Please Remember Me (Yuugi loses his memory)

[cypsiman2]

"Damn." Honda stood outside the hospital gates, closed and shut tight. "Well, there's always tomorrow." Honda restarted his motorcycle and took off in search of the cheapest motel available in Checker City.

....

"Excuse me, Dr. Ku-Ku?" Yuugi cleared his throat as he saw the doctor enter his room. "I, I was wondering if it would be okay if I had some visitors today." Even his imagination by itself could only occupy him for so long.

"Perhaps, if after I've done some tests and am confident that you'll be okay." Yuugi nodded and hoped he would pass; he wanted to see his Grandpa, he wanted to see Anzu, and most of all he wanted to see his Mom.

....

"Oh yeah, that hit the spot." Katsuya Jounouchi loudly yawned and stretched as he got out of bed. "C'mon Otogi, let's hit the cafe and see if the food is as bad as all the sitcoms say it is."

Otogi mumbled an obscenity into his pillow, having not slept nearly so well as his roommate, possibly because his roommate snored like a jack hammer; the matter was still under investigation. It could just as easily be how ungodly hard the mattress was, how the pillow had to be fluffed every ten minutes, or even the pervasive smell of the place. Really, there was a medley of factors to consider.

"Suit yourself." Jounouchi quickly put his clothes on and dashed out, utterly unlike how he'd been the previous day. Whatever.

....

"Is that so? Good. I'll be there right away." Mokuba looked up at his brother as he turned off his phone. "According to Dr. Ku-Ku, Yuugi is recovering quickly. Battle City may not have to be delayed after all."

"Good." Mokuba was not thinking about his brother and what Yuugi's restored memories would mean for him; he was thinking about Anzu, how much she cried over whether or not Yuugi would ever remember her and their history together. "You better get your memory back." Mokuba muttered under his breath, unheard by his brother.

[Scribbler]

They exited the hotel to the limo Seto had called around to wait for them. Mokuba was just getting into the car when a motorbike thundered past at way past the speed limit. There was something familiar about the rider, but he went by so quickly, and his headgear obscured his face so much, that his identity eluded Mokuba even as he watched the bike screech around a corner and out of view.

“Some people, eh?” said Takada, their driver.

Seto grunted and got in, too concerned with his own thoughts to bother about anyone else.

….

Honda braked so hard his tyres protested. He winced; he needed to keep the tread intact as long as possible. With no part-time job like Anzu, the prospect of being grounded forever when he got home, and having spent the last of his money on that crappy motel, there was no spare cash for repairs. He parked up, made sure his security chain was wrapped tight and rushed into the medical centre lobby.

Where he was stopped by a snotty guard who looked at him like he was a pointy-haired dog turd. Honda had to admit, sleeping in his clothes hadn’t left him looking great, but that hadn’t been high on his list of priorities in a room so cold he could practically see his breath. Sleeping in the buff was out of the question, and he’d had no pyjamas.

“Who are you?” the guard kept asking.

“Hiroto Honda. Look, my pal Yuugi Mutou was admitted yesterday. My other friends are already inside. They spent the night here. I know it’s early, but can’t you check the cafeteria or something so they can verify who I am?”

The guard gave him the hairy eyeball. Honda resisted the urge to scream – or pluck the doughnut off the plate he could see at the guy’s desk. He was starving!

“Your name ain’t here,” the guard said implacably.

“Ask Seto Kaiba! He knows who I am.”

“Mr. Kaiba ain’t here.”

Urge to scream, rising. “Then. Call. Him.”

“Call me what?”

Honda spun to find the arrogant asshole himself standing behind him, briefcase in hand and prickish smirk in place. Mokuba peered around his brother and snapped his fingers at the sight of the helmet dangling from Honda’s grip.

“I knew I recognised that motorcyclist!”

“You know this guy, sir?” the guard asked dubiously.

“To my chagrin, yes.”

“Oh, you want I should let him in, sir?”

For a second it looked like Seto would say no, until Mokuba tugged on his jacket and he relented. “I suppose so. He can come upstairs with me.”

The impulse to make a crass joke took hold of Honda’s brain, but he suppressed it. Instead, he meekly followed the Kaiba brothers across the floor to a waiting elevator.

….

