Yu-Gi-Oh! Fan Fiction ❯ The Golden Dance ❯ 5: Strange Reflections ( Chapter 5 )

[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]

Title: The Golden Dance Chapter 5: Strange Reflections
Author: Tsutsuji
Fandom: Yugioh!
Type: Slash/yaoi romance, adventure
Pairings: mentioned: Seto/Jou, Thief Bakura/Ryou, Priest Seth/Thief King Bakura. Implied Yami Bakura/Ryou.
Rating: PG. (R in later chapters)
Warnings: WIP. AU version of Ancient Egypt story.
Spoilers: Spoilers for Ancient Egypt Arc, even though this will be contain an AU version of it.

AN: If Seth and Thief Bakura seem ooc, remember that they come from an AU past! I haven't seen much of the actual AE arc so I don't know very much about Seth in particular. If other characters seem way off, well, that's fanfic, I guess. ;-)
I said there would be lemon in this chapter - didn't quite get that far, I'm afraid, but there are dramatic moments, angst, and m/m implications. Lemon scene in the next chapter. Promise.

***
Chapter 5: Strange Reflections

[This picks up immediately after the last chapter, in which Thief Bakura revealed he had the Ring which used to belong to Jumoke, which prompted Priest Seth to pull the knife from the Millennium Rod and try to kill Bakura; Jou struggled with the two of them and Bakura escaped unharmed.]
---

Once the blood was flowing properly to his brain, Ryou's only thought was that he couldn't let Bakura disappear again. Unfortunately, the murderous priest had landed half on top of him when Bakura shoved him aside. By the time Ryou got untangled from Seth's robes and scrambled to his feet, Bakura was long gone.

He stood on Yugi's doorstep for a moment, looking up and down the empty street. The sun beat on his face, and he shaded his eyes against the glare. A few people wandered by, looking wilted in the heat, but there was no sign of the thief.

The look in Bakura's blue eyes when he'd first caught sight of Ryou was seared into his memory, just as sharply as the familiar sound of the Spirit's voice in his head. He had to see him again. He spun around and looked to his friends.

"We have to find him!" he said urgently.

Dark Yugi was too busy staring down at Seth to hear him. Ryou paused. He hadn't seen that expression on Dark Yugi's face for a long time. It usually preceded a Mind Crush or a devastating Penalty Game.

However, Priest Seth looked crushed already, and Ryou was certain Dark Yugi hadn't had time to do anything to him. The priest was still sitting on the floor, his legs entangled in his blue and white robes. His tall headpiece had been knocked off, and without it his resemblance to Seto Kaiba was even more striking -- except for the grimace of horror he wore as he stared at his empty hands. Ryou had never seen Kaiba with an expression like that.

"How dare you attack my friend in my home, as well as a man who had just proclaimed his innocence before us all?" Dark Yugi shouted at him. He sounded every bit the pharaoh that he once was. "Did you mean to execute Bakura for a crime for which you have no evidence and no confession? What demon made you lift your hand against him?"

"Yeah," Jou added as he stood up and dusted himself off. He seemed equally annoyed with Seth, although he put it somewhat differently. He looked down at the blade still quivering in the floor by his foot. "Get a grip, will you? Not that we believe him or anything, but still! And what's the deal about that other me having the Ring? No offense, Ryou my friend, but I don't want anything to do with that thing."

Ryou stared at him as it finally clicked: Seth's dead friend Jumoke, former keeper of his Ring, was the ancient counterpart of Jonouchi. Except they'd been more than friends, apparently, judging from Seth's reactions.

Seth ignored Dark Yugi's lecture on justice and balance, but he looked up at Jou with a pained expression. Jou shifted uncomfortably. Ryou had the impression Seth was seeing Jou as if for the first time. Then his eyes focused on something else, as if he was looking through Jou into the past.

"Jumoke! May your soul forgive me. I dishonor your memory ... " he said. His voice trailed off, and he looked down at his hands again. He shuddered, and then made a sound almost like a sob. "Oh, Bakura, my beloved, thief of my heart! How has so much evil come between us?"

Ryou's heart flopped in his chest like a landed fish. Staring down at the priest, he imagined he heard Jonouchi's jaw hit the floor.

"What did you say?" Dark Yugi gasped.

With a deep sigh, Seth pulled his head up to face them. He looked at Jonouchi and shook his head sadly. He looked much less like Kaiba with his face streaked with tears.

"Forgive me also, J'nuchi," he said, mangling Jou's name with his accent. He glanced at Ryou. "This boy appears so much like Bakura, and yet so different. Now I can see how my hope made you appear more like Jumoke than you are. Though you could almost be his Double, I realize that you do not have his spirit within you."

