at Nesisi, the island of fire.
He cooks the leftover gods into a bone soup.
._._.
It had not seemed like a long party, but it had been an obscenely long day, and even the other Yuugi felt their body’s exhaustion. Making their excuses, the other Yuugi was finally able to slip away from the crowd, quickly making his way back up to Yuugi’s bedroom. Once the door was locked behind him, Yuugi and his other self switched control again, and Yuugi allowed himself to collapse on his freshly made bed, and instantly too comfortable to get back up again, he kicked the clean clothes on the edge of the bed to the floor. It was good to be home.
The other Yuugi appeared to be sitting on the bed, facing Yuugi, his hip touching Yuugi’s knee. Yuugi kicked off his house slippers and his socks as well, smiling at the dull thud they made against the floor and the clothing already constructing their little burial grounds.
“Hello ceiling, hello bed,” Yuugi said quietly, smiling and stretching his arms under his pillow. “I never thought I’d be able to come back here.”
“I remember,” said the other Yuugi, his hand resting on Yuugi’s leg and somehow, even though he was not a physical person, Yuugi felt the heat from that hand sink down into his marrow. “I’m glad we were wrong. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you this happy.”
Although it was not the other’s intent, the words gave Yuugi a flash of guilt – for Jounouchi and his sister Shizuka, for Hebi and Hikari and their father Sasori, for Souzouji and, and, and – before he pushed it away. It was his first night home after weeks away: he could set aside those feelings for now.
“You know what would make me even happier?” Yuugi asked with a smile, shifting up onto his elbows. The other Yuugi gazed at him questioningly, though that melted into a small, answering smile.
“What would make you happier, aibou?” the other asked, but Yuugi just shifted over slightly and patted the empty mattress beside him.
“It’s a secret,” he said, looking away briefly as though it would hide the grin on his face, “you’re too far away for me to tell you.”
The other Yuugi rolled his eyes, but his lips were still quirked in amusement. “The trials I endure for you,” he muttered darkly as he made a show of stretching himself out on the bed next to Yuugi, their equal height aligning them perfectly: toe to toe, nose to nose.
Though the other Yuugi had complied with the request, and was now as close to Yuugi as he could without lying atop him, Yuugi remained silent behind a painfully sincere grin.
The silence stretched, until finally the other Yuugi sighed. “This is the worst secret-telling I’ve ever been a part of.”
“Oh, hush,” said Yuugi, “you’ve never been part of a secret-telling.”
“And that’s how I know this is the worst,” he answered back. If the other Yuugi had thought that such prodding would result in an answer, he quickly realized his mistake.
“Ai~bou,” he wheedled, staring into Yuugi’s eyes, “if there’s no secret, why—”
“It’s strange,” Yuugi whispered suddenly, his grin receding, his eyes almost unfocused in the darkness; his voice seemed to trail off, the thought unfinished. The other Yuugi waited, but not even in their shared heart did an answer come forth.
Eventually, with a low grumble, he poked Yuugi gently in the stomach, hoping for a response. “Tell me—”
His question was cut off by a soft hand to his cheek, and a subdued and softer smile on Yuugi’s lips. “We share the same body, and even when you’re out like this you look mostly like me – my height, my hair, most of my scars…”
“Aibou?” The thumb swept across the other Yuugi’s cheek, brushing through eyelashes as the lid fell closed. The other Yuugi tried scowling at the thumb moving over his eye, but Yuugi’s small syllable of laughter made his expression melt away.
“But your face… even when you’re hiding behind mine, it’s so…” The hand on the other Yuugi’s cheek stilled for a moment before sliding back, fingers combing into the base of his translucent hair.
“So?”
But what it was ‘so,’ Yuugi didn’t say, for he had instead shifted forward and pulled and was using his lips to kiss the insubstantial mouth of his other self. Though they had kissed before, it was still a bit of a shock to the other Yuugi that Yuugi would want to kiss him in the first place, so even as his mind succumbed to the thrumming sense of feedback, he delayed. He was late to participate, but not unwilling, not unsure.
Lying on their sides to kiss limited their range of motion, and having two forms on a bed built for one didn’t help, but it didn’t matter; their lips had all the room they needed to purse and pull at one another, enough room for one tongue to cross over to give some heated moisture to the other’s inherently arid mouth. The other Yuugi had no blood or tears in this form, and never ate – what use had a spirit for saliva?
The other Yuugi let his hand rest upon Yuugi’s hip, but it was Yuugi who allowed the hand to stay, placing his own atop it, Yuugi who allowed that hand to pull them closer together. It only took a shifting of a leg before Yuugi pushed himself up, kissing the other Yuugi down onto the mattress, sliding his arms behind the other’s back to prevent him from being pushed into the bed. In such a position, Yuugi could not explore the other’s form as freely as the other Yuugi could the reverse, and the other Yuugi took shameless advantage to smooth his hands over the flat planes of Yuugi’s sides through the increasingly distressed dress shirt, over Yuugi’s back, and onto his shoulders.
The other Yuugi had no real effect on the world other than on Yuugi – his weight did not press into the bed, he cast no shadow of his own, and he could only feel solidity the bed abstractly; it was only real to him because Yuugi needed it to be so, and if the other Yuugi got too far lost he might very well fall through wherever Yuugi did not hold him, solid matter holding no resistance to him.
Similarly, though Yuugi had taken off none of his clothes save a jacket several hours earlier and socks mere minutes ago, when the other Yuugi ran a hand over Yuugi’s clothed arms the material offered no resistance: his ghostly hand would pass through, straight to flesh. As the other Yuugi ran fingernails that did not physically exist through a material that surely did to rake lines down what should have been the inaccessible flesh of Yuugi’s back, Yuugi gave a shudder and a sigh into the kiss, smiling, and both tightening his hold and spreading his arms beneath the other Yuugi, as though hearing his fear of falling away.
Though Yuugi’s body was already slick with sweat, the other Yuugi was still as dry as bones, as dice. Yuugi shifted his legs to lay around the other’s, their bodies aligned perfectly, and the heat of Yuugi’s legs against his own was so inviting and pulling that the other Yuugi could not have stopped the upward thrust of his hips if he’d tried, couldn’t help that even though there were several layers of cloth between them it only felt like half, could not stop the clenching of his hands or the groan that passed from his lips into Yuugi’s. Similarly, he couldn’t help but accept the returning noise from Yuugi’s mouth, and the way Yuugi easily crushed his hips back down, feeling the hands under him clench against his back.
Yuugi pulled away from the kiss, obviously disoriented even past the flush on his cheeks and the darker turn of his eyes, relishing in the feedback and the bloodless flush on the other Yuugi’s face.
“So perfect,” he whispered, pulling one arm out from under the other Yuugi, then both, so he could strip himself of his shirt. The other Yuugi’s hands fell away as Yuugi sat up, but the expression of rapt attention and lust made Yuugi grin as he began unfastening the column of buttons. Tossing the shirt aside, Yuugi slipped the lanyard of the Puzzle free of his neck and gently lowered it off the side of the bed, letting it rest on the floor, out of the way. Sitting back up full, Yuugi spread his arms in a gesture of display for the other’s dazed and covetous eyes.
