Disclaimer: I don't own the characters aside from a few corpses and one psychiatrist.
Warning: disturbing and controversial elements, psychological disorder theories. If you don't like it, you're warned already of the contents.
Pairing: Ryouxyugi, Bakuraxyugi
Eclipse
Eclipse-ékleipsis- I cease to exist
-Ancient Greek dictionary-
-o0o-
The mural was a faded picture of three figures, a man holding down a crying little boy on a stone altar, fingers gripping taut on his throat, his other hand raising a gray-tinted butcher knife over his head, poised to swing down. Hovering above them in a white long yellowed by time, an angel extended his hand in a stopping gesture.
As Ryou stared at it, his mind was hazy, dazed by the tingling warmth and the twining scents of sweat, fresh milk and leather polish pervading from the person sitting next to him on the wooden bench. With a tiny poke of his finger, Yugi had his full attention again.
"Is it?"
"Abraham and Isaac. Yeah" Absentmindedly, he answered; his eyes, hidden under the incline of his head and messy white hair, traced the gentle dip of Yugi's collar bone and the curve of his nape, sparsely feathered with downy vellus hair. A silent but profound sense of anxiety filled him from inside as he wondered to himself how Yugi's skin would feel against his lips.
"It's old, just like the rest of this place is. I really don't understand all this but it's fine." He made a tiny motion with his hand, eyes turning over his shoulder to get a better look at the church they were in, an gigantic dome draped in a thick but invisible layer of dust and dour grey, filled with the monotonous hymn of a hundred prayers voiced all at once and smelling strongly of wet coble stones and rat droppings. The sun rays were the only note to relief the hundred year old church off of its immense melancholy. That and Yugi but Ryou said nothing, opting to continue staring at the various murals as he gathered himself. Around them, the Sunday mass went on uninterrupted.
Ryou stayed very still as he watched Yugi pursed his lips into an impish half pout.
"Abraham and Isaac?...I've read it."
"You did?" It was not one of Ryou's favorite. In fact, the text from the bible and the way the painted pictures seemed to jump out of the stone frame gave him a churning feeling.
"For my essay, on religious anthropology." Yugi said, titling his head closer to Ryou.
"It's ...bizarre. Do you think...that God intended to eat Isaac, and that's why he told Abraham to kill him?"
"No, of course not. The angel intervened in time..." He looked back at the winged figure, nothing but faded paint on the hard surface. "...didn't he?"
"Of course."
Not always...a voice answered, crisp and quiet and nothing more than a mere whisper from a secluded corner or Ryou's mind. He paid it no heed. In fact, he did not hear it at all, too busy admiring the smile that stretched over Yugi's lips and lit up his whole face.
"Thanks, you know, for taking me here" Said Yugi, gesturing to the mass, already nearing its end and the many rows of kneeling people. "I really wouldn't know what to do if I had gone alone."
"No problem. Actually, I'm glad you came. Normally I'd just go alone."
There was an instant of silence between them, drowned in the monotonous prayers and punctuated only by the scrutinizing glances from old ladies. The preacher read his rite before making a cross on his chest as he announced the mass's ending and the church's activity for next weekend.
"The eclipse!" Yugi murmured excitedly along with the preacher as he got up. Ryou followed him."I've already bought ...what do they call it? Helioscope.. yeah" But Ryou already knew that. He knew Yugi bought the glass not from the university bookshop but from a fellow classmate, knew he bought it just two days ago, knew the precise amount he'd paid, 500 yen, and that neither Joey nor Tea would be watching the eclipse with him for they were busy with their own affairs. What Yugi didn't know, however, was that he'd have no use for said glass.
"Yugi-kun..." Ryou began gently, his smile all too obvious in his voice. "...it's a lunar eclipse. You only need those for solar eclipse."
"But he said... oh." The duelist blinked in realization before smiling sheepishly"...haha. I guess I wasted all that money then."
"That's alright. You can still bring it along. Just think of it as a souvenir. You'll remember it far better, won't you?"
The bronze bell resounded amidst the fluttering sounds of a hundred pairs of feet slapping on cobblestone and pouring out into the street. Ryou and Yugi lagged behind to avoid the packing crowd pushing through the two large church gates.
