Title: Artisanry
Fandom: Yu-Gi-Oh!
Rating: G
Length: 1000 words
Content notes: Always-a-cis-girl!Yuugi.
Author notes: Call this an outtake from my queer_bigbang.
Summary: Yuuki has a surprise for her other self.

"Yuuki, you have a package!" Grandpa called up the stairs.

There was only one package Yuuki was expecting. "It came?" She hurried down the stairs, collected the box, and checked the return address. "It came!" She danced back up the stairs, box clutched to her chest.

"What it is this?" Yami Yuuki asked, leaning against the wall far more substantial than she.

Yuuki grinned at her other self. "Secret. You'll see."

"Secret, is it?" Yami Yuuki said. "From whom?"

"You, to start with." Yuuki flicked her fingers at her. "Find something else to do for a little while. I'll call you when it's ready for you to see."

"Very well." Yami Yuuki faded away, back into the Puzzle that she never seemed to grow tired of exploring, fatal traps for the unwary or no.

Yuuki rubbed a corner of the Puzzle absently, then turned her attention to the box. Its contents matched the list she'd copied onto the order form; that was good. Purple and black and silvery pewter and steel, and the tools to make the parts into a whole.

Fifteen frustrating minutes later, she felt a nudge from her other self: Is this homework-annoys-you upset, or do you need me?

"Homework," Yuuki said out loud. "Except homework usually stays where I put it." She glared at the narrow chain on her desk.

The feeling of a shrug, then a hug, and the sense of Yami Yuuki slid away.

Ten minutes later, Yuuki gave up on part one of the project. Ten minutes after that, she was done with the rest. She packed the tools and extra materials carefully back into the box for the time being and poked the Puzzle. "You can come out now."

Yami Yuuki materialized. Yuuki grinned at her, shyly. "Time to play Guess What's Different."

"You did something with your hair," Yuuki's other self deadpanned. Yuuki shook her head, shaking the dangling earrings.

Yami Yuuki scrutinized her. "The earrings," she said finally. "I don't recognize them."

"No, you don't," Yuuki said with glee. "I just made them."

Interest sparked in Yami Yuuki's eyes.

Yuuki removed one earring and held it out so her other self could take a closer look. "This pair is yours—the ankh, see? And black lava rock because you like shadows, and purple amethyst because you like the Dark Magician." With the other hand, she took out the other earring and held that out too. "This pair is mine, because of the lucky cat. And black lava rock and purple amethyst because it didn't feel right to make it mismatch yours too much."

"And because you like black and purple yourself," said Yami Yuuki, smiling. "Are you an artisan now, then?"

Yuuki scoffed, her heart beginning to sink. "These are my very first efforts. I don't think they're good enough that anyone would buy them from me."

A blink, and Yami Yuuki stood in their body, Yuuki the translucent onlooker. "I would be honored to wear these earrings," Yami Yuuki said, sliding first one, then the other back into the ear piercings.

Yuuki smiled.

Yami Yuuki turned toward the desk, where the matches to both earrings lay next to the studs Yuuki hadn't taken out since the mysterious appearance of her piercings not long after the mysterious appearance of her collar. Yami Yuuki eyed the box. "May I look?"

"Go ahead," said Yuuki. "It's just the extra pieces and five different shapes of pliers."

Yuuki's other self examined each item in the box from the jewelry supply store before setting it on the desk. More lucky cat charms, more ankh charms, more lava rock beads and amethyst chips, more eyepins and earhooks, each of the various types of pliers, jump rings and lobster-claw clasps, beading wire, and the steel chain that had frustrated Yuuki so. "You wanted to make a necklace, too?" Yami Yuuki asked.

"The chain won't behave," said Yuuki.

Yami Yuuki ran her fingers along the chain, stopping at the several consecutive links that Yuuki had abused in the attempt to get one of them loose. She picked up two of the pairs of pliers, the flat- and the chain-nose, and pried at the first damaged link. It came apart easily.

"You're not magicking that, are you?" Yuuki asked, only half suspicious, but then her other self's threats to use shadow magic on recalcitrant technology were usually only half serious.

Yami Yuuki glanced over. "Should I be?" She turned back to the desk. "It's just another kind of puzzle, isn't it? The necklace needs to hang here, so the chain should be this long, and the little rings go at either end, with a clasp on one of them..." She suited action to word, assembling the necklace, then stopped. "Did you want the ankh or the cat on this one?"

"Ankh," Yuuki said at once. Her other self's first jewelry attempt should reflect her, herself, her (other) self.

"So another ring through this little ring on the ankh," Yami Yuuki thought aloud, "and that around the chain, and twist the ring closed again..." She held the complete pendant and chain up for Yuuki to see.

Yuuki applauded.

Yami Yuuki clasped the pendant around her neck—the ankh fell exactly where Yuuki meant it to, a little below the collar and well above the Puzzle—and released control of their body back to Yuuki. "There is much to be admired," Yami Yuuki mused, "in using talent for creation instead of destruction."

Layers and layers to excavate, there. Yuuki let the lower layers be for now and addressed the surface. "We can do more jewelry making. Not much more jewelry making, or with the really nice metals or gems, because the materials cost money and you know exactly how much pocket money I get and where it usually goes—" Yami Yuuki glanced away, a little guiltily, Yuuki thought, but she liked spending money at the arcade and on Duel Monsters cards as much as her other self did. "But we can keep making jewelry."

"I'd like that," Yami Yuuki said.