Title: Colors of the Soul
Author: Crimson Eyed Dragon
Pairing: Mentions of Marik/Yami
Rating: R
Warnings: Language, mentions of rape
Disclaimer: I do not own Yu-Gi-Oh
Summary: It's been three years since anyone has seen Yami and when the Kaibas' find him, even Seto's best efforts to heal this broken spirit may not be enough.

Status: 4/6

Dragon: Atemu's thoughts are broken on purpose. So any grammar errors during his thinking are intentional.

Italics denotes Atemu's inner thoughts

Chapter 4

A month later

Seto sighed wearily as he closed his laptop then rested his head in the palms of his hands, taking a moment to breath while the peaceful silence remained. Lifting his head up, he checked the clock sitting on his desk, noting the time now read a little after one AM. With a grunt, he pushed his chair back, allowing him to stand up and walk over to his closet, pulling out a pair of sweat pants and t-shirt he had begun to sleep in ever since Atemu – now going by that name since Seto refused to call him anything else – came to stay with him.

During that time, Seto learned quickly that his nights and days would be busy watching over a man who needed constant supervision. While Atemu could do basic things on his own such as shower, feed, and dress himself, he was just too mentally unstable to be left alone in most of the house. If he happened to have a panic attack, flashback or anything remotely similar, any object in that room became dangerous to the broken man.

Realizing this, Seto decided to start working from home, rarely going to KC for anything if he could help it. He could have easily hired a nurse to come sit with Atemu but Seto didn't really trust his cousin's care to anyone else and he highly doubted the Egyptian would take to anyone else looking at him or touching him. The scene at the airport proved that point.

They were walking towards there flight, Atemu calm, head down, shuffling along aside him when he was picked for one of those random body searches the American airports did. When the man touched Atemu, it was like his whole body shut down, his mind withdrew as he whimpered and collapsed against Seto.

After some prescription drugs, threats, and explanations, they finally made it on the plane and back to Japan. It was an experience Seto never wanted to go through again.

It hurt more than he realized to see Atemu act like that. He had always held an undying respect for the other duelist – his strength, his pride, his uncanny ability to win, and most of all, his emotional control in the face of danger or at the other end of a dueling ring. It was something he had only seen in one other person and that was himself.

But now…that version of Atemu was gone, and he was seriously wondering if it would ever be back. He guessed he would just have to have faith that everything would turn out all right in the end.

He snorted as he pulled the T-shirt over his head. Faith. Now that was something he had never believed in before. Mention that word to him and he would have laughed in your face for believing in such a ridiculous notion. But now, it seemed almost…important that he believe in it, if nothing more than for his sanity.

He had to believe Atemu would get better.

And he was beginning to think he wasn't cut out to take care of Atemu for several reasons. For all his research of PTSD and any of the other problems his cousin had, nothing seemed to add up. The symptoms just didn't coincide with any of his research.

If the Items were still around, he might even believe they were the cause of this, because logically, nothing else made any sense. But Atemu had been human now for years and according to Isis and Malik, the golden trinkets were buried and gone along with any magic that could have caused any of this.

With a sigh, finished dressing and sat down on the edge of his bed, elbows resting on his knees as he stared at the wall that separated his and his cousin's bedroom. How was he going to get through this….and he didn't mean Atemu. In the month since they had returned from the States, Seto had slept less – if that was even possible – stressed more and seemed to be in a constant state of worry. It was more taxing than he realized to look after a man that needed to be cared for like a child…a handicapped child as the legal papers labeled him…emotionally handicapped. He growled, hating that word they had stuck on the only person that could easily match him in the brains department.

But deep down he really couldn't dispute it for that was what Atemu was now…and maybe forever. And that scared him, tormented him and reminded him that he could have just as easily turned out the same way at the hands of his stepfather. In a way it also made him feel guilty. He turned out strong, broken in some ways, but still strong and whole. Atemu was looking more and more beyond repair.

Throwing his feet up onto the bed, he shifted his body till he felt comfortable, resting his head on the pillow, his arms crossed over his chest, eyes trained on the ceiling above him. The house was quiet; no wind hollowing outside and his ears rang from the lack of sound. His heart thumped in his chest, its rhythmic beating speeding up slightly even if there was no cause for it too. But Seto knew there was a reason, just as there was every single night for the past month when he finally decided to shut the world out and try to get some sleep.

Atemu never cried, never screamed out when the nightmares hit him, so if one didn't know what to listen for it would be missed until morning. The ex-spirit took his frightening dreams in silence, not even when he was submerged in the darkest parts of his mind did he seek assistance to help him battle the monsters of his memories – to save him.

Seto scoffed. Why would he? Atemu went months –years- without asking for help from a living demon so why would he now that they were just recurring memories?

Thump.

He stiffened, azure eyes darting over to the wall.

Click.

Quickly and quietly, Seto pulled himself off of the bed, making his way over to his open door. Carefully, he peered outside into the hallway just in time to see Atemu round the corner. With a sigh Seto left his bedroom and followed the wandering man to where ever the other's destination was.

This too wasn't new to the CEO, more than once he had caught Atemu walking throughout his house as if he was looking for something hidden with in the vast mansion. But this time the crimson-eyed man wasn't walking with unsure footsteps, as he normally did, but rather with a purpose. Intrigued, he continued to follow, not once speaking to his charge to find out what was going on in his mind.

