[May 25th] [Yu-Gi-Oh!/The Wild Wild West-related] Reasons of Existence

[insaneladybug.livejournal.com]

Title: Reasons of Existence
Day/Theme: May 25th - You're selfish and a coward, yet you can hold my hand even tighter
Series: Yu-Gi-Oh!/The Wild Wild West-related (based on The Night of the Poisonous Posey for the latter)
Character/Pairing: Duke Devlin, Snakes Tolliver
Rating: K+/PG

Continuing from that piece earlier this month with Duke and Slim Marcus.


By Lucky_Ladybug

Duke Devlin had met many strange characters since he had fled to Los Angeles County and taken up working for Slim Marcus in his casino.

Of course, Slim himself was one of those strange characters. An ex-con looking for a fresh start, he was dark and brooding and sometimes had a penchant for drinks late in the night and talking with Duke if he decided to hang around.

When Duke wanted a more cheerful atmosphere, he sought out Tony Earle, another casino manager. Tony was friendly and welcoming, despite Duke working for Slim, and he often bemoaned not having been able to hire Duke first.

Duke played poker and other games of chance with people he knew, such as Bandit Keith Howard, and with complete strangers. Some he never saw again, but other times some of them came back, wanting another go at winning.

One of the repeat customers was among the most unusual of Slim’s patrons. He went by the name of Snakes Tolliver, and from the snake-shaped hypertrophic scar on his left cheek, it was obvious why. Most times he appeared wearing clothing that was stylish and fresh and yet looked like it had originated in the days of the casino riverboats in the America of the Old West. He would sit across from Duke with his cards, smirking as he chomped on a cigar between his teeth. He looked quite young in spite of the cigar and the scar; Duke had the feeling that he was at least partially putting on airs, pretending to be tough and confident.

“You keep a lot of secrets, Snakes,” Duke commented one evening as Snakes swept the winnings towards him.

“Everybody keeps some, pal,” Snakes drawled. He sounded like he hailed from the Deep South. Duke could easily imagine him as a Confederate soldier during the Civil War, if the time period was the 1860s and not the 2010s.

. . . Of course, there was his unique manner of apparel, which Duke had already thought was similar to clothing from that era. But since time travel had never been proven and Snakes seemed quite integrated in the present day, Duke scoffed at the concept whenever it came into his mind. He was just letting it wander down ridiculous paths.

Nevertheless, once the idea had taken hold, he found it was not easy to shake it. Mainly because, if time travel was real by any stretch of the imagination, maybe there was still hope for Duke’s friend, dead these long and painful years after becoming involved in some of Duke’s problems. It was because Duke still could not adjust to that death, and because he blamed himself for it happening, that he had fled to Los Angeles in the first place.

Duke crossed his arms on the table. Naturally he could not suddenly spring such a topic as time travel on Snakes. He would have to quietly build up to it. He had been trying to do that for several meetings, but had always been warded off. This time he was determined to arrive at it.

“Well,” he said at last, “I mean, you’ve never said even simple things about yourself. Like where you’re from.”

Snakes shrugged. “My accent gives that away, doesn’t it?”

“Somewhat.” Duke leaned back, twirling a piece of hair around his finger. “You’re in here a lot. I’m just curious about the people I play poker with night after night.”

“Nothing much to tell.” Snakes counted up the money, making sure it was all there.

“I bet there’s a lot to tell,” Duke countered. “Such as why you like to dress like it’s 150 years ago.”

Snakes paused, one hand suspended over the bills. “There’s other people around here that do that,” he said. “They go to those . . . what do you call ’em? Conventions?”

“Yeah, but they usually stop dressing like that when the convention’s over,” said Duke.

“I guess I just live in two different times,” Snakes said. He got up, shoving the bills into his coat pocket and taking off his hat to collect the chips.

Duke sobered. He knew the feeling. Part of him was always back in the era when David was alive, no matter how he had tried to get over it. When he blamed himself for David’s death, he could never fully put the past aside.

“Maybe a lot of us do,” he said at last.

Something about his changed manner and his words made Snakes pause and look over at him. “What’s the matter with you?” he asked.

