"Hey, you kept him!" Yugi cheered, lifting up the Time Wizard card. "I-I thought you would've thrown it out or something by now..."

 The past is always only one step behind him; close enough to grip him by the collar if he tries to abandon it, but also just out of reach enough to remind him - a little cruelly - that this, too, can disappear. He’s been walking the thin line between remembering and forgetting for so many years that his sense of time is permanently damaged; what’s one or two years receding him? What’s ten? 

What’s Ancient Egypt, a crumbling tomb— - a broken dish in the kitchen when the diner takes on more orders than they can handle and his hands won’t stop shaking with the anxiety that none of this is real? 

He looks to Yugi, who looks at the Time Wizard, and understands that all of this is happening in past tense. They are not saving the world, they are not dueling, the anthropomorphic clock on the card is nothing more but a symbol for times he wants to go back to though, ironically, cannot leave.

The Time Wizard can’t save him anymore. He knows this, but won’t admit it. He just keeps thinking obsessively, if he could just… go back to that time, then… 

                            then… 

                                                              then… 

It’s been a decade since they’d first left Domino City. In his memory, he can still smell the scent of the ocean as the wind blows against him, feel the subtle rock of the ship against the waves as they sail onward to Duelist Kingdom. On the balcony deck, Yugi stands beside him. Joey’s showing off the handful of cards he’d gotten through trading and Yugi shares his enthusiasm. They talk about dueling strategy and Yugi lifts the lid of his Millennium Box, before holding out a card. 

( Every time Joey remembers this, it’s imperative that he places Yugi’s smile. )

                        “Here, add this to your deck. It can be helpful in a tight spot!”                  “Thanks, I’ll take it. I can’t get over how you’re always helpin’ me out!”

‘— -…’ The edges of the card have rounded considerably over the years, it’s gloss diminished by the friction of being pulled from the back sleeve of his wallet one too many times. 

‘You rememba’, Yuug’…?’ He wants to say, but there’s a knot in his chest. He just wants to go back. He just wants to feel the island breeze, the little starships in his palm– - not this. This is the dangerous crossroad where nostalgia fantasy becomes taint with present contrast. It’s something Joey can’t handle, so he tears the flesh on the inside of his cheek ( he’d rather bleed than cry ), and turns away. He doesn’t want to commit such a sad reunion to memory. 

Through his teeth, he lies… unsure for whose sake.

“Oh, ‘dat ol’ t’ing? F’got I even had it.”

a dream, a memory, the past - a happy time joey, tell it us

 In his dream, nobody dies. 

 Everything - as much as it is to be understood - is exactly as it should be. When the TV in Yugi’s living room starts to fuzz with static, Grandpa is still there to smack the sides until the picture clears, and that’s nothing significant—but it’s normal. His soul isn’t taken by a man who does not know how to mourn, isn’t held for ransom at the expense of what the kids don’t yet realize as the end of their youth—————- -

In this dream, they are spared.

“Duelist Kingdom looks like it will be fun!” one of them says. 

For the weeks to come, leading to the tournament, they are too excited to sleep.

 It’s with thrill and bright, wondrous curiosity that leads Serenity to finally unravel the bandages from her eyes, not fear. 

On the other side of surgery is a clear open view of the sea. Her brother does not drown.

She witnesses no death, no unmerciful wrath of God against him… as it should be.

( Because seeing is believing——not disbelieving. )

 Joey knows nothing about Egyptian history, can wield no ancient power. Only the confidence that he knows what he’s about and declares his goalpost with no concern for the alternative. He can save Mai. There’s no question about that. 

In his dream, he does. 

God does not punish him for what he did for love. 

 Atem is so seamlessly woven into his friendship with Yugi that it seems impossible to distinguish which parts are which or who - that trying to dissect something so intimate would only risk making it break. 

Everything is memories. Memories of the past, of a name, of a destiny. Memories of things Joey was never chosen for but his hands have dug in and played a part - and that’s something he can never remove himself from. It is now written into the make up of his very existence, etched with permanence like the hieroglyphs of one King’s tomb. 

There isn’t any dream in which having the Pharaoh stay makes any sense, yet it’s one Joey tries often. The logistics never get very far, but two things are certain: Atem does not have to suffer, and Atem does not have to leave.

 In a world where good and evil are always at ends with each other, good always wins. The heroes survive to see the light of day, and reap the rewards of their feats. The people cheer, the pain subsides, wounds heal. Life goes on - not as punishment, but as a gift. 

Even so, Joey has no grand fantasies like waking up to the woman he loves; safe, healthy, happy—starting the soft, early day to go to a job that fulfills him. Not even the triumph of growing out of ‘the boy who tried saving the world’ and into ‘the man who is saving himself’ takes priority in his dream. It’s something much simpler. Simpler than even his alarm clock not deciding to exhaust it’s battery before morning, or his bike not catching a flat when he needs to get away with stolen goods.

But rather, the quiet, the far away notion that he wakes up wanting to be alive… and it works. 

Because in his dream, nobody dies.

“you can’t save me from this.”

protector / protectee starters

. ———— χαℓℓєт

    ♫. —— She was not a true fighter, she’d always do her best to find peaceful solutions to problems if she can withhold her own pride in check or so she often told herself, but she was a hot head - more so when it came to the well being of those important to her. She’d snapped visibly, the hurt in her features mixed in with her anguish and torment of the words feeling so true.

     ❝ And what makes you think I’ll stop trying?! ❞ It was a shout, and she’d been too late already - years too late trying to salvage her own life and dream and though she’d always said she’d be there it was evident with their current outcome. That that was not the case as her hands had curled into his jacket to almost shake him, a desperate cling to the once boy she’d seen sacrifice himself for his friends over and over - and now he could barely even fight her with how drunk and drugged up he was. He was a mess and every time she saw it it was so much more real than just knowing he was like this.

    Still, there’s the prick of tears showing as her hopelessness fills her faster than her anger can bubble, drowning it out as those fists in his shirt trembled becoming lose and she feels sick at the daunting image of her friend who had drowned himself since long ago.. Her head hung as her voice became timid and and small..

     ❝ I know I’m too late– Maybe you hate me for not being there in truth– But I.. I still want to try.. I could never give up on you.. ❞