Chapter Text
Tick, tick, tick. Malik’s finger tapped against the window to an arrhythmia that he followed with impertinence. It was his first time flying, and between sitting in the same, uncomfortable position for far too long, the airline’s sorry excuse for refreshments, and the looming knowledge of his task ahead, that unsteady ticking of nail to glass felt like listening to the rhythm of a time bomb. Battle City had done many things to him, but it certainly didn’t do anything to aid his dwindling patience, aside from perhaps making it easier to hide when he lacked it entirely.
As he watched the clouds pass him by, he thought about how he’d never liked being in limbo, nor being caught between two allegiances, nor anything else that was particularly messy and complicated. When he led the Ghouls, he knew what he was doing was wrong; he simply didn’t care. Now, in this moment, he most certainly knew what he was doing was especially wrong, and it ate at him like vultures swarming to feast upon his scarred body. Nobody had ever told him ‘changing for the better’ meant his conscience would cannibalize the rest of him.
What Malik hated most, however, was unfinished business— which meant he had to do this, lest he leave himself to the vultures.
‘Attention passengers, we are now preparing for our descent into Domino City—’
He let out an airy sigh, then steeled himself. Was he afraid? If he was, then why? He had left a piece of himself behind in Domino, something he was overjoyed to have shed— and in any other circumstance, the thought might have brought him comfort. Now, it only made his mouth taste of bile.
When he waited for his stowed bag and proceeded to the city’s centre, he could sense panic roiling inside him, a feeling just as familiar as a blade to his back. If there was one thing Malik had learned from Battle City, it was that sometimes the fear did not subside and he must do it afraid.
Malik knew where Bakura lived— or, at least, where his host did. He supposed, in a way, that perhaps the Millennium Ring was what Bakura called home, or maybe it was the skin he’d taken refuge within. He knew next to nothing of the host, aside from everything the spirit had stolen from him, but what he did know was that Ryou Bakura lived alone. That would certainly work to his advantage, seeing as it was crucial there were no undue interruptions.
The cab pulled up to his building, and Malik ambled his way up the stairs, down the hall, and to the apartment Bakura had taken him to all those months ago—all of it, muscle-memory familiar. When he knocked on the door with the same cadence he’d tapped at the plane’s window, he worried if the unfamiliar rhythm had foiled it all from the start.
“Hello?” a young boy spoke with a smile, too sweet. So unlike the person he was here to see, but still bearing that same head of feathery, white hair. “Is there something I can help you with?”
If the inconsistency of his knocks gave him away, then the darkness in those earthen eyes that the spirit could never hide gave him away, too.
“Bakura.” Malik nearly barked out his name, and it didn’t feel like the sound had come out of his mouth, not the person he was now. “You can drop the act.”
That same smile turned unkind, twisting at the edges into something vulgar and cruel. Bakura grabbed Malik by his vest and pulled him into the apartment, fingers curled into a fist around his shirt. “Still as perceptive as ever, I see.”
“You expected something else?” Malik realigned himself quickly, smoothing out his clothes the moment Bakura pulled away. Those dark eyes could see straight through him, and he avoided meeting their gaze.
“I wasn’t expecting anything. Or, should I say, anyone.” Bakura stuck his hands in his pockets dismissively, and perhaps in anyone else’s body, it would have looked sinister. “The Pharaoh’s friends are away for the next few weeks. I figured that would leave me time to put my own plans in motion.”
“I know,” Malik said defiantly enough that it took even him by surprise. “That’s why I’m here.”
“Hmm.” Bakura ran his tongue over his bottom lip. Now he was beginning to appear threatening. “Are you going to help me open the door to the afterlife, or are you still kissing the Pharaoh’s feet?”
Malik scowled. Expecting this to be this difficult didn’t make it any easier. “Don’t give me that. I need you to be honest with me, Bakura. Why are you trying to open the door to the afterlife?”
He didn’t know why he was expecting something as vulnerable as honesty from someone like Bakura, not when the most raw he’d ever been was the day he took a blade to his host’s arm. But— that wasn’t true, now, was it? Malik thought back to the blimp, to their partnership, to the days he nearly wished he had the conscience he possessed now. In all Bakura had done for him, Malik knew there had to be some degree of honesty in that, too.
