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He’d expected waking up to a mosh pit of corpses, which would have been damn lucky, cause that meant he’d have something to do.
There was a bucket list of sorts, (is it a bucket list if you’re already dead and gone?) things he’d want to do and places he’d want to see in the Hell that he imagined, (and trust me, he’d imagined.)
That was, of course, after the initial welcome was said. After he’d been swallowed up by his own laughter at the sick irony, when the crowd crush was overwith, and when his initiation into being a true child of Kul Elna by becoming a half alive, withered and shrieking soul of the damned was complete, oh yes, he’d have much of his not-life to live.
If the eternal torture was merciful enough for lunch breaks, of course, but that’s just nitpicking the details, now, isn’t it?
He’d still have his hobbies to talk about while his ribs were being smashed into itty bitty baby thief sized pieces. Stuff like long walks on the beach. Stamp collecting. Croquet. Murdering the Pharaoh and bathing in his blood. Boat rides. He can’t remember the rest, but it’s the thought that counts. He could pick up some new ones.
…
Decidedly, this was not a mosh pit full of corpses.
Instinctively, his fingers dug into the flora at his sides as he let out a guttural roar. The scream tore at his throat, and when no pain came of it, he only felt his blood boil more.
He failed, of course. Naturally, that is, and now the Gods won’t even allow him to tear and dig at his own skin to pluck out the wicked ring that he’d wanted to scream at until he was a voiceless crying mess on the floor.
The anger in him was a singularity. The bloodlust was a disease. Coursing through his blood, like a mantra— more, more, more.
He suddenly recalls the other half of his hobbies. Murdering the Pharaoh and bathing in his blood. Right. Of course. How forgetful of him.
The thief patted at his sides. If he wasn’t suffocating on the smell of death, it meant he had the chance to do something. It was not clear what “something,” entailed, but it was probably better than eternal boredom, or unadulterated rage.
There was a ritual to these things: check for wounds, start from the bottom, work your way up. He started when he was 11, and carried it with him everywhere— even into bodies that weren’t his. Whenever he woke up from underneath rubble, or from within worlds of darkness, voice like a little brother’s in the back of his head complaining that he was hungry, the habit came first.
It was meditative.
Take inventory of the body now, shred everything down to its last tendon layer.
Feet: Miraculously not sore. Neither are his legs. His eyes are closed, though, because experience taught him that when something is mercifully unfeeling enough it means the worst. He’ll decide to stop being a pussy about that when he’s finished with the rest of him.
Pelvis: Fine, thank every shithole God he could think of. Leg injuries were bearable, foot injuries less so— but the pelvis was annoying, even if it was just aching. Long falls as the king of bandits resulted in weeks of bedrid. Drawn out, unbearable, annoying weeks; weeks he could have been out there, planning, plotting, deceiving, murdering the Pharaoh and bathing in his blood.
But the injury dragged on. A car collision in Ryou’s body at a hard age 6 resulted in one of these, you know— and two dead bodies to boot. But the thief assured Ryou didn’t end up being one of them. They still needed to do wonderful things together. All sorts of horrible, wonderful things.
Anyway.
Torso: Thank fucking God, no lacerations, no open wounds, no broken ribs. The thief felt up and down his skin, just a double check for nothing particularly deep cutting. His fingers brushed over a spot below the ribs; a leathery sheathe of raised skin roughly about four inches in length. He freezes.
Face: His hand runs down the dark skin below his eye, and he felt his scar. His scar— undoubtedly his, the nasty piece of work. A sudden weight on his chest knocked the wind out of him, and Bakura, fuck his miserable life and everyone in it, he resisted the sudden urge to panic and flail in the deep end of the pool. I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore, he halfheartedly joked to himself. “Joked.”
He was shitting himself.
This was his body then. Original— organic, his, in every sense of the word, no rent to pay for it. Ha, he breathed, haha, and quickly twisted himself to his hands and knees, bile burning his throat, as he hoped he could wretch the loser out of him.
“FUCK YOU!” He screamed and spat at the floor beneath him, eyes wrenched shut still.
“I HATE YOU! I HATE YOU SO MUCH!” Though he did not know who he was speaking to. He wanted everyone to hear it— everything to feel it in the pit of their gut. Every mighty roar he had to let out, he seethed for it to command everyone, and demand everything, and yet in the final boom he only said one word:
“PHARAOH!”
And if there were Pharoahs here, they would have understood the command in the tongue of a King’s decree.
But, as fate would have it, there were no Pharaohs here. The birds in the sky wouldn’t have understood the order in his booming voice to hate, and neither would the reeds blooming at his chest. And Bakura, save his poor damned soul, never did vomit up any half-digested chunks of Apep. Unlucky for him. He opened his eyes, and the tears that only ran when he was sick and in pain fell to the ground along with the saliva and mucus.