Ryou laid a hand on his chest to calm his thundering heart but to no avail. Yugi was a few steps ahead of him and bouncing lightly on his feet. A thought flashed through Ryou's mind.
It's now or never...
He took one shuddering breath before...
"Yugi-kun..."
"hmm..?" Yugi smiled at him over his shoulders and slowed down. The church courtyard was almost empty now and surrounded them was the safety of privacy.
It's now or never...
"Yugi-kun..I..."
Could he say it? Ryou's mouth opened just to snap close again.
"...I'm going to watch the eclipse too. My house has a terrace. Would you...like to come watch with me?"
Yugi answered immediately with a toothy grin.
"Sure. I'll come at around..." He glanced at wristwatch. " ...eleven thirty. It starts around 1 in the morning, isn't it? Is that fine with you?"
"It's fine."
"Right. I'll see you around Ryou-kun." And with that, he was gone, running to catch the bus back to the game shop, leaving Ryou alone in the empty church courtyard.
Ryou gazed after him until he was a black dot on the horizon before turning down.
"I'm a coward..." He said in an exhale to the empty courtyard, eyes downcast and hands covering his face. He should have said it. He was about to really. He could have said it. The words were already on the tip of his tongue, but at that last moment, Yugi's amethyst eyes had met Ryou's and in all of their cruel naivety had established a firm hold on his throat. In the end, he did not have the courage to confess.
"Idiot!" Ryou cursed, flinging his arms about in frustration before letting out a resigning breath. There was naught he could do as the duelist must already be half his way home. At least he still had another chance, on the day of the eclipse. They would be alone, in his house, at night. Hopefully, he'd have the guts to not waste another the rare private moment.
At this, Ryou's thoughts brightened. He'd do it, definitely. It was in his house, his home. If he can't do it there then there was no where else.
The bell announced mid-day with twelve resonating sounds, startling Ryou out of his thoughts and reminded him of something he needed to do. More specifically, a place he needed to be.
He shook his head before making a hasty exit; his hands slipped into his pocket, taking out a rolled-up note. The letters were scrawled onto crumbled white paper. It read.
Anthony Grey, PhD, psychiatrist, 27 Flit street.
-o0o-
It always began with a woman, spread naked on dirt floor, her skin and hair a maggot white and her eyes a glassy opal. The congealed blood stood out more like a filthy swipe of caked mud on her neck than a real wound. A vapor hung about, stinking of burned flesh and rotten meats. Everything else was a sandy blur.
He could feel her flaking skin as he leaned down and pressed his lips on hers. The exposed teeth felt cold and slimy. Her breasts held none of that distinct softness of human flesh. He was not deterred. Bending down again, he closed his eyes and spoke to her in a soothing voice, a silent prayer.
"So Mr. Bakura...these dreams of yours. They are always the exact same?"
He opened his eyes to the crackling sound of burning wood. The fireplace lighted the room in dark red, orange, and mahogany brown. The doctor said by his settee, drumming his fingers on a metal paper holder, his glasses weighted down on his goatee.
"Yes"
"And they always begin the same way?"
"Fire. A burning village. A dead woman. Yes...and you can call me Ryou. Bakura sounds...strange."
There was the sound of a pen scribbling on paper. The first time he'd come there was no paper and no notes, but that was a week ago, and the dreams had started long before that.
"Tell me more. Was there anything else? Any other elements? Light? Colors? Sounds perhaps?"
Ryou crossed his hands on his chest as he delved deeper into his memory. Light? No. There was no light but a suffocating fog...but there were other things.
"Sand..." He said after a while "...everywhere...in my mouth even. It's strange. Can you actually feel gritty sand in a dream?" Colors were there, but they were a mere blur, easily forgotten by the fact that that woman was there. She dominated everything else.
He shook his head.
"I'm sorry. I keep forgetting. It's not very clear sometime. It's not easy to describe"
Craving. Something gnawed in his stomach. His throat was clogged. His tongue felt sweet, so sweet it was sickening. Screams, then cries, then shrieks decorated with shouted orders and hysterical pleas. A cacophony of madness. But he could not hear what they say.