“So perfect,” whispered the other Yuugi, shifting himself up to sitting, though it was difficult what with being pinned at the waist and not truly having real leverage beneath him. Once up, the other Yuugi’s hands fastened on Yuugi’s hips and he began trailing hot kisses over Yuugi’s chest, taking Yuugi completely by surprise: Yuugi had expected the other Yuugi to strip, too. But then again, he really wasn’t another Yuugi at all – he was a spirit, a Pharaoh, not Yuugi, never really Yuugi—
“Ah!” The other – the spirit – the pharaoh – the other Yuugi’s mouth had latched onto Yuugi’s left nipple, and his hands were convulsively clenching at Yuugi’s hip and back, and Yuugi had to bury his hands into the other’s starfish crown of hair (one becomes two, one becomes two, to, yes). Yuugi felt more than controlled the rocking of his own hips on the lap of the other, than controlled the lolling back of his head, and then the mouth was at his neck, sucking and caressing with a tongue that was dry but unyielding, and the other was pulling Yuugi down tight against his lap, rocking up against Yuugi, curling tight around him, and Yuugi’s fingers twitched helplessly in the onslaught.
Yuugi’s sigh was quiet, but audible, and Yuugi felt the lips curl into a smile against the flesh of his throat.
“Aibou,” whispered the other against the tender skin of Yuugi’s neck, and Yuugi nodded breathlessly, pushing himself forward again and pressing their foreheads together, their blond fringe trapped between them.
“Always,” Yuugi whispered back, watching and adoring the way the word made the other Yuugi tremble. Slowly, Yuugi reached back to the arms clutching him and pulled them away, guiding the other’s hands back to his own torso, pressing them against the buttons of the other Yuugi’s dress shirt, identical save its translucence to the one on the floor. Yanking his own Pyramid off and tossing it aside, the other Yuugi jerkily undid the fastenings of his own shirt while Yuugi laid kiss after kiss on his brow, and jaw, and cheeks, and Yuugi didn’t even notice when the phantom clothing passed straight through him on the way over the other Yuugi’s head.
The other Yuugi’s torso, like the rest of him, was almost identical to Yuugi’s own, though even in the dark of night and in such a phantom form Yuugi had to ignore the fact that he could still clearly see the pattern of his bedspread through the spirit’s skin. Yuugi began rocking against the other Yuugi again, everything within him clenching at the shuddering moan the other Yuugi released, and in his heart Yuugi felt no greater joy than knowing that no one else would ever be able to hear such a cry from the other Yuugi – no one else was capable of hearing it.
It was dizzying to realize that, as far as the rest of the world was concerned, this other Yuugi didn’t exist, didn’t matter, and it filled Yuugi with both joy and sorrow. Yuugi could have all the world; the other could only have Yuugi.
Damn the world, thought Yuugi; he’d rather only have the other Yuugi.
Pushing down on the other’s shoulders, Yuugi guided the other Yuugi back down to the mattress, but instead of following him Yuugi dragged his hands down the other’s semitransparent arms until he captured the other’s wrists once again. Yuugi began guiding those hands to the other’s pants, manipulating the other’s fingers around the button and zip as Yuugi could not.
“Ai-aibou?” the other Yuugi asked, his voice a low whisper even though no one else could hear, his eyes dark and hooded as he watched Yuugi’s movements with wonder. Yuugi only met his gaze with a smile before he had the fastenings undone and was attempting to manipulate the other’s hands to remove the garment. Catching on, the other Yuugi lifted his hips from the bed and pushed at the clothing, Yuugi wisely having moved out of the way of the other’s thrashing legs. With a final kick, the pants were sent to the clothing graveyard where if they impacted they made no sound.
With nothing else hindering his progress, Yuugi began exploring the other’s bare form, completely bypassing the other’s burgeoning erection. His translucent feet were soft, the nails short, and when Yuugi kissed and nipped at the other Yuugi’s soles (after all, what worry had he for dirt, that which not even shadow could touch?), the other panted and churned on the bed, his frustration evident. His movement was limited to the waist up, where he tried to clutch at the mattress with no success, while his legs were held forcibly still so as to not kick Yuugi in the face. Yuugi exhaled a short laugh, working his way up to ankles and calves.
“Ai-ai-aibou,” the other Yuugi whispered, his muscles quivering under Yuugi’s attention. Yuugi murmured his reply into the line of a scar on the lower end of the other Yuugi’s inner thigh (and Yuugi could even remember when he himself received it).
“Always,” he promised back, his hands trailing up over the clenching muscles in the other’s legs, finally reaching his destination. Yuugi’s hands began massaging the skin around the other’s protruding hipbone and the back of his leg as his lips began circling around the base of the other’s arousal, but not yet upon the erection itself.
“Please,” begged the other Yuugi, his hands grasping for Yuugi’s shoulders, needing something to hold, and though his hips were rocking they sooner dipped into the mattress itself than they would press forcefully at Yuugi. The other had not sunk completely through the bed only through sheer force of will.
When Yuugi’s mouth descended on the other Yuugi, his grip tightened so much on Yuugi’s shoulders that Yuugi was momentarily afraid the other might have drawn blood, but only for a moment, for it was then that their shared response to touch – that had been mostly negligible until then – surged back in full force, and Yuugi had to be very careful about the quiet groan he let out around the other’s arousal, his own still trapped behind too-tight pants. Pulling off for a moment, Yuugi grasped tight to the other’s hip and laid his arm flat for more stability, while his free hand went to his own zipper. The other Yuugi let out a groan at the loss, but his hands on Yuugi’s shoulders were a welcome massage in the way they squeezed tight into his muscles. Yuugi continued to kiss and suck and caress around the surface of the other Yuugi’s erection while his right hand struggled to unfasten his pants without assistance from his left.
Finally free, Yuugi shifted his left hand away from the other Yuugi’s hips and slid his fingers down, under, beneath, gently rolling the other’s sac while his mouth went back around the top half of erection itself. At the moan the other sounded, tossing his head back, Yuugi’s eyes fell closed and he inhaled deeply, his tongue caressing the underside of the shaft, his right hand meanwhile teasing lightly at the hair around the base of his own.
It was not the best blow job ever experienced by man, as far as Yuugi could tell from the echoed perception of it in his own body, but the other Yuugi seemed too incoherent to complain about Yuugi’s lacking technique. Yuugi couldn’t make out words, if there were any; it was a babbling stream of half-formed pleas and endearments, the other’s muscles quivering wherever Yuugi felt them, and only his solid grip on Yuugi’s shoulders kept him from falling away.
The other’s erection was pulsing in Yuugi’s mouth even though it contained no blood, Yuugi’s own tightening, the heat and pleasure building.
“Ahhhh, aibou,” the other called out, weakly, dizzy, and Yuugi could feel how close they both were, and bracing himself Yuugi tried taking more of the other into his mouth, (and for once Yuugi was glad that he was short, and proportionally sized), and with his right hand he began pumping his own erection.
The duality of sensation was too much for both of them – the swift and forceful pressure of the hand, the soft, wet heat and suction of the mouth, the sensations overlapping and feeding so it was easy to forget who was doing what – and the other Yuugi let out a low keening cry, his hands convulsively tightening on Yuugi’s shoulders as his orgasm hit. With a muffled groan and almost no time passing between them, Yuugi’s world exploded a hundred thousand times over, his mouth nearly falling slack and his eyes screwing shut, his orgasm pumping out enough release over his fingers to make up for the fact that though Yuugi could feel the other’s orgasm shaking in every part of his body, there was no ejaculate shooting its way into Yuugi’s mouth.
His limbs shaking and weak, Yuugi released the other’s waning arousal and slowly climbed up the bed to other Yuugi. Although he was not slick with sweat, like Yuugi, the other’s dark eyes were glassy, and his breathing ragged and deep. Yuugi grinned at the sight. He’d done this to his other self; no one else ever would, no one else ever could! Without hesitation, Yuugi leaned over to kiss his other self, and the other Yuugi was much swifter to respond to this kiss than any one previous. This one was a soft thing, warm and languid, and relatively short-lived.
