as Jounouchi slid off his desk; at the moment Yuugi didn’t particularly care about his still uneaten lunch.
“Why do you sound like you’re warning me? I’m not crazy or homeless. Unless...” pausing, Yuugi added quietly, “is it a gang you know?” They didn’t much talk about Jounouchi’s past, and Yuugi didn’t mean it as an insult, but if Jounouchi knew the gang it would explain why he was bothering to warn Yuugi in the first place – and not Anzu and Honda.
Jounouchi shook his head. “Nah, I don’t know who it is either – if I did, I’d tell the cops—”
“Only because you want the reward!” Honda called over, not even looking up from where Anzu was explaining to him their mathematics coursework. Jounouchi half-heartedly made a rude gesture in Honda’s direction, but didn’t otherwise acknowledge the jab.
“—Anyway, I’m just saying – if it were a bully, I’d just break his face twice, no problem,” he said, nonchalant but truthful, “but midnight and dark streets give me the creeps, and it’d be easier for me if you weren’t hitting on disaster, okay Yuugi?”
Yuugi smiled, and nodded, digging through his bag to pull out his lunch. “Yeah, I’ll be careful.” As he leaned back up, the Puzzle clinked softly against the back of his chair. That’s right, Yuugi thought, the Puzzle brought me Jounouchi’s friendship; he certainly wouldn’t have warned me if we weren’t friends. Grinning to Jounouchi and taking the subject to lighter matters, Yuugi silently promised to not break that trust of friendship by carelessly endangering himself with reckless nighttime wanderings.
._._.
Of course, things didn’t work exactly as planned. Grandmother Norie played a really tough game of Popsicle Chess, and had wanted a rematch when her Cherry Shogun had simply surrendered without being threatened once. (The game was actually nothing at all like chess, and the Popsicle sticks had been removed such that the ice could slide across the board more freely.) By the time they actually parted ways, it was falling upon dusk, the last of the sun’s gold drawing away as the rusted bronze of streetlamps flickered to life.
Yuugi walked as quickly as he could without breaking into a run, cursing the length of the streets from that alleyway to the Turtle Game Shop, his home. The sky was clear of clouds, but the moon had not yet risen, making the landscape much darker than had there been the orange clouds reflecting the city’s light pollution. That he was short, had ridiculously attention-grabbing features, and the fact he had a giant block of gold hanging from his slim neck was not boding well for Yuugi’s continued safety. Even without Jounouchi’s warning about a specific active gang, Domino City was not a safe place to walk the streets after dark.
That the shadows stretching in front of Yuugi had more heads and arms than Yuugi possessed did little to ease his mind.
Hands clapped roughly down on each of Yuugi’s shoulders, the sudden force pushing him forward in a stumble until each hand tightened its grip, steadying him. Yuugi tried not to shudder under the depth of the chill he felt from the touch on his arms.
“Hey kid, don’t you know it’s dangerous to be walking around alone at this time of night?” asked a voice to Yuugi’s right; as he turned to confront this assailant, a second voice chimed in from his left.
“There are all kinds of thugs out, preying on loners and crazies. You crazy, kid?” He could tell by the higher pitches of their voices, but it was still a shock when he turned to see that his potential attackers were girls. Very attractive high school girls, at that. Yuugi’s face flushed.
The one on his left was the taller of the two, though both had at least half a foot over Yuugi. The girl on the left reached up to tighten her ponytail, and she smiled at him; Yuugi’s face was redder than the appropriate side of a completed Rubik’s cube.
“That’s why we’re walking together, since it’s safer that way,” said the girl on Yuugi’s right, her hair in buns and with much sharper features, a gentle smile on her face. (And Yuugi was now a solid red Rubik’s cube on fire.)
“Hey kid, why don’t you walk with us for a little while?” asked the girl with the ponytail, “We’re walking the same direction anyway,”
“Hey, yeah,” said the girl with the buns, “that’s a great idea!” and they were both smiling so brightly that the words sprinted out of his mouth before he could even stop to think.
