Special thanks to Meriah, for inspiration and encouragement (and a few little lines I stole!). This is due in larger part to you.

WARNINGS: Rape, childhood sexual abuse (well, this is Mai, after all), much angst, Jounouchi x Mai hints (I've been writing waaay too many het fics, haven't I? o.o;).

A lot of this is taken from the show (like during Mai's duel with Yami no Malik, when she was angsting about her childhood; and the part of the Doom Arc with Mai and Varon talking; and whatnot), but more of it is taken from my strange mind and what I've always thought happened to Mai to make her what she is. I guess along the way this got sort of autobiographical for me, but… :::shrug::: We won't get into that, now, will we?

I 3 Mai. And I hope you 3 my fic.

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Pretty Toy

"I've been looking for a savior in these dirty streets

I've been looking for a savior beneath these dirty sheets

I've been raising up my hands, drive another nail in

Just what God needs -

One more victim…"

- Tori Amos, "Crucify"

Gnarled trees clawed a broken sky, darkness lost against the greater darkness, until lightning split the clouds, a serpent whose voice echoed in the thunder. A gray rain lashed a gray world, until all faded to black in the darkling night.

A rainy night, and dark. A black car winding along a black road, tired eyes that could not see the way before them, and death that came in the headlights of a trailer truck.

And a little girl who looked down on a lost world from a great bay window, waiting for a car that would never come, looking for those who were lost forever.

Death has no meaning to a child. They haven't yet seen enough of life to know that it ends. She didn't understand that her parents would never be coming back.

It was then that he came to her first, her guardian legally and of the spirit. His heavy hand was gentle on her shoulder. Don't worry; I'll take care of you now. I'm here.

And he did, he was. He'd always told her the truth. He was always there. And she came to realize it wasn't such a good thing.

Even as a child, Mai Valentine was beautiful - lily-pale skin touched with the blush of roses, features soft with youth; amethyst eyes, dew-bright; lips like a flower yet unblossomed. Yes, even then she was beautiful. No denying it.

Certainly he always thought so. He, her replacement parent, protector, friend…and ultimate betrayer.

She'd struggled the first time. It hurt, she said, it hurt! And she'd tried to claw his eyes out, so he couldn't see her anymore, he couldn't hurt her.

He's slapped her so hard she couldn't seen straight, and pinned her hands down. Relax, he said as he entered her, tearing her, forcing himself in where nothing should go.

She'd screamed. She'd screamed and screamed and screamed until he slapped her again. And no one heard.

Relax, he said as he began to move in and out of her, slick with blood. Relax, go limp like a little doll. It won't hurt if you don't fight it.

Yes. Because that's what she was, wasn't it? His doll, his pretty toy. That's all she would ever be.

She didn't bother fighting after that.

How many times? She could not even count them. How many times had he crushed/torn/forced her? She didn't know. And yet she carried the burden of each like a scar upon her soul. Each pushed the knife lodged in her soul deeper…and deeper…and deeper….

But even this was better than the alternative. Better than the night, the loneliness, cold and silence that descended with the shadows. The darkness in which she saw her parents and all she ever loved, and knew that they were gone forever. The darkness in which she saw herself and her future, and all the pain that was yet to come. The darkness that had no beginning, and so had to end.

After the darkness, she almost welcomed him. Almost…and hated herself for it.

But she was a lioness in the body of a porcelain doll, too proud to bend and too strong to break. She would survive this. She would survive.

She could do nothing else.

She broke free of this life as soon as she turned eighteen. Fled from his country estate and into the city, that forest of skyscrapers. He would never find her here. And indeed, he never did.

And yet he was with her always, dwelling in her darkness. She could flee from him, she could flee from the life she had lived, but she could never flee from the one that she loathed most - herself.

Sex and the sense of touch, too, followed her. Sex humiliated her, enraged her, tormented her, frightened her, and haunted her.

Perhaps that was why it drew her, inexorably, time and time again.

She lay with anyone who would take her. She would give into it, surrendered to this riptide of dread and desire in her soul. Lose her hurt for a time in a different kind of hurt, lose herself in pain, pleasure, and finally the darkness of oblivion.