The Spirit of the Ring lurked in the observation room. He was glad he had hypnotised that idiot, Jounouchi, into forgetting all about his encounter with Ryou Bakura. Things would have been much more awkward if the fool had gone blabbing about his presence here. Dr. Ku-Ku had been in several times, as had a nurse, but he had burned both their minds, cleansing his face and voice from their memories. It was simple, localised magic, which the Pharaoh’s shadow made a lot easier. It ate their memories as though that was what it was used to doing, and then curled back inside him like a waiting viper.

Inside the room on the other side of the one-way mirror, Yuugi swung his legs over the side of his bed and hopped down. He came over and fussed with his hair, then spent a long time just staring at his own reflection. The spirit found perverse enjoyment in standing with his face near the glass, almost nose-to-nose with the Pharaoh’s precious vessel. A few scant inches and Yuugi Mutou could be nothing more than a bloody, slashed-up pile of meat. The prospect was inviting – the Nameless Pharaoh would be devastated not only by the loss, but by the means of dispatch.

But no, the time wasn’t right yet. The spirit faded back, waiting to see what happened next.

[cypsiman2]

"Hey Anzu, hey...Ms. Mutou?" Jounouchi looked up at the two women awkwardly, as awkward as they both seemed to be with one another. At the very least, it didn't look like they were going to start ripping into one another any time soon, so something had gone right; Jounouchi himself had a complicated history with his own mother, but even at its worst neither he nor she ever showed the kind of boiling over hatred Anzu and Yuugi's mom had shown towards one another damn near every time they'd run into one another.

"Jounouchi, you okay?" He picked up the double-meaning to Anzu's question.

"Yeah, I guess I'm even tougher than I thought." A very slight smile crossed Anzu's face for a moment before she and Yuugi's mom took their seats at his table.

"Katsuya Jounouchi." Yuugi's mom spoke with great formality. "I owe you an apology for yesterday; beyond my general conduct, I called you a child when nothing could have been further from the truth."

"Eh?" Jounouchi really, truly did not remember what had happened yesterday; even with the blanks filled in for him by the others, there were still lots of gaps, and Yuugi's mom calling him a child was apparently one of them. "Well, let's let bygones be bygones and focus on what really matters." Jounouchi took another bite out of his waffles.

"Yes, that would probably be best." Again, Jounochi was confused; his memory of Yuugi's mom was of a woman forceful and aggressive, like Anzu dialed up to eleven, probably a big part of why they didn't get along. Now she was all depressed and resigned. Last he saw Yuugi was doing just fine, so what the heck was bothering her?

"Jounouchi, can we talk for a moment?" Anzu jerked her head to a nearby corner where Yuugi's mom wouldn't be able to hear them, and he nodded back to her. They got up and walked away while Yuugi's mom just continued to sit at the table, staring down at it. Seriously messed up.

"So what's going on anyway? I thought Yuugi was doing okay."

"That...that's actually part of it."

....

"So he's been stuck in there this whole time with no one to talk to but his doctor?" Hiroto Honda looked grimly through the one way mirror as Yuugi took a marker to the wall and played tic-tac-toe against himself.

"That was Dr. Ku-Ku's decision, not mine. Ah, and speak of the devil." Seto turned towards the physician who'd just entered the room. "You told me over the phone that Yuugi was recovering more quickly than you'd anticipated?"

"Yes, the pressure to his brain is almost completely gone and he's reported memories that he doesn't understand. I believe that it may be possible to allow visitors after lunch, though I want to keep the number of visitors down to about two at a time; too many people could cause his memories to become even more jumbled than they are at present."

"After lunch..." Mokuba muttered to himself. "I'll go let everyone know." Mokuba made his way to the door.

"Woah, wait up little man." Honda started after him, but paused; something moved in the corner of his eye, but when he turned to look, nothing was there. He just shook his head and followed Mokuba out.

[Scribbler]

“After lunch,” Anzu repeated. She seemed to cling to the words like a lifeline. “And no more than two visitors at a time.” She glanced sideways at Jounouchi, who looked grimly back at her.

“Dr. Ku-Ku wants Yuugi to see a counsellor first,” said Mokuba. “To assess his mental state before reintroducing any of you.”

“That makes sense.” Grimness coated Jounouchi’s words like he had tossed his voice box in a big pot of grim and then left it to stew for an hour. The reality wasn’t too far removed. Seeing Honda had not eased the knot in his stomach that talking to Anzu had produced. His best pal kept looking at him curiously, so Jounouchi resolved to take him to one side and explain the situation with Yuugi’s mom before he exploded.

