Disclaimer: WookieeBeta does not own Yuugiou, or anything else that may be mentioned in this fanfic.
A/N: Short-ish again… WARNING: Implied rape. Don't like? Don't read.
Hateful Love
By WookieeBeta
Chapter Four: Sunset
Pain. Pain and hurt and agony, forever and always. Yuugi couldn't remember anything else. It permeated his very being; nothing else existed, nothing but the pain.
Well, the pain and the thing that caused it. That man, that tall handsome stunningly gorgeous man, that man that had knocked him over the head and dragged him out of the hospital into this god-forsaken shack and beaten him and abused him until he could no longer move, the man with the black twisted knife that shone like the stars and burned him as it sliced through his skin. The man who had made Yami's most intricate lessons seem easy in comparison.
Even in his worst moments Yami had never done the things this man had done. He had punched, kicked, shouted, thrown him down flights of stairs and laid his arm open to the bone, but he had never, never, never tainted his innocence. He had never approached him in that way. The spirit had touched him, but this man had touched him.
And judging by the quiet padding of bare feet, and the wild smirk on the man's face, it was about to happen again.
This time Yuugi didn't even scream.
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The place wasn't hard to find. The helicopter flew in a straight line for a quarter of a silent hour, urban trappings gave way to wide expanses of open country, and finally Seto's sharp eyes caught sight of a lone shack nearly hidden in a stand of trees. Yami saw it too; he stared at it fixedly, rage and hatred flaring in his eyes.
"Bring us down by that shack," Bakura shouted to the pilot. The brown-haired man looked to Kaiba for confirmation; the CEO nodded, and the chopper settled down in the dirt. Yami forced himself to unsteady feet and stumbled out of the door almost before they reached the ground. Bakura and Seto followed only instants later.
Even through the haze of red clouding his vision and the incessant ringing in his ears, Yuugi caught the unmistakable sound of helicopter blades. His heart sank.
He's going to escape, was all he could think. He's going to kill me, and he's going to climb into his helicopter and disappear, and then he's going to hurt someone else tomorrow… A single tear coursed down his cheek, the first in this entire ordeal. It wasn't his death that bothered him. Death would be a relief, an escape from the pain. No, it wasn't death that made him cry. It was the thought that some other innocent would have to suffer like he had. It rent his heart in two.
"Ah, that must be my friend," the man said with a malicious smile. "Farewell, little Yuugi – I'm afraid it's time for us to part." Yuugi heard the man unsheathe his knife. He felt the vibrations as the man knelt next to him, smelled his too-minty breath as he gently caught the broken duelist's lips with his own. The man stood, but leaned back over in preparation to drive the blade into his heart.
The door crashed open, and the bloody rays of the setting sun nearly blinded Yuugi, but he could still make out the faint silhouette of the ancient Pharaoh, and he could hear the shouting – "Brown hair man will not touch the little light!" – and he could feel the sudden happiness that flooded his body.
"What the hell?" The man spun and snapped his arm forward, sending the knife spinning towards the silhouette. It embedded itself in Yami's shoulder, and the former ruler screamed. Then he reached up with his other hand, grasped the hilt, and yanked it out, ignoring the geyser of crimson blood that necessarily followed. The brown-haired man pulled a dirk from his boot, and then the two were entwined in a hurricane of swipes and slashes.
"Yuugi!" Bakura cried as he skirted the battle. He knelt by the duelist's side, but Yuugi flinched away, eyes locked on a tall figure striding closer.
"Company," Seto murmured in Bakura's ear as he came down to one knee. "Another chopper – I didn't see how many men, at least one, probably two."
"We have to get Yuugi out of here."
"No time. If we don't go now, we're all going to die."
"Then so be it," Bakura hissed. "I'm not leaving without – " Yuugi's eyes flared wide in warning, and he tried to say something, but too late – the butt of the rifle cracked down first on Bakura's skull, and then on Kaiba's, and they both pitched face-forward onto Yuugi's battered form, unconscious.
Yami stumbled as a fresh wave of pain washed over him. The knifeman took the opportunity to punch him in his injured shoulder, and he gasped in agony. His next blow missed.
"Stupid kid," the man sneered, "you should have known better than to go up against me. I'm the best knife-man in the country!"
Yami's eyes narrowed. "Brown-hair-man hurt the little light," was all he said. Then he was upon the man in a flurry of attacks, moving with the frenzied speed that only a furious yami protecting his hikari could attain, but the man parried most blows and dodged the rest. Then Yami felt a stabbing pain in his gut. He glanced down; the hilt of the man's dirk was protruding from his stomach, and his shirt was already covered with his own blood.
"Never take up a blade against the Knife Master," the man smirked. "You can't win." He took a small step back, watching his opponent die.
"…hurt…the hikari," Yami choked out. His shoulders tensed. His arm flashed out in one even, controlled, lighting-swift movement, and the other man's eyes opened wide in surprise and then realization as his body crumpled, lifeless, to the ground.
Yami looked up and caught the rifleman's eyes. His gaze shifted back and forth between the bloody Pharaoh and the Knife Master's corpse, and reality seemed to click. He dropped the rifle and pelted out the door; a second later Yami heard a helicopter taking off.
He stumbled forward. His knees were weak; his legs weren't responding properly; his head felt curiously heavy; all he could think of was getting to Yuugi. But the shadows were already falling across his eyes. He slumped to the bloody floor.
"Little light…"