"Perfectly fine, Mr.Ryou. It's one of dream natures. Vivid but hard to remember. In fact..." The doctor clicked his tongue as he checked the hanging clock. Their session was coming to an end. "...in fact, I think I can safely say that this is a hybrid case of night terror. Strong emotions, fear, anxiety, but hard to recall. It can also be a mix with..." He paused to consider his words "...sexual frustration, loneliness, childhood trauma, the loss of a close relative..." He omitted the word 'female'. "...it can be many thing actually. But you have nothing to worry about. There are certain phases of life when these occur."
"Really?"Ryou frowned, feeling a bit insulted "Don't you think it merited more examination with its ...grisly nature." A dead woman, a naked dead woman, a stranger. What did that say about Ryou's mentality? And who was she anyway?
"Taboo?"
"Yes"
"Dreams...don't do taboo, mr.Ryou. They are not bound by moral standards. They are instinctive, primal even. They simply reveal...sometimes, hidden parts of your self. It's not necessarily who you are. It can be your fears, your suppressed emotions, desires...many thing. Do you know of Giger, H.R.Giger? He's a well known case of night terror. He's definitely not that beast, that 'alien' he dreamed of though."
Ryou was silent for a while, his eyes closed and his brows creased into a frown.
"There were more. There were...some sort of odors. Am I supposed to be able to smell...in dreams?"
The doctor looked up from his notes, a clear interest in his eyes.
"smell? Tell me more?"
Ryou took a deep inhale as if to test the odors of the room itself.
"The whole place stank...something horrible. I kept feeling that something was burning. And...she also smelled..."
Her glassy opal eyes, her opened mouth, the stench of rotten food and saliva coming off it but it was a mere whiff compared to the vapor. Her nipples erect. Was she excited in the face of death? Her flesh...her dead flesh against his cheek and nose smelled like milk, sour with death.
"I don't know this woman." Shouldn't he dream of someone he knew? At least that was what he learned from those books before coming here.
"She has white hair." Said the doctor, leveling a meaningful look at Ryou's own mane.
"I'm the only case in my family. No one else."
"It needn't be someone you know. She can be an interpretation of yourself, or a part of you."
The doctor had meant to placate his worries, but Ryou was far from it. In contrast, he felt slightly annoyed at the other's dismissing attitude and his own inability to recall the dream in full. There was something in that dream that both excited and frightened Ryou at once, like some sort of forbidden fruit, promising of both exquisite taste and severe punishment. The forbidden apple. Should he feel like the biblical Adam then?
He heard rustling sounds of clothes and paper. Was the doctor getting up? There session was already over.
So soon...He thought in his head, still very unwilling to let go of the dream or dismiss it as quirks of his coming of age.
"Doctor" He opened his eyes, a maroon brown, and made sure to look straight into the doctor's own as he said this. " Is there any inkling...any chance that this is a sign of...schizophrenia?" An image floated into his mind, wild white hair, vicious red eyes and a smirk that drew harsh lines on his youthful face. The spirit was gone for years now but memory of him haunted Ryou still.
"schizophrenia?!" Exclaimed the doctor, his hands frozen over the table surface, half in the motion of calling for his secretary. "Young man, that is quite a stretch there."
"Just tell me, is there any chance? At all?"
Anthony Grey huffed as if insulted but he took note of Ryou's calm voice and his unwavering gaze. The boy was dead serious with his question. Finally, the doctor receded.
"No. I don't think so."
He let out an audible exhale. No more spirit, no more. This was the one thing that Ryou wanted to make sure. Because if he was still there, then Yugi-kun...
"But if you're so worried, I can write a prescription for you." Grey wrote a line on a piece of paper but did not give it to Ryou. "This medicine I don't have with me right now, but I can have it delivered to you on..." He checked the calendar "...Saturday. It has a very strong calming effect. If there's any chance that you might have schizophrenia then this will erase it. Is that fine?"
"The eclipse?"
"Yes. Are you busy then?"
"No...not really. I'll be home. Thanks, doctor."
"Excellent." And he sounded for his secretary as Ryou got up from the settee and headed for the door. In his head, a boy with amethyst eyes wrestled with a corpse for dominance.
-o0o-
Saturday came with a slow swagger as if to tease him.
Afternoon passed dreamily to make place for a quiet evening in the kitchen as Ryou prepared and ate his dinner. Supper was cream puff, home made for a touch of sentiment and kept cool in the fridge for that night.
