Disclaimer: Yu-gi-oh is the property of Takahashi Kazuki. The novel "Slaughter-house Five" was written by Kurt Vonnegut.
So It Goes
I didn't really know what I was trying to write. I was planning on just using this fic as a place to write down some ideas and passages, hopefully to put them together. I ended up writing the last scene of this fic, and then the first scene of this fic, working down to the last scene. I think it was mainly me wanting to try out a new writing style (again), and this is the end result.
The line, "so it goes", comes from Slaughterhouse-5 by Kurt Vonnegut. I suspect that the book is much more confusing than my book, seeing that it skips around quite a bit more than mine does.
An explanation of the fic is at the end for those of you who are confused on what happened in the fic.
Thanks to both my beta readers. Couldn't have done it without you.
~ * ~
He was sitting on a fluffy white cloud, and much to his annoyance there was a pretty pair of angel wings coming from his back. He looked nice as an angel, but that didn't really mean he wanted to be one.
"Where am I?" he asked.
"Here," was the vague answer. He would have rolled his eyes, but angels just don't do that type of thing. They just sit there and look pretty, sometimes string a harp and sing a chord. But really their purpose was to sit there and look pretty. He'd rather be without the wings and doing something rather than sit there and look pretty.
"Where is here?" he asked again, hoping for something more specific.
"Here," was the vague answer again.
A sigh escaped from his lips, he just couldn't help it. Here could be anywhere. Here could be in the middle of nowhere and still be a here. He wanted out. He wanted to get off his fluffy white cloud, rip off the pretty pair of angel wings, and stop sitting there and looking pretty.
"Who are you?"
He was expecting an answer along the lines of 'Me' or 'I' or something to that extent. Instead, he got no answer at all.
He tried again.
"Why am I here?"
"Because you are."
"Am I supposed to be here?"
"No."
"Then why am I here?"
Nobody answered him. He supposed that maybe they had just needed somebody else to sit there and look pretty, but for some reason he very much doubted it as well. He was feeling a bit edgy.
Being dead could do that to a person, so he had heard.
~ * ~
Somebody was crying as he started to feel dizzy. He wondered who was crying. Who would cry on his account? He didn't even know why he was here. Wherever here was.
He didn't want to die. Not really. But part of him also didn't care. Of course, that part would be left behind when he died, leaving behind only the disillusions that he should still be alive.
How odd.
In another circumstance, he might have been angry that his chance to live was being taken away. Well, to be more precise, it had been taken away by bigots who thought they were doing right.
Everybody thought that what they did was right. That little lady who let the dog piss on the front step. The teacher who gave you enough homework to occupy somebody on a trip to Pluto and back. The guy who went crazy and shot every person he could see because he thought he was right.
Course, thinking that what they were doing was right didn't necessarily make it right.
As his mind started to shut down, as his breathing slowed and he started to lose it all, he realized that maybe he was right about having earned the chance to live. Obviously, somebody had thought that he didn't deserve to live. So maybe they were correcting a mistake that they saw needed correcting.
Maybe.
So it goes.
~ * ~
His chest rose up and down in an erratic cacophony of up's and down's, punctuated by sudden shortness of breath and the such. He'd supposedly caught some disease while waiting there for somebody to find him in a place where nobody was ever found. Perhaps he would have been better off that way, rather than in this white hospital that spelled of white sterilization.
He might have wondered if somebody had found him, but he was really too tired to care. Part of him felt like closing his eyes and just letting go. The rest wanted to hang on. Unfortunately, 'the rest' wasn't a very big majority. In fact, it wasn't really a majority at all.
Being in pain could do that to a person, so he had heard.
~ * ~
He'd watched in abject fascination as the blood pooled around him. It was red and smelled strongly of taint and pain. It looked like a rose that had allowed the color to bleed from its blood-red petals.
He knew he was going to die.
Such knowledge didn't really make him feel good, but he didn't really want to argue with the facts. There was so much blood, so much pain. And it was starting to get dizzy. The blood was mixing with the dirt and the ground, and strange spots were starting to interfere with his vision. The tears smeared into the blood, the blood metamorphosed into a disturbing ocean of red that he was going to drown in.