He sighed again as they watched, waiting for him to explain.

"Bakura, the thief, was my first love. A fragment of my heart still belongs to him. But a High Priest of the Gods and the favorite of Pharaoh cannot love a common boy, certainly not a thief - not even the Prince of Thieves. And he lost his love for me when I remained loyal to Pharaoh Akunadin, whom he hates, and loyal to the laws of Egypt, which he has no concern for.

"It was a long time since we parted ways. I had not seen him or heard word of him for over a year, and I feared he had come to some evil end. I read every report of the arrest of tomb robbers and the thieves that raid caravans, in case he was among them, but he was never caught. Then, not long ago, he returned unexpectedly, and found me with Jumoke."

His eyes looked far away and he winced as he remembered. Ryou glanced over at Jonouchi, but he couldn't read his friend's expression.

"Bakura threatened Jumoke then?" Dark Yugi asked. His voice was much more gentle, but still demanded an answer.

Seth gave his head a quick shake.

"No. His anger was all for me. In my shame, I had harsh words for him as well. He left before I could call them back. Then Jumoke disappeared, and was later found dead. I went to visit his tomb this morning, to leave a gift for his journey. I found Bakura already there."

"And that's what led you to call up your monsters and fight," Jonouchi concluded. "He was planning to kill you, too!"

Seth drew his knees up to his chest and dropped his head onto them. "I no longer know," he said, his voice muffled. "But I do not think he meant to kill me. I did not believe Bakura would kill anyone, even when my Pharaoh thought him capable of it. When I saw Jumoke's Ring in his hands I lost all reason. But my heart will still not believe it."

He raised his head and looked up at Jou. "I called my creature forth to defend Jumoke's tomb. I feared the thief had come to desecrate it. Perhaps that's true. But Bakura knew he could not kill me with his beast. His ka is not as strong as mine, and I have the Rod besides."

"So, what, he was only trying to scare you?" Jonouchi said. "That's not what it looked like from where I was standing! Anyway, he had the Ring he could use against you."

"But he didn't use the Ring," Dark Yugi said, voicing Ryou's thoughts. "He only revealed that he had it in order to prevent Seth from killing our Bakura. As far as we can tell, the only one who has tried to kill anyone is Seth."

"Oh. Yeah." Jonouchi seemed reluctant to see it that way.

Ryou rubbed his neck where the cord had dug into it. He knew he might be biased in favor of the thief, but it was pretty clear to him who had tried to kill whom.

Seth shuddered, his hands clenched convulsively.

"I am no murderer," he said. "My heart was twisted by grief. I'm glad that the gods allowed J'nuchi to prevent Bakura's death at my hand."

Ryou felt grateful for that as well, intensely grateful, but he wasn't sure it was the right time to say so. Seth didn't say anything about being glad *he* was still alive, after all.

"Yeah, well, I don't know what made me do it, to tell you the truth," Jou said. "Just didn't want to see anyone's blood all over Yugi's carpet." He rubbed the back of his head and made a whistling sound. "Anyway, what are we supposed to do now?"

No one had an answer. Seth was lost in his anguished thoughts. Dark Yugi had fallen silent as well, watching Seth thoughtfully.

Ryou's thoughts spun around as Seth's revelations mixed with everything else that had happened since the Spirit had appeared with his warning. It was all very confusing, with two Millennium Rings, an ancient version of Jonouchi, and Bakura here in the flesh....

He blushed hotly as he remembered the thief's eyes on him. His mind flashed back to the first glimpse he'd had of the man when he stood there panting on Yugi's doorstep. He'd first noticed lean, muscular legs and feet in leather sandals, and then a flash of broad shoulders and a tanned, bare chest. It was quite an eyeful, even in his distracted state of mind. And that was before he'd raised his eyes and realized who he was looking at.

Those thoughts just added to his confusion, until only one thing came clear to him.

"We have to find him!" he said again.

This time, Dark Yugi looked at him and nodded.

***

Jou called Honda and Yugi called Anzu. They were going to need help sorting all this out and finding the missing thief. Besides, Jou knew they wouldn't want to miss out on all the excitement.

When they arrived, Jou explained the situation to them as well as he could. By the time he got done they were thoroughly confused. It didn't help that he kept lapsing into the Egyptian language without realizing it.

It also didn't help that Seth stood off to one side of the room, silently brooding, while Ryou stared out the window and fretted quietly on the other side. Seth had made a brief bow toward Ryou, which Jou figured was the closest he was going to get to an apology for almost strangling him. After that, Seth carefully avoided looking in Ryou's direction again. Ryou seemed happy to return the favor.