Mokuba looked between them, frowning a little. “Is … everything all right?” He sensed the atmosphere. There had been one ever since they arrived in Checker City, but now it had the flavour of unease and internal conflict as well as worry and the external conflict between Anzu and Tsubasa that had everyone looking to hide the cutlery.

“Fine, fine, fine,” Anzu replied, forcing a smile. “Thank you, Mokuba.”

He didn’t look convinced, but left to find out when the counsellor would be available to see Yuugi, leaving his family and friends to sit uneasily together in the small café, a mostly untouched breakfast between them.

[cypsiman2]

"I know, I know, I look terrible, let's find something else to talk about, okay?" Ryuji Otogi slumped down into the only remaining seat at the table where everyone had gathered in the little cafe.

"Yes, because the state of your eyeliner is usually so compelling." Jounouchi muttered.

"Jounouchi, just don't." Honda turned his attention to Otogi. "Yeah, you look like crap, don't bring it up if you don't want anyone to mention it." Then he brought Anzu and Tsubasa into view. "Okay, since all of us are here..." He paused; wasn't there someone else at the hospital, back in the Observation Room? Honda shook his head, figuring he must have been imagining things. "Since we're all here, we need to figure out how we're going to divide ourselves up when we go to visit Yuugi. Obviously Jounouchi and I are going to be one of the pairs, so what it really comes down to, is whether you two think you should visit him together or separately."

....

"Hmm, when will I be available to see that adorable little Yuugi boy?" Mokuba had never seen anything quite so incongruous as the contrast between Counsellor Ichikawa and her office; the office was spartan and professional in the extreme, everything so neatly arranged you could tell if a single pin was out of place, while the woman who occupied it was so bright and cheery and...colorful. "Such a terrible case when I got the file, lost all memory of the last five years, can't remember his friends and his mother, bless her soul, has just abandoned him from his point of view. And yet, it looks as though our facilities, drugs, and techniques are already working wonders on him, I wasn't expecting to see him until the end of the week. Such a remarkable boy Yuugi must be, don't you think Mr. Mokuba?"

It took Mokuba a moment to realize that he was actually being given a chance to speak again, the counselor could have filled an entire auditorium with her voice. "He, is a pretty impressive guy, yeah."

"Yes he most certainly is, and what do I have that is more important than assessing the mental state of such a remarkable young man? Nothing at all! Come with me Mr. Mokuba, we have work ahead of us." She then grabbed his arm and dragged him along, leaving Mokuba feeling helplessly bowled over.

[Scribbler]

“Well now.” Counsellor Ichikawa came out of Yuugi’s room dusting off her hands. It was such an odd sight that Anzu wondered what she had been up to in there. Evidently it was an emphatic gesture, however, as she them rammed those same perfectly manicured hands against her hips and addressed their group. “Having interviewed Yuugi, my recommendation matches Dr. Ku-Ku’s. I can’t see a good reason why he shouldn’t be allowed select visitors in small, staggered groups.”

“Staggered groups?” Jounouchi echoed. “What’s that mean?”

“You will be allowed in to see him in the order in which you all met him. If his memories are restored, they will likely reappear in a non-linear order – which is to say, bits and pieces will come back, but not in the order he formed them,. He may remember his fourteenth birthday, followed by a particularly delicious lunch he ate when he was twelve, followed by a test he took just last week. Unfortunately, the reverse is not true. If he becomes confused or disorientated at this stage, it could affect the progress he has made thus far. So we’ll reintroduce you to him in short bursts. His grandfather and mother should visit him first, since he knows them and is used to them visiting him here.”

Anzu swallowed. That would mean she came next after that, since she and Yuugi had known each other in elementary school. “Will … Yuugi knows me as another eleven year old,” she said, raising her hands as if she was still in school. “Won’t the difference in my appearance affect him?” It wouldn’t be like that for anyone else, since he hadn’t met Jounouchi, Honda or Otogi when he was eleven and was already aware of Tsubasa’s hardened exterior and Sugoroku’s extra wrinkles.

“Not if he’s warned beforehand,” Counsellor Ichikawa explained. She raised her hands above her head, fingers intertwined. Her spine popped and she dropped her arms, swinging them by her sides like a little kid and moving her neck from side to side like she wasn’t addressing a group of worried friends and family. Her bedside manner left something to be desire, although she had to be good at her job if Kaiba had chosen to employ her and keep her employed.

