Chain
It was easy not to look at her, the first time he saw her; she was far from outstanding and her place in his world was the last thing on his mind.
The second time that he saw her, she wasn't even supposed to be there. The ticket she had used to come to Egypt had been Téa's originally; but a last-minute invitation to a prestigious dance workshop had spoiled her plans and Joey Wheeler's little sister had come instead.
Even then, he had no interest in her; she seemed content to sit on the sidelines and he was far more preoccupied with acting normal and well-adjusted. It wasn't until the group started asking for tours of the local attractions that she forced her way into his line of vision.
They lost track of her one day while exploring the market and Ishizu instructed him to split off from the group and find her before her brother noticed she was gone. He searched for several minutes before he found her trying to haggle with a wizened old vendor over a single serving of dried dates. Her red hair stood out against the sand and the mostly monochromatic tones of the bedouin's robes, a light breeze sneaking under her yellow blouse and lifting it to reveal an inch of pale skin. She clutched her purse in one hand and used the other to gesture wildly as she tried to explain what she wanted.
He approached her from behind and listened to the conversation, finding himself amused at her attempts to barter aggressively. She hadn't started nearly low enough and within moments the vendor had tripled the price without a single complaint on her end. Marik would have liked to let things continue, but he was sent here with a mission and this looked like it could go on forever. He stepped past her, making his presence known, and spoke to the vendor in Arabic, telling him to give the girl a break and let her have the damn dates already.
When he turned to hand them over, she snatched the dates out of his hand and shoved them into her purse. "Thank you, but I had things under control."
"He was taking advantage of you," he told her. "You have no idea how much you stand out here."
She glanced around; the men are robed in white, the women in black. There was a flock of camels behind the tents, a pen of goats and sheep beside them. The air was thick with the smell of spices and animals and sand, and their conversation was the only one in English. A crate of doves sat right beside the vendor's tent, which he nearly kicked over as he tried to guide her back to courtyard where he knew the others would be waiting.
"I think I have some idea," she said. "It's not like I'm—"
She stopped, and when he turned back to see why, he found her grinning.
"Something funny?"
"Hm? Oh, no, not really. Life is good, that's all."
He spotted a thin alley that would lead them to the next street and pointed her toward it. "I'll take your word for it."
"Do you disagree?"
He couldn't help the smirk; it was easy to see that she was just as much an endless optimist as her brother. "I don't think I could say that life's entirely good or bad. I've seen my fill of both."
"So how can you deny that life is good?"
He turned to look at her, and he saw in that moment that she had also picked up some of her brother's irrational stubbornness. "Because evil exists," he said. "The good just seems better by comparison. It doesn't mean anything."
"It means that evil can be overcome."
"I'm not disagreeing, but—"
"But nothing. I'm right. You're wrong."
He laughed. "I don't think you've grasped the concept of a debate."
At the end of the alley, she slipped past him and ran out into the courtyard. Finding herself back in the sun, she raised her arms above her head in a long stretch that made him realize just how young she was. When she turned back to grin at him, her smile was blinding. "But this isn't a debate."
He raised both hands in a gesture of surrender. "Then why do I feel like I'm losing?"
"Because you're a pessimist." She pointed toward the far end of the courtyard. "There's Joey."
Before he could say anything else, she had disappeared into the crowd. He reluctantly followed. She was wrong about him being a pessimist, but knowing that didn't change the uneasy feeling that she'd touched on something true. It had nothing to do with her infantile argument about good and evil; he knew she didn't really care if he believed one way or the other. She was so convinced she was right that his opinion didn't matter at all.
He smiled and weaved between a group of tourists. It wasn't worth arguing about. She was young; she'd find out the truth in time.
"We've still got time," he says. "We don't—"
She wants to interrupt him, but she doesn't know what to say. She's tried saying everything else, and nothing's made him change his mind. So she remains silent, and his words peter out and he stops, and they regard each other.
It's hard to remember what it was like, back when they still thought in terms of love and pain and hope. Everything's faded to the same monochromatic pettiness now; they tolerate each other because it's all they have left.
Once, back when they still did this long-distance, he mailed her an incense holder, and she loudly admired the sleek lines and artistic simplicity and put it on her bookshelf. The first time she tried using it, the smell gave her a headache and the smoke made her eyes water. She kept it on the shelf for a few months more, and the longer time went on, the less it looked like a piece of art. One day she looked at it and saw a block of wood with some holes drilled in. That's all it was.
"You never really believed it, did you?" he asks. "You never thought that this would work."
She flushes, because he's always been able to see the things she doesn't want him to see. Everyone always assumes that she's the optimist, but he knows her better, and he knows that every time she closes her eyes, she starts to wonder what will happen when she opens them again. She has to look for the positive in everything, because she's terrified of what she'll see if she doesn't.