He had heard you could drown in your own blood. Didn't quite remember where, but he had heard it somewhere.
Then he was in a field. A field of red. A pretty field of red roses amidst a backdrop of a red background. Everything was red, except him. He stood out like a sore thumb, as the critics like to say. He felt like he shouldn't be there.
Somebody else thought so too. The red ran into his bare skin, turning it into a sickly shade of dried red that would make any sane person puke. But there were no sane people here, and he didn't really care because he couldn't see anything but red.
Then it ran up his body as if it was enduring a race to get to the stop, the many strands of red streaking up his naked body, turning everything in their path that sickly shade of dried red. His pale skin, his white hair. Everything was red.
His hair wasn't dried red. It was pure red. Like the blood.
Only his eyes retained their color. Blue.
A small dot of blue sticking out in a sea of red.
A small beacon of hope in a field of despair.
Then his eyes shut and the beacon was extinguished. The world was red. The world was blood and the world was dying a slow and torturous death in an abyss of red.
So it goes.
~ * ~
They hit him and it hurt. They hurt him and he hurt. They took him in a way he was never taken. They took everything away from him. They took his life, his self, him. They left nothing left.
Even if he recovered, he would have been nothing than an empty shell.
Being raped could do that a person, so he had heard.
~ * ~
He was gay. They didn't like that. So in that back alley they held him down and ripped off his clothes, leaving him to their mercy, the stoic faces obviously not going to give any to the little fag.
Fags aren't human. They're something else. Something that people could do things like this to.
They told him to shut up. They told him that if he didn't stop screaming and begging, they would cut out his tongue.
He heard and understood. He believed them. There really was no reason not to. Even though reason never applied to situations like this. If reason prevailed, things like this wouldn't happen.
At least they weren't supposed to happen.
At least, that's what fairytales and happy endings said was supposed to happen.
At least, that's what they were taught in school.
At least, that's where he learned that the chance of a happy ending in this world was slim.
So he silently cried as they had their way with him. They taunted him and hurt him physically, emotionally, and sexually. They wanted him to make him wish that he had never been born. They wanted to break him. They wanted to utterly, completely, and totally destroy him.
They succeeded.
So it goes.
~ * ~
He felt sorry for himself. He hadn't brought this on himself, he hadn't asked for this. Yet here he was, about to be hurt by people who simply didn't like him for whom he was.
They didn't care.
Why should they?
He wanted to cry out when he saw the disgust in their eyes. Such hate he saw. It was sad that somebody at what really was a young age could feel such hate. It was disturbing, but there was nothing he could do.
Nothing he could do but wait.
Helpless.
Being faced with such hate could do that to a person, so he had heard.
~ * ~
"Ya… yamete… yamete kudasai…" he begged.
A scream echoed through the city.
They were punishing him for something he couldn't really control. It wasn't his fault, he never asked for it. But he was what he was, and for that in their eyes he needed punishment. So they took him one day in some dusty alley in the middle of a district where screams were constantly heard and much ignored, and with the knowledge that nobody would come to his aid, they administered the much-needed punishment.
Somebody was going to die that day, and there was nothing he could do.
And so it goes.
~ Owari ~
The fic is written backwards. I originally intended for it to be a series of quick flashbacks that would end with "… so he had heard", but it didn't work out that way. So the fic is written backwards.
I really didn't know what I was trying to write about for this fic. I suppose it is once again another one of my 'how homophobia destroys' fics. I have been a bit edgy myself about tests and the news and such.
I doubt there will be a sequel to this fic. Don't ask for one. Considering my work ethic, I probably won't write one unless I get a really good idea. This fic itself took about thirty minutes to write, but I will admit to you know that it was probably thirty of the best minutes I could offer.
I'm sorry I killed off Ryou. I have a tendency of killing off my favorite characters. If it makes you feel any better, I'll try to break that habit and kill off some of my not-so favorite characters.
Please leave a review. Suggestions, criticism, anything is welcome. But don't flame if you can't give a decent reason. I have better things to do with my time.
Moonlight Reflection