Half the time, Ryou felt like he was floating around his house, from kitchen to bathroom to library then back to kitchen again after passing by living room. He kept the TV on in an old-fashion ballad but paid it no attention for his head was streaming with a hundred thoughts, and they all centered on one particular person, a duelist with a thing for leather.
Does he Does he Does he...the mantra repeated itself in loops in his head, bringing with it both excitement and dread.
A message came at 5 announcing that his delivery would come a bit later than expected due to a weekend traffic jam.
Beside that, all was going well. Surprisingly, he hadn't had another nightmare since his last meeting with the psychiatrist and Ryou, lulled by this sense of safety in his own house and left slightly exhausted from his own restlessness was soon drooping off on his couch.
He dreamed, and it was in this dream that troubles began, blowing in first with sandstorm and the licking blades of burning fire.
It began out as normal, with a gush of sounds that could have come from a slaughterhouse. Ryou kept his eyes closed and would have done so if it was not for the silence that descended so suddenly over him. Suddenly there was nothing, not a footfall, not a hiccup, not a plea, not even the slightest of murmur. It was only then that Ryou opened his eyes-and froze immediately at the sight spread out in front of him- a macabre beauty, gloriously terrifying.
She lied as usual, bathed in a pale red moonlight, no longer dulled by any fog or vapor. A boy sat beside her, white hair and dark skin, and with reverent movements of his small fingers, positioned her head on his lap.
It was with cold realization that Ryou watched him lean down to lay chaste kisses on her. Mouth, then breast, then belly and thigh. He bound a blindfold over her eyes. A murmur oozed from his lips. The language was foreign but Ryou understood with a frightening clarity; its meaning gripped his heart; his eyes widened in dawning horror.
I love you... I love you... I love you...mom...
'Oh no. Oh no no no...'
He swayed on his feet, momentarily struck by vertigo and the putrid stench blowing at him in waves. Ryou nearly fell when gentle kisses suddenly turned savage and ripping sounds began to fill the air.
Something crept into his mind. This was no dream. This couldn't be a dream. It was much too clear to be one. He couldn't be that boy. That was not his mother.
He whimpered as he tried to fight down the nausea that was raising up from his inside; his feet stumbling backward.
Suddenly, a voice, whispery crisp, sounded from next to him.
"She is...beautiful"
Ryou whipped his head almost violently to the right, and there, just feet away from him, stood the spirit of the ring, his red eyes glued to the gruesome sight in front of them.
"She's beautiful" He said with a slight sway of his head, the like of which an artist would as he admired the Mona Lisa, a stunned awe, a ravenous lust to own that beauty himself. "They are beautiful"
It was as if someone had broken the dam to Ryou. A furious rage bubbled in his chest, and he snarled so vicious he was surprised by it.
"You!"
But the spirit seemed unaffected by it. He did not reply and for a while simply stood there, gazing, basking in the stench and the sound of his own twisted fantasy, his own memory. Finally, Ryou had had enough.
"You should be dead!"
"...oh. Am I?" And he turned to Ryou in an almost lazy grace, his eyes glimmering, mocking.
"It's been so long since we've seen each other, isn't it? I almost miss you."
"Why are you here? You should be dead! Get out! Get.the.fuck.out.of.my.head!" If he weren't so repulsed Ryou'd have his hands on that wretched bastard's neck.
The spirit merely laughed then his lips stretched and pulled into a sneer. His voice escaped from his mouth like a purr.
"Ohh Ryou ryou ryou...so eager to play, so reluctant to admit it! Haven't you figured it out that we, you and I, we are the same." Under the moon light, the spirit's smile was a jagged line carved into his head.
"I'm you, Ryou"
.
...oh no, oh god no...
"And there, that is us" He casted his hand forward. "Aren't we beautiful?"
"You know for a long time I thought I was dead too. But I wasn't. Do you know why, Ryou?"
Ryou didn't know. He didn't want to know. An ominous feeling was clutching at his throat.
"...Yugi..." the name came from the spirit like a holy prayer. He closed his eyes to savor the bliss.
"You love him Ryou. You love him the way I loved her. You lust for him, hunger for him, yet at the same time deny yourself off him. How many time was it? Or have you lost count of your own failures. It would have been pathetic if it wasn't all so...delicious. Every glance, every shameful fantasy you've had of him, every time you fondled yourself to his name, to his scent, you revived me, nurtured me"
He grinned savagely to Ryou's shaking head and trembling form, cruelly taking pleasure with his every word.
