Chapter 12

Touch is a sense perceived through the skin. Touch can tell us how cool or hot a metal is. Touch can tell us how comfortable a hug is. Touch can tell us all kinds of things. Touch can, by its special spark and the blush it brings creeping over our face, tells us when and where we are in love. But touch can't tell us why.

As Marik jogged home, he realized that, other than his hikari, Yugi, and maybe Ishizu and/or Odion on occasion, he'd never touched another human being in his short, six-year-life.

I say I never touch people, he realized, but in reality, I shook Yugi just the other day. That's counts. Skin tingles.

Marik shivered. He could see his hikari's house now. He started running towards it, full-speed. He didn't want to be outside any longer than he had to, since he had accidentally stepped in the koi pond and his pants were all wet.

Once he got inside, he went into his bedroom. It was not much of a room; Ishizu and Odion were in charge of interior decorating, and both of them hated him as is. Malik was the only one who cared, even the least bit to form an ironic relationship, even a mild friendship, with the man who tried to destroy his soul. But then again, hikaris always looked out for their yamis. Even Ryou looked out for his. They felt they had to, for whatever reason. Marik didn't care right now. He sunk into a beat up leather armchair with slashes all over the seat.

Inside Marik's mind, he had a number of unpleasant things to think about. For one, why Yugi was acting so weird. It had started when Yugi had stolen five dollars from Malik and had refused to give it back. On that day, Yugi suddenly hadn't been afraid of him anymore.

"—will send you to the Shadow Realm? Really, Marik, can't you think of anything different? You don't even have the Millennium Rod anymore! Yami gave it to Mokuba to put in a safe for… safe…keeping, y' know?

"Okay, so I don't have the Millennium Rod!" Marik seethed. "Geez… I'm still a pretty scary person, aren't I? But then… I wasn't exactly scary when I found out that Yugi was playing with fireworks. I should've gathered blackmail or something, but what did I do instead?"

"Did you just say… Did you just say all this was cool?"

"Uh, no! No way! It wasn't me. I was just saying that fireworks in, uh, what's the word… general, that fireworks in general were cool, and, uh… Give me five dollars."

Marik growled. "Smooth," he told himself. "I ended up giving him advice on how to get out of cleaning bathrooms! But he made it sound like Yami had been ignoring him… good… that could make him easier to exploit—if I felt up to exploiting him, but I've already got the mission of gathering my hikari's money, so that has to be taken care of first…"

"YAMI!" Marik heard pounding on his door. "Who are you talking to! Come out here!"

"Why are you harassing me, lately? You usually don't play bitch to your other half like that."

"You better have gotten my money!" Malik threatened, muffled by the door.

"You know I love it when you try to touch me Marik."

"SHUT UP HIKARI!" Marik threw something at his door. The sound of glass shattering filled his ears, bringing him a sense of inner chaos, an ineffable peace, which muffled his quiet thinking, rendering it inert, blasé, out-of-date. He didn't need to think about Yugi.

"You know I love it when you try to touch me Marik."

That was a JOKE! He didn't need to THINK about that!

Marik got up and, adjusting his uber-cool cape, made to open the door to his room. He found his hikari blinking back at him.

"My money?" Malik asked in a guilty-sounding voice. He stepped away from Marik.

I can scare hikari-sama, so…

"NO!" Marik slammed the door shut.

I should be able to scare Yugi. I'll touch him… strangle him in his sleep, is what I'll do. I'll… hey, wait. How many times have I actually touched somebody, anyway? … Like, never. Nobody comes near me enough for me to even brush against them. What if Yugi's skin feels gross or something, and so I let him go and he escapes? I'll never live that down…What does skin feel like, anyway? I forget. Maybe it's grimy. Besides mine. I'm always clean. - Hygiene keeps my hair pert after all. Hey, that must mean that Yugi keeps clean too…

Marik opened the door to his room. Loud munching sounds greeted him as he found Malik Ishtar sitting on the couch again, eating popcorn with his eyes glued on some Latin music video. He crept up on his other half silently.

"Hey!" Malik cried half a second later, when Yami Malik grabbed his wrist. "Let go of my wrist, you psycho."

Five minutes ago he was "yami." Now he was "psycho." If intimidating his own hikari was this easy, why couldn't he even get Yugi to whimper a little? Yugi was supposed to be the lightest one—and purity, like a gaseous star, was supposed to be unstable, faulty. No matter; he'd get him tomorrow…

Marik spent the next five minutes tracing the veins on his other half's wrist. Malik's skin felt smooth. The inside of the scared Egyptian teen's mouth became as dry as cotton.

"Yami," Malik uttered gaspingly, "what are you doing?"

"Tracing where I'm going to cut. Piss off."

"…Are you crazy! You can't kill me. Ishizu would—"

"Can it," Marik said glumly.

"Something wrong?"

"You SUCK!" Marik roared randomly. The veins on his face showed prominently.

"…Did you get my money?"

Marik growled. Malik rolled his eyes, as if to say, "Oh, I see. I get it now." Which was apparently what he was thinking, because he then said: "Look, just because you're not strong enough to beat up a midget, that doesn't mean that you can—"

"I'm killing him."

"Pardon?"

Malik looked at Marik, whose eyes were glowing a faint red.

"I'm going to strangle him tomorrow until he coughs up twenty," Marik promised. "Now good night."

Marik retreated into his room and slammed the door. Malik followed him.

"Yami," he said quietly, "forget what I said about the five dollars. Obviously Yugi's acting pretty effing weird or something. I've noticed it too. Just forget it. I'll swindle the money from some other poor sap." Malik shrugged, even though he knew Marik couldn't see him. "Just… really… forget about it. Yugi's pathetic. You just need some time to cool down before you try again…"

Perhaps that's it, Marik agreed. I'll take tomorrow off. I'll spend a day without seeing him once. Where can I go?

…My pants are still wet!