"Don't you dare pin this on me," she says. "I was always the one who tried to make this work. You never changed. I was the one who had to change for you, and now you blame me for—"
"Don't kid yourself. Isn't never changing kind of your shtick? Serenity the faithful, Serenity the steadfast—"
"I care!" she screams. "I care and you don't! That's it! That's why!" She catches herself and stops, pressing a hand to her eyes and finding herself perplexed when it comes away wet. She thought she'd gotten past the point of tears long ago.
He watches as she turns away to hide her face. When he speaks, she can discern no emotion in his voice. "Fine," he says. "That's fine. It's my fault. I'll take the blame. That, at least, I can do."
"I can do it," she said, stunning him into silence. "I don't know why you think I'm afraid, but I'm not."
"You should be," he muttered, his hand tightening around the receiver. It didn't matter if she was lying or if she wasn't. Either way, she was wrong. "You don't know what you're getting into."
"Don't say that. I know you, Marik. You overestimate yourself."
"I think I know better than you what I'm capable of."
On the other end of the line, he heard her sigh. She thought he was overreacting. Thousands of miles between them and she was still as transparent as ever.
"Listen," he said. "I don't care if you think I'm wrong. I'm putting my foot down. This has to end. You aren't ready for this type of—"
"What? Commitment? Challenge?" She sounded angry, and her anger incited his own. He had to force himself to tune out her words, but it didn't work; it never did. Her voice merrily pierced through the shield he lifted around his mind and tunneled through his brain, and he couldn't for the life of him think of a way to make her shut up. "You seem to think I'm innocent or something because I'm young, and I haven't seen the things you've seen. So what? I've seen you, even back then when you were…whatever. I don't care! I can handle myself, even if you think I can't."
It was getting harder and harder to be reasonable with her, and he lowered his head to rest it on his forearm, cradling the phone against his ear and closing his eyes. "I don't think that, you know."
She stopped talking, and for a long time all he could hear was the sound of his own breath and the strange crackling echo that always seemed to come with these long-distance phone calls. He knew that he was one of the only people who had really allowed her to stretch herself past the boundaries assigned to her by her family, same as she was the only one who thought he was capable of getting along without his siblings.
Still, when she spoke, she sounded so damn vulnerable. He hated that she sounded that way, but he couldn't hate her. He could never hate her.
"…I know." she sighed. "Believe me, I know. I just…I don't understand why you insist on being unhappy."
"That's not what this is—"
"I'm coming to Egypt."
"You're what?"
"I bought the ticket last week. That's why I'm telling you this. You can't change my mind." Her voice softened, and he could tell that she was trying to tease him. "Don't tell me I misread all your emails and you aren't hopelessly in love with me."
He felt his shoulders relax and he lifted his head to grin. "I don't think ever said that."
"I don't care," she replied, laughing. "You meant it. Now shut up and let yourself be happy for once."
"I don't care," he says, laughing. "Really." As he speaks, he folds his arms over the pillow, lowering his chin to rest on his wrists. He looks up at her through a curtain of hair that's gotten too long, and she nods.
Cautiously, she studies the raised ridges on his back. She uses her fingers instead of her eyes, her hand running down the length of his spine, standing out pale against the dark symbols and his bronze skin. He watches her expression without moving, and when she reaches the end of the scars the corner of his mouth curls up into a smile.
"What do you think?"
"It's horrible," she says.
He twists toward her and pulls gently on her arm until she obligingly lies back down to settle against his chest. His hand moves down her arm to her wrist, and his fingers wrap around her palm so tightly she can feel the pulse in his fingertips.
"Don't state the obvious," he says. "I asked what you thought, not what you think you're supposed to say." He kisses her fingers, and she shudders. He always knows when she's lying, and he never settles for less than the absolute truth.
"Well it's…" she buries her face in his shoulder, embarrassed, and he raises an arm to entangle his free hand in her hair. "…I guess…it does look kind of cool."
"Hmm…" he presses her fingers to his lips again, more thoughtfully, and she looks up in time to see him grin down at her. "I knew it," he says. "All this time, you've just been pretending to be a nice girl."
"Have not," she protests, but then he finally leans forward and kisses her on the mouth, and the protest dies with the rest of their conversation.
In the morning, she asks him if her answer had upset him, and he pins her against the mattress and tells her, in no uncertain terms, that he doesn't give a damn what she thinks, so long as she isn't afraid to tell him.
She was afraid.
She disagreed with him, he could tell that she did, but she didn't say anything, just shrugged, her hair sliding off her bare shoulders in a way that distinctly reminded him of his sister. They both avoided making eye contact in the exact same way, looking down and away, pretending that they're deep in thought when really they're afraid, fucking afraid, of saying the wrong thing. And he knew she wanted him to blame himself, like he always did. It's easier to let someone else carry around all this guilt than to shoulder some of it yourself, and to admit that maybe you had been responsible for it in the first place.
