…+….+…
Chapter 8 - Surrender in the Red Mist
Hope and reassurances give a man strength to walk in darkness. He hopes that he will make it through to the other side. He hopes that the even though all seems dark now, he will not always wander in darkness.
The car purred and gently rocked. Two boys whispered to each other and played at make believe. A little girl slumbered. A man stared out the window at the moving scenes.
Pegasus was only dimly aware of the motion of his hand, stroking Anzu's sleeping head. Working, reflexively, his hand tried not to reach up to his face. He tried not to let his thoughts swallow him up. They wrapped themselves around his mind and fought to permeate every fiber of him.
He had made the mistake of taking a glimpse into Anzu's mind.
+…+
The Traveller had stood atop a lone hill. His eye had searched desperately for some hope to cling to. But standing on that lone hill as red mists swirled and rose, all he could see were the last crumbling bits of the dream. They hung in jagged remnants and tattered shreds. The dream had been all but destroyed.
There were sweet fluffy creatures wandering through a red and black mist. The Traveller watched as they were digested. Fluff slowly broken down, then flesh, then muscles. Until there was a skeleton, which also succumbed, falling to dust, unseen in the mist.
The Traveller's heart ached. The Painter refused to be coaxed forward, too distraught by the destruction to his masterpiece. He saw the landscape being changed. Being ravaged. His feet were rooted to the spot. Mist rolled around his feet but he didn't look down at it. It slithered up to his knees. His eye was riveted to something… both glorious and horrible.
A warrior stood in a valley. Her hair did not flow in a beautiful breeze. It clung to her head. Blood dripped from it, plastering her hair to her head. Clinging to her armor. Coating her shield and sword. She stood, ready for something. Waiting for some for an enemy to make itself known. Her bloodied cape did not stir.
The Traveller watched as this warrior looked around. Her face turned in his direction and he tensed but she looked through him. The Traveller saw the features of the girl…Anzu. Blood and dirt had a firm hold on her face. A sword was held, ready to hack and slash, to rend asunder, any threat. Her shield was raised, ready to protect her, if only to allow her to make another killing blow. Her determined expression spoke to the years of grim determination. Her stance spoke to a lifetime of fighting.
The Traveller looked around the red tinted world. This was not the world the Painter had created. This was not a sweet thing. This was a cruelly warped reality. The warrior's head turned to look at some swirl of the mists. Every muscle was ready for some hideous thing to jump out at her. She was not a gentle child who could simply be placed in a peaceful world. She would not submit to being told to just accept that the world was now gentle and safe.
She was a warrior. Hardened by battle. Scarred by the world. Her eyes could not be closed.
He had made a terrible miscalculation. A deadly miscalculation. He had sought to tear something from her which she was not ready, willing, or able to have taken from her. This was a fundamental thing he had tried to take from her. The Painter had sought to make something nice but in his arrogance, he had not thought about the canvas- about the person. He had not thought about whether his selfishly conceived fantasy would be desired or appreciated.
+…+
Pegasus sat in Seto's office. Yuugi and Mokuba were safely tucked in bed, sent off to the land of dreams. He was sitting beside the sleeping form of the girl. He sat with the sleeping child…and his thoughts.
A warrior…
He had been foolish… once again. He had been blinded by his hopes. By his own hopes.
Even outside of her mind, Pegasus saw the warrior, poised and ready for a fresh attack. He saw, laid over her sleeping face, the blood and filth covered grim face of the fighter who was ever ready for the horrors she knew, all too well, to be in the world.
The door opened and Seto walked in. He looked at Anzu, sleeping on the couch. His eyes flicked to Pegasus, for a moment, and then back to the girl.
"I heard…"
Neither man wanted to say it. Neither wanted to acknowledge the savagery that this girl had shown herself to be capable of.
Pegasus knew that Seto was in the room, closing the door behind himself. He didn't look at him, his focus was on Anzu. He racked his brain, trying to think of how he could fix this all. How he could make everything rosy and sweet. How he could make everything happy. How he could make everything normal…
The boy with the thumping raw heart whispered in Pegasus as Seto walked closer. His hand came to rest on Pegasus' shoulder.
"You have done so much for them."
It's not enough…
"I know you did a lot."
You tried…
"So…what will you try next?"
You need to make another dream. And another. You are running up a wet hill. You are trying to be her champion. You are trying to do what Seto couldn't.
"Maybe she should stay out of school for a year while you work with her." Seto's words were so reasonable. They were so solid. So logical.
The heart thumped and Pegasus felt Seto's hand on his shoulder. His mind filled with a deluge of doubts and questions. He wanted so desperately to be the master of minds that Seto thought him to be. He wanted so badly to be the holy champion that he had dreamed of in his darkest moments. He wanted, with every ounce of his being, to make everything perfect.
A champion… We all want a champion. Someone to illuminate the darkness. Someone to fight for us. Someone to save us.
"i can't…" Pegasus felt it all weighing on him. He felt Seto's hand like a two ton boulder his shoulder. He felt all of his unspoken promises to save the girl. He felt the heavy words of Bakura, 'Hiding from the truth is not living.'
"I can't keep doing this!She's not responding to this treatment. She's a fighter. I apologize, Seto. If I keep trying to do this she will lash out worse and worse. I'll have to change the way that I treat her. Yuugi wanted to forget. He accepted the changes." The words tumbled out of Pegasus' lips and as they hit the air, he heard them.