After only a minute or so, Yuugi felt the other pull away gently, but it was all right. Yuugi laid his head down to the pillow as the other Yuugi shakily propped himself up on an elbow. Yuugi smiled up, still floating on the high of his orgasm.
“All right?” Yuugi asked in a whisper, brushing a hand over the other Yuugi’s exposed torso. The other Yuugi trapped Yuugi’s hand beneath his own.
“Aibou,” he whispered, a low undertone of confusion and awe evident in his voice. Yuugi’s eyes were drifting shut, but he made an effort to focus on the other Yuugi beside him.
“Mm?” The other Yuugi’s hold on Yuugi’s hand tightened briefly, and Yuugi gave a comforting squeeze back.
“You… you didn’t have to do this,” he whispered, letting his hand slide from Yuugi’s and gesturing to the bed, “I mean… instead of… I could have—” Yuugi smiled, fatigued, at the other Yuugi’s hazed fluster.
“I know,” said Yuugi, closing his eyes, too sleepy to keep them open. “But it’s not like I didn’t enjoy it, other me.”
Yuugi shifted, his arm shaking and heavy as he pulled the kicked-aside blanket to cover his and the other Yuugi’s naked forms, although of course the blanket simply passed through the latter.
“But why?” asked the other Yuugi, leaning closer to Yuugi, hoping he would not yet fall asleep. Yuugi opened one bleary eye to the curious face, and couldn’t help but smile.
“There is nothing and no one more precious to me than you,” whispered Yuugi, closing his eye once more, “and I wanted to show you that.”
Yuugi did not see the smile that plastered itself across the other Yuugi’s face, one of surprise and wonder and love. Had he seen it, Yuugi would have cherished the memory of it for the rest of his life.
“I think that about you too, aibou,” the other whispered sincerely into Yuugi’s ear, hoping that Yuugi would carry those words with him into sleep. The other Yuugi then lay down flat beside Yuugi, pushing his semitransparent form as close to Yuugi as he could, giving the illusion that he, too, lay under the covers. He wrapped an arm over Yuugi, kissing his brow, and prepared for the sleep that would claim his insubstantial form back to the Puzzle. It was as his eyes closed that he heard Yuugi murmur softly as the latter began to drift off.
“Of course you do,” whispered Yuugi, not knowing that he was heard, or even that he spoke, “you don’t know any better.”
The other Yuugi’s eyes opened, confused, but Yuugi was asleep before the other Yuugi even had a chance to think on the words. Had Yuugi been awake, he would have heard the quiet stream of curses, and would have been forced to stifle inappropriate laughter at the way the other Yuugi tried slamming his fist against the mattress in anger. The air of frustration around the other Yuugi was palpable, his whole body wound tight.
That someone as brilliant and wonderful and giving and loving and perfect as Yuugi could see no problem with sharing his very life with anyone as freely as he did with the spirit of the God Pyramid, and to love him and protect him and save him and all – that Yuugi was so blind as to not see his own virtue! It infuriated him; how had the other Yuugi managed to fail Yuugi so completely, that Yuugi would doubt the other Yuugi’s heart? Doubt his want to be with Yuugi? Unable to do anything else, the other Yuugi instead slammed his fist into his own leg, his features contorted in a bitter scowl, and even then the contact made no sound no matter how many times he repeated the gesture.
Receding to shadow, the other Yuugi raged at his own failure – even after all they had done, all they had been through, the other Yuugi had never once been able to convince Yuugi that he was truly worth something – had failed to prove his own devotion to Yuugi, failed to prove that Yuugi was appreciated and wanted and loved for who he was in return, that of all possible people the other Yuugi could never imagine anyone better to entrust his heart.
Shadows of vases and statues and skulls flew and shattered across Yuugi’s dimly lit walls, the darkness playing a show of silhouetted destruction, but eventually it scaled back down to the shaking and weary form of Yuugi’s shadow, locked in his own impotent range.
Again, again, he had failed his most precious partner, who slept on, undisturbed.
._._.
The other Yuugi was quiet the next day. Yuugi hadn’t noticed at first, what with grandfather’s huge announcement at breakfast about how, by the way, not only was his long-dead wife not actually dead, but that because they had so much catching up to do they were going to go on a short trip to Jenga, where Yuugi’s grandfather and father had lived before they’d finally moved to Domino.
Yuugi continued to not notice the uncharacteristic isolation when he had to go to school a whole hour early in order to speak with a couple councilors about what he would need to do in order to catch up, they scolding him for not maintaining his study habits while evading police custody, (as if Yuugi had study habits to begin with). He did not even notice when he sat through several classes with everyone staring at him and whispering behind their hands and his back. Even when Yuugi went out to eat his lunch on the school roof with his friends – to avoid the blaming and distrusting stares of his classmates, though Yuugi was surprised by the fact no one tried to actively steal his lunch, and he spent nearly half the period trying to assure Anzu and Honda and Hanasaki that really, he forgave them, just help him catch up in his schoolwork! – the silence of the other Yuugi did not weigh heavily on his mind.
This is not to say that Yuugi is a cruel person, or heartless, or cares not for others who suffer. If the other Yuugi knew that anyone would accuse Yuugi of such, that person would be shown their error when it would be Yuugi that would spare that person’s heart from destruction. Of the two, Yuugi is the more compassionate, more merciful, and the one who is much more likely to seek out the reason for someone’s sudden emotional distance.
That Yuugi did not notice the other’s significant presence-yet-silence is only pointed out to illustrate these few things: Yuugi was still quite used to being alone in his head, as is the natural state for almost all inhabitants of the Earth, so a few hours of Yuugi engaged in his own thoughts is much more common for him – and everyone else, at that – than sporadic pseudo-telepathy. Even after assembling the Puzzle and becoming aware of the denizen within, communication with the other Yuugi was not as frequent as one would initially assume, and upon all this was Yuugi’s rather unfortunate tendency of being separated from the other Yuugi by means both physical and inexplicably magical. For another, this was the first true day of reacquainting himself with his old life, and as busy and as stressful as it was, Yuugi barely had a chance to have a thought with himself, let alone his other self.
On top of this, even though the other Yuugi was in a state of emotional turmoil and suffering from feelings of inadequacies, Yuugi had thus far been given no indication or even a hinting of such; it should be pointed out that Yuugi would have stopped everything at the shortest sign of such turmoil. It should not be expected that Yuugi would notice this situation for quite a bit of time, considering also how well the other Yuugi was intentionally hiding from Yuugi, and considering how skilled the other was at doing so.
Therefore, the fact that it was not until Yuugi was walking home from school that afternoon that he noticed this silence should be taken to show that Yuugi is an observant individual, and that only taking ten stressful and busy hours to notice is, in fact, a good thing.
(Had it been any of Yuugi’s friends or classmates in a similar situation, notice probably wouldn’t have been taken until the next morning at the earliest.)
Or, to put it another way: when Yuugi internally called to his other self with a touch of worry, even the other Yuugi was surprised.
Aibou? Is there something wrong? He asked, hesitant to manifest visually when Yuugi was in such a public place. Yuugi shifted his rucksack-cum-backpack, full now of textbooks and small wooden puzzles instead of the clothing and medical supplies it had housed before, and he exhaled slowly.
Not with me, no, but… replied Yuugi, dodging the other people on the street with ease, you have me worried, a little. You haven’t said anything all day.
By second nature Yuugi glanced at his shadow, cast upon the store walls he passed, even if it was only the result of his eclipsing of the sun.