A kernel of dread appeared in Anzu’s stomach. She would be the sticking point. The changes in her would be the biggest hurdle for Yuugi to overcome in accepting what had happened and connecting his version of the present with reality. After the drug regimen and the reduction of the swelling on his brain, if he could make that connection between eleven-year-old Anzu and her, maybe it would provide an avenue for his other memories to return. Anzu took a deep breath, but before she could speak, Tsubasa cut her off.

“No.”

“No?” Jounouchi bristled. “Whaddya mean, no?”

Anzu wanted to bristle too. It would have been so much easier to let her battered emotions fall into the familiar pattern of loathing they had held for years. Was Tsubasa trying to make sure Yuugi didn’t remember things? Was she going to try and keep him the way he was so she could have that second chance at being a real mother to him?

“You can’t keep me out,” she started to say.

Tsubasa shook her head. “That’s not what I meant.” Her voice was low, her tone blank, as if all her emotions had been washed away, leaving only indifference. If it hadn’t been for her confession the night before and the tense line of her shoulders, Anzu could have believed that tone. “I want you to have my place, Anzu. You and Sugoroku are to go in together.”

“What?”

“You heard me.” Tsubasa then took the unprecedented move of turning away from them and walking towards the door. “You go.”

“Tsubasa –” Sugoroku called after her, but she pulled open the door and shut it firmly behind her.

[cypsiman2]

Tsubasa Mutou stood on the other side of the door and wiped away the first of the tears that broke through. "I can't do this." The admission shook her. "I can't make him remember all that." The times when she'd come back when she couldn't avoid it, the times she'd left as soon she could without saying a word, without even telling him she was going. It didn't matter that she'd never said she was going to stay, the hurt had been done. To make him relive those memories, help put them back in the order that she'd put them in the first time around, unforgivable.

"What do you think you're doing?" Tsubasa turned and saw Anzu standing there, kicking the door shut behind her. "Yuugi is expecting you; Counselor Ichikawa told him that you and his Grandpa would be the first to visit him, so if I go in your place he'll be confused and his memories might get jumbled up so bad that we can't fix them again. So why are you being so selfish and childish?"

Tsubasa simply didn't have the fight left in her, the past few days had been so draining, so exhausting, she was so far past her limit she couldn't even see it anymore. "Yuugi shouldn't remember me, he shouldn't remember all the times that I've hurt him. He should just have all the happy memories that he's made with you and his other friends."

"No." Anzu's voice was so firm, where was she getting all that strength from. "It doesn't work like that, you can't pick and choose the chapters of your own life story. Yuugi needs all of his memories back, good and bad, like the pieces of a puzzle..." Suddenly Anzu stopped, spoke silently to herself. She shook her head and resumed speaking out loud. "The point is, that you and his Grandpa are his family, you are the only ones who can lay the foundation for the rest of us. So you go back in there, you face your son, and you own up to everything you've done, you got that?"

A pregnant pause descended upon the space between them. Tsubasa closed her eyes, squeezed out a few more tears before wiping them away. "You're right Anzu. I...I need to stop running away; from my son, from that day, from myself." She took several deep breaths, and opened the door to go back in. She caught sight of Anzu rushing over to her friends and quietly discussing something with them, but there was no time to listen in on that. She rejoined Sugoroku. "I'm sorry about that. Shall we go see Yuugi?"

"Yes, I think we will."

[Scribbler]

“Did you seriously just do that?”

Anzu kept her eyes fixed ahead, her mind whirling with possibilities.

Jounouchi, however, kept pushing it. “Did you seriously just get her to come back when she tried to leave? I thought you hated her.”

“She’s Yuugi’s mother,” Anzu said tightly.

“Yeah but … Anzu, for the past few days you’ve been acting pretty nuts. Now suddenly you’re pulling a one-eighty and making like you like her? It’s just a little random, even for you.”

Without looking, she reached up, grabbed his collar and dragged him down to her height. “I never said I liked her. I said that she. Is. Yuugi’s. Mother. Okay?”

“Okay,” he croaked. “Breathing … becoming … an issue.”

“Anzu, let him go,” said Honda.

She did so, snapping her arms back into their folded position like a piece of elastic. She watched the door close behind the counsellor, Tsubasa and Sugoroku, and hoped she had done the right thing. Biting the inside of her cheek, she headed for the door to the observation room. “I’m going to watch,” she said. “Are you guys coming, or what?”

