Summary: Malik x Seto, yaoi lime Bound by fate and a dark past; enemies, yet each forever a part of the other. And then one night Malik appears in Seto's rooms, a strange promise on his lips…

This is kind of one of those, Let's-See-What-Weird-Pairing-Rhelle-Can-Get-Away-With-type fics. Plus, I've really wanted to see how a Malik x Seto would work. Thus…this thing was born.

If you think about it, they really do have a lot of similarities. They both killed their fathers, they both had terrible childhoods, they were both possessed by darkness, they both had control of the Millennium Rod, and lastly they've both fought their fate. Soo…yeah. Read. Enjoy. Kapeesh? XP

Sweet Dreams (Are Made of These)

Malik

Blue eyes regard me over the waste of steel, dark, and bright with the fire of the soul behind them. Like the eyes of the Bennu bird that was before the world, gazing down at the scene that spreads before it.

You know this deadly game I play. In a game in which you are only a pawn, you stand like a king over all you see. Even in your most humiliating moments, you have never learned otherwise.

You're so like me. So beautiful, so full of agony and pride.

They say that pride was the sin of the angels; that it was through pride that all souls fell from grace. But your soul is my soul, and your fall from grace may yet be my salvation.

Seto

You were born in the darkness beneath the desert where the sun never shone, and with this darkness you have come to destroy the world or save it.

There is darkness in your every step and gesture, ancient magic in your eyes. Yet there is something half-familiar about you, also, and the way your voice seems to call to me from across the abyss.

You are everything I loathe and fear and love, and dare not believe in. I see in you things I do not remember, lives I have forgotten.

You are my enemy, but you are my other half. So different, and yet so much the same.

You are an enigma, a riddle I am forever trying to solve. I have always loved riddles, and you are one that captivates my soul as well as my mind.

And thus why I am drawn to you, irresistible as gravity, hypnotized by both your darkness and your strange light. A chill creeps down my spine, and I shiver with something more than dread.

I know I am not making sense, not being reasonable. But you and the things that bind me to you do not make sense, are anything but reasonable.

As you said yourself, I am your past and you are my future.

I do not believe in either of these, but it doesn't matter. We are caught together in the riptide of events, and every day I am sinking deeper and deeper into what I never believed was real….

1111

You came to me in the shadow-land between dreams and waking, in the deepest hour of the night when spirits walk (or so the foolish say).

I was alone in my rooms on the airship, lying on my bed. Lost in my thoughts, and exhausted, yet unable to sleep.

"Kaiba."

I leap up from my bed. I see you, and for a moment I'm too stunned to even ask what the hell you're doing here. "Malik."

You smile, cat-like and sensual, strange pale eyes shining. "Kaiba. I've come for you."

I snort. "Don't give me that bullshit. I've already won."

You're laughing at me. "What? Do you think just because you defeated my sister, you somehow defeated your own destiny?" You shake your head. "Symbols, Kaiba. For a man of tangible things and the material world, you are certainly obsessed with symbols. My sister may be the herald of destiny, but I am destiny itself."

I remember that I was getting truly irritated now. "Don't lie. You fight your destiny even as I fight mine. I make my own fate."

Bright eyes flicker with dark amusement. "Do you, now? Or does it make you…?"

My lip lifts in a sneer. "Fate does not exist. Magic is a lie."

You simply shrug. "That which you call impossible is your past. That which you call non-existent, I remember. The lie is but the illusion of an illusion, because the truth is a matter of perspective.

"And I know, Kaiba, that you are very afraid to believe in anything beautiful, because you think you will be deceived."

I have no answer for that. You so continue, and begin walking towards me.

"You are like fire, Seto," you say. "All you touch, you bend to your will or destroy, like a reverse King Midas. So bright and beautiful and fierce, you draw people to you like moths to that flame. But in the end, you will devour all you have loved, and you will be consumed by your own unending hunger. Your success is your tragedy, and you do not even know the difference."

