Author's Notes:

Yes, I know. I have fics to update, yet here I am, writing a oneshot that's related to one of said fics I need to update. (I will update them, though.)

I...honestly have no excuse for writing this. It's with fem!Yami again, but it's not canon to Vessel's Shadow. That is, it doesn't actually happen in it. Think of it as a spin-off, like an AU where Yugi meets his female yami earlier than he actually does, or just an entirely unrelated fic where Yami happens to be female like in Vessel's Shadow.

This is really mostly made as a test run on writing sex. I think I did alright, but I can't say so exactly, considering I'm a virgin. That, and it's to fill the quota for the disappointing lack of Yugi/Fem!Yami smut. Seriously, why is there so little Fem!Yami in this fandom, yet so much Fem!Yugi. It needed to be rectified, so here it is. Hope you enjoy.

It is cold, too cold. The kind of cold that runs through blood when the hairs on the back of the neck stand up, worse than any winter chill. It burns, too bright, too deep, and here, it is too dark.

The mazes run through it, weaving in and out, up and down and spiraling into a never-ending web of stone. It's from them that the cold emanates, from where she steps out.

She reminds Yugi of ghost girls from horror films, the kind he'd only watch from under blankets on a couch while Anzu laughed at the failed special effects beside him. She is pale, too pale, an enigma with eyes the color of torn out hearts and their scarlet puddles. But where there'd be dark hair and a white dress, with or without blood stains, there is hair that mirrors his own but longer, spikier and pierced with more gold, and his own clothes.

Unlike him, she doesn't wear the white shirt over the black buckled one. Unlike him, she stands tall, proud. Confidence rolls off of her lissome frame in waves. A smile, a little too wide, curls her too pale, too cold mouth.

It doesn't fit. None of it fits.

She looks like the kind of girl who'd offer you a kiss with her eyelashes fluttering, then shove a knife through your ribs while sliding her tongue over yours. And that's exactly what she does to him—but the knife is now metaphorical. Her breath is surprisingly warm when it brushes over his mouth.

"Why?" he asks quietly, when she breaks away. The word slips from him before he can stop it, as he feels a lingering chill on his lips.

"Hm?" Yugi tries not to shudder as her tongue finds the point on his throat over his pulse. She nips at it and he jerks, gasping involuntarily.

"Why—why did you—" He closes his eyes, trying to find his voice. When he does, it only comes out as broken as before. "—you—you ki-killed him—"

She doesn't respond. Her mouth moves over the nipped point as she starts to suck, and he feels something in his knees give out when she winds her hand through his hair for good measure. When she pulls lightly at the roots, nails over his scalp as she drags her tongue along the line of his neck, he starts to sink.

"The man on death row?" Her voice is disarmingly smooth, too calm to be normal. She murmurs it lowly against his throat, her lips barely moving, and he can't see her eyes, the look of a murderer still in them. "Oh—him. He deserved it."

He doesn't realize what he's doing, or know how he'll respond to that, until he's sitting on the floor, the stone hard and cold under him while she presses closer. Closer, until he can feel her chest against his, his thundering heartbeat making up for her lack of one. He jerks again when she finds his collar bone, tracing the dip in the middle with her tongue. Cold, cold, so cold when she does that, when she does this, and oh, he wants her to do it again.

Through half-lidded eyes, gasping, groaning, Yugi can barely think. Or maybe he can't at all. He doesn't think when his hands, desperate to find something to do, fumble up over her shirt—his shirt, the one he wore earlier today, the black one with the straps and the buckles he hides under his school uniform. Somehow, his fingers slide under, and they only find more cold.

She gives some kind of noise, against the crook of his neck, when his fingertips find her chest. Hesitantly, he moves a thumb over a hard point. He starts to stroke, and this time she's the one who convulses. But there's no gasp, no moan of pleasure, only ragged breathing that's sharp in his ear and almost inhuman.