“Bakura. I need you.”
Malik stared him down through the girl’s eyes and spoke to him through her teeth.
Just as much as this was his last chance, it was his only chance.
“And you think that I’m going to help?”
Bakura appeared languid and casual, tucking his own teeth into a smile.
“What’s in it for me?”
“Our agreement still stands. You’ll get the Rod, and the scars on my back.”
He watched Bakura furrow his brows, but he didn’t need much convincing.
“Fine,” he spoke, soft as a knife to the throat. “Come with me.”
Bakura had helped him, even with the threat of death over his head.
It was perhaps the most kindness anyone had ever shown him,
if it could even be called kindness at all.
The way he looked back at him, Malik nearly expected Bakura to reach for his throat. This time, Bakura spared him.
“My situation is… complicated, if you may.” Bakura leaned over the kitchen table, folding his fingers beneath his chin. “I want to be whole again.”
Malik didn’t quite understand, but he couldn’t voice why. His eyelids lowered to a squint, staring back at Bakura through slits. Bakura responded in tune.
“I trust in your little studies as a tombkeeper, you’ve heard of Zorc Necrophades?”
“The Dark God. The one the Pharaoh sealed away, along with his name.” Malik, though curious, remained composed. “Why would you ask?”
“Because,” Bakura’s heavy-lidded eyes remained low, almost sultry. “He's in here, in the Ring with me. I’m going to revive him and let the rest of the world crumble. So, are you joining me or not, partner?”
Bakura’s words nearly felt like a kick to the jaw, or perhaps like he’d sprung for his throat at last. Malik almost wished that he would, just to make it all finite. How did Bakura fathom he’d be fine with this? They’d formed their allegiance to take down the Pharaoh, not to bring about the apocalypse. This— it was too much.
“No,” Malik said, resolute. He wouldn’t let Bakura take that away from him. “Was this your plan from the beginning?”
“Of course.” Bakura inclined a touch forward, enough to see the shine in his near-crimson eyes. “And what changed you? Back when we worked together, you were going to give me the Millennium Rod for working with you, were you not?”
Malik’s heart was beginning to staccato beneath his ribs, his head flurrying with so many thoughts and potential responses he worried it would make him ill. The only thing he could be completely certain of was that he’d never wanted the world’s destruction.
“If I had known back then, I wouldn’t have agreed to a single thing with you.”
“Aren’t you righteous.” Malik could tell Bakura was stopping himself from snorting, the same way Malik was stopping himself from leaning over that goddamned table and knocking some sense into Bakura with his teeth and tongue. “Destroying the world doesn’t mean you have to die, you know. You could even help me rule, along with Zorc. You could have all the power you’d ever wanted and more.”
A month prior, maybe even in another life, Malik would have jumped at the idea, but he wasn’t that person anymore, and he hoped he never would be again. When his lip clamped down between his canines, he sucked down the anxiety and barked back.
“You don’t know anything about me, Bakura,” he spat, fingernails trailing along the indents in his palms. “There are so many things in this world that are worth living for. Can’t you see that!?”
“Mm. After all this, you think I don’t know anything about you? How harsh.” Bakura traced his tongue over the boundaries of his lips before continuing. “I tried to save you, you know.”
And then Malik was ruminating again, scanning through his picture book of poor memories until he found the one he desired. One month felt like a thousand years, and he had to wonder if Bakura felt the same.
The next moment, they stared up the Sun God himself,
waiting for the blow that would end them for all of time.
“Bakura?”
Malik, formless, turned to his partner as the light drew nearer.
“What is it now?”
Bakura remained collected, and Malik figured the least he could do was attempt the same.
Malik’s translucent body found its strength thereafter.
“Was it really worth it?”
He gazed over at Bakura, who did not look back.
Moments before the glow turned to shadow, Bakura opened his mouth to speak,
and before he could voice a single word, his half-sided grin was all Malik needed.
“Nothing to say now?” Bakura prodded, snapping Malik from his reverie. “Don’t try to tell me I’m wrong.”
