AN: Allo! Welcome to the next chapter of Solace Still reading? Well, there's a lot happening in this chapter. (Chapter Eleven! That means I've only got six more chapters to post!) Since it's taken me so long to update I'll give you all a brief recap.
Malik's a runaway from Forest Hills Hospital, where the head doctor does freaky things to his patients. You know, like turning them into animals for starters. Doctor Newton's experiments are being funded by an unknowing Seto Kaiba, for the promise of a tax break. (Mwahaha?)
Colin Persa is a mute former-secret serviceman whose brother was killed by Malik. He's out to take Malik back to the hospital for vengeance.
Meanwhile, the Ishtars are staying in Domino and working out a life post-destiny. Malik is sick in a few ways, but he got to go to a party with Ryou, Yugi, Bakura et all which thrilled Isis. Rishid's taking odd jobs.
Yami's not very happy with his memories, in which he seems to turn on those he loves. (Who would be happy remembering that you had to kill those you loved for people who would betray you? Poor Yami... sniffle) But he's working that out with encouragement from Yugi, which is decidedly a good thing.
And...I think that brings us up to speed.
As a side note since I don't know if I'll go into this in detail via Malik-thoughts later...No, Malik's not suicidal. If he was, he wouldn't do it with a knife or any other sharp object.
Finally, HUGE thanks go to Borath who beta'd this while she was staying at my house (Weekend of heaven, yeah, baby! .)
Solace
Chapter 11
The week had begun stormy, with sleet spilling onto the ground to freeze leaves and strewn trash that the winds had kicked loose from the too-full bins outside the hotel. By Thursday the sky had cleared and burned a dark October blue, a few cold white clouds left in place, following where the storm went.
Saturday morning, Malik was still asleep when Rishid had finished showering and dressing. A rather harsh knock at the front door startled Rishid into dropping the pen he'd been using to map out his day, but the sound did nothing to rouse the blond.
The light in the hall was dim and flickered a few times when Rishid opened the door. Bakura looked up at him briefly, just enough for it to be considered an acknowledgment, and then pushed his way inside and strode easily to Malik's bed before Rishid could comment.
Malik was still asleep and unaware of this intrusion. He was wrapped deep under the blankets and shivering from time to time, but otherwise still and quiet. Bakura flicked the covers off without a second of hesitation, though he kept a noticeable distance in case Malik struck out at him.
Instead of that, Malik sat up sharply and glowered. He relaxed only a little and tiredly rubbed at his eyes once or twice when he saw who it was.
Bakura smirked faintly at the disheveled look Malik was left with. His hair was tousled and matted from not brushing it after his shower the night before, and despite having slept nearly three days he didn't look any refreshed for it.
The blond, noticing the expression, didn't take to it at all. "What?" he snarled acidically. The blankets had been warm and gathered just so about him; he could even pretend that he didn't feel as if the world was spinning around him, leaving him dizzy and alone. Bakura intruding in on his discomfort was even more unwelcome than it would have usually been. He fought a shudder, unwilling to tremble where Bakura could see him.
Malik's general attitude was condescending and his tether was only as long as a matchstick. When he argued with Bakura he usually became more haughty as Bakura became more threatening, and both of them could be ridiculously stubborn. Even so, Rishid had only seen him snap at Bakura perhaps once before, and that had been when they'd first met and begun working together.
Bakura seemed taken by surprise as well because he paused before retorting, "don't you think the maids are tired of having to clean around your lazy ass? Get up."
Rishid looked from Malik to the thief and back again, before quietly retreating to Isis's room. Malik couldn't ask him to throw Bakura out if he wasn't there to be asked.
Luckily Malik was too busy glaring at Bakura to notice his brother vanishing. "It's what, six in the morning? What do you want?"
Bakura tossed the blankets on the floor and folded his arms over his chest. "Get up. I'm not going to ask again."