Rubbing at the back of his neck, Jounouchi assented. Then he patted himself all over and turned in a small circle, panic crossing his features. “Where did I put –”

“Here,” Otogi sighed. He held up a hand, the Millennium Puzzle dangling from his outstretched index finger. “You’d be lost without someone to babysit you, wouldn’t you, mutt?”

“Hey!”

“Move it along, you two.” Honda shoved both of them inside after Anzu and kicked the door shut behind them.

[cypsiman2]

"Mom! Grandpa!" Yuugi had been seated on his bed, but the moment he saw them enter his room, he ran up and embraced the both of them in a tight hug. It had been so long since Sugoroku had been hugged by his grandson, he didn't even mind the minor slight that Yuugi had called out to his mother before him. Indeed, it would have been churlish of him if he had minded.

"As adorably wonderful as this exuberant display of emotion is, I'm afraid we simply have to get to business." Counselor Ichikawa spoke in her seemingly perpetually peppy voice; even though the fact that Kaiba was employing her meant that she had to be more than qualified, he still had his doubts. "Now Yuugi, you understand the purpose of these meetings, yes?"

Yuugi nodded as he reluctantly let go of his family. "We're going to talk, and put my memory back together, like the pieces of a puzzle."

"But this puzzle is a little more delicate, you can't just put the pieces down in any order. But, that's enough from me, my job here is observation, so shutting up now." Scratch peppy, Sugoroku wondered if she even had a mental filter.

"Now then." Tsubasa spoke. She got down onto her knee to look Yuugi in the eye. "You've grown up so much."

"I don't know...everyone says I'm sixteen now, but I don't really look it." Sugoroku saw the tears welling in Tsubasa's eyes, and the fretful look that Yuugi reacted with. "I'm sorry Mom, I didn't mean to upset you."

"No, Yuugi, you've done nothing wrong, and I'm going to need you to be quiet and listen, because this is very, very difficult, and if it weren't for a certain young lady, I couldn't even do this much. So please, let me explain, about what's happened over the last five years, as best as I can." Sugoroku put his hand down onto Tsubasa's shoulder. She looked up at him.

"I'll help fill in the gaps too."

[Scribbler]

“You reckon she really will tell him everything?” Jounouchi asked as they watched through the one-way mirror.

“She can’t,” Anzu replied.

“Huh?”

“She doesn’t know everything. That’ll be up to us.”

“Yeah, but … with her in the room? I don’t think she’d be too hot on learning all about … y’know.” Jounouchi gestured at the Puzzle in Anzu’s hands.

“That’s why we’re going to try putting the Puzzle on Yuugi again,” Anzu said quietly. They had discussed it, and though there were risks, as long as they explained to the spirit what was going on, it was the best option they had to help Yuugi remember such a big part of his life without alarming his mother and potential having her whip him away in a cloud of (belatedly) maternal dust.

Otogi shook his head. “This is all really chance.”

“And you’d know, right?” Jounouchi sniped. “Look, between the two of us, we rely mostly on chance for our duelling. It stands to reason it’d come down to the same thing now.”

“How does it stand to reason?”

“I dunno. It just does. Honda, back me up here.” Jounouchi looked at his best friend. “Honda?”

“Hmm?” Honda tore his gaze from the shadowed corners of the room. “What?”

“You seem pretty distracted there.”

“What? Oh. Well, wouldn’t you be?” Honda asked hastily. He joined them at the glass, where their breath almost fogged it from being so close. “I hope this works.”

“You and me both,” Anzu murmured. “So who’s going to volunteer to host the spirit for a minute while we explain what’s going on?”

Jounouchi’s expression turned pained, but even as he opened his mouth to volunteer, Otogi cut him off.

“I’ll do it. I’ve known Yuugi a shorter time than any of you, so his mother can predict me the least. If I go in there wearing this ugly thing, she’ll question it less.”

“I’ll go in with you, then,” Anzu assented. “Jounouchi, Honda, are you okay to come in third?”

“Sure.” Jounouchi watched Otogi carefully. “Be careful, dude. It’s … not a fun experience.”

“I’ll bear that in mind, mutt,” Otogi replied breezily, taking the chain and slipping it over his head.

….

“Big Brother, are you sure you don’t want to be there –”

“I’m sure, Mokuba.”