“A lot,” Duke said flatly. He leaned forward. “And maybe I’m wrong, but I started wondering if you might be able to help me with some of it.”

Snakes looked both weirded out and apprehensive. “Just what could I help you with?” he frowned.

Duke stood and placed his hands on the table as he leaned forward some more. “If you’ve come here from the past, don’t worry; I won’t reveal your secret.” He kept his voice low. “I just want to know how you did it so I can go to the past and save my friend from dying.”

Instead of laughing it off, Snakes stared at him, the color draining from his face. “You . . . you really think I’m . . .”

“I know, it’s crazy and ridiculous and I could get thrown in the nuthouse for saying it.” Duke’s fingers curled as he regarded Snakes in sheer heartbroken desperation. “But if you have the secret of time travel, I’ll pay you for it.”

Snakes’ eyes glimmered. That offer had definitely reached him. “How much?” he queried, cautiously.

“More than you could probably imagine. But I’d have to have results first,” Duke asserted. “I wouldn’t just pay you on good faith, figuring you’d deliver. You could just run out on me with my money.”

Snakes considered that and slowly started to smirk. “You’re no fool.” He dropped the last of the chips into his hat. “The problem is, pal, I didn’t come here in a machine or anything like that. It’s a portal, and it only goes back to my time, as far as I know.”

“Maybe it could be doctored to go to other times and places,” Duke persisted.

“Maybe,” Snakes said noncommittally. “But some scientists already tried that and didn’t have any luck.”

“I’ll find a way,” Duke vowed in determination. “Even if it takes me the rest of my life, I’ll get my friend back.”

“You know, I think you really mean that,” Snakes mused. “Maybe we could work out some kind of deal.”

Duke relaxed. “Good,” he said. “That’s what I want to hear.”
****
Snakes was both self-serving and a coward, but he hadn’t been lying about the portal. Upon Duke’s request, Snakes directed him to the thing on top of Mt. San Antonio just outside of Los Angeles. It was a bizarre phenomenon, basically a doorway suspended in the sky. When Duke stepped through, he found himself on the outskirts of an Old West town, in an Old West time. He came back, his eyes shining with enthusiasm and amazement over the experience.

“This is incredible!” he declared. “There has to be some way to get to other points in time, if not through this portal, then maybe by making another one. How did this one get here?”

Snakes stuck his hands in his pockets and shrugged. “It had something to do with an electricity overload,” he said. “It opened up a hole in the space-time continuum and this happened.”

Duke fingered the portal. “What could cause an overload of this magnitude?” he breathed. “What could possibly . . .”

“Uh heh . . .” Snakes adjusted his hat, suddenly looking uncomfortable. “You’ve heard of Dr. Frankenstein, I suppose.”

Duke blinked and looked back. “Well, yeah. So?”

“So that’s what caused the overload—someone acting like Dr. Frankenstein and ending up trying to do too much at once.”

Duke stared at him. “You’re serious.”

Snakes nodded. “I’m serious.” But suddenly he looked worried. “You’re not going to get ideas about doing that yourself, are you?!”

Duke sighed. “I don’t think so. I mean, with embalming and stuff like that, I . . . I really couldn’t think about trying to revive a dead body that’s been gone more than a few hours. I have to focus on making sure the death just doesn’t happen in the first place.”

“. . . Do you really think you can?” Now Snakes looked hesitant. “I mean . . . there’s those ideas that when things like that get tried, it never works and the person always dies anyway. I think it has to do with the idea that they have to die or you’d never get the idea to tinker with time in the first place.”

“I don’t care about those stupid rules,” Duke said impatiently. “There has to be a way around those, too.”

“If you say so.” Snakes shifted. “But you don’t still want me hanging around, do you? I mean, I don’t know about this kind of stuff. The portal is as far as my knowing goes.”

Duke studied his strange companion. “You’ve been straight with me so far,” he admitted. “But I don’t know if there might be something else you know, even if you don’t know you know it. I’d like to keep you around a while longer. It’ll mean more pay.”

Snakes’ eyes glittered. “Well, in that case . . . I could probably squeeze some more time out of my busy schedule.”