Malik ground his teeth together, looking mad enough to kill if Bakura came within reach, and stood up. He knew the tomb robber well enough to know that he had only one chance left to get up on his own.
Wordlessly, a glare punctuating his silence, he dared Bakura to give him another order.
"Get a shirt on and let's go." Bakura kicked Malik's boots away from the bed and waited.
"Should I even ask 'where'?" Malik muttered, waiting just long enough to irritate Bakura before scooping up his black sweat shirt and yanking on his socks and shoes.
"Ask all you want," Bakura said, opening the door and holding it open. "Just keep walking."
Malik paused at the door, where he would have to pass under the thief's arm to get out. It had occurred to him that going without knowing what the spirit was planning was probably dangerous. Their eyes met for a moment, Bakura's expressionless and Malik's wary. Then the teen ducked his head and went out.
Bakura followed, allowing the door to slam shut behind them. "Stairs." He made a gesture, in case Malik had forgotten where to go. That earned him a dirty look, but Malik continued on ahead. At least there was no more argument.
They passed a tired-looking desk clerk without a word and stepped out under a peach morning-sky. Here Bakura took the lead, making his way to a badly parked silver car.
When Bakura got in and motioned Malik to do the same, the teen regained his familiar sneer. "You drove here by yourself?"
Bakura looked sidelong at him as he started the car. "Why?"
The smirk became a little more pronounced. "Just a guess. Where'd you get the car? It's not Ryou's."
"I 'found' it. I'm surprised you didn't 'guess' that, too." The car squealed once as they pulled out, and rumbled when they stopped behind a truck at a red light.
Malik laughed once, softly enough that it was almost masked by the car's screeching when they began moving again. "You couldn't have 'found' a nice sports car or motorcycle?"
"I suppose you'd want me to snatch up yours." The blond stiffened a tiny bit at that, but Bakura didn't give him any notice. It wasn't really his concern if something as simple as selling a motorcycle was a sore subject.
Malik began picking at the frayed edges of the seatbelt he wasn't wearing. "Where are we going?"
Nothing sarcastic immediately sprang to mind, so Bakura chose not to answer at all. Ordinarily this would have driven Malik mad with impatience, but today he merely sat back into the lumpy seat and watched the scenery pass in silence.
After a half hour or so they pulled into the parking lot of a small restaurant. Bakura turned the car off. "Get out," he said gruffly.
Malik took count of the cars in the parking lot, a knot of dread tightening in him when he realized how full that restaurant would be. "I'm not hungry."
"Yes you are." Bakura opened his door but stayed sitting, waiting for Malik to get up first.
"I'd know if I was, wouldn't I?"
Bakura appeared bored with Malik's response and tilted his head back towards the restaurant. "They serve koshari."
Surprised, Malik could only stare at the thief. "You..." what he'd begun to say froze on his tongue and he finished flatly, "don't like koshari."
Bakura shrugged once. "They serve other things, I'm sure. It's called 'Diner' not 'Koshari Palace' if you'll notice."
Malik watched the clapboard building, willing himself to move. Thoughts of the crowd that awaited them seemed to press down on him, pinning him, and he couldn't move.
The thief gave him only a minute to collect himself. When it appeared the youngest Ishtar wasn't going to get out, Bakura slid out of the car, walked around to Malik, yanked open the door and grabbed him roughly by the shoulder.
Panic began to trickle into Malik's mind, but Bakura tugged him along, not allowing him time to struggle, walking ahead of him, keeping his fist tight around the black sweater. The scent of pancakes and bacon rested in the air around the building, forming a warm barrier to walk through on the way in.
There were faux lanterns set into the walls and up above, shedding dim yellow light on fingerprint-stained dark wood and gray-green carpets. Most of the other customers were already seated, chatting amid the clank of silverware and porcelain. The fact that their entrance went unnoticed at first gave Malik a moment to gather himself.
When he had, he yanked his arm away from Bakura hard enough that his elbow nearly smacked against the wall, and stood seething, glaring. "How dare you," he hissed, and turned to leave.
