***Disclaimer: There's a bit of violence in this chapter, and Ryou has a close call with some near-non-con. He gets out of it, but because of the set up and the fact that all his attackers get killed, I wanted to put a trigger-warning up for anyone that's extra sensitive to that kind of scene.

Otherwise, most anyone who's reading this has probably read some of my Deathshipping fics before so you guys already know how this is going to end. It's not like I stray from the formula. In fact, I *tried* to make this one a little harsher (that's why he's Mariku and not Kek in this fic), but by chapter two Mariku is freaking drinking tea in Ryou's kitchen and at that point I just tossed my hands in the air, gave up, and let the story write itself, and if ppl think he's ooc ~oh well.

Thanks to MooksMookin for betaing this a long time ago, and for Revengineer for giving it a last read through***

The city was a dichotomy of indigo shadows and orange street lights. In the distance, traffic hummed down safer streets where the lights kept the rain-slick concrete glowing with an assuring, gleaming yellow color. The side street Ryou walked down, however, had alleyways drenched in darkness, and the only street light Ryou saw in the distance had a shattered bulb.

Ryou hugged himself, pulling the black trench coat around his slender frame. A small switchblade in his coat pocket provided some assurance, but he couldn't stop his maroon colored eyes from searching each shadow.

Ryou noticed someone leaning against the dark lamp post. A cinder of red winked at Ryou from the man's cigarette before he flicked the butt into a puddle, exhaling the last of the smoke into the cloud burdened night sky.

"Hey there." The man smiled, a dark shape blocking the view of a dark sky.

"Hello," Ryou muttered out of politeness, but he lowered his head and diverted his path so that, as he passed the lamppost, he'd have an extra foot of space between him and the stranger.

"Nice night."

Ryou gave a little grunt of acknowledgement, his shoes striking the pavement a little quicker. Once he reached the point where he passed the stranger, the shadow lunged out and grabbed Ryou's wrist.

"What's the hurry? I just want to talk." He laughed, black strands of hair falling into eyes hidden by shadows.

Ryou stayed motionless, neither struggling to pull his hand free nor trying to run. "Please," Ryou said in a very soft, unwavering voice. "Let go of me. I don't want to hurt you."

The man laughed again. With his right hand still clamped around Ryou's wrist, he used his left to grab Ryou's chin and force Ryou's gaze upward. "There's no need to be so mean. I just wanna be friends."

There had been a time where grabbing Ryou or trying to become friends with Ryou would have ended up the same - body in a coma, soul trapped into a Monster World doll, but that time had been years ago.

Ryou already had his left hand around the knife in his pocket. He pulled it out and slid the steel blade across the nerves and veins along the man's wrist. The stranger let go of Ryou's hand in order to hold his own wrist. The small knife only made a thin cut, but it bled wonderfully because of the sliced artery.

Ryou ran, black coat fluttering behind him like a cape, his hair a chaos of loose, white ribbons. His attacker growled and tackled Ryou to the wet cement. Ryou bit his tongue on impact, tasting the tang of metal and wincing at the sharp, sudden pain. His attacker used his good hand to grab a fist full of Ryou's white hair and drag him into a side alley.

Ryou heard laughter. Not his original attacker's. The laughing belong to several new voices.

"Why didn't you assholes help me?"

"Because it was fun watching you get stabbed by a girl."

"Fuck you," Ryou growled at being called a girl. It'd grown old over the years.

A face blackened by shadow leaned forward to examine Ryou. "You're pretty enough to be a girl, anyway."

Ryou's left fingers still wrapped around his switchblade. When the shadowed faced bent down to inspect Ryou's delicate, white features, Ryou slashed out, running the knife-tip down the stranger's face from his forehead, along his nose, and over his cheek.

Their laughter stopped. Ryou felt the himself being slammed face-first into a puddle. A boot stomped down on the his knife hand, someone else held his right hand, while yet another person held down his legs. Everything happened in a blur; Ryou couldn't keep up. He struggled, but they firmly held him down. All he could do was keep his head lifted out of the puddle in order to breathe.

He felt his coat tear from his body, then his shirt, fabric stretching and ripping off of his back. Cold air bit Ryou's toes as his shoes were pulled from his feet. Ryou screamed and fought hard to break free from at least one of the pairs of hands, but he couldn't move.

He saw his own knife wave near his eyes, the steel dull-colored in the dark alley.

"Think you're tough? Think you're a badass? You ain't shit!" The one screaming at him and flashing his own blade was the man whose face Ryou had slashed. Blood ran down the man's skin, making him uglier than before.

A separate pair of hands were working on removing Ryou's pants; however, in order to pull them down his hips, they made the mistake of letting go of Ryou's legs. He kicked out, feeling a solid, reassuring impact of someone's chin against the heel of his foot. Ryou continued to kick out, and then he lunged forward. He knocked the man holding his right wrist to the ground, but before he could wrench free, the man with his knife grabbed Ryou's hair again and pressed the blade beneath Ryou's jawline.