Duke was sure he could.
****
For weeks Duke examined the portal, researched, and sought out believers in time-travel. Despite all his efforts, and how much he felt like tearing out his hair, he was no closer to reviving David than he had been before meeting Snakes.

Theirs was an unusual partnership. Snakes would still come to the casino to play poker and other games of chance, and Duke would often represent the house in playing against him, but during their games they mostly discussed what progress—or the lack thereof—had been made with their secret venture.

Snakes wanted to stay alive and free above all else. Duke had sized him up to that effect near the start and his opinion had only been strengthened as the time went on. Snakes was also very greedy, as were many people, and tempting him with money to stay on was all too easy to do.

“Snakes, you’re the kind of guy who’ll do almost anything for a buck, aren’t you?” Duke commented one night.

Snakes shrugged, adjusting the positions of the cards in his hand. “I’ll do almost anything to keep living,” he said.

“Then it would probably be pretty accurate to say that you’re a crook,” Duke remarked flatly.

Snakes froze. “. . . I guess you could say that,” he admitted. “But there’s nothing you could really charge me with. You wouldn’t, anyway. Not as long as you still need me.”

“That’s true,” Duke said. A bit of guilt flashed in his eyes but then was gone. “What I’m really wondering, though, is if you’ve always been this way. Was there ever someone you were worried about, maybe even risked your life for, other than yourself?”

Snakes shifted, uneasy and nervous now. He wouldn’t meet Duke’s gaze. “What makes you ask?” he retorted. “That doesn’t have anything to do with our partnership. We’re each in this just for ourselves.”

Now Duke shrugged. “I guess I just wondered what would happen if, say, I fell into a time vortex and you were the only one who knew about it. Would you just let me drift through all the time periods or whatever weird thing might happen? Or would you try to find out if you could save me?”

“I don’t make a habit of sticking my neck out for people. That just gets you burned.” Unconsciously Snakes raised a hand to his cheek, running it down the ugly scar in his flesh.

“Literally?” Duke’s eyes narrowed. “How did you get that?”

Snakes glowered at the table and set down the cards he wanted to play. “In the war,” he muttered. “It doesn’t matter. Are you going to play or aren’t you?”

Duke laid down his cards as well. “The Civil War?”

Snakes scowled further. “The War Between the States, yeah. I was a Confederate soldier.”

“I thought so.”

“Why?” Snakes countered. “Just because I’m from down South?”

Duke paused. “I’m not sure,” he said. “I guess something about you just reminded me of a Confederate soldier.”

A sneer slowly spread across Snakes’ face. “You’d never see me joining any army anymore, pal.”

“I can believe it,” Duke said.

He peered at Snakes’ cards. “It looks like you won this hand.”

Snakes drew the money and chips to him, both pleased and defensive. But Duke didn’t bring up the subject of Snakes’ past again that night. He let it go as they continued their game.
****
It was strange, how prophetic Duke’s words had become.

That was what he thought moments after he and Snakes stood on the edge of a swirling time tunnel that Duke had at long last managed to create. He leaned forward into the strong winds, not caring as his hair and clothes blew wildly.

“Look at this!” he cried. “We did it! We actually opened something new in the space-time continuum!”

He couldn’t see his eyes, and Snakes could only barely see them, but they were filled with mad excitement and anticipation. What was waiting beyond? Would he travel to where David was still alive? Did this portal go instead to nowhere in particular or everywhere at once?

Alarmed and disturbed, Snakes shielded his face and grabbed at his hat as he started to back up. “This is where we part company,” he said. “You go on and find your friend. I’m getting out of here!”

“Fine!” Duke called back. “I won’t need you anymore. I gave you a blank check. Go ahead and fill in any amount you want.”

And he leaped in.

It was an eerie sensation of falling forever, the same sort of feeling he’d had when Noa had made him believe that he was falling into Noa’s virtual world. But this was not virtual. This was every bit for real.

It remained exciting for a while. Duke fell a while longer and then the rules of gravity abated. He spun, floated, and twisted in mid-air, half under his own power yet half under something else’s. It did not take long before he realized that he could not choose where he wanted to go; the vortex had its own ideas in mind for him.

