Disclaimer: I do not own Yugioh, nor do I claim rights to any of the affiliated characters. I make no profit from this story.
Warnings/Notes: This is very angsty. There is character death, you have been warned.
Cheated By Fate:
The edge of the glass pressed itself against his lips, breath emitting from him eased it's way around the outside of the glass, forming a fog against it's cold surface. His redwood eye scanned the dark crimson that had become his hallow addiction. Absentmindedly he sipped it, the bittersweet medley lingered on his tongue longer than he'd expected. He set it down, watching as the sun light refracted off its edge to form a mirage at his feet, a cloud passing over the sun ceased to shadow the artificial array of colors. He laughed; artificial colors to match his equally feigned happiness. How convincing both could become when you grew accustomed to them.
Sighing he sat up a bit straighter, he smiled somewhat genuinely now, he had to admit, the demeanor was growing on him.
As his slippers connected with the ground at his feet they sunk into the warm, lush green, and servants stood on edge until he waved a hand to dismiss them. They had all tried to keep him inside, they'd all asked him to be reasonable, after all, he'd just come back from the hospital, he'd still be weak and in need of rest, but Pegasus never was one to listen to reason.
He made his way through the fields on unsteady legs, ones which, no longer seemed to adequately hold his weight. He stumbled on air as he approached the seemingly never-ending stairwell to his castle. These feet clothed in cotton had been long sense forbidden to tread on ground of tile and sod alike. How he hated that hospital bed.
He swallowed and pursed his dry lips together, forming somewhat of a scowl as he started to make his way up the stairs. Contact with anything solid was foreign to him, for weeks he had been asleep, in a gray box room, living a dream, a memory which never ended, repeating the same scenes from his youth over and over. The scowl fell from his face little by little as a cool wind pushed him onward, it was nice to be free of a place where there was no change in season.
His feet walked the even beat of the cement for what seemed like an eternity until he at last came to stand face to face with the french doors of his humble abode. "Cyndia…" Her name rolled quietly off his tongue with unmatched fluidity, a sound, which was to resemble laughter escaped his lips, "When did this become my fate…?" He pushed the oak doors open with what little strength he had left in his still tired bones; the hardwood flooring was much kinder to him than the stairs had been.
His fingers traced over the wall he clung to in order to support himself, everything here was so monotonous, functioning exactly the same as it had been before his time in recovery. Slowly he made his way to the master suite and sat down on his own bed. "Cyndia…" He whispered, "How your portrait haunts me."
"Cyndia I can't paint your eyes correctly if you're crying."
Laughing a bit she dabbed at her eyes with the delicate sleeve of her dress, "Sorry." She whispered in a voice riddled with traces of unbridled joy and shock. She dipped her head down for a moment to gaze adoringly upon the ring her husband-to-be had earlier that day placed on her finger, grazing over it with nimble fingers. "I can't remember a happier time in all my life." She laughed a bit at how silly she told herself she was being, and tears came in a flood.
Pegasus abandoned his painting supplies through a smile, which never faltered. Then moving to embrace her he held her with a passion she had not before felt radiating through his hands. "Cyndia." He whispered at her as he rubbed her back in a soothing manor and her tears died in the face of laughter. His hands found their way into hers and instinctively she interlaced their fingers as he stepped away to look her in the eyes. "Never in my wildest dreams could I imagine what marriage will mean for and bring us." The smile that had graced both of their soft features was one no paintbrush could ever duplicate.
He laughed somewhat bitterly as he waited for nightfall to approach. Slowly he felt his eyes growing heavy, and he didn't fight the sleep that came with the setting of the sun. However, when he awoke in the early hours of the morning he was not at all hesitant to slip on a coat and travel across his courtyard into his forbidden sanctuary.
His eyes battled with the rosetta light as he flipped the switch to turn it on. He felt increasingly weak, but that was of little concern to him now. He took a seat at his stool and forced himself to steady his breathing. Surrounded by her memory all was well. Sitting here in this room alone, tucked away deep in the confines of his robe, a tool that would give him new life, all was well.
Slowly he pulled out a switchblade and cleared his throat as he set it in his lap and picked up a clean painting pallet to mix dark shades of red with brown hues. Upon finishing he fingered the sharp and crisp metal of his new paintbrush, and without a second thought, sliced the skin of his wrist. The blood came slowly at first, in a beautiful pool of dark red, which settled on the surface of his unmoving flesh. Slowly he dipped a brush in it and began to paint a gown on the canvas; the smell of dried blood resembled that of drying paint, over time he'd come to realize that.
He painted her in red, as he never had before, though the paint for the dress was runny, it's detailing and shades remained unaltered. The only thing different from the original was the color itself. He looked down at the deep, self-inflicted cuts when at last he'd finished painting and admiring his new work of art, how perfect they too looked. Tucking the knife away, the clean, untarnished incisions, which had no chance to become carelessly stained by excess blood, were once again hidden under long sleeves.
He thought of self-mutilation not as a poorly chosen way to cope, but as a way to flirt with suicide with the unshakable intention of escaping it. He laughed in satisfaction, in a manor which would lead people to believe he was mad, finally, without the millenium eye, he had found a way to cheat fate as it had cheated him so many times before.
As knocking and frantic yells sounded at the door outside his studio he rose to his feet and slid the new, still wet painting safely behind another. Staring deep into the faded pigment of her blue eyes those emblazoned in his memory came to mind. They, unlike his heart and paintings, were untarnished by the slow decay of time. He laughed as a smile graced his features. In her presence, because of her; both the best and worst things in life had sought him out. Patting the knife in his pocket as he had the case that held her wedding ring when still in the prime of his life he unlocked and opened the door to his studio. Stepping out into a world of reality that would drive him to madness, to her, once again, he closed his eye and placed a hand over the one that'd been taken from him not long after she had.
Even without it he was able to see into people's very minds, eyes, and souls with such accuracy it sometimes amazed even himself. Though after searching the confines of his own heart for many years he couldn't find the cure to what ailed it.
Irony was such a cruel thing….