They were a truth that he had not wanted to acknowledge. They were a terrible honesty that he had not allowed into his heart. He was trying to quell a hurricane. He was trying to smother a righteous fire, which had fought for so long for a valiant purpose. He was powerless in the face of it all. He was powerless in the mind of Anzu.
Seto sighed, heavily, "Yes, I can see that. But what do you suggest? I don't like to see her suffering but these outburst are getting worse."
Pegasus felt his tongue and lips move, without his bidding, "I don't know but the teacher said she looked like she was going to kill that boy."
Another terrible truth came from his lips.
A sad silence settled over them.
More truth blossomed from Pegasus' lips, "Anzu, needs something different than Yuugi. She doesn't want to let go. She doesn't seem like she's going to let it go." Pegasus listened to his words, the situation seemed to float further and further away from his grasp. "If we don't address this soon, she'll end up snapping and killing someone." It all seemed to fall deeper and deeper towards darkness. "And then, it will be too late-"
Seto's hand shook on his shoulder and his words wavered, uncharacteristically unsure of themselves, "I know. I know… I just…How do you get her to accept her monster but not use it? What can you do for her?"
Suddenly, like a match struck in the dark, Pegasus saw that he was not alone in his fears. He was not alone in his convictions and uncertainties. He did not have all of the answers and Seto did not either. Seto was not asking him to have all of the answers.
More importantly…Most importantly, Pegasus saw the thread between Seto and Anzu.
Pegasus sought to be a champion for Anzu, but she was not a sad little waif waiting to be saved. She was the brave child, promising her sword and shield. She was the strong child, whispering in the darkness, promises of heroic deeds. She was not Max. She was Seto.
The revelation hit Pegasus and he could not help but chuckle. "I wouldn't know. Seto, you're the one who accepted his monster. You're better equipped for this than I am. I can only give her sweet dreams."
Pegasus was so preoccupied with trying to be Seto that he had not seen that he couldn't be Seto. He was so focused on being the hero that he didn't realize that he was dealing with a little hero. He was trying to subdue a person who had fought, all of her life, against people trying to subdue and smother her.
Pegasus stood up, Seto's hand fell from his shoulder. "Tomorrow is the weekend. I suggest you start working with her."
He took a step towards Anzu.
Relax…Sleep…Rest…
The girl's breathing deepened and Pegasus turned back to Seto. A thin smile spread itself across his lips.
"Seto… Neither of us- None of us, have all of the answers. But I think," He looked at Seto's eyes, focused on the sleeping girl. "I think that you have more of the answers than you think you do."
Seto looked up at him and his brow wrinkled. His icy blue eyes looked at him and his mouth started to open to ask a question.
Pegasus' smile spread and he shook his head. "You have managed to do great things. Have faith that you have more great deeds still in you."
Pegasus turned away and walked out of the room. He glanced over his shoulder, for a moment and saw Seto pulling the chair closer to the couch. He smiled and closed the door.
Pegasus finally acknowledged that there were fights that he could not have for other people. He finally realized that he could not be a hero for this girl. For, she was a champion, all her own.
He leaned against the closed door. Weariness was beginning to settle upon him.
"It may be time for all of us to wake up, Max." Bakura stood beside Pegasus and his hand touched his arm. "You each have a sweet and battered heart." Bakura reached up and touched Pegasus' cheek. His cool fingers slid up and gently moved aside the curtain of silver hair. "We all bear scars and I think that that boy also has the same sweet and brutalized heart that you posses." His thumb traced a silver brow and his palm rested on Pegasus' cheek. "You have not lost a fight. You simply have to choose a different battle."
Bakura's face was full of understanding and sorrow. His eyes shifted from the golden eye to Pegasus real eye and he smiled. "We all have strengths. And in this world there is always someone who can use that, just as there are those who have little need of it." His hand gently replaced the curtain of hair and came to rest on Pegasus' shoulder. "Do not lose your hope. Do not lose your heart. Use both to help mend a heart which has lost all hope."
Pegasus listened to the words and felt the touch. His eye looked away. It looked towards the stairs. It looked in the direction of the bedroom where Yuugi lay, wrapped safely in his dreams.
His lips parted, "Thank you, Bakura."
Bakura smiled and Pegasus straightened himself. Pegasus moved away from the door and Bakura went inside.
+…+
For a moment, the Painter stood in a roiling mist. Everything had been completely destroyed. A deep sorrow cut into his heart but he allowed himself to accept truth. He knew that this was what had to be.
The dream has ended. Long live Anzu.
Some battles are chosen. We see an injustice, a hurt, a wrong which needs to be made right. Some battles choose us. A wrong which knows that we know best how to make it right. A broken heart calls out to us. An injustice which calls to something in our past which shaped us. It is a truth which we may try to ignore. A truth which we may try to fight. However, in the end, we often find our fight is for naught. The battle knows that the call will be too strong and we will answer it.
A man laid down his weapons on a battlefield. A Painter laid down a brush before a canvas which would not yield to his design. Both turned their eye to the insidious fight, the canvas which took too quickly to the design. Both ready themselves for a fight which they had thought they had already won.