Malik shook his head, letting his bangs swish from side to side and turn his vision gold. He wasn’t sure how much more he could take, but he’d brought this upon himself, hadn’t he?
“You formed our partnership to destroy the world without telling me, so I need you to tell me now. Were you ever honest with me, Bakura?”
Bakura looked back at him the way he used to look at the Pharaoh’s friends— no longer like an equal, but like prey. “Well, I certainly never lied, did I?”
“And you would have made me an accomplice to the world’s destruction!” Malik shouted; he was becoming increasingly thankful Bakura’s host lived alone.
“The first person I’ve ever thought of as an accomplice of my own, and even you disappoint me. Hmph.” Bakura straightened his back, the grief of three millennia apparent in his stance. He no longer looked angry; instead, he looked sad, so much sadder than Malik had ever seen him.
“Bakura,” Malik returned without care for how he would have continued, even if he could. The tangled mess of words in his throat felt like it would asphyxiate him on the spot. But seeing Bakura like this, so human in spite of it all, made something in him ache; he couldn’t explain why he felt this way, not how Bakura’s presence always seemed to make his heart react the way it did. Maybe this, then, was just another of Bakura’s little violences.
The silence between them felt like breathing through smog, like secondhand smoke caught in his lungs. The fear did not disappear as the evening wore on; he would do it afraid.
“Bakura,” he repeated, sharper this time. “Don’t do this.”
“I’ll be challenging the Pharaoh to a game soon. A final Shadow Game. If you show up,” Bakura paused, and Malik bore witness to the hitch in his breath, “then I’ll know where your allegiances lie.”
Malik forced himself to turn around, his heart in his throat. After they stood in stillness for what felt like a lifetime, he forced out the words “Forget it,” and strode towards the door like the earth's grip was calling him home.
“You have time to change your mind, you know, Ishtar,” Bakura stated the moment Malik’s hand hit the knob. “At least if you die, you’ll die fighting for something.”
“And what will you die for, then?” Malik replied without stopping to turn around. He could feel a sob creeping up in his chest, and he wanted none of it. All he wanted was to turn around and take Bakura’s hand, to beg him to stop this, to kiss him, and— no, he knew better than that. It was a lost cause. He was a lost cause.
Even still, he heard Bakura chuckle behind him, low and brooding. If there had been anything human left in him, it died the moment Malik turned his back.
“Revenge,” Bakura said at last, nerves sizzling raw. “The only thing worth both living and dying for.”
Then Malik stood in place, hesitation overwhelming him like a landslide. All he wanted was to kill whatever within him hurt, but he was no longer in the business of killing, and he knew the emptiness that would surely replace it would only make it all a thousandfold worse.
“I hope the Pharaoh takes you down,” he finally spoke before twisting the handle and stepping into the hall. Before he shut the door, Malik looked back at Bakura, who would not meet his gaze, but smiled something wicked all the same. Just like the day they stood before Ra.
“Goodbye, Bakura.”
As soon as he exited the apartment, he sat himself on the cusp of the stairs and let the sob leap from his throat. The self-inflicted heartache consumed him whole— it ate at him, the same as his conscience, the same as the vultures that had feasted upon him from the moment he’d stepped back into Domino. All he wanted was to bury everything he’d just unearthed, to fill the grave he’d just dug for himself, and Bakura, and the world— but there was no going back to who or what he was before, and that was something he’d only have to learn the hard way.
He couldn’t deny anymore that he loved Bakura; something that could have been a sigh escaped his lips, had he not been crying, until he ticked an uneven rhythm against the gold band on his arm. A mechanical motion straight from his mechanical heart. Bakura had saved him; maybe, one day, he could return the favour.
But— that thought felt like no more than nonsense now. Bakura was too far gone in his own revenge, and Malik was no longer the person Bakura knew. He got to his feet, wiped his eyes dry, and found himself snared in the impossible. There would be no use saving Bakura, would there? But - but—
When he walked down Domino’s streets in the evening haze, he thought, if anyone could perform a miracle, it was him. And he’d try, and try, and try, and then try again until he got it right.
He would save Bakura. He would.
…and the last thing he saw before Ra consumed them whole was Bakura’s serpentine smile.