Jonouchi found Ryou's concern for the Spirit of the Ring and the Thief as baffling as anything else that had happened. But then, he reflected, it made as much sense as his own feelings toward Seto Kaiba. Those looks of longing Seth had been giving him had brought something to the surface in Jou's heart, something that he'd just as soon have kept buried.

Something else about Kaiba kept knocking at the back of his mind, but it wasn't until Dark Yugi spoke up that he suddenly remembered what he'd been about to remember before Ryou arrived.

"I won't be helping with the search," Dark Yugi said. "I'm going to take Seth to meet Kaiba."

Jou remembered what he'd forgotten, with a jolt that twisted his gut.

"Wait a second, didn't you say Kaiba got sick or something?" he asked. He tried not to sound as fretful as Ryou.

"Yes. Mokuba called and said he'd collapsed from the heat and was acting strangely. However, while we were talking, Kaiba seemed to revive. Now, I wonder. Ryou had a strange spell of weakness when Bakura arrived from the past. It's probably no coincidence that Seto Kaiba collapsed at the same time. In Ryou's case, the Spirit of the Ring absorbed the effect, at least for the time being. However, he seemed to think Ryou is still in danger. And Kaiba has no such shield against whatever is causing the weakness."

Jou didn't like the sound of this at all, but he didn't say so. Dark Yugi turned to Seth and explained where they were going. Seth looked down his nose. Apparently his time spent brooding had allowed him to regain his lost dignity.

"I will go with J'nuchi," he said imperiously.

Jou rolled his eyes. Even though Seth had finally accepted that he wasn't Jumoke, he still refused to believe that "Nkuku" had any wit or authority in the matter. He had barely acknowledged Honda and Anzu when they arrived, and continued to act as if Jou was the only real person in the room. It was flattering but annoying.

"Alright, then I'll go to Kaiba's with you," he said, exchanging a glance with Dark Yugi. "Just to make my day complete, I'll go hang out with two of the biggest snobs in the world," he muttered. He heard Anzu and Honda try to stifle their laughter. Fortunately, Seth hadn't understood that last bit.

Dark Yugi nodded his approval, and called Mokuba to tell him they were coming. Mokuba was reluctant to speak to him at all, until he mentioned they might know something that would help Kaiba, if he was still feeling weak. The next thing they knew, a long black limo was pulling up outside Yugi's door.

***

Jou had to stifle his amusement at Seth's shock as they drove swiftly through the crowds and towering buildings of downtown Domino. He and Yugi explained that, no, these were not temples of the gods, or palaces of kings, or monuments to the dead, but the workplaces and homes of common people.

Of course, the most impressive building in the city was KaibaCorp Tower. Once he connected that with the person they were going to see, nothing could convince Seth that Kaiba wasn't a great ruler of their world. Jou shook his head in disgust, but he had to admit it made a strange sort of sense. If the modern world was ruled by wealth and technology, Kaiba was certainly a king in that realm.

Seth relaxed visibly when they arrived at the mansion. He seemed right at home with the bowing servants who held doors and tried not to stare too openly as he passed, and he glanced around the mansion with approval, even though it must have been different from anything he'd ever seen before. Jou realized that wealth and power were probably recognizable in any time and place.

Mokuba came running into the foyer to greet them. When he caught sight of Seth, his jaw dropped and his feet stopped moving. He skidded halfway across the polished marble floor to a stop right in front of them. He looked up with wide eyes at the priest, staring at his tall headgear and his severe blue-eyed gaze.

"Seto?" he said in a small, wondering voice.

While Yugi explained to Mokuba, Jou caught Seth's displeased scowl at the younger boy.

"This is Mokuba, Kaiba's younger brother," he said, taking care to speak in Seth's language.

Seth turned from Mokuba's upturned face to Jou. He looked startled.

"He thinks I am his brother? Then it's true that I resemble this Kaiba as closely as you resemble Jumoke?" he asked.

"Oh, yeah," Jou said, nodding emphatically. "You resemble him a lot."

Mokuba couldn't help staring at Seth as he led them up the broad staircase and down a long corridor. Seth tolerated his stares with a little more patience than usual, it seemed to Jou, until Mokuba paused by a closed door.

"He's in here. Just let me go in and tell him you're here." He shook his head slightly and sighed. For the first time, Jou noticed how worried he was. "I sure hope you can help," he said.

To Jou's surprise, Mokuba was looking at him when he said this. Then he
disappeared into Kaiba's room.