Turned, and nearly ran into the hostess who had come to seat them. She stared a little bit longer than a simple greeting required, clearly wondering what had upset the blond, but decided to pretend she hadn't noticed at all. "Welcome...this way, please. Just two?"
Bakura nodded once on their behalf. When the hostess's back was turned he planted a hand between Malik's shoulder blades, began to push him forward. Malik cringed and moved forward out of reach, but this still put him further into the café.
When they reached their booth, Malik pressed himself against the wall, turned a little to face the aisle. It was a disturbingly defensive and frightened posture and some part of him knew it and acknowledged it distantly.
Bakura's fingers pushed and chased a knife around on the table as he watched this. When the waitress came Malik seemed to huddle further in on himself, even went so far as to lower his gaze, went even further and shook visibly. He heard Bakura order for both of them-two waters, a dish of koshari, a steak cooked very rare. When the waitress left, Malik remained still, feeling the world falling away from him, hearing voices crashing down into shrieks, incomprehensive and piercing.
"Malik. Look at me. Look up." Bakura's voice sounded strange, tinny, muted. A woman laughed nearby, too near, so close that Malik flinched.
Moving jarred him out of this falling, wrecking state. When Bakura spoke again he could hear the thief more clearly. "Look up here, dammit!" Malik did, and wished he hadn't. Bakura's expression was annoyed, disgusted, and uncertain at once; it was an expression Malik had never thought he'd receive from the thief, one that he would never have wanted.
There was a butter knife clenched tight in Bakura's fist. He set it down when Malik noticed, and forced himself to appear cold as he always was. "Just stay here. Are you listening? Malik...stay here. Don't listen to the other people. You're going to sit here and eat. Then we're going to leave. If you eat, we'll leave."
There was patronization in that tone, but Malik was too absorbed with fear to be angry. "Not hungry," he mumbled, but his voice was sticky and his words choked themselves into a strange whisper. It should have been humiliating. If there was a later, maybe it would be then.
"You are hungry, and you're going to fucking eat, do you hear me?" Bakura growled this out, patience thinning. Malik's eyes darted back to the strange couple across the room. Bakura reached across the table to touch him, tugged him close by grabbing his shirt.
Malik gasped, almost yelped, and shoved himself back against the wall. "D-don't...."
"Stop looking at them." Bakura had caught Malik's gaze and finally Malik didn't seem anxious to look away. Slower, the thief went on, "Tell me about koshari."
"What?" His throat still felt tight, but he wasn't whispering now.
Bakura was careful not to move, to keep Malik's attention away from the diner. "Why do you like it? What does it taste like?"
"It is good." Malik could hear a little of his own accent in those words, which was a rarity. He had worked hard to sound exactly like the people around him. Bakura didn't seem to have noticed, just kept still and calm, staring, leaving Malik steadied but uncertain.
The blond drew a quivering breath. "I like it...it tastes...like health." It didn't make any sense, but it was the only word he could think of to describe it. He felt better when he ate it, or he had in years past.
Again, Bakura didn't react to the oddness in Malik's words. He seemed to be waiting for Malik to go on, but it was a while before the teen spoke again. "Isis made it for me when I was a child." There was no shakiness in his voice now, and Bakura finally sat back a little, though he didn't release Malik's gaze.
The world seemed to have settled back into place. It exhausted Malik just to feel how still everything was now; he felt as if he'd fought his way through cement just to get to a place he could breathe. He folded his arms tight across his stomach and looked at the tabletop, though he still felt Bakura's eyes on him.
The waitress came and gave them water, promised to be back with food. Neither of them paid her much attention. Malik's mind wandered as he sat waiting. His thoughts slid down to the black sweater he wore, how warm it was, as if no cold could penetrate it. To the sore gash on his hand.
Shuddering, he looked quickly back up at Bakura, who was no longer watching him so intensely. Their eyes met. Malik turned away, feeling slightly anchored.