I didn’t want to intrude, replied the other Yuugi. I thought it would be better if I did not distract you today. Although the words and the reason seemed simple enough, Yuugi could not but feel his own insecurity increase.
He continued walking in silence, not quite brooding, but the fact that the other Yuugi made no move to dispel the silence did not alleviate Yuugi’s distress. If anything, it made him feel worse.
Yuugi was more than halfway to the Game Shop before he spoke again. Other me? Do you… do you regret what we did last night? I know it was—
No, aibou, of course not! I— the answer was swift, but there was an undercurrent of sorrow, and Yuugi caught that more than he caught the words. He had to clench his eyes shut as he walked.
Of course he does. Stupid, idiot Yuugi, Yuugi thought to himself where the other could not see or hear or know the words, but he’s not going to tell you because… well, he shares your brain. What’s more awkward than… than regretting that between two people in one head? It’s not like he could say anything anyway – he probably thinks you’d just lock him away if he did! Aaahhh, I’ve screwed it all up.
Yuugi was close enough to the Game Shop that he didn’t even need to think for his feet to find the familiar path. Grandfather said that he and Grandmother Kameyo would have already left by the time Yuugi would get back from school, so Yuugi had to fumble with the key to the front house door. Mother would still be at work, too, so the house would be empty save for Yuugi and his other self.
Finally getting the door open, Yuugi kicked off his shoes once inside, not even bothering to put on house slippers. The door, too, he kicked closed, and his rucksack dropped to the floor without care. God, where had that confident, delusional Yuugi from the night before – hell, from the whole month before – gone? Simply a brave front, and now that he was back home, everything would go back to the way it was before, only with more angry fangirls with their projectile ballet slippers and fewer friends. Again. Dammit. How bad of a lay did Yuugi have to be to fail to do well with someone who received no other external stimuli ever?
He headed for the kitchen to do something to get over this (a good solid puzzle to build would be nice, or if he still had cards he could play some solitaire varieties he hadn’t touched in ages), and the force that pushed him into the kitchen counter was unexpected and unrelenting. Yuugi cried out, twisting, wishing he were closer to the jar of cooking utensils so he could at least attempt to fight off his attacker until he saw who it was.
The other Yuugi pinned both of Yuugi’s hands to the kitchen counter, leaving Yuugi trapped between it and his other self.
“Why is it,” whispered the other, “that I can never do anything right by you?”
Shocked, Yuugi pulled at his wrists, but the other had the leverage. “Oth—”
The kiss was not gentle, or soft, or loving – the other’s perpetually dry mouth moved hard and fast against Yuugi’s, their teeth jarring together painfully, the other’s tongue dominating Yuugi’s own – and it ended as suddenly as it began. When the other Yuugi pulled away, Yuugi attempted to follow, but the other’s face was turned down, away.
“No matter what I do, it’s wrong, and you suffer,” said the other, his grip tight but not bruising. “I try to be your friend, you hate me, and when I try leaving, you won’t let me. Any time I try to help you, you get hurt. Any time I try making you feel better, you feel worse. It always backfires. Aibou,” again the other moved to kiss Yuugi, but this was desperate and angry and pained and Yuugi wanted so badly to embrace the raging spirit— “Everything I do pains you, and yet you hold me in such high regard – aibou, aibou, everything you do is so wonderful, and I’ve never been happier than I was last night, with you – you were so, ahhh, absolutely, nnng, perfect in every possible way and somehow, somehow! I ruined that too! I don’t even know how, but I must have done something wrong, because after all of it you’re hurting because obviously I’m so much better than you, that I’d want to leave you even though you know how much I hate when we’re separated—”
“Wait, what?” Yuugi interrupted, completely confused by this whole diatribe. The other Yuugi ignored the interjection.
“And what is so wrong with me,” he shouted, a catch in his voice like someone on the verge of crying, but of course the other Yuugi had no tears beneath all his rage, “that I can never make you as happy as you make me?”
The other Yuugi released Yuugi’s wrists and pushed himself away, but he did not flee from the room or to the Puzzle. Yuugi was shaking from the emotional backwash, but he consciously did not rub his sore wrists. Yuugi did not know what to say; they’d had a similar fight before, and still the miracle answer eluded him. Maybe there wasn’t one.
“… You thought I was perfect? Seriously?”
The other Yuugi choked out a noise, like a laugh and a sob and a scowl all blended together, and shook his head in a motion not to be taken for negation. “Everything you do is a hundred thousand times better than what I can do,” he whispered, his eyes completely dry, though he did not look at Yuugi. “And unless there’s something better than what you did, that I can give you, then yes.”
About a dozen different images and memories flitted through Yuugi’s mind, many of them heavily digitized from videotapes, but he pushed them away and tried to hide his flush.
“Well, there’s more to it than what we did, for sure,” Yuugi muttered softly, leaning back against the kitchen counter; the surrealistic nature of talking about sex and self-worth with a spirit in his family’s kitchen struck Yuugi with only a glancing blow, and he pushed it off as one of the least strange things about this whole adventure. The other Yuugi, though, was now standing with a stillness living humans could never hope to imitate. “And it’s not like… other me? Are you all right?”
The other Yuugi’s gaze turned to Yuugi, his eyes half-closed and dark, the rest of his body perfectly still.
“Other—”
“Aibou,” whispered the other, his eyes fixed so forcefully on Yuugi that Yuugi felt more pinned by that stare than he had by the other’s hands moments earlier. “I… I need you to know how precious you are to me.” The movement was slow and silent, and though it screamed ‘ghost!’ Yuugi did not care. The other Yuugi laid his hands lightly on Yuugi’s hips, and through their shared heart Yuugi felt and saw both his other self’s determination and his fear, and at the latter Yuugi was confused. Why should the other fear Yuugi? Yuugi was nothing—
“That!” exclaimed the other, suddenly, quietly, his hands tightening on Yuugi’s hips. “How do I show you, prove to you, that you’re anything but?”
The hands on Yuugi’s hips kept adjusting their grips, the strong fingers pressing on his flesh, almost massaging him, and Yuugi’s eyes slid closed as his pelvis twisted minutely under the seemingly negligible attention. The other Yuugi inched forward at the reaction, his eyes focused downwards as the fingers on Yuugi’s hips shifted toward a much more deliberate rolling of pressure, like fingernails drumming on a desk, and Yuugi’s hips jerked with approval, memories of the night previous bubbling gently into Yuugi’s mind and into his blood.
The other Yuugi was nearly atop him now, only a few inches separating their forms from contact, and Yuugi could feel the body heat of the other layering atop his own, even though the other Yuugi had no true body and thus should not produce heat. The other Yuugi’s face came forward, his lips not touching Yuugi’s, and Yuugi gave a short gasp when the hands slid down, kneading at the small of his back and the top curvature of his buttocks.
“What do I have to give you,” whispered the other Yuugi into his ear, “what can I possibly give you to show you how much I—”
A low groan rolled from Yuugi’s mouth when the other Yuugi’s teeth and lips began assaulting what was easily becoming the other Yuugi’s preferred earlobe, and Yuugi’s hips arched forward, allowing one of the hands to slide down further along the shallow curve.
“What do you want, aibou?” said the other Yuugi on a breath, warm and dry like a breeze passing through fire. The hand that was not massaging and groping Yuugi’s ass had instead glided upward, raking nails across Yuugi’s sensitive back, even though Yuugi was fully clothed. “Anything you want, it’s yours.” This wind was a comforting one, exhaled before a kiss over his inner ear, “but you have to tell me what you want.”
The heated mouth descended to Yuugi’s neck, nipping at the exposed flesh above his choker, and Yuugi’s hands instantly went up to begin unfastening the garment.