“Sure! I only live a couple blocks from here and companions would be nice!” Dammit. Yuugi laughed awkwardly. The girls, still smiling, spun Yuugi back around and each girl stole one of Yuugi’s hands to hold in her own. Yuugi wasn’t a brick in fire – he was a brick melting in the fire-blood magma in the center of the Earth. His brain was melting – all he could get out was a strangled “bwuh?”
Ponytail, holding his right hand, and Buns on his left, actually giggled.
“Oh,” said Ponytail, “I’m Hikari, by the way,”
“And I’m Hebi,” continued Buns.
“Oh. I’m Yuugi,” He mumbled out, his face still red and his hands both unseemly warm in their cocoons of girl-hand-flesh. Buns – Hebi – giggled.
“That’s such a cool name, Yuugi-kun,” he nearly tripped over his own feet at the remark, looking up sharply at the gorgeous girl on his left.
“Really, you think so?” he asked, his voice ringing at much higher pitch than usual; ever since he and his mother had moved in with Grandfather at the Game Shop, the kids at school would taunt him for being the game that no one would ever buy, or for being a pervert for playing with games all the time.
“I think so too,” said Hikari on his right. “Your necklace is cool too. Where’d you get it?”
Yuugi looked down at the Millennium Puzzle resting on his chest, the orange of the streetlamps making the pyramid look like an angular sun. “This was a gift from my grandfather,” he said, pulling his hands out of their grasps to cradle the Puzzle lovingly. “A puzzle, found in Egypt. It took me eight years to solve, and it’s full of all my wishes and dreams. It’s very precious to me.” Yuugi didn’t know why he was saying all of this as he continued walking, but he looked up to see that both Hikari and Hebi had stopped where he released them.
“Yuugi-kun, your name means ‘game,’ right?” asked Hikari, using the English word. He hadn’t really noticed before, but both girls seemed to be foreigners – their accent was noticeable, but Yuugi was terrible at recognizing an accent’s nation of origin, and their beautiful but generic mildly dark pigment left him no clues. Yuugi gave a short nod, not removing his hands from the God Pyramid, still warm beneath his fingers.
Hebi grinned at him, and he felt his face flush again. “We’ve had fun walking with you,” she called, “but this is where we live.” Hebi gestured to a rather run-down apartment building nearby, its building front weathered and faded under minimal care. “Do you want to stay the night with us?”
Yuugi’s brain fired off a single warning flare before being pitched into chaos and hormones, and the only coherent thought he could muster involved the words “holy,” “sandwich,” “on a,” and a slew of vulgarity that Yuugi was too embarrassed to say aloud.
But it was dark, and there had been that rash of murders recently, Grandfather and Mom were probably worried sick, and Jounouchi would kill him if Yuugi told him that he had spent the night with two gorgeous girls at their invitation. Hitting on disaster indeed.
The Pyramid’s edges and contours were a welcome distraction to focus upon while he tried to be as polite as possible while turning down the offer. “My family will worry if I don’t get home soon,” Yuugi said, proud with how steady his voice—“but why don’t you come to the Game shop tomorrow?” Dammit!
Yuugi blanched at the sudden invitation that had spilled from his mouth, and even though they weren’t close and the sky’s darkness was almost overpowering, Yuugi saw both girls smile.
“Thanks, Yuugi-kun,” said Hebi, and Hikari added, “We’d love to! See you later!” With a laugh, the two girls clasped hands and ran into the lobby entrance of the White Cat apartment building, across the road.
Yuugi stared, still flushing red, but he ran a thumb down the sharp edge of the puzzle, and muttered, “Well, that was weird,” and walked home without further incident.
._._.
“Yuugi-kun, you idiot!” Anzu shouted, slamming her hands atop his desk. Yuugi flinched back from the blow to the wood, a wide-eyed grimace on his face.
