#this chapter made me cryyyyyy T_T

[ayma-nidiot]

“Don’t Speak Their Names” - Shrimpshipping fic Chapter 32

This chapter can be found here on AO3.

Chapter 32 - God-Shattering Star

“Oh, cry me a river, Rex!” Weevil glanced to the battle below; many of the Club members had already died. Joey, Mai, Yugi, Téa, Tristan, Atem, and Duke were the only fighters who hadn’t sustained any serious injuries against the massive Earthbound army. Even Phuckdis and William were riddled with gashes, yet refused to retreat with Dr. Balls. “So your allies still cling to life like a drowning man onto a rock. Cute. Not that it will do any of you any good!”

“Rex…” Mako crawled on the floor; luckily for him, Espa retreated from the battle before he got hurt at all. “Don’t listen to him! You’re… hah… You’re the only one who can… save us…”

“Mako, don’t…” It was just then that after recalling the fight with Nortius, Rex had an idea. “Wait a second, Amber.”

“Papa, what is it?”

“I want to try something out. Why don’t we try fusing, just like Mako did with Jinzo?”

“But we don’t even have Polymerization! Those who do either are incapacitated or otherwise occupied! And you can’t even fly… If you fell to your death just like Kaiba, and all because of a stupid and ill-timed experiment, I…”

“Argh, we’ll both die anyway if we do nothing!” Rex pumped his fists in the air. “Show a little bit more Raptor spirit, why don’t you?”

“Papa… Okay. I trust you.” So Amber spoke as she half-shifted, and Rex began a long freefall.

“You really are a blooming idiot, aren’t you?” Weevil would have laughed longer, but stopped when he saw Rex glow pink. “So you think you can- Huh?”

“What’s… What’s happening to my boy?” Ptera wondered as Spinos tended to her wounds.

“Don’t tell me…” Phuckdis began. “Rex is…”

Before Rex could fall very far, Amber had completely fused with him, and he grew angel’s wings that soon turned into Rabidragon’s wings. Even if only by a little bit, the gloomy weather began to dissipate, replaced by an enormous pink glow at the top of KaibaCorp Tower. 

“What is the meaning of this?” The shining presence of Rex - with his bow, fluffy white shirt, golden pants, and Rabidragon’s ears and tail - intimidated Weevil. “Just who do you think you are, that you can challenge me? Well, no matter! I’ll kill you right here, as I intended to do from the beginning! Take this!” 

“...” Rex didn’t say anything as he simply held his bow at his side, and grabbed the chain whip before it could hurt him.

“It’s… Impossible! Aaaah!” Weevil reeled backwards when Rex threw him. “How can a weak rabbit like you stand up to me? ”

“It’s because…” Phuckdis made his presence known. “Rex is the true God-Shattering Star.”

William bowed in reverence with his brother and the remaining members of the Club. “He is the light that will save us all.”

Espa could still see Weevil and Rex, even from his hospital room. “Is that you, Rex Raptor?”

Joey looked up at Rex’s true form with a hint of jealousy. “That’s more powerful than anything I could cook up with the Claw of Hermos. I suppose that runt isn’t as weak as I thought him to be.”

Rex finally opened his now-crimson eyes and began to speak in a distorted voice. “Weevil… No, Earthbound God Sanpedro. I will kill you, right here and now, and free my beloved Weevil Underwood from your clutches.”

“So now you want me to die? That’s rich! What a fool. Come on, boy, come try me!”

“Hey, let me help too!” When Joey rushed up to Rex, he could feel an invisible barrier push him backwards. 

“Joey, this is my fight alone. Why don’t you just take out the small fry and let a pro handle this?”

“Hahaha!” Despite the fact that there were still several hundred Earthbound soldiers left, Joey couldn’t help but laugh. “Even when he’s some almighty angel… god... thing, he’s still definitely that silly Rex Raptor. Well, my dude, consider my morale boosted! You heard the man, guys!”

“H-How dare you address the God-Shattering Star that way?” Phuckdis was clearly offended. 

“Aww, come on, lighten up! Or you can just, I don’t know, sit there and relax while us duelists take care of the bad guys.”

“Or I can just, you know, show you just how strong us shapeshifters are!” Upon hearing Joey’s words, Phuckdis felt his strength anew, as did his brother. “I cannot fly, but that doesn’t mean I cannot fight!”

“Headstrong and reckless like your ‘God-Shattering Star.’” Duke chuckled. “Well, then, you better do a good job proving how strong you are!”

