Requiem For his Scars

Holy frig will you look at that. . .an update. It's been what, three months?

Whoops.

Also this has copious amounts of feels. I am not responsible for whatever may ensue in the aftermath of reading this.

He could feel the blood streak down his arms in rivulets as he struggled to break free of the cloth bonds about his wrists and ankles. The white cloth was stained red as the skin about his extremities began to bleed from so much movement as the skin was rubbed away. The blade was hot, oh so hot as it carved and sliced through the flesh on his back. Those ancient carvings that they had spent thousands of years hiding away from the world. The chanting of the Tombkeepers pounded in time with the roaring of blood in his ears, the rise and fall of their unearthly voices in rhythm with each heart beat. He frantically gaze about him to see the walls carved with hieroglyphics towering over him, the statues of the unhearing gods peering down at Marik, their gazes silent and judging as the torches mounted on the walls cast everything in long and cold shadows.

"Make it stop," he moaned, wanting nothing more than to crawl away from the spectacle and curl up in the fetal position. "Make it stop," he sobbed.

He looked down, to find that he was no longer strapped to the bed but rather face down, peering into the abyss. The binds were still about his wrists but he was no longer shackled to the stone bed where they had conducted the ceremony. The cloth binds were heavy with his lifeblood. Marik could feel it trickle down his back as well, fresh and open to the world.

"Where, where am I?" he asked to the cavernous nothing surrounding him. As he spoke, a single droplet of blood fell from his cheekbone and landed on the invisible surface. Ghostly green ripples spread out from the point of origin and Marik watched, fascinated as the once empty space morphed and transformed into a familiar and old foe. The green six pointed star and rings of Enochian were unmistakable.

The Orichalcos.

"Well, I was wondering when you would show up."

Marik glanced up to find his darker side, the accursed yami that would not leave, standing on the other side of the ring, sneering at him. He held the Millennium Rod, unsheathed at his waist. His other hand was gripped about the head and neck of a young woman, her throat exposed to the lethal blade. "I was getting bored," he crowed sadistically. "After all, what's a little torture without an audience?" His cape billowed to a invisible wind as he spoke, emphasizing the yami's delusions of grandeur. The girl whimpered when the blade pressed a little harder to her bare throat.

Sivya.

"Get your hands off of her, you sick bastard!" Marik screamed, struggling in vain to stand up, to whisk her away from his darker side's sadistic grasp. He tripped and stumbled forward as he attempted to make his way across the face of the Seal. "She is an innocent bystander to your game!"

"Funny, I don't recall you saying that when you controlled the minds of Yugi's little friends, and how you manipulated your brother and forced him to use a fake God card knowing that it would kill him."

"That was the past."

"And this is now and apparently nothing as changed," the yami proclaimed in a sing-song voice. Suddenly he jerked Sivya's head up, the dagger of the Millennium Rod reflecting the ghastly green light of the Orichalcos.

"Now, shall we begin?"

"Sivya!"

He jerked upright, his back screaming in pain as Marik looked frantically about the darkness, his mind reeling and racing. A part of him wondered which was dream and which was fantasy. His fingers clutched the sheets of his bed, an anchor to reality and after a few palpitating heartbeats, he found his bearings. He was back at his room, in the apartment his siblings, Sivya and he shared in the City of Domino. Odion was in the bedroom to his left, Sivya in the bedroom to his right. The red numbers of his alarm clock was like a beacon to banish the dark, but it cast everything in a blood red hue in its wake.

Just like his dream.

He unconsciously whimpered to himself like a small child scared of the dark as he hugged his knees, rocking back and forth, hoping to banish the horrific images seared in his mind.

There was a knock at his door and a small female voice calling out, "Marik?"

Marik wanted to cry out in relief. It was Sivya. She was perfectly alright and nothing had happened to her, something Marik wanted to ensure for now and forever.

"Are you okay? I heard you cry out."

Marik went to the door and opened it up to find the sight of Sivya looking up at him, her face an admixture of worry and concern. "Are you hurt?" Her hand reached up to cup his face.