Jounouchi and Honda too were around Yuugi’s desk the next morning before the first class bell, strewn in chairs in a way that their teachers would certainly disapprove. Jounouchi glowered. “I tell you to be careful, and you go hooking up with strange women in the middle of the night?”
“They could have been killers,” Honda muttered, his voice angry. Yuugi couldn’t tell if it was directed to the situation or something else entirely, “or prostitutes, or vampires—”
“Vampires, Honda-kun?” Anzu asked, confusion plastered on her face so thick Yuugi was afraid it would crack and cake off like— huh, Yuugi thought, my analogies aren’t making any sense lately. The thought wanted to finish ‘cake off like a puzzle,’ but puzzles didn’t cake off of anything, let alone faces.
“Vampires, yeah. You know, seducers of men, drinkers of blood, denizens of hell—”
Anzu cut him off quickly. “I know what vampires are, Honda-kun,” Yuugi looked down at his desk, his fingers tracing the eye of the Puzzle while, of all people, Anzu and Honda got into a fight about vampires. “Do you even know what ‘denizen’ means?!”
Yuugi looked away, feeling awful. It looked like he wouldn’t be able to visit Grandmother Norie any time soon – not until the crime spree ended, what with Jounouchi promising to follow him everywhere now. He sighed; he loved his friends, but he wished they wouldn’t treat him like he was still a kid. Unless... being over-protective was a part of friendship? Maybe he should take them to meet Grandmother Norie – Jounouchi and Honda would probably go if promised inexpensive ice cream.
“I’m not encouraging prostitution!” Anzu shouted, her fists clenched, and Honda shouted loudly at the same time “You shouldn’t—”
“Guys,” Yuugi said loudly, dividing his attention between his friends, “I’m sorry I worried you all, but nothing happened. If you want,” he said, “you guys can come visit Grandmother with me today... but only if you promise to be nice!”
“I can’t,” said Honda with a resigned frown, “Nephew and dogs today, nothing personal.”
“I can’t either,” said Anzu, moving toward her own desk with the approach of the class bell, “my you-know-what. Besides, Grandmother freaks me out and doesn’t like me anyway.”
Yuugi frowned, but Jounouchi’s hand fell upon Yuugi’s shoulder, and that hand’s owner grinned. “Don’t worry, Yuugi, I’ve got your back. I kinda’ want to meet this grandmother of yours.”
Yuugi tried to correct him, that the woman wasn’t actually his grandmother, but their teacher’s arrival halted the words from leaving his mouth. The class easily fell into their customary introductions, but Yuugi’s was lackluster at best, and through the morning history lesson Yuugi tried solving a Rubik’s cube in his mind to pass the time, though he kept losing the yellow side.
._._.
The day did go by quickly after that, and Honda got to make up for not being able to join them later by beating up one of the upperclassmen that had decided Yuugi looked like an easy target for a petty mugging. Eventually classes ended, and Yuugi and Jounouchi made their way through the shopping district and passed the crowded liquor store as one of Grandmother’s customers began choking on his ice cream. The man, an Anglican with shockingly bright natural red hair, dropped both the cone and bottle of vodka in shock.
“Christ, lady!” shouted the tourist, his appearance Irish but accent wholly American; probability said he was likely from the Pacific coast.
“Oh dear,” replied Grandmother, “I did warn you not to choose that one.” The tourist shouted something threatening in English and grabbed Grandmother’s cart as if to knock the whole thing down.
“Leave Grandmother alone!” Yuugi shouted; his fists were clenched, but not in threat. “She’s just trying to sell something she loves, it’s not her fault you didn’t like it!”