“You’re a poet and didn’t even know it!” Tristan quipped.

“You see, Weevil?” Rex stared at the nearly-soulless shell of his boyfriend. “You picked the wrong side to fight for. You have no friends there.”

“‘Friends,’ huh…” Weevil stared absentmindedly at the fighting below, especially at Joey and Atem. The chain whip rattled in his hands as he shook in anger. “Must be sooooo nice to have them! It must feel soooooo nice to be able to get palsy-walsy with people who didn’t give a shit about you just four years ago!”

“Weeves?!”

“You… YOU FUCKERS WILL ALL PAY!” Weevil dove as fast as he could, with all the anger he could muster ready to fuel his strike upon Atem.

“You coward! Get back here!” Rex couldn’t dive anywhere near that quickly, but tried to keep up as fast as his unborn baby would allow him, holding onto her for dear life.

“Eh?” Joey noticed Weevil coming for him before anyone else did, and braced himself with the Red-Eyes Black Dragon Sword. “Atem, look out!”

“Amulet Dragon, protect us!”

Weevil had originally planned to strike everyone in one blow with the chain whip. But being the deceptive little shit he was, he decided on a different mode of attack - bypassing all of the monsters and encasing his two most hated enemies in spider webs instead. “Ha! Syke!”

“Ggh!” Already, Joey was up to his neck in spider webs - yet for some strange reason, his sword arm remained free, as did the sword itself. The webs would not give way, no matter how hard or often he slashed at them.

“W-Weevil…” Atem could hardly talk, as the spider webs gripped his throat tightly. “I… I thought we were friends!”

“Me? Friends with you?! What a joke! Do you honestly expect me to believe a word of bullshit coming out of your mouth after the suffering you’ve caused me? Do you honestly think that after all you’ve done, I’d consider you a friend?” Weevil cackled as Atem writhed in pain. “If anything, you’re lower than the dirt underneath my feet!”

All the commotion awakened Heka. “F-Father… No! Dear gods, what’s happening to my father?”

“Boy! How does it feel to know that your father is no longer the King of Games?”

“Leave… him alone!” Heka flung a flimsy arm, releasing a ball of light that Weevil easily blocked. 

“Hmm… Nah, I think I’ll pass on that. In fact, I’d rather kill him before your very eyes!” Weevil approached Atem, with the intent to decapitate him with the chain whip. That was, until Rex blocked him in the nick of time, drawing Weevil’s attention away from his two captives. “Humph. It’s you again.”

“Damn right!” Rex’s smile faded when not long after he blocked the attack, his bow began to crumble. “Uh… Uh-oh…”

“Hah! Some ‘God-Shattering Star’ you turned out to be! Looks to me like you’re the one who’s shattered!” 

“Crud… I kind of need a weapon!” Rex picked up a sword from one of his fallen allies, but it was so weak that Weevil shattered it with his bare hands, grabbing Rex by the throat right after. “Ngh!”

“Before I kill you right here and now, tell me something, Rex. Why did you defend these guys?”

“B-Because… They’re… my… cough… cough…”

“They accepted you so easily, just because you play by the rules… Why is friendship such an easy thing for you, yet I could never make one friend? Why do Joey and Atem and literally everyone else in this fucking city love you and think I’M the worst duelist there ever was?”

“Don’t… Don’t I count, Weeves?” More than the iron grip of Weevil’s right hands, Weevil’s words hurt Rex. ��And your own daughter? Have… cough… Have you already forgotten what we’ve all been through? We’re… willing to… forgive you… Just… Ugh!”

“Not another word out of you! The Earthbound Gods are the only friends I need now! Not you weaklings!” Ignoring the twinge of pain in his heart, Weevil lightly ran the chain whip over Rex’s left arm, barely enough to draw blood. “I’m going to fucking kill you!”

Weevil was so far gone into his own madness that Joey was certain he wouldn’t be able to hear him now. “Psst… Rex.”

“J-Joey?” Rex turned his head around, just enough to see Joey.

“You said… cough… that you needed a weapon, right?” Joey held up his sword arm. “Ya’ think this will be good enough?”

“That’s…!” Flashbacks of his Orichalcos duel flooded Rex’s mind. That’s the sword that sent my soul to the Great Leviathan! But if there’s no other choice, then…

“It’s now or never! Think fast!” Joey threw the Red-Eyes Black Dragon Sword at Rex, hoping to the gods he’d catch it and put it to good use.