Then she saw him watching her and straightened, wrapping her arms around herself in a way that was supposed to be casual, but she only seemed more terrified—and look at this, this poor little lost girl and the big scary man that only wants her to give a damn about what he's trying to do, watch her tremble when he asks her if she loves him—
"Stop looking at me like that!" she snapped, and she threw her arms down and tried, against all odds, to look defiant. "I'm sick of this! If there's something you want me to say, just tell me what it is!"
"Tell me what you're afraid to say."
"There isn't anything! I promise! Just—"
"Then why are you still here?" he took a step forward; he supposed he should credit her for not flinching. She really was angry. "The only reason you're still here is because you still have something left to say—"
"Do you think I'm lying?" She was shocked, dismayed. He wanted to laugh; she was just so appalled that her loyalty was thrown into question. She'd never had the tables turned on her, had she? She couldn't comprehend that he wasn't the only person capable of making mistakes. "Do you think I want to leave you? Why are you asking me this?"
"Because you're still here."
"I'm still here because I—I love you!" Oh yes, now she was crying. He was really going to pay for that later; he could tell. He'd have to come back crawling on his knees for her forgiveness, and she'd give it, because she was such a saint; she'd forgive anyone. She thrived on forgiveness, she pulled your sins out of you like splinters, and she smiled and she forgave them all, because she was so damn perfect. She didn't care if you were bleeding out at her feet; she'd already done her job.
"If you love me," he asked, "Then why are you crying?"
"Be—because you're being horrible!"
Just like that, the tension within him snapped, and it was easy to fall back into the neatly assigned grooves they had laid out for each other. He took another step forward, and cupped a hand under her chin, and he watched her hands clench into fists while she stared up at him. It only took a moment; she choked back a sob and fell into his arms.
"Gods, Serenity," he said, burying his face in her hair. "Why couldn't you just start with that?"
Her laughter was weak against his chest, but she didn't have an answer. She never did.
She doesn't have an answer for Ishizu, just that she doesn't want to be down here any longer. She's prepared to go back to the surface by herself, but to her surprise, Marik volunteers.
He takes her hand and guides her back through the passages, the beam of his flashlight bouncing against the stone walls in a nonsensical pattern that makes her suspects that he doesn't need it to see at all. He must be keeping it lit for her sake.
"I'm not afraid of the dark," she explains, her hand tightening around his. His skin is cool; as is the air within the passage and the stone under her feet. For a place that's supposed to be so warm, she's felt nothing but cold since she got here. "I just don't like—"
She can't finish that sentence. She could descend into darkness, sure. She was familiar with the sensation of losing all powers of sight, of relying on all your other senses, of reaching for someone and having infinity put itself between you. She could handle that; she knew that darkness was just an illusion. As soon as they left the crypt, everything would appear before her exactly like it was supposed to. She just couldn't stand the laughter. You shouldn't laugh in a place like this.
"So what if you're afraid?" he says. They've paused at a division in the path. He decides on the route on the left and gives her a gentle tug to warn her before they start off again. "Fear is a normal response to the unknown."
"It's not unknown."
"Darkness?"
She murmurs an assent, wondering if he knows about her eyes. She had the surgery right before Battle City, but she can't remember if anyone had mentioned it around him. He might not have listened if they had.
They've reached the entry chamber and he switches off the flashlight. There's enough light coming in from the stairwell for them to see each other clearly without it.
"You don't have to wait with me," she says, letting go of his hand. "I'll be fine by myself."
"I don't mind. You can only see so many tombs before they all start to look the same." There's a large square stone in the center of the room. He crosses his arms and settles against it, staring down at his tennis shoes. When she had first gotten to Egypt, she had wondered how he could wear long jeans in this heat. After feeling the chill of the tomb, she understood.
She sits on the ground beside him and draws her knees up to her chin. "I don't know how you can stand it," she says, shuddering. "Knowing that this place was built just for dead bodies. It gives me the creeps."
He nudges her leg with his foot, "And here I thought you weren't scared."
"Not of the dark," she retorts. "Ghosts are a different story."
"Hm." His teasing tone disappears. "They aren't worth being afraid of. Believe me."
"How do you know?"
"I've seen my share." Subtly he shifts his weight, and she realizes that she might have touched a nerve. But before she can apologize, he glances down and sees her expression, and his own softens.
"Sorry," he says. "I didn't mean to scare you."
"You didn't scare me," she whispers. "I'd just forgotten…about what happened."
He looks surprised, but he doesn't say anything else, and the room fades into silence. After a few minutes, she buries her head in her arms. She doesn't see the point of straining her eyes when she's not looking at anything anyway. The doctors said she shouldn't have to worry, so long as she didn't spend too much time on the computer or reading, but she doesn't take chances. It's easier not to look.
End