Making a grand entrance usually held vital importance to Malik, but toppling into an overflowing sink and receiving a face-full of water in the process hadn't been high up on his agenda. Amidst the wetness coating his skin and hair, he became aware of iron-scented warmth dripping down his cheek, a direct result of the smashed crockery beneath him. To make matters worse, he couldn't see a thing in his right eye.
God fucking dammit, how did I manage to lose one contact lens?
If the sound of a potential burglar entering the apartment didn't pique Bakura's interest, he didn't know what would. True to thought, a loud yell rang out from the next room.
"I swear to fucking god, Kek, if that's you, I am going to garrotte you with Ryou's washing line and string your guts up on it!"
Malik had to wonder how many times Kek had forced his way into Bakura's living space for him to automatically assume the source of all the clamour. He clambered out of the sink, and brushed his wet hair back from his face, and walked towards the doorway. "Close, but not quite."
A slight pause. Then -
"Ishtar, what the bloody hell were you doing climbing through my window?"
"You wouldn't answer the door."
"A sane person would take that to mean I don't want anyone in here."
Malik ignored the pointed quip. He reached the living room and closed his blurry right eye, squinting with the other. The room might as well have been pitch-black for all the good it did; he couldn't see Bakura anywhere. Malik had mostly gotten over his initiation-borne fear of darkness, but the gloom still pressed upon him uncomfortably for reasons completely unrelated to the scars on his back. "Where are you?"
"Go away, Malik."
"Hell, no. Fucking show yourself, I'm half-blind right now."
A low groan resounded from somewhere near the floor, and a lamp flickered on in the corner, bathing the room in soft, red-hued light. Able to take in his surroundings at last, Malik peered around and tried to ignore the itching discomfort in his lens-less eye.
What he saw left him aghast, to say the least. Bakura clearly didn't care for being house-proud, and could only be described as living in chaos. Dust coated every surface, and various items of dirty crockery littered the low table in the middle of the tiny room, interspersed with bottles of spirits in varying degrees of emptiness. The switched-on lamp in question sat on a corner table beside an old sofa, and on the floor, leaning back against said sofa, emerged a dull mass of limbs and tangled hair that vaguely resembled Malik's old friend.
Oh, Bakura…what happened to you?
He'd been warned that Bakura had fallen on hard times, but he'd never imagined it could be this bad. He was an utter mess. Listless brown eyes, set deep in a gaunt face and framed by locks of untamed platinum, glared up at Malik. Dark circles shadowed the deadened orbs, and even with his poor vision, Malik shivered as Bakura's gaze burned through to his very soul.
Seeing Bakura in such a state had all sorts of odd emotions thundering through Malik's veins, but before he could rush over and sweep him into his arms, his mouth got the better of him.
"What the hell, Bakura? You're too proud for shit like this. The fuck is wrong with you?!"
"Fuck you. Barging in here and laying into me like I even give half a shit." A slur twisted Bakura's words, beset with exhaustion, world-weariness, and a touch of booze-induced drowsiness. "Didn't the radio silence on my end tell you idiots anything? I don't want to see you, Ishtar."
"Well, tough shit," Malik shrugged. "I didn't really believe how much of a fuck-up you'd become, but I had to come see it for myself."
Bakura bristled with anger, a dangerous gleam flashing in his eyes. "I'm sure you've seen enough now, so...dammit, quit squinting at me like that!"
"Sorry," Malik murmured, rubbing his eye. "I dropped a lens in your sink. I can barely see."
Bakura raised an eyebrow. "Since when do you wear lenses?"
"Since I realised that I saw better through the eyes of my Ghouls than I did through my own – look, can we not talk about this right now?" Malik sat on the sofa, ignoring Bakura's venom-soaked glare. Resigning himself to an evening of magnified eyes, Malik removed his remaining lens and flicked it into the nearest mug he could focus on, before reaching into his pocket for the case that held his glasses.
Bakura burst out laughing when Malik opened the case and slipped the slim, black frames on. "You look ridiculous."
"Says the alcoholic sprawled out on the floor," Malik snapped. "Why are you even sat down there?"
"I had a fight with the floor, and the floor won." Bakura started flicking through his phone absently, playing a game. "Are you done here?"
"Fuck you, Bakura. Like hell I'm done."
Bakura grunted in acknowledgement. "Figures." His eyes remained firmly on his phone as he continued to play his game.
Malik would get little else out of his old friend by this point and stood up to find the bathroom. It proved to be just as untidy as the rest of the apartment; Malik's brow furrowed at the overflowing laundry basket and the thick layer of dust under his feet. "Bakura, why is there no mirror in your bathroom?" Malik called out.
"Should there be?"
"There's a big mark over the sink where a mirror used to be."
"Bite me, Ishtar."
Malik settled for using his phone camera, snapping a picture and looking at that instead. The cut wasn't as bad as he thought, and he rinsed it off carefully, then splashed water over the rest of his face and towelled his hair as dry as he could get it. He didn't feel any cleaner, but it was better than old dishwater covering him.
In the two minutes it had taken for Malik to clean himself up and return to the living room, Bakura had fallen asleep with his head on his knees, phone still shining brightly in his hand. Malik knelt beside him, reaching out to turn the phone screen off. The smell of alcohol and general neglect hung heavy around Bakura, the kind that spoke volumes about how little one cared for themselves anymore. Malik gently stroked Bakura's wild mop of hair, wishing he knew what to do for him.
The tell-tale headache of frustration and anger began to build within him, but…
I understand, I guess…how easy it is to sink into the blackness of despair.
The trouble was that Bakura seemingly had no intention of pulling himself out. Ryou had tried, Kek had tried, but all their attempts had been met with staunch disinterest. Malik, however, had learned a thing or two from Yugi, and he wasn't ever one to back down from a challenge. He slid an arm round Bakura's back and another under his knees, hauling him, with some difficulty, into a position where he could manoeuvre him. Malik's scarred back screamed in protest, seizing up in response to the intense strain being placed on it, but Malik forced himself to breathe heavily through it, until Bakura had been safely deposited onto the sofa.
He's so light…jeez, how much weight has he lost since Battle City?
Bakura didn't stir, even when Malik started gathering up the multitude of ceramic and glass from the table, creating an almighty racket in the process. Well and truly out for the count.
He didn't know quite why he had decided to tidy Bakura's apartment at three in the morning, but the place was filthy, and he knew Bakura wasn't likely to handle it himself. At the very least, he deserved to wake up to a nice environment. Malik cleared away the broken crockery from the sink, washed the remaining lot, then swept, dusted, sprayed and mopped, even found a geriatric-looking vacuum cleaner and ran it round the living room. Bakura didn't so much as move his head, despite the roar of the vacuum a few feet away, though his snores could have put him in the running for a gold medal against the old banger.
Malik didn't go near Bakura's bedroom; something told him he'd be massively overstepping his already mouldering boundaries. I'm probably doing enough to invade Bakura's personal space and privacy as it is, and…
He winced, rolling his sore shoulders. Damn, I'm so tired...
His muscles ached, his back felt tight and stiff, and that armchair practically begged to be sat in…Malik dropped onto the soft cushions and closed his eyes, meaning to rest for just a moment…