He tries to get his thoughts back together. He has to remember, he can't forget how she'd killed that convict in Burger World just earlier today. How those flames had consumed the man until there was nothing of him left, a fiery inferno swallowing him up while the acrid smell of burning flesh had filled the air. How he had felt it pulsing from her, the things that'd tipped him off to the other one in his body, his mind—the sheer fury, the hatred, the satisfaction that he'd gotten what she believed he deserved.

None of which Yugi had felt. He couldn't, he can't—how can he when such a life was thrown away so casually?

"But—you—you murdered him," he whispers. "How can you just—?"

"—I did the right thing." She sucks in a breath, cutting herself off, as his fingers clench of their own accord, stroking, groping. From the way her face is buried into his throat, her teeth starting to scrape lightly over the slope where his shoulder meets the base of his neck, he can only imagine her expression.

There's a chill that runs under his skin at how resolutely she says it, so immovable. How can she, he wonders. How can she say that so calmly? No normal human being would be so casual about murder, no matter whose life in particular had been taken by their hands.

But then again, Yugi thinks, as she pushes forward into his hand and teases his jawline with her tongue while working her fingers under his pajama shirt, she isn't normal. She isn't even human, not like him, anyway. She is an ancient force wrapped in the body of a girl who appears another age entirely, that of the girls in his class who gossip and pass notes and fiddle with the sleeves of their rose pink uniform jackets. An age that doesn't suit the haunted look in her eyes.

"That wasn't..." Yugi tries to find the right words, struggling for them as a fish on land gasps for water. They're already hard enough to find on their own without her fingers unbuttoning his shirt and pushing it off of his shoulders to stroke the skin underneath. Without the cloth, he feels exposed, too vulnerable.

"Wasn't what?" He sucks in a sharp breath as her hand slides downwards, the thumb finding the top of his boxers and slipping underneath. It finds the growing hardness against his stomach and squeezes. Involuntarily, he bucks forward with a gasp, his hand squeezing in return, and she groans as her other hand works in through his pajama pants to slide them off of his legs.

"It wasn't—it's not—" His words come out as broken stutters, helplessly grasping at some counterargument that immediately dissolves into mindless moaning as she starts to stroke. Her fingertips brush leisurely over the length, dragging lightly across the underside and over and back again, twisting around the top until he can't think at all except for just how good it feels, how the pleasure leaves heat roiling through to his core and he needs more. More.

"It's not what?" Yugi grits his teeth at the purr in her voice, how he knows she's smirking without having to look at her. She sounds so smug, almost amused, the note in her tone is even playful. Teasing. As if he's stupid, childish for being horrified at what she's done.

His fingers move of their own volition, almost in tandem with hers. While hers continue to stroke and drag, so painfully slowly that he thinks he'll go completely out of his mind if she doesn't let him finish, his retreat from under her shirt to reach up and unbuckle it. They're clumsy, trying to pull apart the numerous workings and tugging at it.

She laughs lightly into his ear, and her voice is low enough to make his insides feel like mush. The amused note still lingers in her voice. "Are you really that eager to get that off?"

As if to illustrate her point, she squeezes. Hard. Yugi nearly bucks completely off of the floor, his hand jerking from her shirt and catching on a strap, but his legs completely give way for him to crumple again when she starts stroking again.

"I don't—" He can't think of a coherent response when his mind is nonexistent at this point, too clouded with pleasure to think. "If mine's off, then—then yours should be, too."

"Hm." That's all she offers for a response, but even that single word is enough to travel south.

Shakily, he undoes the strap. He pushes with the heel of his hand and the shirt slides, opening across her chest. She absentmindedly shifts a shoulder so that it falls away, landing on the floor in a crumpled heap of black.

Her hand twists, jerking over his length and her thumb sliding over the top. Something in his core snaps, releases, and he groans as he comes. Dimly, he registers the wetness now leaking from between his legs, dripping into his boxers. She withdraws her hand, and he sees the whiteness gleaming across her fingertips, sticking together in long strings that she dips her head towards so she can lick them away.

She stares at him all the while as she does it. It's almost unnerving, it should be unnerving, but Yugi can't bring himself to look away.