“Please,” moaned the other Yuugi against his jaw and newly exposed neck, the buckle falling carelessly to the floor, “please, tell me what you want.”
Yuugi wasn’t sure if he was lifted or if he jumped, but he was on the kitchen counter, and the other Yuugi still held tight to him, trailing hot, dry kisses over his neck and jaw and chin, and it was as though he were being caressed by fire, or the sun, or a desert wind. Although the counter gave him the height advantage, Yuugi was still at the mercy of the other Yuugi’s assault, and even with free hands all Yuugi could do was wrap his arms around the other’s shoulders and hold on. The attack on Yuugi’s neck had not yet ceased, and Yuugi’s head was so far rocked back that he nearly gave himself a concussion against the edge of the dish cupboard.
Hands slid back down to Yuugi’s waist and stilled, and the other Yuugi’s hearth of a mouth was whispering up into Yuugi’s ear, the warmth of it giving the rest of him shivers. “What do you want?”
“I… I want,” Yuugi panted, the crown of the other Yuugi’s hair tickling his face while the libidinous mouth continued robbing him of coherent thought, now by nipping softly at the skin below Yuugi’s ear. “I want—” Yuugi’s words were cut off with a groan, the other Yuugi’s hands having pulled Yuugi forward, Yuugi’s groin pressed tightly against the other’s flat, warm stomach. Yuugi’s head did hit the cupboard this time, though thankfully it was the flat of the door. Even the throb of that contact could not detract from the feel of solid heat against his trapped erection, and with the newfound (though stinging) leverage of the cabinet, Yuugi pushed back to roll his hips up and pressed them tighter together.
The hands on Yuugi’s hips gave a spasm, and the other Yuugi pressed closer, panting heavily on Yuugi’s skin. “Tell me,” he murmured, rocking against Yuugi and possibly passing through the counter itself in the motion. “Tell me…”
Words were beyond Yuugi, his muscles jerking in awkward places, but the answer jumbled and bounced around in Yuugi’s mind and their shared heart: want burning aching fire yes want this want more more heat want want you.
The hands held still Yuugi’s hips, preventing him from pressing forward into the warm stomach that was now pulling away; Yuugi nearly cried out at the loss, but the other Yuugi’s face had finally realigned with Yuugi’s own, their breaths mingling between them.
“You have to tell me what you want, aibou,” The other Yuugi’s eyes were not opaque, but they were dark and full of desire all the same, fixed on Yuugi’s own.
Yuugi did not wonder as to the picture he made, ravaged, fully clothed and, to an intruder’s gaze, completely alone; Yuugi merely leaned forward, whispering the words into the other Yuugi’s bruised lips and open mouth, “I want you,” he whispered, “I want you, you, only you…”
The other Yuugi only nipped quickly at Yuugi’s lips, pulling away before the contact had even registered. “But that doesn’t tell me anything,” murmured the other, frowning, “I still don’t know what to do.”
Yuugi released a short, exasperated sigh. “Jerk.” The insult was an endearment, and the other Yuugi pressed forward, kissing Yuugi fully once more. When Yuugi opened his eyes, he was struck by the surreal nature of this encounter with his other self – Yuugi could see the palm of his own hand, cupping the back of the other Yuugi’s head. Yuugi could accept such oddities now, and he let his eyes slide closed once more.
“What do you want,” the other exhaled between kisses, pulling Yuugi’s hips to grind his crotch up against the other’s stomach again; Yuugi gasped at the pressure, tightening his hold and kissing harder.
After a moment, Yuugi pulled away with a grin. “I want to have sex with you, other me,” he whispered, kissing up the other Yuugi’s jawbone to continue quietly, directly into the other’s ear, “I want to feel you… I want to see your face when you climax, calling out to me, ‘aibou’,”
“Aibou,” the other Yuugi echoed, bowing his head forward, his hands roaming over Yuugi’s back.
“And to know… that no one else can ever hear you, touch you, love you the way I can, the way I do,” Yuugi continued, his hands sliding down to the other’s shoulders, “to feel you, and me…”
Yuugi pulled away, turning his gaze to the other Yuugi’s down-turned face, and he tipped up that chin so he could gaze directly into the other’s eyes.
“I want to fuck you, other me,” he said with a smirk, pulling the other Yuugi into another fervent kiss.
Yuugi couldn’t get off the counter fast enough – the other Yuugi nearly yanked him down as they tried navigating through the house while still firmly attached to one another, mouths and hands and minds more concerned with one another than the route to Yuugi’s bedroom. The trip was mostly successful – Yuugi only kicked the corner of one table, as the other Yuugi had accidentally walked straight through it. Their school jackets were discarded in the hallway, and Yuugi laughed into the kiss when he saw that the other Yuugi’s jacket fell completely through the floor itself. Whether it disintegrated thereafter, or continued falling to the center of the earth, neither cared.
Yuugi kicked the bedroom door shut behind him as they crossed the threshold, more out of habit than worry of being caught. It was a different door entirely that Yuugi should have worried about, but it would be hours before the matter would come to his attention, and by then – by then, the door would be the least of his concerns.
._._.
Being unable to directly manipulate one another’s attire made it surprisingly easier to undress while kissing – Yuugi’s uniform shirt and leather bracer easily passed through the other Yuugi’s body entirely, and the same was true for the reverse. In that manner they didn’t technically need to undress in places, but it was so much more appealing to feel the thing one was actually seeing. Finally bare save the Puzzle, Yuugi’s chest was swiftly claimed by the other Yuugi’s mouth, the force of his exploration pushing Yuugi back flat against the closed bedroom door with a thud. Yuugi hissed in pain as his head once again knocked on a solid wood door, but the throb of the impending bruise was pushed from his mind when the other Yuugi’s warm tongue began tracing circles around his nipple, his hot breath tickling Yuugi’s chest hair.
“Are you all right?” the other murmured, tilting his head up and away from Yuugi’s torso. Yuugi looked down with a frown.
“Of course,” he said, breathing heavily between words, “why’d you stop?”
The other Yuugi pursed his lips momentarily. “I… pushed you a bit hard there. Are you sure—”
“I’m fine, other me,” Yuugi stressed, his hands snaking into the other’s hair, “and the fact that you’re talking when you could be doing other things displeases me.”
The other Yuugi had to suppress a laugh and smile, letting the flats of his fingernails trail over Yuugi’s sides. “How remiss of me,” he murmured, standing fully once more and kissing Yuugi’s mouth once more.
Yuugi’s heart and pulse were pounding loudly in his own ears, his pants much too tight over his groin. When the other Yuugi moaned into the kiss, pulling Yuugi flush against him, pulling them both to Yuugi’s bed, unmade and slightly musky from the night before, Yuugi groaned right back, rocking his hips against his other’s.
Gravity was not fast enough, and Yuugi was glad his head hit the pillow rather than another door, the other Yuugi pressed tight above him.
Moving then, the other Yuugi propped himself up on one elbow, spreading his legs around Yuugi and pressing them flat against Yuugi's sides and hips. The other Yuugi then mimicked Yuugi's actions from the night before, taking and guiding Yuugi's hand to whip off the Pyramid of God, then to the solid metal button and zip of his pants.
“Yes,” Yuugi groaned, lifting his hips as together they slowly pulled the shiny metal tab, and gently – gently – their hands moved together, slowly parting the teeth away from Yuugi, his pants nearly splitting open with the strain. Writhing free of the garments was difficult, but soon they, too, were kicked unceremoniously to the floor. Without assistance, the other Yuugi rolled onto his back, away from Yuugi, slipping off his Puzzle and kicking off his own pants in a much quicker movement, the apparition leather vanishing before it even hit the floor.