“David!” he screamed as his body contorted and was manipulated through the dizzying cyclone. The sound echoed and warped many times over, until he could barely distinguish the words. “David, where are you? Are you here? Can you hear me?! I’m coming to find you, to get you back! I’m coming to . . .” He swallowed hard. “To fix an old mistake.”

But this was not the way to get him back. Duke knew that, knew that he had to have control over his movements before this would ever work. And that was not going to happen in here.

He was only now becoming aware that he was careening towards a scene, an ancient scene. He could see chariots and palm trees and a palace. It was Egypt of the past.

“No!” he shouted, even though he knew there was no one to hear him, no one to help him. “I can’t go there. I can’t get stuck in the past. David isn’t that far back!”

His heart thumped frantically. Please, God, help me get out of this! His prayer was one of desperation, of futility. It would take a miracle to save him now.

“Hey! Kid!”

A hand snatched his wrist without warning. Duke shot to a stop, as though the force pulling him on had suddenly acquired brakes. But then it started again just as swiftly, trying to drag both him and his rescuer to ancient Egypt.

“It’s no use!” Duke exclaimed. “It’s going to take me. You have to let me go!”

“I’m not going to be dragged down with you. And you’re coming up with me! Fight it, kid. Come on, fight it!”

Duke gritted his teeth and squeezed his eyes closed. He was being pulled in seemingly two directions. But when he couldn’t see the confusing reams of spinning colors, he was able to concentrate on his own mind somewhat better. With sheer force of will he managed to rip his other hand free of the current and clutch Snakes’ arm. Then they were climbing, ascending as quickly as possible even as the winds of time still swirled around them, trying to pull them in.

Suddenly the pressure was gone. The two collapsed on the grass, gasping and breathing heavily from their ordeal. Duke slumped against Snakes for a moment and then fell away, staring into the sky as he lay on his back.

“Why?” he choked out. “Why did you come back?”

Snakes passed a hand over his eyes. His hand was shaking too much to even begin to untie the rope around his waist.

“I don’t know,” he said. “The only times I’ve ever tried to help someone besides myself, I’ve ended up hurt. During the war when I tried it, I got branded with this as the result.” He indicated the scar. “But when I was running off now I realized you might need someone. And I started thinking about how just looking out for number one hadn’t helped me much, either. I . . .” He trembled. “I was one of that mad scientist’s experiments. I was dead and she brought me back to life. And I was so afraid of losing my life again that I tried to kill the people I’d wronged before, so they couldn’t kill me first. Instead I almost died a second time.

“I guess maybe . . .” He trailed off. “Maybe eventually I decided that if nothing was working out, I should see if helping somebody else would go better for me this time. Maybe I was tired of standing for pretty much nothing.”

He closed his eyes and shook his head. “Or maybe I just didn’t want you to go falling into the wrong time and blundering up history.”

Duke came up on an elbow. “You know, I don’t think I care much why you did it,” he said. “I’m just grateful you did.” He drew a shuddering breath. “And that you made it out alive, unlike . . .” He looked away. “I . . . I don’t think I could bear having another life on my conscience.”

Snakes was silent. “Are you still going to try to bring back your friend?”

“Yeah.” Duke ran a hand into his hair, brushing it out of his face. “But I’m not going to go jumping into any spinning wheels unless I know what I’m doing. Or at least, not unless I have a good backup plan in case I don’t know.”

Snakes nodded, sitting up. “I’m with you on that.” He looked to the hole in the ground. “The thing’s gone.”

“I guess it’s just temporary.” Duke sighed. “There has to be a better way. There is a better way, and I’m going to find it.”

“You don’t believe in giving up, so . . .” Snakes drew a shaking breath. “I’m starting to think you will.”

Duke looked to him. “And are you going to stick with me through the rest of the search?”

Snakes considered the query. “Well,” he said at last, “it’s not like I have anything better to do.”

Duke smiled. “Then it’s onward to success.” He held out a hand.

Snakes took and shook it.

It was a strange partnership, but Duke believed it was safe. And maybe, perhaps, Snakes was starting to believe in it as well.