She tried to forget the shadows of her nights, lose them in the light of day. She took up with a new game, Duel Monsters, that was circulating around the streets. Everyone played it, even young kids who knew nothing else.

Perhaps that was what drew her to the game. The promise of victory to the defeated, the offer of power to those who had none. In cards, as in life, she played for nothing less than the best.

Head high, she strode into the dark corners of the city, the dens of thieves and killers where the righteous feared to tread, and challenged the best of them to a duel. She feared nothing. All the things she feared most had already come to pass.

Her prize, if she beat them, was money, jewels, cars, material wealth. And her opponent's prize, if they won…was her.

What was there to lose, that she hadn't lost a hundred times before?

For this, she played. And very often in those early times, she lost. Lost more than just a game.

Thrown down on dirty sheets, held down, as others took their pleasure in her, any who so chose. Torn again, helpless as a child, their pretty toy once more.

But even this was better, this being taken again and again, crushed beneath another's sweating body - than being alone again, in a night that had no end….

Even in this, she would not give up. Even in this, she would not be moved. She tried, again and again. And she began to win.

She became one of the top-ranked duelists in the world. Money, jewels, power was hers (a compulsion, perhaps, to try to buy fulfillment of the soul with material possessions). But her true prize was pride, and it was pride she took from her defeated, as a vampire takes life from its victims - fulfillment, again, taken by those who had none. Searching for something to feed the fire that consumed her.

She held power now over those who had held power over her. Her beauty was her weapon, and she learned that she could use it against others even as they had used it against her. Sex she dangled over their heads; sit up little boy, whimper, beg like the dog you are. I'll torture you as you once tortured me. This is my revenge.

And then…she met him. Jounouchi Katsuya, her beautiful boy, with summer-gold hair and shining amber eyes.

She hated him a little. He'd beaten her at her own game, he'd reduced her to the person she'd been, all without even meaning to. And yet he loved her, he cared about her welfare.

Maybe the reason she hated him most was because she loved him, too.

He was a riddle to her. He wanted her, she knew he did. But he didn't want her as a sex toy, a trophy, a slave, or even the whore that she was.

He wanted her as a friend.

Desire she could accept, desire she could understand. But…love? This was strange to her.

"It's a vicious game you play, Mai."

She turned to look at him, him with that perpetual lopsided, happy smile on his face. Only one who knew him as she did could detect the shadow of hurt it held.

She laughed - at him or at herself? - and there was no humor in it. "I play the only way they taught me."

"It's only a game."

She looked at him, long and slow. Whatever he saw in her eyes, she never knew, but he shuddered and looked away. "Life is only a game to me now."

His face contorted in pain - her pain - something he could neither alleviate or understand. Those bright eyes met her dark ones once more. "I can't give you absolution, Mai, I can't give you salvation. I can only give you love."

She did not reply.

"Please, Mai, don't hate me for loving you…"

There was such a painful tenderness in his eyes. Close to her now, so close, he reached his hand out to touch her face, and whispered, "You're so beautiful, Mai."

She froze. Beautiful? She was not beautiful. She was…

Unclean.

Used.

Usable.

A toy to be cast aside.

Taken, time and time again.

She fled. She turned her back on the only one who had ever really loved her. She pulled away from him and ran.

Yet something, all and nothing, stopped her short. She hesitated, trembling in the silence of her soul. She turned around and went back to him, twined her arms around him, pressed herself against his chest, her cheek to the beating of his heart.

And she cried, cried for what had been and what would be, cried for Jounouchi's sake and for her own, cried for the person she was and the person she had been…at last in the arms of the one she loved.

FINIS

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I don't know if this is a sad ending or a happy one. I guess I'll let you decide.

And I don't know who the guy who first rapes littlekid!Mai is. I figure after her parents died, Mai was appointed a guardian or foster parent. And Mai, lucky ducky that she is, got stuck with this guy, a child molester.

Oh, and please review. I've been getting really depressed about this . I think I'm going to take a break from the fandom for a while after this. I'll still work on my Ryou x Bakura chapter fic, Shadowlights (which is really the source of my depression; it's my best work, and nobody wants to review it), but that'll be about it. But hey, I'll get my Lord of the Rings ficcy out, so :p