No. He has to focus. Focus, right? He has to get it through to her that what she's doing is wrong, she has to stop, she can't distract him—

But oh. His mouth is terribly dry as her tongue flicks out over her fingers, laving across them before moistening her lips. He can't help but wonder what else she could do with that tongue. What else she could do to him, if he let her. If he wanted to...

No. No. He does not want this. He does not want this. She is insane. She is inhuman. She lives in his Puzzle, she has broken people's minds and murdered a man in cold blood, she has no form of her own except his body. He should want to be rid of her, he should not want her—

Yugi runs this all through his head as he tries to concentrate. He tries to find the words to voice them in.

And they all die in his throat because she gives one more lick of her fingertips before she pushes them against his chest. This time, he feels the floor coming up to meet his back, the icy stone against his bare skin. She braces her hands on either side of him, strands of her hair—the hair like his own—falling to brush as light as feathers over his cheek. Her chest touches his, pushing into his, but where his heart beats, there is none for her.

Her eyes are piercing, devouring. So full of sheer want, something he never dreamed would be directed at him, that he finds himself returning the gaze.

Slowly, her hand—the same one she used to give him pleasure and lick clean—comes up to slide across his face. Her fingers cup his chin, grasping the bone of his jawline and starting to stroke.

"I know I did the right thing," she says softly, and her voice is like liquid silk. "Because it was for you. I do so much for you. Don't I?"

Yugi stares at her, once again at a loss. "...But that doesn't make it right," he whispers. He almost regrets it—almost—when he sees the hardening in her eyes.

"He deserved it." Her voice grows cold, her grip tightening. He represses a wince. "He would have killed Anzu. He would have killed Jounouchi and everyone else. He was willing to hurt them—should I not have done anything to help them? I saved them. I saved you."

"That doesn't mean you had to kill him." His voice nearly cracks, but his words are clear. He returns her gaze steadily, and she blinks. "The police would have handled him—you didn't have to—"

"But I did." Now her voice is softer. "I still did. I don't regret it."

Yugi has to bite his lip to keep from screaming out in frustration. "Why? You just—you took a man's life. You killed him. What—what gives you the right to decide who lives and who dies?"

For one long, long moment, she says nothing. Something in her eyes shifts, stiffens. When she speaks, she sounds like someone teetering in an abyss.

"I do not decide that." Something in her voice cracks. "The shadows have that power. I merely give them what they need for it to be used."

Neither she nor Yugi moves for what seems to be hours. The way she speaks the word—shadows—strikes something deep within Yugi's memory. He recalls it from the recesses.

The one who solves me shall gain the powers and wisdom of darkness, he remembers. He doesn't realize he's said it out loud until he sees her staring at him.

"The powers and wisdom of darkness," he repeats. The words are awkward on his tongue, but they make sense. "...The shadows. That's what they are. Aren't they?"

She continues to stare at him, her expression inscrutable. It lasts until, just as he begins to think she will not respond at all, she speaks again. "Yes. I...suppose they are."

Her hand releases its grip on his jaw, coming away to instead comb through his hair and smooth through its fringes. There is no sound from either of them other than slow, slow breathing. It's just as much from her as it is from him, which Yugi thinks should be more than a little odd, considering what she is.

What she is—Yugi doesn't fully understand any of it except what is now here, her fingers raking over the spikes in his hair and over his scalp as her other hand fumbles, yanking his boxers down. Without another thought, he gives a kick to push them away and into a pile on the floor to join the other discarded clothes. Her pants, the same dark blue ones he wore just today at school, follow thereafter. It's a moment later with a glimpse that he realizes, belatedly, she also wears boxers.

Of course she wears boxers, you idiot. She's the other you. Remember?

Yugi remembers all too well. But it feels so distinctly off, that this girl is purportedly him, his other half, himself, the darker side—when there's that one gender difference to offset it. It's all like a twisted game, of yin and yang, feminine and masculine, that neither of them knows the rules to.

This would be his first time. Both of their first times, really. Which, if he stops to think about it, is more than a little strange. When he had learned what sex was, he'd gradually developed an idea of what he'd wanted his first time to be like—and the porn tape stash had helped in that department. It would be with a girl with eyes beautiful to look into, with shapely curves and long legs. It would be slow, sweet and warm, the kind where neither of them would leave before the other had woken up. The location varied: maybe a bed, maybe a beach, maybe the floor, but it came down to being more about what it'd be than where it was.