The other Yuugi was above Yuugi again, smiling.
“You’re back,” Yuugi whispered playfully, tapping a finger against the other Yuugi’s nose. The other Yuugi scrunched up his face, but followed it with a smile.
“For you, aibou? I will always come back,” he whispered, reverently, and he softly leaned down to kiss, leaned down to press against Yuugi fully. Hot and heavy in arousal they pressed together, so intensely that Yuugi had to pull away from the kiss, panting from the feel of the feedback. His hips thrust without his conscious thought, almost as though striking them together like kindling, or tinder. The other Yuugi’s groin pressed down firmly against him, and Yuugi had to bite into the flesh of his palm to both muffle his cry and distract himself from the fire that was raging and escalating across their shared heart. Though still pressing tightly against him, the other Yuugi’s hips had stilled.
“Aibou?” he whispered, the breath hot against Yuugi’s ear, and Yuugi nodded.
“Yeah, yeah, I’m… I’m okay,” he said, his voice far too shaky to be of any reassurance, “it’s just – ah… a bit much.” Yuugi smiled, leaning up to peck against the other Yuugi’s lips. “I’m okay now.”
The other Yuugi didn’t look convinced. “You were biting your hand,” he said, concerned – how the other Yuugi could feel that concerned, with as much of a hard-on as Yuugi felt pressing against him, he’d never understand –
“It’s nothing, other me,” he replied, still smiling reassuringly.
The other Yuugi didn’t look particularly convinced.
“But this is the point where you let me up,” whispered Yuugi slyly, sitting up partially, “so I can pound you into the mattress.”
The other Yuugi groaned, thrusting his hips against Yuugi, the electric desire surging through them both. Yuugi’s hands came up to grip the other Yuugi’s semi-opaque, naked, sweat-free shoulders, and for a moment his mind cleared.
“Of course, if I tried that,” Yuugi murmured, “I might wind up losing you to the mattress—” the other Yuugi thrust against him again, and with a cry covered Yuugi’s mouth with his own, pushing him back down to the bed; Yuugi’s words were easily transformed as they thrust against one another, their frottage the flint and steel of their fire, and their hands were clawing so tightly to one another that Yuugi thought they would draw blood beneath their nails (never mind the other Yuugi could not bleed, never mind the other Yuugi would never hurt Yuugi).
If the threat of insanity was still there, Yuugi could not possibly care less as they rocked together, so much better than foreheads or hands or kissing or anything before it, but—
“I want,” panted Yuugi, breaking the kiss, delirious and close, but— “I want—want you— nnngh,” Yuugi pulled the other Yuugi down, the other Yuugi’s face against the light sweat of his neck, and he felt the desperate laugh there.
“Aibou,” the other Yuugi murmured, letting go of Yuugi as he began pulling his body up, away, turning above Yuugi, repositioning. Yes!, screamed the passion in Yuugi’s blood, every beat of his heart a tattoo of affirmation, except one: a single synapse in his brain, trained through years of coaching, years of it not mattering, years of embarrassment cried out against him. The synapse shouted twice, and Yuugi quickly responded; his hands nearly slammed against the other Yuugi’s hips, halting his descent before contact had even been established between them.
“Wait,” Yuugi panted, frantic, repeating the first command while his mind raced to remember the second.
“Wait?” repeated the other Yuugi, his eyes clouded with arousal, though he did not move against Yuugi’s word.
The synapse fired again, and deliberately Yuugi sat up, pulling his legs close to him so he could push the other Yuugi back, sitting the other Yuugi down upon the mattress and holding him there for a moment. Once placed, Yuugi rose from the bed, crossing quickly to his dresser, his erection bobbing painfully as he walked.
“Aibou?” called the other Yuugi quietly as Yuugi begun digging through his top drawer, finding the unopened box easily. “Is–”
“I just needed to grab something,” Yuugi replied, forestalling the question, tearing open the box and snatching one of the square packets within.
Returning to the bed, Yuugi carefully began opening the packet (like he had, embarrassingly, been repeatedly shown by both his mother and grandfather on separate and numerous occasions – as though he would forget!). Careful to not snag his fingernails on the contents, Yuugi pulled the item from its packet while the heavily trained synapse in his brain continued firing instructions.
The other Yuugi, aroused but also curious, watched his movements attentively. “… what is this?”
“It’s a condom,” Yuugi replied easily, holding it out so the other Yuugi could see the red circle of latex with its thickly rolled outer ring and light sheen of lubrication.
The other Yuugi stared for a moment. “It’s for protection,” Yuugi clarified, examining the ring of latex, flipping the condom over a couple times in his hands to be sure of the direction of the roll of the latex. The other Yuugi, too, seemed to be awakening slightly from the fog of lust, for he scowled minutely.
“Protection? From what?”
“Pregnancy—”
“Aibou!”
“—and diseases.”
Yuugi’s hands, which had just begun unrolling the condom onto his aching erection, were stilled by a touch from the other Yuugi.
“Aibou,” the other Yuugi said slowly, “I’m not a woman.”
“I know that, other me, but condoms–”
“Aibou,” he said, more sternly, pulling up Yuugi’s hands and the condom with them. The other Yuugi kept his gaze locked on Yuugi’s face, then with his ghostly hand made a very deliberate karate chop through the condom. His hand passed completely through the latex. Yuugi stared in confusion for one short moment before he flushed in embarrassment.
“I don’t have semen, or blood, in this form,” stated the other Yuugi with an exasperated fondness, “nor an immune system. What disease could I possibly carry? What could you have that could hurt someone who does not actually have a body?”
Yuugi pursed his lips, his face still red, and he laughed. “Would you believe me if I told you I forgot?”
The other Yuugi smiled, cupping Yuugi’s cheeks and kissing his lips softly, tenderly; the interlude had only eased the flame of desire, but had not even come close to snuffing it out. “You were just concerned,” murmured the other Yuugi, pulling away from the kiss slightly, letting his hands roam over Yuugi’s sides and tug lightly at the trim hair of Yuugi’s armpit; Yuugi’s eyes closed at the attention, his breathing quickening once more and the condom falling from his hand, “and were our situation different, then I would—”
“Other me?” Yuugi interjected, his eyes only narrowly open. “Stop talking.”
The other Yuugi grinned, pouncing upon Yuugi with a laugh and pinning him to the mattress. “Gladly,” he sang, silencing himself with the tender flesh of Yuugi’s neck.
Again they began worshipping the flesh of one another, rekindling the fire, their explorations of one another more thorough than before. Attention to Yuugi’s left nipple, for example, almost always caused his hips to buck, while similar attention to the right caused him to shudder under the other Yuugi; there was a spot on the juncture of the other Yuugi’s neck and shoulders that, when teased lightly with teeth, caused both of their left legs to jerk, the synchronization of it causing both of them to kiss through their laughter.
Yuugi’s erection nearly ached for release, and even the other Yuugi’s alternating hot and cool breath on his sweaty chest made him gasp.
“Please,” Yuugi begged, fisting the sheets, his hair damp and matted to his skull, “please.”
The other Yuugi nodded, kissing Yuugi’s earlobe softly. “I love you so much, aibou,” the other Yuugi whispered, pushing himself up, getting ready. His lower legs were firmly planted against Yuugi’s sides to make up for the fact they could not be firm upon the bed, and carefully he positioned himself over Yuugi’s erection.
Slowly, so slowly, he eased down, feeling the organ push past the initial ring of muscle with a tight burn. Yuugi hadn’t mentioned that this would hurt, so the other Yuugi sucked in a breath and hissed it out as he continued his descent. It wasn’t so— OW. Pain lanced through him, and the other Yuugi tried not to visibly wince.