&&&&
Ryou had asked him to come to an after school activity. It was simple; paint murals for a new nursing home. Ryou drew the outlines and then told Malik to paint in and shade them as he wished. It gave Malik a few hours of time to move his hands and not think of anything but color, and after a few days he craved it. Ryou was more than happy to bring him along, and the rest of the group was warm enough to him.
A week passed, and Malik was as close to thrilled as he'd been in more than a year. He could be involved actively; his murals would be displayed, people would see them, like and praise them even. There were still hundreds of little touches that needed to be added, and only a month or so in which to do them, but Malik was determined to work hard at it.
When the rest of the group slacked, he nudged them on. A few went along, but some of the older members frowned at being told what to do. Malik ignored it, insisted that they keep working. He wouldn't tolerate the murals being anything less than gorgeous for the open house.
He sat at dinner with Rishid and Isis and described the colors, the shapes, the paintbrushes he was using, reminded them daily (sometimes three times daily) of the open house. He told them that Ryou's mural was going to be beautiful, though Paul's needed work. But Paul was lazy. He didn't understand the importance of what they were doing, and Malik hoped that Susan, the instructor, would kick him off of the team.
They only painted Wednesdays and Saturdays. Malik anxiously waded through the week, always thinking of what he'd add to his murals when he couldn't be there physically to do it. He went to Ryou's and Bakura's occasionally, chatting to one about paints and bantered with the other.
With three weeks to go until the open house, the painters were all anxious and worked themselves into a frenzy each time they got together. Malik was running low on pills, had begun counting them obsessively when he was home. Except for the peace of painting, he felt he might have been suffocated long since by the worry for Isis and Rishid and the guilt of weighing them down, the disgust with himself for not telling them how helpless he was becoming. Susan was less than pleased with most of the progress, and pushed her team to do more in the few hours they had.
She snapped at Paul, to Malik's grim satisfaction. Paul left silently, and Malik was given charge over the extra murals. He flitted from one painting to another, redoing the trees that Paul had butchered. Ryou offered to help, and Malik reluctantly accepted, though he outlined very specifically what he wanted done with it.
"Are you sure that you'll be able to get all this done in time?" Ryou asked quietly as he mixed colors on a stretch of wax paper.
"Yes. I'm nearly done with the horse over there; the cottage should be done by next Saturday. Then I'll have more time to work on the rest of mine." He glanced over his shoulder at where Susan was correcting another student. "It'd be a lot easier if I could come in on extra days, though. It's not like I'm doing anything else."
"You could come to school with me," Ryou offered.
Malik snorted. "I could if it wasn't so boring. I know what they have to say."
"That was a different school. And you never did finish home schooling anyway, right? You need school if you're going to get anywhere, Malik." Ryou didn't sound at all like he believed himself, but Malik opted to take his words at face value. He scoffed at them.
"Malik," Susan said quietly from behind him. "What are you doing with that tree?"
"He fu- Ah, I don't like what Paul did with the shading. I'm fixing it."
"We don't have time to redo the murals, Malik. Just finish what he was doing and then finish yours." She turned to walk away, Malik heard her boots on the plastic drop cloth.
"Yeah, I could do that, but I want it to look nice."
At that, she stopped walking and turned back to him. "What?" There was an edge to her tone that made Malik want to shrink away and bristle at the same time.
"I said," he turned slightly to look at her, "that Paul couldn't paint a motel room, much less a picture. I'm in charge of his murals now, and-"
"Do what I said!" Her eyes glinted dangerously. "Stop arguing with me and do it!" Silence had fallen over the room.
Malik resisted the urge to grab hold of something as his stomach fell. "But..."
"Stop arguing! We don't have time for you to fuck it up, do you hear me? Just do what I said and let's get this damn job done!"