Mokuba bit his lip. He didn’t like this.

[cypsiman2]

"Big Brother." Mokuba was driven on two accounts; one being concern for his brother, the other concern for Anzu. The addition of the second concern drove him that much stronger. "Yuugi needs all his friends and family to be there to help get his memory back together. If you don't go down there, there's going to be a big chunk of his memories out of place and he's not going to be able to participate in Battle City."

"...We are not friends."

"Fine, that's okay, you want to be stupid and stubborn about this, I get it." He did, the things Gozaburo did to his brother, they would have crushed any desire for human companionship out of anyone, much less a grimly determined ten-year old child. "But Yuugi saved us, he saved both of us, you owe him this."

"I'm already repaying Yuugi."

"It won't count if you don't do it properly." At last, his brother looked him in the eye.

"I fear for your enemies when you get them." Seto got up and made his way towards the door, making the meaning of his peculiar words perfectly clear to Mokuba as he followed behind.

....

"You're certain that this won't hurt my Partner?" It had been one thing to see Jounouchi talking like the other Yuugi, but Otogi...eesh.

"According to the doctors, the better part of the physical damage has been taken care of, so we're working on the psychological." Anzu explained. "You have a big chunk of his memories with you, so we need you to make sure he gets them back safe and sound."

"All right, and I'll be more careful this time; if Yuugi's soul room looks like it can't handle my presence, I'll withdraw immediately." Otogi then slumped a bit, and then stood back up, distinctly green around the gills.

"You know, sometimes I wondered what it would be like to wear the Puzzle; Yuugi can keep it."

[Scribbler]

….

Tsubasa and Sugoroku exited Yuugi’s room with much hand-holding and wringing. Sugoroku was struck by the change in his daughter-in-law. In a relatively short amount of time she had converted from an ice-queen to … less of an ice-queen. Around Yuugi, certainly, she was actually emotional and no longer seemed to mind people observing it. She was still reticent around his friends, but at least she seemed to have reached, if not peace, than at least a stalemate of anger with Anzu.

The two nodded at each other as Sugoroku and Tsubasa passed. The pairings they had chosen surprised him; Anzu and Otogi? Still, he supposed they knew what they were doing. Spotting the Millennium Puzzle around Otogi’s neck gave him hope. He had wanted to tell Yuugi so much more than he could with Tsubasa around. Maybe his grandson’s link with the spirit would be the spark needed to get back the Yuugi they all knew and loved.

Maybe.

….

“Honda, why do you keep looking around like that?” Jounouchi demanded.

“I dunno,” he admitted. “Something just feels really weird in here.” He looked back at the one-way mirror. “Oh, hey, look. Anzu and Otogi are in there with that weirdo counsellor woman. Won’t she be a problem?”

“I hope not. Anzu seems to know what she’s doing.”

“You think so?”

“I don’t know what to think anymore.”

“How are they gonna get Yuugi to put on the Puzzle without looking suspicious? Come to think of it, how long will he need to wear the thing before it does something to his brain? That woman might make them take it off him before it does any good, like that nurse back in Domino General. Who knows? We could’ve fixed Yuugi right off if she hadn’t done that.”

“I don’t know, okay?” Jounouchi heaved a sigh, but choked on it when Yuugi’s mom and grandfather entered the observation room. Leaned close to Honda, he hissed, “Showtime.”

[cypsiman2]

"Anzu?" Yuugi stared at her with blinking eyes.

"Yes Yuugi, it's me. How are you feeling?" The gentleness and care she demonstrated with Yuugi, it was equal and opposite to the rage and fury she'd unleashed upon his mother. Otogi couldn't help marveling at the contrast.

"I'm feeling okay, I guess. I'm still confused about a lot of things." He looked at himself in the mirror. "We, we got to the same high school together, right? Because we're 16 and everything, right?"

"Yes Yuugi, we go to Domino High together, but there's a lot more we need to talk about before we get to that part." Otogi decided to leave this part to them; their attention was so utterly wrapped up in one another, they weren't going to notice him at all. Instead, he walked over to Counselor Ichikawa. He gave her a quick look, and got just the smile he wanted from her. Perfect.

"Excuse me, Counselor Ichikawa?"

"Young man, you don't have to be so formal with me, you're not my patient; just call me Miranda." Hmm, now that he looked for it, he could see the American features to her face; maybe an American parent, or more likely grandparent.