The tourist, his eyes blazing, turned his gaze towards Yuugi and Jounouchi. “You trying to start something, kid?” growled the tourist, glaring at Yuugi though his hands remained firm on the vendor cart. Yuugi swallowed his fear when he saw Grandmother staring at him, her face a familiar tomato red. Yuugi always stood up for Grandmother Norie, even though he knew she never wanted him to do something so reckless for her; it was how they met, though they were both years younger and in the end the twelve-year-old Yuugi had a black eye, a swollen lip, and free ice cream for the rest of his life.
This time things were different: Yuugi wasn’t alone.
“Who do you think you are,” Jounouchi yelled back, standing between the tourist and Yuugi in a distinctly protective manner, rolling up his cuffs as he approached the American, “You’re picking on old ladies and kids half your size; does that make you tough? Pah! You’re not a man unless you fight me!”
The tourist glared at Jounouchi, but Yuugi could see the way his eyes flicked between them all. He pushed away from the cart, causing it to wobble, but even Grandmother could stop it from even coming close to tipping over.
“She’s disgusting, and so’s the ice cream,” the tourist spat, his anger unaltered, “and you owe me for the booze!” he exclaimed, backing away from the cart.
“You dropped it on your own,” said Grandmother, “after I warned you.” He scowled and, with one last glare at Jounouchi, stalked off in the opposite direction.
“What a creep, picking on old ladies and kids,” Jounouchi growled, striding forward and grabbing a chunk of broken glass from the sidewalk. He chucked it at the tourist’s retreating back, but thankfully didn’t actually hit the guy. “Go back to Russia!” he shouted, lobbing another chunk of glass before Yuugi pulled on his uniform jacket.
“Jounouchi-kun, he’s gone, you can stop now.”
Jounouchi continued glaring, but eventually his tense stature relaxed. “Sorry Yuugi,” he said, “it’s just that – urg, picking on weaker people like that, he makes me so mad!” Hadn’t that been Jounouchi, only a month or so ago? Yuugi smiled.
“Young man, that was very kind of you,” said Grandmother to Jounouchi, her face still the red of a bruised tomato, “I can see why Yuugi-chan can hardly stop talking about you.”
Jounouchi and Yuugi both turned to her, red with embarrassment, though in markedly different respects; Jounouchi ruffled his hair with both pride and humility, and boasted loudly, “Aww, thanks, but anyone would of done the same,” while Yuugi looked flustered and red and quietly pleaded “Grandmother...”
Grandmother Norie grinned, her teeth dark and crooked but her expression still full of joy. “Would you boys like some ice cream? Defenders of street vendors get theirs free.” At the prospect of anything free, Jounouchi usually leaped at the opportunity, so at the mention of free food Jounouchi spun so quickly that his arm nearly slapped Yuugi in the face.
What a cheapskate, Yuugi thought affectionately, smiling softly as Jounouchi listened with barely contained excitement as Grandmother listed flavors. He acts like a little kid.
The sun was still high above, but the minor angle cast a half-sized shadow across the pavement and cracked glass. When Yuugi saw his shadow, he shifted forward so his shadow’s head wasn’t filled with drying liquor, and for a brief moment he thought he saw an odd movement in the shoulders and hair, but there were clouds and it was just a shadow. Yuugi pushed it out of mind and approached the cart as Grandmother began preparing Jounouchi’s strawberry cone, perfectly safe, though Jounouchi seemed somewhat perturbed by her methods.
“Ah, shouldn’t you be using a spoon, or wearing gloves, or something?” Regardless of his reservations, Jounouchi began gnawing on the dessert as soon as he received it. Grandmother laughed.
“Oh, what harm could my hands do to you here that could not be done while I churned this in the privacy of my home? I wash in hot water between flavors, too, so don’t worry.” Yuugi grinned, moving to lean on the cart and stare into the freezer, but the escaping cold air blinded him in its bite. He laughed.
“What flavors do you have today, Grandmother?” An arm wrapped around him in a loose headlock, and Yuugi grinned up at Jounouchi.
“Yuugi, this strawberry ice cream is amazing! You have to try it!”