He panted.
Ugh. This was gross.
He supposes he was done being a pussy, and peered down at his legs: good, he thought, unprocessing of his own words. No wounds. No… Nothing. “Nothing,” Bakura said the last bit out loud, almost like a request for explanation. “Nothing.” he says again.
Fuck. Double fuck, triple fuck. He resisted the urge to curl into a ball and heave once again. He’s done acting like a child, he promised himself, finished. Tantrums, he hissed to himself. Reduced to tantrums. Like some child, really! Because, as you know, only children curl up and cry.
“Haha,” “You’re quite a laugh, you know.”
The sound of a voice jumpstarted him to his feet. It was close. He wouldn’t admit to being startled if it caught him dead, though— no, about now he was torn between ‘who are you?’ and ‘I’ll rip your fucking face off,’ which were, of course, strong contendors to indicate that he was startled, instead.
“Uh,” He said, lamely.
There was no reply. Obviously. He feels more stupid than a bird when he considers how fucking eloquent he’s being here, and steadies himself so that he doesn’t look like an idiot who’s ready to turn this encounter into some, some, what, play date?
He wasn’t, you’ll want to note, because he’s already boiling his brain in his skull with rage, mentally accusing the anonymous perpetrator of thinking this affair will be anything pleasant. How dare you, how dare you, how dare you.
No, this will not be pleasant, because Bakura doesn’t do play fights. Bakura snaps necks.
Pushing his legs forward and preparing to stride through the tall grass like a slithering, growling beast, he braces himself for anything he could.
“Whatever happens, I’m just glad you’re here for this.” The voice spoke again, and Bakura froze in his prowl. A tilt of the head; was that a conversation? He parts the reeds before him and dives further into the landscape— and rest assured, he did hear two voices.
He stalked, and stalked, and stalked through the grass as he presumed. Swimming through the flora kissing his skin, he felt his heart hammer harder, and harder, and harder ever yet from the inside of his ribs. Had he not instinctively tried to force the Satan from his gut upon his rude awakening, he would have assumed it was searing his stomach lining alive.
“Well, then I’d say, let’s start with dessert and go backwards. It’s been a backwards kind of day!” It was right in front of him now, and he was just about ready to do something drastic and horrible. Blood in his veins hotter than fire and faster than any serpent on Earth, he holds his breath and barrels through the last bush before him. It was then, only then, and for the first time since he decided he was an angry, angry 11 year old, did the burn of rage in his soul, sweat, and spit freeze over as if it were Hell in a metaphor.
Her hair, as always, was kept neatly beneath a wrap that he could recall she’d decorated herself. The tribal patterns of their family pressed into the cloth by careful fingers dyed red with henna, adorned by gold.
The callouses and scars that clung to those hands, and arms, and legs, remained exactly where he left them— on nights where she’d cut her ankle fetching coriander from the far side of town, the nomad of her own design that she was, decidedly.
And the night that she shoved him into that barrel— that disgusting night, where he watched his neighbor, then his tutor, then his father die to protect the two— he rounded the corner, just as the soldiers left, and watched as her head was severed cleanly from the rest of her.
What a nasty scar that‘ll leave, he found himself thinking, as if it were another cut or scrape from grinding herbs. Of course, it never did, because no such thing would heal. And as he gazed upon her now, still, no scar adorned her throat— because the Gods were merciful, and loved her, too— loved her because she was love, and so was he, and so was every bird in the sky, and so was every blade of grass, and so was Kul Elna.
“Mama?” His voice trembled, too, like a reed in the wind.
But she was not alone, and when his eyes swept to the side, the tremble became visible. Because the other woman looked down on him with familiar eyes; like she’d once had a child who was wilder than moonlight, and like she’d once had a child who was smiling like sunshine— like Bakura would know them, like they’d been here before. Worst of all, she looked down at Bakura, the tall woman she was, as though he was a northern summer. As if he took his while— as if he knew it all, as if they met before.
They did.
She felt taller than Bakura had recalled. Long white hair— that black dress that would have made the gold on a king envious, the way it made her regal. Her hair felt shorter. He would have asked if she had trimmed it, but every word in any language was futile when you stood before a woman who was wilder than moonlight and smiling like sunshine. Her dark eyes were a catalyst that raised people up to dream— wild and strong dreams— long ones. But in so many dreams did he watch her die; like a record, like a haunted phonograph. One day they stopped. They didn’t come back.
No words left Bakura’s mouth this time. No sounds. He wanted to say it. He needed to. But in no world did he deserve to. At that moment, he didn’t feel like he deserved to be looked at. He felt too small. Yet, there they were. Like they’d been here before.
Then, too, like she’d known, like she’d seen it all, like she’d been here before— she parts her lips to speak. “I forgive you.”
And Bakura, her northern summer; he curled up into a little ball, and began to cry.