Shameshipping (Rishid x Ishizu x Marik)

"It's not your fault."

"Yes it is."

"It's not."

"Then whose fault is it?"

Hesitation.

"...it's all of us. All of us have to share the blame...and the shame that goes with it."

Marik didn't believe his sister. How could Ishizu and Rishid have had anything to do with what happened? No, it was his fault for begging Ishizu to let him go to the surface, his fault for letting the pharaoh control him, and his fault that father was now dead.

"There's no way," Marik said. "It's me. And the stupid...the damn pharaoh."

"Marik," Ishizu pleaded. "Don't swear. And it's not your fault."

Rishid put a hand on Marik's shoulder, gentle as always, but Marik stiffened at the touch and shoved his hand aside.

"Marik..."

Ishizu took Marik's hands in her own, her liquid brown eyes thick with tears as she looked up at him.

"Please. Don't take this burden by yourself. Let us work through this blame together."

Marik met his sister's eyes, feeling his own tears bubble up in him.

"Marik, we are all at fault," Rishid said, surprising Ishizu and Marik both. His soft, unassuming voice could have been the stone walls themselves speaking. "I should not have agreed to help disguise your going...Ishizu should not have taken you...you should not have gone. But...it's over now...it's been done...there's no point in trying to place the blame..."

The tall boy shifted, wincing at the pain in his back. Marik met his sister's eyes, and Rishid's eyes, and the the faraway single golden eye of the Millennium Rod, gleaming in its case far away. Terrible half memories of what had been done flashed through his mind, and sobs welled up, unreleased, in his chest, until he thought he might explode.

"We have to stay together," Ishizu pleaded. "We can't blame ourselves, or anyone –"

"No!" Marik screamed, jumping to his feet. "You don't understand! You and Rishid – you don't understand! This is my fault! My shame! Mine, and mine alone, and neither of you will ever understand it, and IT'S ALL THE PHARAOH'S DAMN FAULT!"

He fled from the chambers, running away from the cries of Ishizu and soft pleas of Rishid. He ran until he could run no farther, and he was swallowed up on all sides by shadows. Then he collapsed to the ground and sobbed, letting his tears echo against the catacomb walls.

It was the pharaoh's fault. Not Ishizu's. Not Rishid's. And not his.

It was all the pharaoh's fault.

A/N: Poor Marik. :( I think people tend to write Marik off as a pointless, annoying, or badly written character (probably because of the Abridged Series, though I love it to death), and so readers fail to see the depth that the characters of Yu-Gi-Oh are capable of. I love the Tombkeepers characters. There's so much emotion to work with that wasn't addressed in the manga or anime. Shakeshipping (Takaido x Kotsuzaka) is next.