Stop being so pathetic, he chastised himself, Aibou has given you the world – you can suffer this for him. He began to bear down further (there couldn’t be that much more, could there?), biting his cheeks to keep from crying out, so he was surprised when the pained cry escaped regardless.
Yuugi’s hands were on him then, pushing him – up? The other Yuugi opened his eyes in confusion, looking down to ask what it was this time when he noticed the tears on Yuugi’s face.
That cry had been Yuugi’s.
“Stop, stop, god,” Yuugi panted, pulling the other Yuugi off of him, pulling him down to the bed beside him, pressing his wet cheeks against the other Yuugi’s chest. “How could you do that to yourself?” Yuugi choked out, nearly shuddering against the other Yuugi, who only suddenly remembered their sensory feedback.
The other Yuugi had been focused so much on getting past the pain that he had not even felt the phantom clench of tightness around his own erection; apparently the pain had been too much for his partner to bear either. His heart (which was only metaphorical, not physical, in this form) felt as though gripped in a fist: he had been perfectly willing to suffer the pain of dry sex for his partner, completely forgetting that Yuugi would feel that same pain too.
Yet again! He thought sourly, yet again I fail you, aibou…
“It’s okay,” Yuugi said, his voice more steady now, “that was obviously a bad idea.” He leaned forward to kiss the other Yuugi softly, “we can try something else.”
Enraged at himself for forgetting something so obvious, for hurting Yuugi, the other Yuugi’s mouth moved desperately against Yuugi’s, the kiss overflowing with his feelings of despair and inadequacy. Yuugi felt, and responded, trying to pour in reassurances and forgiveness, but it was not enough. Yuugi forgave so easily, even when it had not been earned: how could the other Yuugi accept it? If only— if only— wait. The answer was so obvious!
“Aibou, do you trust me?” he whispered quickly, pulling Yuugi into another hard kiss before he could answer.
“I’m not going to–”
“No, not that,” agreed the other Yuugi, “but do you trust me?” Yuugi nodded, arching against him desperately.
“Always,”
“Close your eyes,” the other Yuugi said needlessly, “and let me guide you.” Yuugi nodded, and with another soft kiss, the other Yuugi guided Yuugi’s arm over the edge of the bed, forcing Yuugi to grab the lanyard of the real Puzzle. Pulling it up together, the other Yuugi did not have to break the kiss to loop the cord over Yuugi’s head, as the leather passed through him without even a whisper of sensation. Holding tight to Yuugi’s body, he began retreating back into the Puzzle, drawing Yuugi’s mind with him.
He would not have ever dared this move, had Yuugi not told him of how he had somehow gone into the Puzzle itself to rescue the other Yuugi. Hell, the other Yuugi hadn’t even known he’d had a heart’s room until Yuugi spoke of them – Yuugi’s own like a bedroom, the other Yuugi’s a dark and endless labyrinth. It was to Yuugi’s heart he pulled them, allowing Yuugi’s physical body to fall into an aroused stupor.
Although it had taken focus, it had taken no time to cross from the physical plane to the mental, and the other Yuugi opened his eyes to the brightly lit room of Yuugi’s heart, Yuugi still held tight to him. They lay on a perfectly made bed, one that the other Yuugi could actually feel beneath his legs.
He smiled. “You can open your eyes now,” he said, rolling off of Yuugi, reaching for the small pile of cards on the bedside table.
“This… my heart’s room? Other—” Yuugi sat up, scowling. “Don’t tell me you brought us here for card games,” he growled with a great deal of threat, and the other Yuugi shook his head.
“There’s only one card I want,” he said softly, swiftly flicking through the deck, “and I didn’t want to send you downstairs to get it. Here!” snatching the card in question, the other Yuugi let the remaining deck fall to the floor, the cards scattering like leaves. Yuugi – still frustrated – continued to glare.
“We are never doing this again,” he glowered, and the other Yuugi kissed Yuugi’s scowling forehead.
“I told you that you were the woman,” he teased lightly, but before Yuugi could respond the other Yuugi had flicked the card, and from the printed image he pulled a small bottle.
Yuugi could not help but be surprised. “Wait—”
“I have dominion over all games,” the other Yuugi replied, straddling Yuugi and pouring the liquid onto his hand. “I could’ve done this outside, but your deck—”
Yuugi was still staring. “You pulled a lubricant out of Duel Monsters?!”
The other Yuugi grinned, snapping the card to Yuugi while he set about preparing himself. Yuugi, keeping his appearance of anger, completely ignored the other Yuugi and instead examined the card.
“… huh. I never would have made the connect—Ah!” Yuugi gave a spasm, shocked, and he glared. The other Yuugi continued, trying to stretch himself with the assistance of the lubricant (which made things much less painful, though the angle of his fingers was certainly awkward). Beneath him, Yuugi was reacting much more than the other Yuugi was to this stimulus, though he did not appear to be in pain. “Nnnn,… other me…” Yuugi panted, tossing his head back and dropping the card, allowing his body to fall back to the mattress.
“Look at me, aibou,” the other Yuugi panted, searching within himself for the gland he hoped existed for one without a true body. There! Yuugi moaned beneath him, responding to caresses that were not even touching Yuugi’s skin. It would be an interesting experiment for later, the other Yuugi thought briefly, the sensation within him causing his teeth to chatter weakly and the muscles in his legs to quake. The other Yuugi nudged Yuugi lightly with the side of his foot. “You said you wanted to see me climax,” he whispered softly through their heart’s room, removing his hands from his own entrance.
Yuugi’s eyes opened for only a moment, until the other Yuugi’s still-slick hands began lubricating Yuugi’s swollen arousal. Yuugi could hardly stay flat on the bed.
“Watch, aibou,” the other Yuugi whispered, finally prepared, positioned over Yuugi (for the third time), “watch as I bury you within me.”
Yuugi’s eyes snapped open, his expression one of rapt wonder as the other Yuugi slid down, down, without pain or burn or latex in the way, sliding down and knowing that somehow Yuugi felt this both within his own body and without, just as the other Yuugi could feel the phantom muscles tighten around his own arousal.
“Look, aibou,” he whispered, softly, as finally his descent ceased, when there was no more to take in, “at what no one else can ever touch, no one else can ever know—” the other Yuugi pulled himself up, but went back down more quickly, causing Yuugi to jerk beneath him; Yuugi’s eyes remained forcefully open, the stare of one committing a sight to memory. The other Yuugi repeatedly impaled himself upon Yuugi’s solid erection, the slide of the lubricant making his nerves tingle until he slammed contact with that bundle of nerves deep within his body; Yuugi cried out, thrusting up to press in deeper, and the other Yuugi echoed the sound, a spasm of pleasure shooting through him from everywhere and nowhere at once.
“Let me— let me—” Yuugi thrust up into the other Yuugi again, his sentence cut with a shuddering cry, his hands dropping on the other Yuugi’s thighs. “Yes!” cried Yuugi, “show me—”
Higher and brighter their fire burned, the other Yuugi bearing down on Yuugi desperately, Yuugi meeting each with a frantic thrust up, each feeling the other’s pleasure in their untouched nerves, their sweat (both sweating, both real here) and heat mingling in the air. The other Yuugi twisted on Yuugi, needing to give his partner as much as he could, feeling fingernails digging into his legs in passion.
Unable to take any more, the other Yuugi’s hands fell to his own neglected erection, stroking and squeezing in opposition to the rhythm of their union. Yuugi’s face showed the nearness of his impending climax, red and damp and muscles tight, his expression rapt and wanting, wanting.