Ryou didn't care. The blade against his skin felt safer than the cold air biting at his bare chest and waist. Ryou held his breath, pulled his pants higher on his hips, and prepared to break free although he knew he would not escape the blade digging into his skin.

But in the second before all that could happen, Ryou noticed a new shadow enter the alley, and with it, the entire night appeared to darken. Spikes like spear-tips crowned the silhouette's head, and a cape danced around its shadowed form.

The man holding Ryou's knife turned to look over his shoulder as the others cursed and threatened the new stranger. A grin - a wide, sinister, joyous grin - greeted them, and when Ryou saw the glint of violet in the silhouette's eyes, his heart felt like it stopped.

"Who the fuck are you?" The man holding Ryou's knife let go of Ryou and pushed the blade towards the silhouette.

The silhouette side-stepped the attack. He raised his own blade into view - a large, thick bowie, the kind one saw in old American movies. He grabbed the attacker's head, plunging his knife into the man's throat and laughing as the man choked to death on blood.

The rest attacked. Ryou noticed there were four others, two with brass knuckles, one with a chain, and the unarmed man who continued to hold his wrist to keep it from bleeding.

One. Two. Three.

That's all it took for the caped silhouette with daggers for hair to dispatch of his armed attackers. Three quick, simple knife strokes and they all fell to the ground with the first body.

Ryou's original attacker tried to run, his elbows sticking out at an awkward angle because he refused to let go of the little cut in his wrist. With a few large strides, the silhouette reached the escapee, snatching his hair, and dragging him back to Ryou just as he had dragged Ryou into the alley.

Ryou stood and shook, trying to get his pants to go back around his waist, but the button had somehow been ripped away in the struggle, and rainwater made the blue jean material heavy. He watched as the man screamed for his life and the silhouette ignored him as he dropped him to the ground and slammed a knee into the man's stomach.

"You're a coward," the shadow growled. "You attack in groups and run when you're alone."

"Stop," Ryou whispered, holding out a trembling hand as if it held the strength to stop the man Ryou only knew of through stories. "Stop. Please. Stop."

His dark, furious, and violet eyes glanced up at Ryou. He shook his head and then sank the knife into the attacker's soft belly, twisting the blade and tugging upward to make sure it tore through the soft, vulnerable flesh.

The man stopped screaming after thirty seconds or so.

Ryou rubbed his hands, as if he was trying to wash them, but all he managed to do was smear the few drops of blood on his skin from his own two attacks. Ryou thought of his knife, about his fingerprints on the handle. He found his torn shirt on the ground and used it to wipe his switchblade clean. He wrapped the weapon up in the material, deciding it would be better to dispose of it later, so the police couldn't match it to the scene or identify Ryou as it's owner.

"What are you doing?" the living shadow asked.

"This knife is mine," Ryou muttered, his maroon eyes wide and his skin covered in gooseflesh. He glanced around, thinking of other evidence. "I … need to get my clothes."

The shadow walked up to Ryou. "They're soaked. Here." He pulled the cloak off of his thick, bronzed shoulders and wrapped it around Ryou's delicate frame.

"No ..." Ryou shook his head, looking around as if he didn't know where he stood. "It's evidence. I need ... I need to get rid of it. We need to hurry before someone calls the police."

"In this neighborhood?" The blonde-haired shadow snorted. "No one's calling the cops tonight, and when they do, this is going to be written off as gang violence."

"You can't be sure. We ... we have to ... clean the area up ..." Ryou started pacing, eyes darting to everything incriminating. He didn't see corpses; he only saw problems that needed solving. His attackers had never been more than faceless shadows to Ryou's mind.

Two brown hands held Ryou in place. "Stop."

"But we have to-"

"Fine," he growled. "I'll clean up, but you stand there. You look worse than the girls did." The former alter ego opened up a covered dumpster and started piling the bodies inside of it, adding Ryou's ruined clothes and shoes as well.

"What do you mean the girls?"

"In the six months I've been back, this is the third time I've stopped something like this from happening. The other two were girls. That's why I know the cops won't give two shits about these corpses. I did them a damn favor by killing those punks." He gave Ryou a wolfen smile, taking a small canister out of his pocket and dousing the liquid within into the dumpster. Then he snatched a zippo lighter from another pocket and tossed it inside the trashbin. Finally, he used his knife to carve a symbol into the metal of the dumpster.

"That fire won't burn everything," Ryou protested, standing in place like one of the Spirit's Monster World figurines - a soul bound up in an inanimate form.

"Doesn't have to. I tagged the bin with a rival gang sign. As long as it mucks up the evidence enough, the cops will write this off just like the others."

Ryou blinked, eyes lost. "What did you do with those girls after you killed their attackers?"

He walked up to Ryou, those violet eyes of his burrowing into Ryou's mind. "What else?" He grinned. "I took them home."

"I don't believe you," Ryou stepped back, flinching.

"Is it because you remember me?"

"Remember you? Not really, Marik and the Spirit were in my head back then. I don't remember much of anything, but I know who you are."

"Is it so hard to believe?" Marik's alter ego asked. "That I protected them? I was created as a defense mechanism, you know."