Your hips are moving from side to side as you walk, like a dancer's, and I realize I'm swaying slightly in time, like a snake to a snake-charmer's spell. In a single smooth motion, you sit down next to me on the bed.

Your beauty is hypnotizing, your closeness intoxicating. I have to look away and close my eyes. "Why are you here?" The words come out harsh, and ragged with desire.

You put a hand under my chin, and turn me to face you. "To save you, Kaiba."

I try to laugh, but I can scarcely breathe this close to you. "To be saved implies you must be lost."

You smile, sweetly, almost sadly. "Kaiba, you have been lost for so long that you don't even know where you are. You have been broken for so long that you do not remember what it feels like to be whole."

You run your fingers along my cheek, so gently. "You killed your father as I killed mine, and we have both suffered in darkness from it. Do you not see the pattern emerging? We are one. I am more the incarnation of who you were than you are now. I am your future, as you are my past."

And with that you kiss me, fiercely, tongue parting my lips effortlessly, silken and warm in the darkness.

Still kissing me, your hand slips up my shirt. You push me back down on the bed, straddling my hips. Dark skin and ivory pale, the sweetness of flesh entwined. And I offer myself up, burning with desire, ready and waiting for you.

All my life I have struggled, resisted, never given in. Yet I did that night; I learned the sweetness of surrender, from you, Malik. I do not often like to remember it, not because it was bad - but because it was so good….

1111

Lying on your stomach on the bed, swathed in sheets, you stretch, languorous and replete with the afterglow of sex. And lying next to you, I run my hand over the intricate patterns engraved on your back; the art, the utter cruelty.

"Terrible scars," I say softly.

You turn your head on the pillow to look at me, and smile fondly. "Your scars are just as terrible, even if they are not so plain to see."

I trace the designs of hieroglyphs, monsters, the winged sun. "They are…beautiful."

"Yes, they are. As much as I hate them, they are. Even scars can be beautiful."

Something changes in your face, and you lift yourself up on your elbows to better look at me. You cup my face in one hand, and gaze at me with something close to love. "You do realize, Seto, that whoever may win in this war of the Gods, we will be lost."

And though I do, I know this, I feel a sudden grief like a chasm in my chest.

You continue. "Should the darkness in me win, we will all be doomed, and beyond caring about matters such as this. Should I win…I shall go back to Egypt, and live out my days without purpose or prophecy, only freedom.

"And you, Seto, if you live through this, then fulfill your dream, and build your paradise for children, your 'Kaiba Land.' Life is too short to not do what you want with it. I know this now." You kiss the top of my head.

I never told you or anyone about Kaiba Land. I won't bother asking how you know.

Still, I have to fight down the quaver in my voice as I say, "So you are leaving, then? So this was no more than a dream." I look away from you.

I hear you laugh, lightly and clear. "Kaiba, when will you see that the things in the shadows are as much a part of this world as the light? When will you accept that dreams are a part of reality?

"And anyway," you turn me to face you. "There are some who leave footprints on our hearts that never fade. If I pass through your life so briefly, know that I will leave marks that will endure forever. If I am only a dream, I will be the reoccurring kind."

I find myself smiling, and I pull you to me again, your body atop mine. "If I will only be able to remember you, then give me something to remember."

Smiling wickedly, you do.

1111

In the end, I don't know if you saved me. I don't know if I can ever be saved. But I do know, truly, that I have never forgotten.

You are gone now, across an ocean far away, in your home in the land of the sun. You are gone, as if you had never been. I will never see you again. Only…only in my dreams.

The heat of flesh against flesh; of mouths and tongues. Pale lavender eyes glitter with laughter, and a white smile flashes in a dark face. "Shadows are no less a part of light, dreams are no less reality. And just because you can't see it doesn't mean it isn't there."

FINIS

No, I don't know what the hell that was. But who cares? It's seksay. And review, please, me pretties. :D