[fic] When We Collide
Hee, thought I better get this posted before arostine gets mad and eats me xD;
Fandom: Yu-Gi-Oh!
Title: When We Collide
Pairing: Thiefshipping (Yami no Bakura x Malik)
Rating: T+
Warnings: None
Word count: 1144
For: arostine
Summary: (Sequel to Leaving and Losing. In-canon BC) Banished to the Shadows following the duel with Yami no Malik, Bakura can't help but wonder why he put himself on the line for Malik in the first place. Of course, the Shadows have a way of reminding you of things long lost and long forgotten. (Part 2 of 4)
Bakura was of the opinion that he hadn’t so much met Malik as he had collided with him.
Meeting someone was when you were introduced and you exchanged formalities and you prattled on about useless garbage until you decided whether you actually gave a shit about each other or not. They hadn’t been so mundane. Malik had just exploded into his life (if what Bakura had now could be called a life). The Millennium Ring had perked up, detecting the presence of another item, and minutes later this crazy, hell-bent-on-revenge kid had come screeching around the corner on his almost definitely stolen motorcycle, only missing Bakura thanks to some fancy manoeuvring.
(And Bakura couldn’t help but wonder what it was that had made him throw himself in Malik’s path like that. What was it that had made him so sure that this kid would stop? Why had he just stood there, arms outstretched, thinking He won’t kill me, of course he won’t kill me...?)
And, of course, they had been sparse with the formalities. Once they’d ascertained that they could use each other to a level that satisfied them both, that had been quite enough.
...And things had been going so well, up to a point. Until it had come to light that Malik was, in fact, completely insane and had a whole other personality stored away inside his mind. A personality that wasn’t merely pissed off and bitter and vengeful, but was the very essence of hate itself.
In hindsight, challenging Malik’s darkness to a duel probably hadn’t been Bakura’s wisest move. After all, he knew better than anyone how powerful a motivator hate could be.
But he’d done it. It had seemed a short-cut to achieving his goals at the time.
(And Malik had asked him for help. And saying ‘no’ to Malik was...difficult. Even when Malik had made the ludicrous suggestion of sacrificing his host in an attempt to defeat the Pharaoh, Bakura had almost gone through with it-)
“Well, this is just lovely,” Bakura said with a sardonic sneer, folding his arms and looking coldly at his surroundings.
“Wh-” Malik’s voice failed him first time. “Where are we?”
“Shadows,” Bakura replied shortly. “Never been here before?”
“...No.”
“Hn. Good luck, then. It’ll take you a century or so to get used to it.”
“I don’t plan on being here that long,” Malik snarled, turning away from him.
“Yeah?” Bakura said in amusement. “You think the Pharaoh can defeat your darkness? Because that’s our only shot at getting out of this place.”
“I’ll think of something,” Malik snapped before looking around him nervously. “Um. So what...happens here?”
“Here?” Bakura repeated blandly, glancing around at the swirling darkness with disinterest. “Nothing especially nice, as I’m sure you guessed. It likes to mess with your mind. It uses your fears against you. That seems to be the most efficient way to make a person totally lose it.”
“Is that what happened to you?” Malik asked acerbically.
“No, I just had time to get used to it,” Bakura said with evident boredom. “I locked up all my fears. They can’t hurt me anymore.”
“That so?”
“Yes. You, on the other hand, are going...to...” Bakura trailed off and frowned as a strange sound reached his ears. He’d heard plenty of hideous sounds during his lengthy time in the Shadows, but this was new. An odd, high-pitched whine. Quiet but impossible to miss. And it reminded him of something. Since he couldn’t remember exactly what, he supposed it must have been something from back in Egypt-
He noticed a tiny black speck on Malik’s arm and for some reason his blood ran cold.
“What’s that?” he demanded, pointing to it.
“What?” Malik said, lifting his arm and peering at it. He frowned. “Is...is that a mosquito? There are mosquitoes here? I gotta say, that’s just- ow!”
He let out a yelp when Bakura grabbed his arm and dealt the insect a somewhat over-exuberant slap.
“...Bakura?” Malik said cautiously, looking nervous again. Bakura ignored him, instead choosing to concentrate on wiping every last trace of former-mosquito from his hand and Malik’s arm.
“What is it?” Malik tried again, trying desperately to catch Bakura’s eye. “Are Shadow-Realm-mosquitoes worse than...?”
He didn’t finish the question, because suddenly they could hear that horrible whine again. Only this time it was amplified. It sounded like hundreds of insects, but Shadow Realm acoustics being what they were, it was impossible to tell exactly where they were. Far away? Real nearby? Already crawling under their clothes-?
“Bakura, what’s going on?” Malik asked, sounding utterly panicked now. He wasn’t scared of the bugs, though - he was scared by Bakura’s reaction to them. So was Bakura, in all honesty. If Malik wasn’t scared of mosquitoes, then that meant the mosquitoes were aimed at him. But why...?
One landed on Malik’s cheek. He didn’t seem to feel it. Bakura swiped it away desperately, not knowing why it was so important. It just was.
The whining became impossibly loud (in the real world, no insects could ever have been that loud), and it seemed to be all around them. Bakura felt the crushing, insane fear of the Shadows grip him for the first time in centuries. Not knowing why only made it worse.
“No,” he said simply, grabbing Malik in a tight, protective embrace, as if he could defend him from a swarm of bizarrely-scary mosquitoes in this way.
“Bakura, it’s...it’s alright,” Malik said uncertainly, instead of snapping something disparaging, which in itself was weird. But things were always weird with Malik. Never what you expected.
Bakura wasn’t sure how long they stood like that, huddled together and staring into the endless darkness with anxious eyes, waiting for that sound to intensify and engulf them completely. But after some time, something changed. Malik started to...fade. Right there in Bakura’s arms, he was fading.
“What...?” Bakura started to ask, trying to conceal his panic.
“It...it’s that girl,” Malik said in evident surprise. “Anzu. I’m still...connected to her mind. It’s pulling me back.”
“Go,” Bakura said shortly.
“N...no,” Malik replied abruptly, holding onto him more tightly.
“Why not?”
“I...don’t know. I just...” Malik shrugged helplessly. “I don’t want to leave you. Not here. Not anywhere.”
The buzz-whine-scream of the mosquitoes seemed to get even louder. (Even closer.)
“Go, Malik,” Bakura growled, shoving the blond away from him. “Just go.”
Malik stared at him, looking confused and torn. Bakura wanted to say something to him, explain what he was feeling to him-
‘I’m not scared to let you go because I know you’ll always come back’
-but whatever was pulling Malik back to the real world was beyond the blond’s own control, and he vanished before Bakura could say a word.
Maybe that was for the best.
“Until next time,” Bakura said with a grim smile, settling down to wait.