“I would, but my throat will swell up so bad I won’t be able to eat for a week!” A bit of ice cream landed on Yuugi’s upturned forehead, and he squealed in a completely masculine way at the sudden cold. He quickly wiped off the offending dessert. “Jounouchi-kun, don’t eat that standing over me, you’ll get it all in my hair!” Jounouchi ruffled Yuugi’s hair with his free hand, and Yuugi’s face scrunched at the intrusion. Grandmother laughed, deftly tossing a cone from one aged hand to the other.
“Today I have one from the vine, one from the trees, and a sin that fights back.” Yuugi smiled, pulling out from under Jounouchi’s arm, and asked for the second of the three; it was going to be a very sweet green tea and honey blend, which Yuugi thought tasted better frozen than as a beverage. Grandmother began packing his cone lovingly, and Yuugi’s eyes traced the patterns of her skin; again he saw the eye, but today there was a dagger near it, an image that gave him pause.
“So you’re not actually Yuugi’s grandma, right?” Jounouchi asked, his mouth full of sugar-cone. Grandmother nodded, her ratty pink wig swaying.
“He calls me grandmother because he enjoys making an old woman blush,” she said jocosely, a bit of unblended honey trailing behind on her fingers and catching the sunlight, “and because it gets him discounts.”
“Grandmother~~” Yuugi whined at her words and Jounouchi’s laugh, “you always lie about me like this.” She clicked her tongue, handing Yuugi his sweet-tree cone.
“When you live up to your reputation, little Yuugi-chan, I’ll be honest with your friends. As it is, I have more drunks and dreamers to snare, and you’re blocking my cart. Shoo!” she said with a fond smile chiseled into her face as if by erosion, waving them away and flicking drops of hot water at them. The two teens laughed and bid her a farewell, joyfully running with their desserts through the city streets as though they were each a decade younger than high school sophomores.
Eventually though, curfew approached, and though they had long since finished their ice cream, Jounouchi brought up the subject once more.
“So, what’s her story, Yuugi?” Jounouchi asked, stretching his arms as they walked, “Selling ice cream to alcoholics seems like a dumb move to me.”
Yuugi shrugged, his hands in his pockets. “She says she does it to ‘wake up people no longer connected to the world,’ but these days... I think she’s waiting for someone.”
“Waiting for someone?” Yuugi nodded, gazing up at the golden sky. “Who’s she waiting for?”
Yuugi shrugged. “I don’t know...” he trailed off, gnawing on the inside of his cheek. Grandmother Norie had been acting a bit peculiar lately, to be perfectly honest – her attention kept drifting off to a side street nearby, as if waiting for someone to walk by or something to happen. When Yuugi had followed her gaze, he didn’t really see anything out of the ordinary, but just because he saw nothing didn’t mean there was nothing to see. They walked on in silence after that, but it was a good silence for sunset. Sunset...
“Jounouchi-kun, it’s getting late – I should head home...” the arm that wrapped around Yuugi’s shoulders and neck was unexpected, but it was Jounouchi, so not unwelcome (though Yuugi did flush a bit under the inherent affection of the move).
“Yuugi, you idiot,” he said, shaking Yuugi a bit before releasing his hold, “I’m not letting you walk home alone again when you’re being stalked by crazy foreign women.” Yuugi’s flush deepened, but—
“I didn’t tell you they looked foreign,” he said warily, looking up at his friend, but Jounouchi’s gaze was focused far off elsewhere.
“I know,” he said, nodding in the direction he stared, “but that’s them, isn’t it?”
Yuugi turned and saw, casting lengthy shadows in the late rays of sunset, two girls with three ponytails between them. Dark skin glowed in the golden light, and from the distance it looked as though they wore matching dresses. The girl with two ponytails, probably having fallen from tied buns, waved.
“Yeah,” said Yuugi as the girls approached, “that’s them.”
._._.