When they rounded the last corner, Seto stopped at the door way of the kitchen and lean casually against the frame as he observed the smaller man make his way over to the refrigerator, opening the door and began to pull an odd assortment of items out. Not seeing anything remotely dangerous in Atemu's actions, he decided to stand back and let whatever was going to happen, happen.

Atemu walked over to the butcher block in the center of the kitchen floor and laid his items on the edge then took his arm and swept it across the surface as if to wipe it clean. Seto raised an eyebrow, leaned forward slightly when Atemu opened a jar of blackberry jam and stuck two fingers inside it, scooping out some of the substance and dumped in on to the wood. Using the same digits, he began to spread it around, thinning the lumpy jelly till it was a thin layer. Scooping out more, he moved over slightly and began to 'paint' another jam blob onto the butcher block.

Curiosity pulling at him, Seto stepped closer to the other man, his blue eyes watching intently as Atemu grabbed the hand towel hanging on the side of the workstation and wiped his hand clean before grabbing a jar of mayonnaise and repeated the same process. Walking around the butcher block till he was standing on the other side of his cousin, Seto crossed his arms, his eyes narrowing as he began to make out blurry human-like figures made of food.

Two dark figures seemed to be facing each other and the lone white figure was 'laying' down next to one of the blackberry jam images. Squatting down so he could see Atemu's face, Seto opened his mouth, ready to ask what the meaning behind all of this was, only to close it when he noticed the dazed look to the crimson eyes that darted back and forth as he worked, grabbing for the ketchup next.

Blacks.

Evil? Love? Life? Me?

White.

Pure. Clean. Love. Me but not me – a part of me. Lost.

Must show.

Failed – lost white. Failed him.

Must show Blue.

End of the equation.

Red. Lots of red. Sticky. Sick. Life. Love. Death.

Gone.

Failed.

Lost.

Must show. Understand. Need. Alone. So alone.

Black. Gray. Red. Brown. White. Invisible.

Yellow. Blue. Not whole.

Alone…alone…alone…

Seto jumped when Atemu suddenly screamed in rage, sweeping the various items off of their resting place, letting them crash to the tile floor, glass shattering sending their contents splattering against the white ceramic. Shocked and dazed at the sudden change in his cousin's demeanor that he failed to notice when Atemu grabbed a knife from its holder till the gleam from the raised weapon flashed before it was brought down onto the butcher block. Over and over again the large kitchen knife was raised and slammed back down, going further and further into the wood.

Frightened that his cousin would hurt himself, Seto darted around the object –not thinking about the broken glass - and grabbed the other's raised arm from behind, stopping it in mid decent. He called out Atemu's name, getting a little louder each time as the ex-spirit struggled against him till it seemed to work. The tanned hand – lighter than it used to be for lack of being exposed to the sun – released the knife, letting drop with a thud against the block, silver metal gleaming innocently against the brown, food stained surface.

"Atemu," he soothed, cradling the limp man against him as he ran a hand through the now dye-free tri-colored locks, knowing this one of the few things that tended to calm the other down. The smaller body shook against his own quivering body, the experience scaring him more than he cared to realize.

Seto didn't know how long they stood there in the kitchen, food contents and glass scattered on the floor around them, but he continued to speak in a hushed voice, whispering comforting, soothing words over and over again as they both slowly settled down.

"Blue."

Atemu's scratchy voice broke through the monotony of his words, stilling his hand in the still long locks of his cousin's hair. Carefully, he untangled his hand, pushing the smaller man back from his chest so he could look into the other man's eyes. "Yes?"

Crimson eyes darted up, quickly gazing into his own eyes before he turned his head, looking back at the butcher block. Slowly, Atemu lifted his hand, index finger pointing to the two blackberry jam figures. "Black," he said before shifting his finger to point at the one made of mayonnaise. "White."

Not letting go of Atemu, afraid that if the other man moved he would step on the glass, Seto eyed the food drawings when something clicked. "Black and white. Yami and hikari?" Atemu nodded. "You, Marik and Yugi." Another nod. "Marik killed Yugi didn't he? And then you killed him."

Atemu didn't answer, but he didn't have to. Seto knew the answer as he pulled the smaller man back against him, kissing him lightly on the forehead, even as he closed his eyes not wanting to look at the crude drawing anymore now that he understood what the other had been wanting to tell him.

That Atemu had killed Marik after he had killed Yugi was nothing new to him. That information had been passed along by Mokuba when he had found out about it himself but to hear it, so to speak, from Atemu himself was both heartbreaking and joyful at the same moment for this was the first time that he had attempted to talk about what happened that day that changed Atemu forever. For Seto knew that the death of Yugi hurt Atemu more than anything Marik physically did.

Another kiss to the forehead, Seto released Atemu and gently picked him up in his arms – something he had only recently been able to do without him mentally withdrawing – and carefully made his way out of the kitchen. "Lets get you back to bed. I'll clean this up in the morning."

Nothing else was said as they made there way back to the bed room or as Seto laid Atemu on his bed, checking his feet to make sure that he hadn't been injured on the broken glass before he covered the seemingly lifeless figure up with a blanket. "Get some sleep Atemu," he whispered as he ran his fingers through golden bangs, watching the other's dull eyes for any hopefully change. Shaking his head at the lack of response, Seto pulled his hand away and turned to walk out of the room when he heard something that stopped him in his tracks.

"Seto-blue, black minus white. Failed."