“If that sword can’t cut the spider webs, then what makes you think that Rex will somehow magically put it to good use?”

Rex felt the sword land in his right hand, and had a clever idea. “By doing… this. ”

“G-Gaaaaah!” Weevil howled in pain when Rex did the unthinkable - completely cutting off his right arms and thereby freeing Atem and Joey from their bonds. He stared at Rex wide-eyes. “You would dare hurt me? Aren’t you scared of losing the love of your life?”

“Yes, I am.” Rex pointed the sword at Weevil’s face. “But the thing I’m even more scared of? Seeing Weevil Underwood beat himself up and become a destructive monster where a man once was.”

“Ugh, you were always so talkative!” Weevil flew higher and dove at Rex like a peregrine falcon. Rex took to the air as well and parried this attack with the sword, but not without some recoil. “Just one of the many things I hate about you!”

“Hah!” Rex repelled Weevil with the sword, enough to put a slight dent in the chain whip. “Your psychological tricks aren’t going to work on me now, Weevil!” 

“But maybe a variety of attacks can!” Weevil shot spider webs from his left hands that stuck to Rex’s butt-length hair and part of his shirt.

“Tch…” Rex didn’t like the sensation of sticky things in his hair, but grinned and bore it for now. “Am I supposed to be scared by the fact that you’re still part-spider?”

Weevil smirked as he barraged Rex with the chain whip. “Oh, I still see the fear in your eyes, Rex Raptor. A fear that you will lose the father of that child you’re carrying.”

Weevil’s words reminded Rex of his more painful contractions that got ever closer - yet being the bold man and duelist he was, he paid them little heed.

“I’ll give you credit for one thing,” Weevil spoke while he beat his wings faster, deadlocked in battle, trying to crush Rex with the chain whip. “You’re quite the warrior. And you’ve changed since your Orichalcos duel with Joey. It appears that you’re not going to let something like mere words rile you up.”

“But I can tell my words are riling you up…” Rex whispered closed to Weevil���s ear, catching him off-guard, before stabbing him in the shoulder with the sword. 

“Ngh…” Finally in pain, Weevil could feel his strength dwindling.

“Weeves…” Rex stared at his boyfriend - and stabbed him in the left thigh - in sorrow. “You can’t honestly mean that you want this… any of this! Don’t you remember seeing your daughter for the first time on the ultrasound? A-And how I told you all those years ago that I want nobody but you? How fast our hearts were beating when we confessed our love?”

“You… dino brain! Ack!” Weevil could no longer repel Rex’s attack and fell a few feet downwards. “I thought I told you that you can’t sweet talk your way into killing an Earthbound God!”

“You called me ‘dino brain’ again…” Tears of joy pooled in Rex’s eyes. “I know you still love me… Once the Rex Raptor has his sights on you, you can’t get rid of him.”

“Actually, I can ,” spoke a voice that was clearly not Weevil’s.

“Is… Is that you, Watda?” Weevil’s real voice finally came out.

“It appears to me that you’re going to be useless now, Uru… So it looks like I’m going to have to take matters into my own hands.”

“No… No!” Weevil thrashed about in the air, confusing Rex. “Leave Rex and Amber alone!”

“Weeves, what’s going on?” Rex couldn’t hear Watda’s voice.

“Goodbye, you damned useless rabbit…”

Weevil couldn’t control the ball of dark energy coming out from his right hands. “Wait… Watda, stop!”

“Ah!” He wasn’t fully confident that he could block this evidently stronger attack, but Rex enveloped himself in his dragon’s wings. 

And Rex wouldn’t have to block the attack. For before Watda’s attack could hit him, Weevil managed to separate from Watda, taking the full brunt of the attack last minute.

“W-Weeves!” The strength in Rex’s eyes now gone, he watched in horror as his boyfriend froze in the air before beginning a rapid descent into Domino City’s concrete. “Oh my gods… No… You’re going to come back, just like you did last time… right?”

“Even an Earthbound God and the Blue-Eyes Shining Dragon can’t survive a 1000-meter fall. You saw it yourself when Cusillu, Aslla Piscu, and Kaiba all died.”

“Shut… up…”

“Now what are you going to do, since your beloved Weevil Underwood lies dead?” Watda laughed as his shadows grew fiercer. “You’re nothing without him, you weak-ass monster. Nothing!”

“That’s… That’s not… Oh!” Before Rex could aim his sword at Watda, he suddenly felt amniotic fluid trickle down his legs. He shook so badly that he lost grip of the sword as it plummeted after Weevil.

