"Why?"

The sheer question had scared Ryou. Why indeed. Why did she want to meet him again? Why did she feel scared about losing someone who manipulated her life for her again? Why?

"I… can't explain it…" That was the truth. She couldn't explain it without sounding like a total loco. How can she explain that having a voice behind her head comforted her? No way.

"Just try and tell." The Thief King was staring at her intensely, and it made her undeniably uncomfortable. "Before I meet Yugi and the others… I had no friends." She murmured, and she felt somehow glad that Bakura didn't ask her to enhance her voice.

"I was always alone. But when I found Monster World – a very great game – I found friends. And when I play with those friends, it felt so fun that I want it to stop forever. You, I mean, my yami, made it possible for me- although in a very inconvenient way." She took a deep breath before continuing. "It was scary. And it continued. Whenever my friends play with me, they went into comatose state. Their souls are trapped within my dolls, playing the game forever. I become very detached and empty. When I moved to the Domino High, I met with Yugi.

"And at the same time, there was a teacher who hates me. And you eradicated him for me…" The Thief King raised one of his eyebrows. "That was the first time anyone ever do something for me, Bakura, do you know how much it means for me…?" Oh god. Outburst is bad, especially to the man who doesn't know a thing…

"Don't raise your voice at me, hikari." Ryou jolted, but not at the sharpness of those words. The last time she checked, this was Ancient Egypt and not the present Japan. His - her yami wasn't supposed to know that word, much less use it as a nickname like he did now.

What puzzled her even more was the fact that Bakura himself looked bewildered at the words he just said. Could it be that he didn't know what it meant?

"Bakura?" Ryou asked. She would never get used to the fact to other people, she sounded like she was calling her last name. To her, Bakura was always him. Her yami.

"Akefia." He said, sounding irritated for some reason. "My name is Akefia Bakura. I'm always Akefia to those who knew me." Ryou raised one of her eyebrows, raising the silent question of 'Marik?'. "That asshole is too caught up in our titles. To him, I'm always Thief King Bakura before Akefia Bakura. I can't ask for a better partner though."

Somehow, a link Ryou never felt for one year surged and it transferred amusement down her way. She looked up to Bakura, who looked confused as well. /Just like before.../ she thought, but judging from the way Akefia's hands went to his pocket to find his hidden weapon, he heard it too.

/We could do this before.../ Ryou thought hesitantly. /But it was always in a way that I'd rather not remember/ but her mind unwillingly played the memories for both of them.

The Ring. It attached itself to her- when she was a he- chest while her yami says that he didn't want to part with her yet.

The Monster World. Her yami had pierced a hole through their hands just to make her silent.

The duel where she was losing to Yami. When she was bleeding on her arm.

Those were the times when they talked. But Ryou could vividly remember the comfort of her soul room right across Bakura's. She always cower in fear, but the Thief's room was always warm and full of passion (and desire to revenge), it comforted her somehow.

"I see..." Bakura said as he exhaled. "I didn't know I could be even more of an asshole that I already am. That's probably why I was locked inside that ring, huh?" Although he just sounded a question, Ryou knew that she didn't need to answer.

"So I was your yami, your darkness." He said for both of them. Ryou nodded. "Technically, you will be." They were in the past, after all. Bakura laughed. "Let's start this my way, 'kay? I'm Akefia Bakura, the Thief King of Khemet." Bakura, no, Akefia held out a hand for her. If it were her yami, he wouldn't have done this in a million years. But she came to notice that her yami was a part of Zorc while Akefia was his own person. Ryou smiled.

"I'm Ryou Bakura." Something in her heart whispered that it was a start for something she had dreamed of for a long time: coexistence between light and dark, just like how Yugi and Yami were.

Unlike Yugi and the Pharaoh, Malik and Marik were in no way a normal light and dark. Malik knew this for a fact.

She wasn't a light. She was far from it. Light, hikari was a term she'd rather use to refer to Yugi or Ryou since they really were pure and light-like. Meanwhile, she was very different.

She was curious, and many other feelings such as regret and disdain came from that curiosity.

Regret because she couldn't satiate all of her curiosity, and disdain because she knew very well what caused her to lose her chance at doing what she wanted to do.

And at the same time, it caused hatred and envy to surge from the depths of her heart. She envied Odion, who can't receive the Tomb Keeper's initiation. She envied Ishizu, who didn't need to receive the initiation because she's born a girl. She hated her father for doing whatever he had done to her. She hated Marik for killing her father. She hated Shadi for lying to her about the whole thing about the Pharaoh's soul.

Surely a light shouldn't feel this much hatred?

That's why Malik would never be a 'hikari'. She might be a light to Marik's darkness, but she was not a hikari. Hikari means light. And light means purity. She wasn't pure. Oh no, not at all.

That was why she and Marik were lying beside one another with nothing on besides a blanket. Unlike those two spirits who they knew as a different entity altogether, Malik grew up knowing that Marik was another part of her. That he was always there for her to fear. Twisted, yes, but at this point, nobody cared.

"Your back is beautiful, pretty light." Marik touched her carved-back, causing her to wince. Not from the pain, but the sheer fact that somebody touched the darkest part of her life while saying that it was beautiful. "Pretty light?" Malik scoffed at the nickname.

"Just let me kill him, let me kill our father, hikari-pretty!"

"It feels right to call you that." Marik said as he tightened his grip around her waist. "Tell me the truth, Marik…" Malik sighed, tired of being suspicious. "Who are you really?" Marik burst into laughter, his breath invaded Malik's ears pleasantly. "Who knows?" Marik chuckled.

"I woke up in the middle of the sand, knowing nothing but my own name: Marik." Malik gasped. Could it be that… that Marik was here simply because she wished to see him again?

Would this be how her yami could have been without all those hatred and vengeance she implanted on him? Or maybe, Marik wasn't actually alive before. He was created for the sole chance so she could return to him as his own person, with his own darkness and not hers. Could it be that it was some sort of a practical joke that she was granted a new chance to be with her darkness?

Malik sighed as she closed her eyes. Whoever created this joke, if it really was, she needed to thank them.

I suck at writing tendershipping and bronzeshipping, but I really do ship the pairings DX