Malik swallowed heavily, unable to find words to yell back at her. She went on irately, "Do you think just because I put you on those walls I couldn't find someone else to replace you? Do you know how fast the rest of the group would snatch up your work? You're expendable, and you're really pushing me, do you understand?"
Malik felt his hands shaking and wanted to curse himself for it. He nodded, barely, and Susan stormed off. Ryou said nothing; like the rest of the group, he stared all the more intently at the walls. Malik couldn't make himself paint, though Ryou tried to get him to.
He sat outside as he waited for Rishid to come and get him, but the doors were always left open after the painting sessions to air out the fumes.
Malik was still quaking, slipping further into a granite-faced agony he had faced so many times before. A very distant part of him longed, begged, to turn on Susan. The rest of him felt only rejection and, a thousand more times more keenly than that, the spinning dismay of having lost this haven. The more he thought about it, the louder Susan's words echoed in his ears.
And then he heard Susan speaking again, in the present reality his mind did not want to exist in. "...I'm just so stressed out right now, I don't know what to do."
Desperate to stay in good graces, another student sputtered, "I'm sorry I've made this so hard."
"It's not you!" Susan sounded exasperated. "It's Malik. I mean, who does he think he is?"
A tear, so hot it almost startled him. Ashamed and incensed now, Malik rose and stalked away from the nursing home. As he walked he wrestled other tears so fiercely he felt sick with the effort.
"Malik!" Rishid's voice. The blond forced his expression to be blank before he turned.
When Rishid asked how the night had been, Malik lied and marveled at how cheerful he sounded, though Rishid didn't look convinced. Malik insisted on walking ahead in silence.
By the time they were halfway to the hotel, the pain had slid beneath Malik's consciousness, held back by a hungering absence, a creature whispering of hiding. Of resolution.
When he and Rishid finally got to their room, Malik opened the door and stopped. "Rishid, I wish to be left alone." If he spoke anymore...Rishid would know.
Malik's moods were something that his siblings had become used to by now, so Rishid went to Isis's room with only a tilt of his head and a second look back. Before there could be any second thoughts, Malik shut the door behind him, still shaking but now out of anticipation.
He kept Rishid's old knife under his mattress, rolled in a washcloth he'd stolen from the hotel. When he pulled it out, his heart throbbed in his ears, adrenaline spilled through his blood, drowning him.
Malik held the knife lightly, dragged it hard on the topside of his left forearm, expected blood. The thin blade only let a little spill and irritation goaded him to lengthen the incision. A shock of pain, a slick wave of sickening relief. He cut again, further down, again, going the other way.
Slash, drag, watch the little line of blood gather and threaten to run down. He grabbed a cube of ice from the ice bucket in the fridge and held it to his left, unmarked arm. He held the ice there until it hurt, then sliced into the numbed skin. Each mark let the frustration, rejection, sickness, confusion, agony...let all of it seep out to hang in the air a moment before dissipating.
He was nearly exhausted by the time Rishid knocked on the connecting door and asked to come in. Malik hadn't bled enough to have left any on the carpet, so he had only to hide the knife and put his sweater back on. He didn't bother to wrap the knife up before stuffing it under the mattress.
Giddy from the relief and numbed from the truth of what he'd been doing, Malik didn't have to work hard to smile at his brother. It must have been an unusual expression for Rishid to have stared so long at him, but Malik turned and disappeared into the bathroom before any questions could be asked.
&&&&
Malik woke to hear Rishid still in the shower. The light outside the window was gray, the bedside clock read 5 a.m. There was no pause between that waking moment and the moment memory intruded into his mind.
So much smaller now, the sense of rejection squirmed to the fore. He looked down at the slashed topsides of his arms and it vanished. Malik smirked, stood up, and pulled on jeans, a t-shirt and his black sweatshirt.
Despite how comforted he felt, the blade under his bed...frightened him. He did not want to be in the same room with it just then. He had nowhere else to go, but even the vending machines down the hall seemed preferable. Malik tried not to dwell on how jumbled he was beginning to feel as he left the room.