For some reason, whenever he'd pictured what the girl would look like, she always resembled Anzu. And it'd be that point when he'd start feeling sick with himself, ashamed he was having such fantasies about a girl he'd known since they'd still had baby teeth. He respected her far too much to relegate her to the starring role of his less than innocent dreams. Those and his personal life felt like entirely different worlds in their level of separation, and he wanted it to stay that way.

But now...he would be lying if he said he didn't think this was lower than the last kind of first time he'd anticipated. For one thing, the girl is nowhere near as curvy or long-legged as the one in his fantasies because she is him, and he is her. And her eyes—he can't call them beautiful, not when they pierce through his skin and rake over him with that hunger, an insatiable longing like that of a succubus.

When she sinks, she clutches even harder at his hair, her chest presses into his and his heartbeat pulses over her lack of one as her hips rock against his. The moaning is loud and long and he's pretty sure it's from both of them, he thinks, but he can't tell because how can he, when her voice runs into his?

His hands find her waist and they grab, pushing her. For a second, he grabs too hard, so much that his fingerprints could leave bruises if she had a physical form and he immediately loosens his grip. But she doesn't care. She only keeps rocking, sliding in between his legs, wet and slippery and so cold. Why is she so cold?

He thrusts upwards, once, or maybe twice. Three times, four, until it makes a rhythm that pounds relentlessly, his breaths in shredded gasps as he arches against her and she makes a noise in the back of her throat to sink her hips against him further. The angle is awkward, his knees give way as she straddles him and she moves her head to close her lips over his open mouth. Her tongue flicks over his teeth and he shudders because it's like ice, like her.

"You killed him," Yugi repeats lowly, breathlessly. He kisses her, again. Her mouth is still cold, but not unresponsive. He murmurs the words against her lips, it's all he can do while he still can't think straight enough to keep it all in order.

"You killed him, you burned him to death and I'm afraid of you." The words come tumbling out in a stream of near-gibberish, but he knows she hears them all. He thrusts, his hips snap up, and she rocks into him again.

"I'm afraid—" It comes out as a hoarse whisper. Rock. Thrust. Thrust. "—I'm afraid of what you can do. What—what you'll do again, why you'll do it—again—"

"All for you," she murmurs fervently, her eyes dilated, sweat beading her face as it's flushed with no actual heat to it. Slickly, he pulls, she pushes forward, so tight and so cold. "I do so much for you—just for you—"

At that, Yugi only wants to ask why. Why him, of all people? Why the loser, the one always last? He isn't worth this. Is he? How can anyone be worth murdering for?

It's fire, all fire. Black like ashes and white like heat that isn't there, only replaced by cold. The cold of stone walls and shadows that never really leave. It still burns against him, through him, streaming in heat that's not heat until he's mindlessly clawing at the skin of her shoulders and pounding into her so the fire continues. An inferno, all cold, all icy burning and consuming and leaving him helpless, in ashes.

When she slides against him, one final time, it's lost in a burst of bliss, a scream he isn't aware that's leaving his throat until he hears it as white drips down around their legs. Stars fill his vision, blinking in sight around his eyes until they're all he sees.

Absently, he thrusts again, only a few more times until the sensation of euphoria begins to fade. Dimly, as if from far away, he feels fingertips cup his face and smooth over his jawline. The touch leaves delicate trails of cold burning in its wake, raking over his skin, and he shivers.

She buries her head into the crook of his neck, her lips finding the pulse point over his throat. Slowly, his arms wrap around her, holding her to him. When he skims his fingertips just the lightest bit over her sides, he finds ridges of bone under frigid skin, pale with perhaps the slightest hint of gold.

"So warm," she murmurs into his skin. "So kind. So generous. And you ask me why I do it all for you, for you..."

It is cold, too cold. And he knows, someday, he has to change that.

(More) Author's Notes:

Please review and let me know what you think.