| ❖ | Jack Atlas wasn’t the King anymore? Yuusaku could almost scoff at the thought; perhaps he was really out of the loop with the news from New Domino City. But clearly the blond man hasn’t fallen from his high horse completely if his arrogance wasn’t in check.
❝ Yeah, things do change, Jack. I’m not the same kid you once knew. ❞ Learning the truth about his past and confronting his inner demons had been only the first of many steps to walking towards his brighter future. He might not be anywhere close to being ready to settle down peacefully, but at least he was trying, and with other people. His friends.
❝ No, you can’t say the same thing about me. I do have friends here now, as a matter of fact. Friends who can understand how I feel, people who know what we’re fighting for. But you have no idea what’s at stake right now. ❞
No, Jack wouldn’t know. He can’t know. This war with the rouge Ignis was kept under-wraps, otherwise unaffiliated parties would try to intervene. The Zaizen siblings were the only ones outside of the current alliance to have any sort of knowledge of the situation at hand, and that was solely so Akira could act as another line of defense if Team Playmaker were to fail in this mission.
No, Jack can’t be in the know. His identity as Playmaker was still to remain a secret. Hell, even this meeting has to stay a secret – if Lightning were to discover his former ties, he could use them against him. Yusei, Crow, hell even Jack here.
With a sigh, Yuusaku glanced down at his duel disk, Ai’s winking eye looking back at him. Knowing his partner Ignis’s cheeky demeanor, if things here were to escalate too much, he may just intervene in a futile attempt to ‘lighten the mood.’
❝ Why are you even here, Jack? Surely you didn’t come to just bitch about my living quarters again. ❞
Honestly Jack wasn't even sure if he knew Yusaku at any point at all. Of course they grew up together, but the younger one always had been so quiet. Stayed mostly on his own. Yusei somehow had reached him. But Jack never really had bothered to try.
So the other one had friends. It was...kinda relieving to hear but somehow it rubbed him off just the wrong way.
"Well you never gave up the chance to become friends like that." he replied, forced himself to stay calm even though there was some bite in his voice. "Instead you went and replaced not only us, but Yusei as well. He nearly died recently. Twice. But you probably don't care about this either."
For a moment he felt silent, watching the little cleaning robot instead. Yeah... why was he even here? It was the big question, hu? Yusaku probably won't like the answer though.
"You probably won't believe it, but I was worried about you. I haven't heard anything from you for weeks. Wanted to make sure you're actually still alive."
He couldn't look into Yusei’s eyes anymore otherwise. But the other one didn't need to know that.