He ended up walking around the block, though it took a few hours as he kept pausing to rest on the benches. A small café caught his eye, so he took an outside table and had a glass of water and a few slices of toasted bread before going home.
He was just through the end of a CatDog cartoon episode when Ryou called. "Hi. Um, I was wondering what you were doing for the rest of the day."
Malik didn't bother to mute the television. "Depends on why you're asking."
That took the other teen by surprise and there was a moment of silence. Eventually Ryou seemed to decide on telling the truth. "I was a little worried about you after last night. Susan snaps and it's kind of...hard to know how to take it."
"Hm." Malik turned the channel to an infomercial, hesitated, switched it to a talk show.
Ryou waited, waited, and then, "Do you want to come with us to a movie today?"
"Who's 'us'?" Ryou never included Bakura when he spoke, and the thief wasn't fond of most modern 'entertainment' anyway, which meant there had to be someone else there.
"Yugi and me. We thought we'd go see Cages."
A few weeks ago, Malik probably wouldn't have even answered the phone. He was hesitant now, but his mind was clear enough that the truth of who he was could peek through and he found that he truly did want to see more of the world, even if it was just the inside of a theater. "Fine, why not. How am I supposed to get there?"
"We can come and pick you up on the way if you'd like."
"Yeah. But don't just walk past the desk clerk, tell her why you're here or she'll call the police." It had happened to their neighbors two nights ago. It still seemed funny.
"All right. We'll see you in a half hour or so."
"I'll be here." He hung up but forgot to add 'good bye' before he did.
An hour later, Yugi and Ryou were standing at his door. Malik left a note on Isis's night stand and didn't bother to turn off the T.V. when they left.
&&&&
Seto Kaiba usually got home in time to have dinner, do homework, help Mokuba study, and sleep. It was a comfort to be able to share even that much time with his brother, so he didn't take kindly to people intruding in on it.
Today his workload was just light enough that it looked as if he might be able to get home early enough to bounce ideas off of Mokuba before dinner. He had been hopeful, that is, until KaibaCorp's accountant, Reg, stalked in with a fistful of papers and a frustrated glower. It was the universal "what did you do to screw up your books now, Oh-Mighty-CEO?" expression.
Kaiba didn't stand up, but he did set his current paperwork aside, and he sat back to wait for Reg to speak first. Considering Reg had walked in without the usual go-ahead, that was quite generous.
"Did you write out a check for Forest Hills Institution?" The dark-haired accountant clearly had the copy of the bank statement in his hand, but Kaiba knew he wanted confirmation. For legality or simply as a power kick, Kaiba didn't know, and he didn't have time to really worry about ulterior motives.
"More than likely. Why?" On the other hand, Reg couldn't expect Kaiba to remember each check he wrote. Literally hundreds passed under his pen per day.
Reg tossed the papers on the mahogany desk and leaned forward, excitement and irritation dancing in his eyes. How anyone could be so enthused about bookkeeping was a mystery; if it had been anyone but Kaiba staring up at this man, it might have been frightening to see such 'madness'.
"I suppose you had a good reason for signing over so much money, but the problem is, it's fraud." He pointed at the Forest Hills letterhead, a message which thanked KaibaCorp for their continued charitable donations. "There's no such place. You've signed over six-figures over the past year to these people, and they're probably running off to Jamaica right now. You hear that? That's their plane, bye-bye."
Annoyed, Kaiba shot him a withering glare before turning his attention back to the Forest Hills folder. "Impossible. They're owed another check, they wouldn't take off without it. Take this matter to KaibaCorp's attorneys and make sure they know that I'm telling them to go after everything these bastards have got. I don't just want my money back, I want compensation. Got it?"
"Got it." Practically humming with the thrill of the hunt, Reg scooped up his papers and trotted back out the door.
Kaiba smirked to himself before returning to his regular paperwork. The coming month promised to be hell for someone.