“You’re in labour, hmm? Looks to me like you have two choices: one, continue to fight me and risk losing your baby; or two, going back to ground level to give birth. But with that second option, there might be a sliiiiight chance I’ll destroy the world. Either way, you lose! Hahahahaha!”

No, he won’t, spoke Amber’s voice.

“Ngh… Amber, you’re still there?”

I’ve been with you the whole time, Papa. You’ve got to finish this fast!

“But how do you expect me to do that? Especially since… your Daddy is…”

There is one way. Now that Daddy has been separated from Watda… Papa, I’ll give you all of my strength. Use it to finally banish this mongrel to hell, where he belongs! Amber de-fused from Rex. In fully shifted form, she engulfed Watda, leaving only the Earthbound God’s chest exposed. In the process, lights sprung from the ground as the bow regenerated in Rex’s hands.

“Ggh! Let go of me, you wench!” Watda struggled to no avail.

Before Rex could process what was going on, he coruscated like the northern lights, and he stretched out his new angel’s wings. His hair grew past his legs, and brown locks encircled his arms.

“Oh my…” With the Earthbound army now vanquished, Phuckdis could truly behold his people’s chief god.

“That’s my boy!” Ptera cheered. “Give that bastard what for!”

“Hehe!” Rex gave his mom a thumbs up. “One kick-ass arrow, coming right up!”

“What are you doing?” Watda could feel his time at an end.

“Watda!” Rex continued to growl as he pulled his bowstring back, and his body and weapon grew ever brighter. “Go back to the shadows! Hyaaaaaaaah!”

“It’s…” Watda could say little more as the glowing arrow impaled a giant hole in his chest. “It’s done… I’m… done… Aaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrgh!”

“Finally, something we can agree on.” Rex’s descent back to Earth started slowly, but upon reaching six feet above ground, he reverted forms and fell into Spinos’ arms.

“God-Shattering Star!” Phuckdis and the remaining Club members ran up to Rex.

“Is… Is that what I’m called? Heh, sounds pretty cool…” Rex would have rested if he didn’t wonder about Amber. “Wait a second, where’s Amber? Where is my daughter?”

“Rex!” Mokuba pointed to an approaching Joey, who carried a heavily mutilated Amber in his arms.

“Amber!” Rex got up from his prone position to hold Amber, whom Joey had gently lowered to the ground. “No! I… I thought we got him! I thought we defeated Watda together!”

“W-We did… But at a cost… What did you think I meant when I said ‘I’ll give you all of my strength?’”

“Amber…?” Rex couldn’t even hold Amber’s right hand anymore, as it began to fade into nothingness. “What’s happening? Please… This isn’t happening!”

“My… My granddaughter…” Ptera cried as Spinos and Tricera consoled her. Not a single eye was dry as Rex’s friends and allies watched the scene unfold. Even Espa and a newly-healed Mako could see what was going on.

“But… But we only got to duel once!” Joey got down and cried with Rex. “And you haven’t even dueled Espa yet! I thought you were going to win back his Serpent Night Dragon!”

“Joey… My friend…” Amber reached out her left hand to Joey. “I… I just wished I had… acknowledged you as such… earlier…”

“Amber! No, please don’t die!” Pretty much every body part Rex tried to grab at faded away, except for Amber’s head, shoulders, and left hand. 

“Die? No, I’m just about to be born…” Amber placed what was left of her left hand on Rex’s baby bump. “I can’t wait to see you again and forge our bonds anew.”

“Amber…?” Rex cried as Amber chuckled one last time before her future self was no more. “AMBER! NO! Oh… my gods… Sniff…”

“My love!” Heka, who had just fully healed, ran to Rex. He had only seen future Amber for a brief spell before she died. “Oh, no… My heart…”

“Heka, I’m so sorry…” Rex hugged his daughter’s boyfriend. “Not only for your mother’s death, but also for Amber’s…”

“Forget about me! You just lost your daughter!” Heka cried into Rex’s shoulder as Atem consoled him too.

“Amber… I… Aaaaargh!” Rex suddenly doubled over as the remainder of his amniotic fluid gushed out all at once.

“His water has already broken… Rex is going into labour!” Mokuba announced. “Someone call an ambulance!”

“It’s for real this time, guys!” Joey got up and dialed the campus emergency number. After that, he knelt down again, trying to calm Rex down in any way he could. “Rex, hang in there. We’re going to get you help!”