Yu-Gi-Oh! Fan Fiction ❯ One Day ❯ One Day ( Chapter 1 )

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He could feel them.

 

Every one of their eyes locked on his back, breaths paused and lips clenched between teeth as they waited with tangled fingers and shaky prayers for his next move.

 

It seemed easy enough, didn't it?

 

Shoulders back, head held high, and just a flick of his wrist needed to draw a card, -the- card, to turn the game around. Match the devastating move he had just lost several hundred points to with something better, stronger, more debilitating so his opponent would be the one feeling the tingle of sweat beneath his skin.

 

It sounded easy enough to him too, what with countless games played just like this he knew he should be smirking sharper, scoffing louder, and slapping a card down sooner.

 

But in reality…

 

Times like these, they were trying at best; the clockwork in his head ticking and tocking to the menacing and ever-silent clunk of duty and present need that weren't really any of his concern.

 

What did he care about saving this lifetime anyway? He didn't belong here. It wasn't as though he had -asked- to be placed here. He had no claim to this, this…

 

What -was- this?

 

Existence? No. Not really. Certainly he existed in the eyes of his `friends'. The joyous, trouble-attracting band that followed him around, noses pinned to his ass as they fumbled along in their attempt to befriend him thoroughly enough to secure a reason for personal salvation.

 

Salvation? Yes. Because like the precise clockwork in his head, the fate of the group's safety, sanity, and faith between them always seemed to fall into peril. And who was time and time again requested, called upon, -expected- to save them?

 

-Him-, of course. Why? He had no clue, but it was maddening more than it was flattering.

 

`What if I -don't- want to help? Can you manage on your own and leave me to think and -rest- to my weathered heart's desire?!'

 

Oh, wouldn't it be just fantastic to scream that at the top of his lungs and watch their glowing faces tremble and break away to reveal their raw fear and scathing hate at being denied the right to merely watch and ride along the coattails of his glory?

 

He could never do it though. Not because he didn't have enough motivation, want, or months of collected frustration, but because there wouldn't be a point. If they hadn't picked up on his agitation yet, would spelling it out be of any real help? He doubted it and he knew his lighter half disapproved of sour thoughts, never picking up on the real reason for the annoyance either. It was better that way perhaps, the more innocent half of his soul shouldn't be exposed to the turmoil beneath the surface of his mind, especially when nothing but shadowed questions and grievous thoughts bred there. Many of which he had no solutions to or clear manner by which to attempt to conquer even after all these years of timeless death which had given him more than enough time to process such musings.

 

Damn it all.

 

Why couldn't he rest with at least a portion of peace? Break away from the games and soul endangering ventures to simply shut his eyes and fall away to the dreams he could never reach even when he slept.

 

He had lived his life and damned it to eternity, but he had accepted tranquility with himself over such a choice long ago while wrapped in the twisted fingers of the darkness. Although he had never expected to resurface within someone so calculatingly balancing. All for the better. He never would have been able to maintain his silence had his other half been less stable or less understanding, because even when the more innocent portion of his soul didn't know the reasons for his passionate competitiveness, at least he was there to quell him and take over when time away from the stifling fawning was needed.

 

Stifling, choking, smothering infatuation was pelted at him daily, and he was sick of it. At first it had been amusing enough, watching others cheer and praise his words and choices even when they didn't comprehend the thought process, but the constant monitoring with high expectations drained him far more than he ever let on. After all, it would disappoint them to know their idol was capable of fatigue, and he'd never live it down were he to ask them for time alone. And so he fought with every ounce of strength he had regardless of how heavy his heart felt, but not to please the others, no, hardly. He did it in an effort to see if maybe trying a little harder, pushing a little further would grant him peace, break him away from here and let it all wash away to the back fogs of his mind so he could enjoy the death he had denied himself the first time around.

 

So far his efforts had proved fruitless, but there was always the next duel to try at. And so long as there was a next duel, he -would- try.

 

One breath at a time, that's all it really took to continue through the monotonous cycle of his shared half-life, it also settled his thoughts away from his unrewarded reaping, leaving him more determined than the previous day.

 

And so as his eyes stirred behind loosely shut lids, the chaos within subsided for later brooding as a breath was drawn and coiled coolly throughout his lungs. Hand tensing, his fingers splayed loosely over the deck at his side, the familiar warmth that hummed from the cards rippling up his arm and comforting the ragged edges of his mind and soul. A smile formed, although to others it may have seemed like a competitive tool to unnerve his opponent, there was nothing cocky behind the flickering moment of ease he allowed himself to express.

 

It felt good, listening to nothing but the subtle thump of his heartbeat in his ears, seeing nothing but the dark red of his eyelids, and thinking of nothing but of how indulgent this fleeting sliver of personal time was.

 

One more second.

 

Just let it last.

 

Please?

 

But all the willing in the world wouldn't allow him to extend his wish. Time wouldn't stop for him. There were others in the room he recalled, docked along the platform he stood on, and time needed to pass for them. Their eyes still wide, he knew their visions were beginning to rim with worry and frustration because… wasn't he taking too long?

 

Fine.

 

He'll give them what they want, please the cluster of tagalongs it if would keep their questions and noses from his thoughts.

 

“Heart of the Cards…”

 

There, they were smiling like puppies again, jumping on their toes with presumed victory just as his fingers plucked a card from the deck and his eyes flashed open red and dark, staring ahead at his rival he didn't really see because it was just another practice round, wasn't it? But no one needed to know that, no one would guess it either, because they knew how the game would end now.

 

After all, he had never disappointed them when -that- line or look was drawn.

 

But…

 

It was still a shame they didn't know the real reason he fought so hard.

 

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