Dark Summons

Summary: After trying to comfort a dangerously sick Yugi, Yami wakes up in a strange world and meets up with the others. Together, they must rescue Yugi. But what happens when the enemy is a friend?

Dark Summons

I

Tall and regal, with tan flesh and fierce crimson and violet eyes, he was a wild head of black and purple hair, and bangs that danced around his head, as though he had tamed the lightning itself with the powers he wielded. He was the Pharaoh, Atemu, a 3000 year old spirit resurrected to dwell once again in the land of the living.

And he was crying.

He wasn't openly crying. Atemu, who was referred to as Yami by those closest to him, didn't think that he had openly cried since his youth, years before his inauguration as Pharaoh of Egypt. Still, however, he could not ignore the tears blurring his vision, the burning behind his eyes, and the wetness on his cheeks.

"Aibou…" he whispered softly.

The boy on whom Yami's mind was focused was currently lying before him, curled up into a tight ball beneath a mass of blankets. His wild hair matched Yami's, but his taming of the storms seemed not to match the Pharaoh's, for he lacked the extra golden bangs that ricocheted through the rest of his hair. At the moment, the boy's face was as white as a sheet, but his cheeks were flushed in fever. His beautiful violet eyes were closed and he shivered weakly in sleep.

Yugi Moto, rightful possessor of the Millennium Puzzle and wielder of a power even he was unaware of, whimpered lightly in a mixture of loneliness and pain.

Yami, who had been standing next to Yugi's bed, feeling useless as his soul raged with terror, moved forward immediately, placing a hand gently upon the boy's quaking shoulder. Yugi's breathing evened out almost immediately, and even the shivering seemed to lessen, as a calmness overcame him. He mumbled something softly under his breath, but it was too low for Yami to hear, and his mind was elsewhere.

"Yugi," he whispered softly. "Aibou."

Yami was frightened. The fear within him had amassed into a giant spiked ball and was currently being thrown viciously from one side of his soul to the next. Yami had seen this sickness before. It was an illness that stole the lives of the innocent. It had taken many of Yami's loved ones in the past.

Not now, he thought desperately. Please… not Yugi, too…

Yami shivered involuntarily, but the cold from which he suffered was an icy kiss to the soul. He was cold on the inside, and no amount of blankets could purge him of such a frozen touch.

"Y-Yami…"

Yami turned at the sound of his name. Yugi was still asleep, curling up like a cat. His face, however, was contorted into a mask of terror and pain. He was shivering violently and whimpering. Every few moments, Yami could hear the child utter his name with weak desperation, as though trying to fight off a demon that he could no battle alone.

"Yami… please… Yami…"

"Aibou," Yami whispered.

He had been reluctant to move closer to his partner. It was not that he feared that Yugi's illness would pass to him (in fact, he would choose to suffer its wrath, so long as it promised that he remained with his Hikari), but that he didn't know how the young boy would react to his presence.

Yami's "body" was a spirit form. While the wind would blow his hair and a couch would sink beneath his added weight, Yami was a ghost, in almost every sense of the word. He could touch his Aibou, for they shared a vessel and Yami's soul-prison, the Millennium Puzzle. Yami could not, however, touch others. He actually usually avoided physical contact with his Aibou, as well, for fear that he might frighten the child away. He didn't think he could bear such a thing.

Now, however… the boy was calling out to him, and Yami dared not ignore his pleas.

Slowly, hesitantly, Yami moved closer to his Aibou and crawled onto the bed, careful not to jostle the child awake. Due to being a spirit, Yami weighed considerably less than he would have had his body been completely physical, and so he didn't need to worry too much.

Keeping his crimson eyes focused on his Hikari, Yami quietly lay down next to the child. Reaching a slender hand up, he tenderly stroked the side of Yugi's face. The boy gave a shivering breath in surprise, and then calmed.

Smiling softly, Yami curled up a little himself and closed his eyes, cherishing the feeling of his Hikari lying so close to him. Something seemed to call to him, and his subconscious answered with a weak murmur, before pulling Yami down into the depths of slumber, burying him deep within a darkness beyond all shadows that he had ever known…