“Aibou,” the other Yuugi called, using his free hand to pull up Yuugi up to sitting, bringing them closer. Yuugi’s eyes cracked open, his violet eyes dark, almost black with lust. “Ai-aibou.” The other Yuugi clenched around Yuugi, his hand swift and churning around his own erection, the white hot fire consuming, consuming, consuming, and there was another hand joining his, pressing wherever his own hand was not, and the thrusts into him were not as strong or long but much more frantic.
“Yes,” Yuugi hissed, watching the other’s face in adoration, rocking up hard and squeezing, “show me.”
Although he had been much more vocal before, sound seemed to lock in the other Yuugi’s throat as orgasm ripped through him, again, again, white release pumping from between their joined hands, his muscles quivering and shaking and unable to keep the rhythm of the act – but Yuugi was there, still thrusting up into him shallowly, guiding the other Yuugi’s body down, even through the orgasm that pumped into the other Yuugi, Yuugi beneath him, within him, holding him, loving trusting cherishing him—
“Ai~bou!”
He let the brunt of the orgasm take him, his body weak and tense all at once, maybe at twice, and he cherished the feel of warmth that diffused through his entire body, worshiped the hand that was not his own still drawing pleasure from him, worshiped the other hand that held him balanced atop Yuugi. He worshiped the feeling of pure joy within him and without, every pained emotion within him draining away as he slowly ebbed down once more, and though he faintly felt arms encircle him and carry him he didn’t care, shaking, leaning forward to bump noses with Yuugi. Soon, he pulled free from Yuugi’s softening erection, but never from Yuugi, never willingly from Yuugi.
“Aibou, aibou,” he whispered, a mantra of awe as they both sank back down to the mattress, warm and full and loved.
Kissing Yuugi gently, he only allowed himself to fall asleep after Yuugi had done so first, gladdened that even in sleep Yuugi couldn’t stop smiling and knowing that no one else would have the opportunity to etch there a similar grin.
._._.
The nameless spirit of the Millennium Puzzle – a Pharaoh, if the book Yuugi had received from his grandmother was at least somewhat accurate – awoke slowly, drifting lazily from a land he would not refer to as the land of dreams (for, like many things, he had no memory of what dreams he might have dreamed). He was unaccustomed to sleeping, even less accustomed to waking, and as far back as his memory went (which, granted, was only a few months), he had not frequently woken up in a bed, arms wrapped around another person. Then again, the only time he’d ever awoken in a bed before had been in this fashion, and had been in Yuugi’s arms after his apparent resealing within the Puzzle, bound by a false name. Yuugi had told him all of the rescue itself, but had not yet gone into the details of what else that transpired in his absence. It did not matter; they had time yet.
The spirit – the broken half-heart of a king, it seemed – stared upward, his hand drifting slowly across the naked arm of Yuugi, brushing through the dusting of blond hair, pondering. Since he had been unsealed (the first time, many months ago), he and Yuugi had only been separated twice: once by the strange magic wrought by Kaiba Seto that neither he nor Yuugi truly understood, and once by physical necessity. Yet, in all that time since the first unsealing, from when he protected Yuugi from the petty scum of Domino, to their initial and terribly triggered first interaction, through all that time spent playing games for useless money in Titan – even though they had always been together save those two occasions, the other Yuugi had never felt closer to Yuugi than he did now.
He knew – because Yuugi knew – that sex usually altered one’s perceptions of one’s partner (he shivered in delight at the word, how utterly perfect a word it was now), but there was no way that he could not love Yuugi. Yuugi, still asleep beside him, was perhaps the most perfect person he’d ever met. Sure, he didn’t have experience with many people, and with fewer still that weren’t trying to hurt Yuugi, but… it was frightening, how balanced they were. Where the spirit was cold, and distant, unfeeling, Yuugi was anything but, and where Yuugi had been lacking in self-preservation and cunning the other Yuugi made up the difference. Yuugi said this was because he was only half a heart, too – something Yuugi had privately suspected, but had not known for sure until the man with the Balance of God had tried to weigh it during their separation.
How wonderful was it, then, that the Millennium Puzzle should be assembled by someone who was fragmented too? The other Yuugi (who was really quite different than Yuugi, beyond the superficial things) closed his eyes briefly, not bothering to hide the smile on his face even if it did hurt his cheeks to wear. He turned slightly to watch his Yuugi (and no one else’s!) sleep. They were light and dark, in a sense, but not quite – he was not completely devoid of goodness, nor was Yuugi free from dark thoughts and deeds, but – he didn’t know the right words.
If they needed words, he thought, Yuugi would know them, but he wasn’t going to wake him for something like that. Not yet, anyway.
The spirit – who had, for a while, carried the name ‘Saikoro,’ but no longer – wanted to curl back into the peace of sleep, but something kept him awake. Somewhere important, something was greatly amiss. It was not here, with Yuugi, who slept more soundly than he had in ages (the spirit knew, he kept tabs on that sort of thing), but… somewhere.
The other Yuugi figured it was out in the real world, where Yuugi’s body was probably lying asleep, mostly naked (everything except the Puzzle, which he’d looped around Yuugi’s neck before they came here), in a sex-smelling bed. Perhaps Yuugi’s mother, or grandfather (and the sudden grandmother about whom he still knew very little) had come home? The other Yuugi carefully untangled his limbs from his Yuugi (his! If Anzu or Kaiba or anyone else tried to take him away with false promises and callous words and insincere hearts, there would be no end to their suffering!), watching fondly as Yuugi tried to pull him back. Very softly, he kissed Yuugi’s brow, still tasting of cool sweat.
“Sleep, aibou,” he murmured, unable still to cease smiling, “I will see to this unease. Sleep.”
Yuugi shifted, one eye cracking open at him slowly, still mostly asleep. “ ‘kay,” he muttered, burying himself under the covers and releasing his hold on the spirit. “Be fast. ‘S cold without you.”
The spirit laughed, smothering his face in Yuugi’s hair playfully. “You won’t even notice my absence,” he swore, the words slightly muffled, finally pulling himself away and allowing his consciousness to reconnect with Yuugi’s body.
His eyes still closed, the other Yuugi became aware of two things very quickly. The first was that he – Yuugi’s body – was vertical. Although the other Yuugi was used to taking over a standing body, it was always because Yuugi had been awake before that moment. That an unconscious body was standing was not a good sign. The second he noticed came in multiple parts, none of which were good: he was wearing more than Yuugi had been when they’d gone into Yuugi’s heart’s room. There felt like loose boxers clinging to his hips in the familiar grip of elastic, and an unbuttoned dress shirt covered most of his arms and part of his torso, though it being unbuttoned seemed to defeat the purpose of wearing it in the first place.
There also seemed to be something wrapped around his legs, and what felt like metal bracelets tightly secured to his wrists and also to something else; the latter (handcuffs, he realized) was chaining him to something above his head, and was probably the cause of his standing. He was also blindfolded, which was why he could only guess as to his garments, his wrists hurt from holding his weight like this, and there was a bruise the size of Mt. Fuji on the back of his skull throbbing painfully.
These things in combination led him to the conclusion that he was not, in fact, in Yuugi’s bedroom – he could not recall there being anything both high and sturdy enough to support handcuffs and his weight like this, as well as the fact he could think of no possible reason why he should wake up in such a fashion at the Game Shop.
The other Yuugi, hearing no one around him, seeing no lights filtering through his blindfold, did the only thing he could think to do: he quietly closed the barrier to Yuugi’s mind, and with a very deep breath muttered, very loudly,
“Well, fuck.”
._._.
