Hikarishipping (Bakura Ryo/Marik Ishtar/Mutou Yugi)

. . .

"Have you never been to a karaoke bar before, Marik-kun? You have to come with us! It'll be fun!"

So Yugi had said, but Marik felt his stomach flip-flopping and nerves tasted heavy on his tongue and wow, he should have just stayed at the hotel tonight. He lingered just outside the door of the karaoke place, hands curled tight in his pockets and his stomach doing nervous cartwheels. Lights flickered and flashed on the logo, sending patterns across his skin as he shifted his weight from one foot to the other. Just—he just had to open the door. That was it.

He couldn't get his hands out of his pockets, they were knotted too tightly. What was he even doinghere? This was stupid. He stepped back from the door, feeling his insides drop to the very bottom of his feet. Yeah, he'd just—he'd just go. They probably wouldn't even notice he wasn't there. Yugi had a lot of friends, after all, and they were probably all coming...

"Oh, Marik-san!"

The soft voice made Marik almost jump two feet into the air, but he was a master at steeling himself, and managed to stay still. He plastered a bland smile on his face as he turned around to find...Bakura. Bakura Ryo, wasn't it? Guilt rippled up his spine and made his shoulders hunch slightly—after what he had done to this boy, he couldn't even remember his name? He really was the world's biggest asshole.

The young man smiled—it might have just been Marik's nerves, but his smile looked as bland as Marik's own.

"I guess I'm at the right place then; I got a little turned around," Ryo said. No, Marik definitely wasn't imagining it, Ryo had a sort of...veiled look in his eyes even as he smiled passively. Marik felt something in him tighten up. This was more than just awkward, he felt...wronglike he shouldn't be here.

"I-I guess," he said, and mentally swore at himself for stumbling over his words. He never would have been like this back when he was the leader of Ghouls. Had he lost all of his way with words when he had shed the cloak of his past?

For a moment, they only stood there, obviously trying not to look at each other, Marik staring at the sidewalk, and Ryo studying the sign of the karaoke bar. Marik felt like he was going to be sick. He just had to leave. He'd make some excuse and he'd leave. This was wrong, he shouldn't be here, Ryo clearly didn't want to see him, and none of the others would want to either...

"Ah! Marik-kun, Bakura-kun! Thank goodness!"

Yugi's voice jolted them both out of their pointed ignoring each other, and both of them turned to him. The short boy jogged down the sidewalk, coming to a stop in front of them and putting his hands on his knees to catch his breath.

"Ahhh, I was so worried that no one was going to come," Yugi said between heavy breaths. "Anzu, Honda-kun, and Jonouchi-kun all got busy last minute, I was worried I had rented the room for nothing!"

"Oh...no one else is able to make it?" Marik said.

Yugi straightened, smiling at Marik—it was a wide, abandoned sort of smile, without any of the blandness or guardedness that Marik or Ryo both seemed to have. Marik felt a twinge of guilt—how could Yugi possibly smile at him like that?

"I guess it's just us three!" Yugi said with a laugh. "I'm sorry, I know I said there would be more people, but I guess the last year of high school's getting busy for everyone. I'm super glad you two could come though!"

"R-right," Marik said, rubbing the back of his neck. "I'm...glad I could make it too."

Ra, he couldn't leave now! What was wrongwith him, he used to be so good at this social thing—was it because this time, he was actually worried about Yugi and Ryo not being upset or angry with him? Usually his social interactions had been just him trying to get information out of people, and it didn't really matter if they liked him or not. This was so much more stressful.

"Well, I guess we should head in before they give our reservation to someone else," Yugi said. "Come on!"

He had such a bounce in his step that he looked like he was skipping—what was it like to have that much cheer in one small body?

Marik and Ryo just stood there for a moment. Almost at the same time, their eyes slid over to each other. Marik wondered if he was projecting what he saw in Ryo's eyes—was that anger or hate, or was Marik just paranoid? Yugi was halfway to the door before he noticed.

He turned around, blinking at them.

"Is...something wrong?" he said.

Both Marik and Ryo jolted out of their personal reveries, and they looked away from each other quickly.

"I...I'm sorry, Yugi, I don't want to make you guys uncomfortable," Marik started.

"I'm afraid I'm making Marik-san uncomfortable," Ryo said at almost the same time.

They both stopped. They both stared at each other.

Yugi looked from one to the other. And then he snorted. He had to press his hand to his mouth to still the sound. Marik felt heat on his cheeks, and he saw that Ryo was actually blushing too, tilting his head down so that his hair fell over his face.

"Why would yoube making me uncomfortable?" Marik said to Ryo. "I'mthe one that, you know, took over your mind."

"But you and...the other one in my head had some kind of agreement, and then you broke it off at the end," Ryo said. "I know that—he's not the kind of person you want to mess with, so I thought you might be worried he was...still around and out to get you."

Marik rolled his head back to stare at the sky, a weird sort of relief flooding through him.

"Oh, gods," he said. "I thought you were looking at me like that because you didn't think I belonged here!"

"What? No! I thought you were giving me side-eyes to make sure the other guy wasn't sneaking out! He's not here, you know, he disappeared with the Ring!"

Yugi was laughing so hard that he actually had to sit down on the sidewalk. Ryo and Marik both glared at him, twin blushes heating their cheeks.

Yugi finally calmed down enough to get himself back to his feet. He hopped over to the pair of them, grabbing Ryo's hand in one of his hands and Marik's in the other.

"Come on, guys," he said. "We're all friends now, okay? So let's stop making assumptions!"

Ryo and Marik glanced at each other. Then they looked at Yugi—the bright cheer that poured out from within him, a complete and total forgiveness and acceptance.

"I suppose we should," Ryo said, rubbing his nose with his free hand.

"Yeah," Marik said, rubbing the back of his neck again. "I guess...we should at least get to know each other for real this time."

Yugi laughed again, and it was such a nice sound that Marik couldn't help but smile.

"Great! Now that that's out of the way, we can all go embarrass ourselves by singing terribly!"

"Terribly?" Marik said. "I actually havetaken voice lessons, you know."

"That's the exact opposite point of karaoke," Ryo said with a laugh.

Yugi tugged on both of their hands towards the karaoke bar. Marik found, to his surprise, that...he really didn't mind when Yugi didn't drop their hands.

. . .

A/N: this is actually...super cute and I would like to see more of these dorks being friends/poly. Or at least, more of them like this, cause I notice some Hikarishipping makes all of them little perfect angels, which none of them really are ^^; Anyway, next up! Hieroglyphshipping (Pegasus x Priest Set).