"I'm you Ryou. I'm that part of you that craved for him. That part that you deny. Tell me..." He brought a hand to his mouth and licked at it, his tongue coiling around the fingers.
No please no...
"What does Yugi-kun taste like?...How does it sound when you tore off his clothes? Does he scream? Does he cry? Did you dare to look into his eyes or did you cover it? Did you bite? His skin, his hot flesh...so so so delicious."
And the spirit laughed then because Ryou was stumbling back with his hands clutching painfully into his mouth. He felt exposed. He felt naked and ugly, as if someone was looking, gaping in disgust, into his soul, into his very core, into his filthiest parts yet at the same time revealing nothing of himself.
His heart drummed in his chest and he wanted very much to deny it all, but couldn't. Because he knew, without fault and without deny, deep down he knew that the spirit was right. But by god he couldn't, didn't dare to say it. Gone was the anger, gone was the thoughts of disgust and left behind was a choking shame. He wanted nothing but for the spirit to just disappear now but that too was not possible.
So Ryou did the only thing he knew how to do, the thing that he did with all of his failures, with every time he looked onto Yugi's face and was speechless. He turned on his feet, his back facing the spirit, and ran.
He ran blindly into the night, into the dark pit that was his heart, chased by the bitter laughters and accusing voice. Anything, anything to escape those eyes, red then glassy opal then glistening amethyst.
"Run, Ryou, run. Run all you want. But don't forget this. You can't escape. Nobody escapes me. No body escapes us."
-o0o-
He woke up screaming to his room, dark and smelling of cold sweat. In his mind, a mantra was starting. It was a dream, was it? It was only a dream, a dream. Only a dream. It was not real.
He yelped at the sudden bong of the grand-father clock and stumbled hands and feet onto the floor, whimpering as he did so.
He found the light switch first then the fridge later in jerked movements and bumbling steps. His throat was parching and his his shirt damped.
A bell sounded in front of his house and Ryou jerked up. A thought zipped past his head.
"The medicine" that was it. His answer. His salvation. Ryou needed only to take a pill and the spirit would be gone, suppressed and caged away.
He ran to the door so fast he almost tripped over a chair, powered on by fear, anxiety and a forlorn sense of hope. The door opened with clicks of its lock and light flooded the room. Standing there on his doorstep was no deliveryman, but a boy, black hair and golden bangs and glistening amethyst eyes. Hanging off his neck was the helioscope and if it were any further up, it would have looked like a blindfold.
"Ryou-kun?"
Suddenly, he was overpowered by a tranquil calm. Behind Yugi, the moon shined down and bathed him in a pale red light, illuminating his cream-colored skin.
Dreamily, Ryou laid a hand on his cheeks, his soft cool flesh, wafting in the scent of fresh milk and leather polish, in the scent of sour and rotten death. His maroon eyes reflected the moon in pinpoints of red. The name escape him like a breath, like a holy prayer.
"Yugi..."
The End
I've seen a lunar eclipse once before a year ago and the moon looked very red, like a giant dot of blood on the sky. Fascinating and scary at the same time.
One concept art has been uploaded in my yugioh gallery. The link can be found in my profile.
The idea of a cannibal Bakura came from the fact that he must have been stuck in his village without food for quite some time since the village was small and isolated in a desert and that there could have been more than just 99 people so the spares would have been killed and buried. Bakura was hungry, he was around 8, prime time to develop an Oedipus complex and must have been starving. Taking in the trauma of watching his whole village deep fried into gold. Well, you can work out the math.
In many folk lores, the lunar eclipse can mean corruption of the soul, the night of the devil and so on.
The list of Bakura/Ryou's mental illnesses: cannibalism, mild necrophilia (there was no sexual intercourse involved. He was eight), Oedipus complex, obsessive-compulsive behavior, schizophrenia, and some other smaller ones that were only hinted at.
H.R.Giger: the Swiss designer who created the alien creature in the Alien franchise. He's known to have night terror.
Hope you enjoyed it (and if you didn't then don't feel too bad because you might not be the only one).
Sythe