***

Seto Kaiba hated being sick. He rarely fell ill, and when he did he usually ignored it. There was no way he could ignore the weakness he felt now, or the weird thoughts and fever-like dreams that kept flooding his mind.

Since his initial moment of light-headedness, he'd been assaulted by increasingly strong waves of this physical weariness that made it difficult to lift a hand. Those spells alternated with weird dreams and brief moments of clarity. One minute he'd be able to struggle against the weakness, demanding answers of his private medical team or barking instructions to his staff. The next minute, taxed by the effort of speaking, he'd fall back onto the pillows of the hastily rigged hospital bed they'd placed him in and lie there helplessly for a while. And then he'd fall into one of those dreams.

It didn't even surprise him that Jonouchi's face appeared in his muddled visions. He was more annoyed that his dreams were invaded by images from that ancient Egyptian fairy tale that Yugi kept spouting at everyone.

He opened his eyes after one of those dreams to find Mokuba standing by the bed, asking him a question.

"Were you just asking to see Jonouchi, Big Brother?" Mokuba asked. He sounded surprised and hopeful, as if this was a great idea.

Kaiba scowled and roused himself, embarrassed and alarmed to discover he'd been talking out loud in the midst of his fever-dreams.

"Of course not! Why would I want to see that mutt?" he snapped - or what passed for snapping in his current condition.

"Well," Mokuba hesitated. "Jonouchi's here to see you," he went on in a rush. "And Yugi, and... someone else you should see, Seto."

"What?" He glared at Mokuba.

"They know what's happening to you. I think they can help you. Your own doctors aren't doing any good. I think you should listen to them, Seto," Mokuba said.

Kaiba could see his little brother was determined, and even when he was well, he had a hard time arguing with a determined Mokuba. At the moment he was too weak to argue. He just hoped they wouldn't stay long, and even more fervently, he hoped he wouldn't lapse into one of his rambling dreams while they were here.

"Fine, let them in for a minute and then get rid of them," he muttered.

Mokuba's face broke into a hopeful grin as he darted away. Kaiba laid his head back on the pillow and closed his eyes, breathing deeply to gather his strength.

When he opened his eyes again a moment later, all he saw was Jonouchi.

Big, glimmering brown eyes under that honey-gold mane of hair were staring down at him. He'd girded himself to face a smirk of superiority, or worse yet, pity, on the blond's face. He was startled to find that Jonouchi looked just plain scared.

"Jeeze, Kaiba, you look like shit," Jonouchi muttered. He sounded as if Kaiba looking like shit was a sign of the end of the world.

"Jonouchi!" Yugi's voice cut in to Kaiba's thoughts.

Jou reacted like he was covering something up. "Just trying to get a reaction out of him, Yuge!" he said, grinning but embarrassed, and looking more like his usual idiotic self. Kaiba almost forgot himself and smiled. When had the mutt's idiocy become so charming?

With an effort, Kaiba dragged his attention away from Jou to the shorter boy. Yugi's expression of concern was no surprise; it was merely annoying. He started to protest that there was nothing wrong with him and pushed himself up on his elbows. Then his gaze landed on the third person who had entered the room.

For a few seconds he couldn't make sense of what he was seeing - his own brown hair, intent blue eyes, and tight-lipped, unsmiling mouth stared back at him. Had someone brought a mirror into the room? But then he recognized the clothing his supposed reflection wore. He'd seen that ridiculous outfit in those visions from Yugi's fantasy.

Indignation gave him a rare burst of energy. He sat up in bed and glared at all of them.

"What kind of stunt are you geeks trying to pull! Get this dress-up character out of my room!" he shouted.

He gasped and fell back on the pillow. They stared at him, reflecting the shock he felt. Even as the words left his lips, he knew that he was speaking most of them in the language that hadn't been spoken anywhere on earth for nearly 2000 years.

"What's happening!" he snarled. His voice was weak, and the words were still foreign words. He closed his mouth and tried to clench his fists.

Kaiba willed his mind to think, clearly, and in his own language. All his brain would say was "This can't be real." But even in his fevered state, he knew it was real.

Jonouchi's face started to fill his vision again, looming before his eyes. He'd come closer, and his deep brown eyes were shining like liquid. Then blue and gold and white surrounded this vision of Jou's eyes. A blue river, a golden sun, and a high wall of white stone appeared behind Jonouchi. A doorway opened in the stone, with endless darkness beyond it. Jou started to shrink back into that dark place.

Kaiba reached out for Jonouchi, calling his name, but he was too weak. He fell backward, and then everything faded away completely.

***

--to be continued--