AN: I'm trying out different styles of writing, so I hope this turned out ok :3 everything I write is getting progressively fluffier; I'm not really sure how I feel about that. Enjoy, read and review, all that jazz.

Prompt #41 - Shapes

I don't give a damn what they say. I'm the right kind of wrong.

This is what Bakura used to say, rings of smoke delicately tracing his lips as he flicked his cigarette. Marik, he'd just watch him with those cold amethyst eyes. A coroner's eyes, a reporter's eyes. Somebody who sees the world for what it truly is. Ever the observer, Marik's cold dead eyes would watch the way Bakura held his cigarette with delicate laziness, the offending object slack in between his fingers. He'd watch the way Bakura's mouth would turn slightly downwards when he talked, the way his eyes would look at anything but Marik himself. This made it very easy to watch him. It's easy to observe when nobody's watching you. The only problem was, Marik got so caught up in Bakura's jaw line that he failed to notice Bakura's eyes narrowing, his brow raised curiously at him.

"What the hell are you staring at?" Bakura sneered at him, the Big Bad facade gracefully executed. The thing is, Marik had watched Bakura too long; he knew that beneath Bakura's bravado, he just wanted company.

"You," he replied truthfully. Bakura's precious little poisonous mouth twisted into a lopsided smirk and Marik couldn't help but smile back. The cigarette lay on the floor between them, forgotten, as Bakura's hands rested in Marik's hair, on the small of his back, his mouth pressed to his; the taste of tobacco lingering in their kiss.

Later, they'd be curled up in Bakura's bed, those long artist's fingers playing with Marik's hair, and Bakura would say things like 'mutilation is the single most defining thing about a person' and he'd press a small, firm kiss to Marik's head. Marik knows this is what he tells Ryou, too; tells him that it's a good thing that the spirit inhabits his body. 'It makes you interesting,' he tells him. He says this same thing to Marik, too – but when he tells his lover, Bakura traces the intricate protrusions on his back, the thick, scarred skin that covers his torso. He brushes his fingers over the scars under his eyes and he kisses him.

"Bakura," Marik growls against his teeth. "If you don't stop being so soppy I'm ending this partnership. You're no good to me when you're being... gentle."

Bakura nips the skin on Marik's neck and chuckles, low and throaty. He sucks on his skin until it bruises and Marik laughs. "That's better."

They lay in their post-coital aftermath, another cigarette between those lips that Marik loves so damned much, both of them sweaty and calm and still. Marik sits and watches Bakura, and he pretends that he doesn't notice but the slight curve of his smile gives him away.

"Do you mean it?" he asks quietly, and he half wonders if Bakura is going to pretend not to hear him. He stops himself from sighing with relief when those fiery eyes turn to look at him carefully, narrowing harshly as they observe him.

"Turn over," he commands, and Marik scowls adamantly before complying. Bakura and his pianist fingers trace of contour of his scars, and he sighs deeply. "Of course I do."

There's a pause as Bakura inhales his nicotine. "This cigarette," he explains, "is changing my – Ryou's – body. It's a part of life, and it doesn't make this body any less human. You view your scars as ugly, yet they're anything but."

Bakura sits and listens to Marik's breathing grow shaky and he really hopes his lover isn't crying, because he can't be doing with some pathetic little crying boyfriend on top of all his other problems.

"Hey – come on. Listen," He commands, and this time Marik obeys without even a trace of a fight. He turns to face Bakura, eyes red-rimmed but not a tear in sight. "It's not mutilation. It's mutation. All that is, really, is creation. How can anyone evolve without changing?"

"That doesn't change that I'm... I'm – wrong!" Marik scolds him, brow furrowed as if he was a child throwing a tantrum. Maybe that's all he is, Bakura realises.

"Shut up," he snaps, and he takes his artist fingers, placing them under Marik's chin. He presses their lips together softly and pulls his body nearer to him. "This," another kiss. "Is mutation. It's two people becoming one."

Marik smirks inside the cocoon of their kiss. Bakura continues, "And aren't we creating something beautiful?"

This is the very moment when Marik, enveloping himself inside the comfort of the monster he loves so much, realises: two wrongs don't make a right, but they're so damned close.