"It would be my pleasure Miranda. Now, I got to be honest, there's something I need to talk to you about."

"What is it?" Half her attention was still upon Yuugi and Anzu, taking notes on what they said and how Yuugi seemed to be reacting.

"You see this big, bulky, gaudy piece of jewelry I'm wearing?"

"Yes, it looks intricate and expensive."

"It's also Yuugi's, and it has a great deal of sentimental value to him. I can't help but think that if he were to start wearing it around the right time in his memories, that it would really help put things back where they belong. You're the psychologist, you tell me if that makes any sense or not."

"Oh, it most certainly does young man! Both people and objects can be very significant triggers for memories, and if this item is as important to Yuugi as you say it is, then he certainly should get it back at just the right time." She then noticed a lull in the conversation between Anzu and Yuugi, and stepped forward. "Excuse me, Miss Anzu?" She whispered into Anzu's ear, obviously taking care to make sure that Yuugi didn't hear anything prematurely.

"Yes, we're getting to that part very soon."

"Very good."

[Scribbler]

Anzu perched on Yuugi’s bed. “We’ve been together since elementary school.”

“I remember that part,” Yuugi broke in, relief evident in his voice. “You borrowed my Gameboy.”

“I broke your Gameboy,” she corrected. “You were kind to me when I was on the outs with my friends and I thought I had to be mean to you to get back in with them.”

His brows knitted. “Really?”

She nodded. “I finally confessed it on the last day of vacation before we started high school.”

His frown increased. “I … don’t remember that.”

She smiled sadly. “It took all my courage to tell you. I thought you might think I was shallow. Well, I was, but I worried you might think I was still shallow, which I wasn’t anymore. Not as much, anyway.” She swallowed. “Knowing you … changed me, Yuugi. You have this uncanny ability to change people just by being yourself. That’s always been the same, whether you were sixteen, or ten, or a hundred.”

His eyes widened. “Please don’t tell me I’m actually a hundred and you’re all being super nice because you don’t want to tell me.”

She laughed. “No, you’re sixteen.”

He nodded seriously. “I’m trying to feel like I’m sixteen.”

She bit her lip. “You want to be?”

He hesitated before saying, “Yes.”

“Then … maybe this will help.” She turned to look at Otogi.

[cypsiman2]

"Here you go." Yuugi watched as Otogi took off the big golden pendent he was wearing, his shoulders relieved as the chains left them, and handed it off to Anzu.

"Yuugi, this is the Millennium Puzzle, the one you'd been working on since you were eight years old."

"You mean I finished it? Did, did I get my wish?" Yuugi felt a warmth he couldn't name fill his being, there was something about the finished puzzle that called out to him, spoke to him, wanted him.

"I'd say so, and you've got a lot of memories tied up in this, and you finished it not long after High School started." She told him about how he'd been working on it in class, about how Jounouchi and Honda bullied him and she protected him, about how he'd told her about the puzzle and the wish, about how Ushio had beaten Jounouchi and Honda and tried to extort protection money from him, and how Jounouchi had returned the last stolen piece back to him through his Grandpa. Then she paused. "After that, only you know what happened after that." Anzu held the puzzle tight in her hands. "Do you think you're ready Yuugi?"

"Yes." Yuugi nodded firmly. "I, I think I've got all the pieces together now."

"All right." The tension in Anzu's shoulder's was visible. "Here you go." She handed the puzzle to him, and he was surprised at how light it felt, the gold and chains should have been much heavier he thought. He felt the puzzle's desire to be worn, to be his, and so he put the chain over his head and felt his eyes droop down.

He opened them again and saw himself in a room full of toys; there were a few small cracks here and there in the walls, but nothing serious he thought. Then he heard a knock at the door. He walked over and opened it entirely by instinct, and gaped at the sight of himself, only with the kind of confidence and posture that he could only dream of. "Partner?" The other him said, his eyes watery. "Are you okay?"

"Yes, I'm fine, but who are you, and why do you call me Partner?" He stepped back a bit and off to the side, to show his other self that he was invited. His other self took a slow and cautious step into the room, like he was worried he might break the floorboards; once his foot was firmly inside, once he was satisfied that nothing was going to break, he took another step in.

"Thank goodness." His other self sighed in relief. "Forgive me partner, but I feared that I might not ever see you again." He then took a seat near a board game. "Here, why don't we play while I try to explain?"