"An angry, violent one. How many did you kill? To protect them?"

"Including the ones tonight, the body count is at nineteen."

"That's ... wrong ..." Ryou began the sentence as if he was sure of his words, but by the last syllable his pitch lifted as if he asked himself a question.

"Is it? I never thought it was. Marik did for some reason, though." He shrugged. "I don't care. I don't look for trouble, but if I see it - why shouldn't I have some fun? Watching cowards like that hurt people pisses me off." He frowned, crossing his arms over his chest. "Why shouldn't I hurt them back?"

"What if they had guns? What if they shot you instead?"

Marik's former self growled at Ryou's statement. "Then they better kill me with the first shot, or they won't like what I do to them in return."

Ryou shrunk into the dark plum cape around his shoulders. "I want to go home. D-did you really take those girls home?"

The living shadow scooped Ryou up into his broad arms. "I said I did. Where do you live?"

"What are you doing?" Ryou shouted. "Put me down!"

"Your shoes are in the trash with those corpses."

"I don't care. I'll walk."

"You'll catch cold."

"I don't care!"

He set Ryou down with an irritated huff. "The other two didn't mind it." As they walked out of the alley and back onto the street, Ryou noticed a slight blush darkening his companion's cheeks. "They wrapped their arms around my neck and kissed me once I got them home safely."

"They kissed you? Why on earth-?"

"As a thank you for helping them. Apparently girls have better manners."

Ryou squeezed the ripped fabric still wrapped around his knife. "Well, excuse me for not following your mental stereotype of a damsel in distress."

"Actually, I saw what you did to that guy's face - it's a nice change to see someone try to actually fight for themselves for once."

"I wanted to run, but I was trapped."

"You're preaching to the choir. That's why I exist - because Marik wanted to run, but he was trapped. That's why I killed our old man - because Marik wanted to run, but he was trapped. But you're still looking at me as if I'm a monster instead of the guy who just saved your ass - figuratively and literally."

"I..." Ryou lost himself in his thoughts. He glanced at the man walking beside him. He had heard stories, but the person beside him didn't exactly match them. Maybe he was different? He'd been sent to the Shadows, but here he was, walking down a rainy street at night. Perhaps something happened to change him, if only a little. He seemed as violent as ever, but now he seemed to be directing in a defensive rather than offensive manner. Ryou looked to the wet cement below their feet. "You're right. I'm sorry. I didn't mean to be rude. I-it's just ... and everything was a blurr... and I kept thinking if I had the Ring - but that's wrong. I shouldn't have thought that."

"Why is it wrong?"

Ryou shook his head. "It's wrong to hurt people."

"It's wrong to get hurt in an alley when you're outnumbered."

"I had a bad feeling. I should have crossed the street. I shouldn't have said hello when he greeted me. I should have taken a different way home."

"Stop that." The alter ego pressed a hand on Ryou's shoulder. "This isn't your fault. They were dogs. I put them down. The end."

Ryou continued to shake his head. "But ... I'll have nightmares. Their cut throats, that one guy's screaming ..."

Ryou dropped to his knees. He felt the cold and wet soak into his already shivering skin, but he couldn't stand. Ryou pressed his hands to his eyes to cover the images playing through his mind. He heard Marik's other self whispering in his ears.

"Ryou? What do you see?"

"I ... see ... the Millennium Eye. The Spirit killed Pegasus. He locked me in my soul room, so I wouldn't see, but ever since our first RPG, I could always sneak out. I saw the body ... the blood. I felt so bad. I feel so bad. People are always dying around me."

Ryou felt himself being lifted into the air again. "I didn't mean to trigger you," the other Marik said with a dry voice. "Guess I can't even help people without hurting them."

The air fell silent, profaned only by a single set of footprints. They continued like that for a block and a half before Ryou spoke. "Let me down."

"You're feet are red from the cold."

"It doesn't matter. This is my apartment building."

He set Ryou down and followed him into the building. Ryou walked up to the third flood. It wasn't until he slipped his key into the doorknob that he truly registered the fact that he wore the Darkness' cloak. Ryou's hands dropped to his sides, the key forgotten in the lock. He turned and looked at the blonde standing beside him. "Thank you ... thank you for saving me. Thank you for getting me home safely. Thank you for letting me borrow your cloak."

He grinned wide; the expression looked handsome on his tanned face. "Well, what do you know? You do have manners after all."

"I'm so sorry. I've been horrible all night."

He reached out and touched Ryou's cheek. "I think you're in shock. Maybe you should call one of your friends to come over and stay with you. Yugi or someone."

Ryou grabbed the alter ego's hand. "No, not Yugi. Shit, they already think I'm weak and fragile, this would make it worse. Plus, I don't want them to know … " Ryou looked away, clutching his rag-wrapped knife to his chest. "I don't want anyone to know what happened." He closed his eyes, leaning against the door.

The living shadow leaned forward, petting Ryou's hair, whispering in a low, quiet voice. "They can't hurt you. Never again."

Ryou opened his maroon eyes and looked at Marik's double. "Are you hungry? I really should do something to thank you. I can make you dinner at least."