As she did this, he reached out and pulled her into a tight embrace, his face buried in her long black hair, deeply inhaling her scent. "I'm fine. It was just a bad dream, that's all."

"But you look as if you are about to cry. And your heart, it is beating so bad. I do not think it was merely a bad dream."

Marik sighed. "I can't get anything past you, can I?"

"It was the Orichalcos again, was it not?"

"You know me all too well." He reluctantly let her go and led her to his bed. Both of them sat on the edge in the dark.

"It was more than that," he began. "It was my Tombkeeper's initiation as well. All of the most terrifying instances of my life rolled into one lovely dream," he hissed ruefully as he unconsciously reached up and fingered the scar tissue upon his back. "I'll never be able to escape it, my past, I mean. I can never be truly ahead of it and once I think I am, it comes at me in a rush and reminds me that I can never ever leave it behind."

Sivya was quiet for a moment placing a hand on his shoulder. It was such a personal,almost intimate gesture for her, one that she would not have made in most other situations, but this was Marik, the man who loved her wholly for who she was and would fight a pack of rabid jackals if they meant to harm her. She haltingly began, "I do not think you can ever truly "escape" your past. It is always a part of you, but you can learn from it, and grow from it and maybe someday. It will not hurt as much as if did the day before."

Sivya could see Marik smile wanly in the darkness. "How is it that you are far more wiser than any of the rest of us?" He said at last.

"I do not find myself any wiser than anybody else," Sivya protested meekly.

She was taken aback by the next gesture he did.

He reached up with his hand and gently clasping hers, brought it down to the base of his neck, where the scars began. "I think it's time."

"Time for what?"

He breathed deeply. "You will be the first person to ever lay a hand on these scars on my back. I did not even allow Odion nor Ishizu to touch them and after the initiation ceremony, I vowed that nobody would. As you said it yourself, we should learn from it and grow."

"But I can't-" He cut her off with a wave.

"It's okay, I promise."

"Will I hurt you?"

Marik shook his head. "No, you won't hurt me. I'm sure of that."

"If anything, I'm always afraid of hurting you."

He could sense her hesitation as her fingers rested lightly on the nape of his neck. She then removed them and brushed against the winged sun at his shoulder blades.

"Oh Marik, I am so sorry," she whispered raggedly, her thumb feeling the jagged and ruined flesh. "How could someone do this to you?"

"Tradition," he whispered bitterly.

"Then that tradition is wrong."

"I know, but it doesn't change a thing. You learn to live with it."

She continued to trace, her fingers drawing out the hieroglyphics in the dark. Just as he had told her, she didn't hurt him, but she could sense and feel the tension in his shoulders and back muscles. "You are tense," she told him. "Should I stop?"

He shook his head. "If you want to, you can."

She paused before asking, "What do they mean, these markings?"

"The markings tell of how the Nameless Pharaoh could unlock his memories. You see, Yugi once had an item called "The Millennium Puzzle". Inside was the soul or spirit of a Pharaoh who had died saving his people. As one of the Tombkeepers, we knew how to help him regain his lost memories."

"That seems so sad."

"For whom?"

"For everybody."

"Yeah, I guess. The Pharaoh did regain his memories and could return to the afterlife however and the Tombkeepers no longer have to watch over his tomb. That's sort of good."

"And the monsters?"

"They're the Egyptian god cards. The top one is The Winged Dragon of Ra, the dragon one is Slifer the Sky Dragon and the one that looks like a man is Obelisk the Tormentor. Remember those monsters that Yugi summoned when we were in Atlantis?"

"Yeah. . ."

"Those are the Egyptian gods."

"Oh."

She traced the last few hieroglyphics before pulling her hand away from the small of his back. "You did not deserve this," she told him. "Nobody deserves to be harmed in such a way." Marik was surprised to hear the anger in her tone.

"Nobody ever does." he told her facing her. He reached up and cupped her face. "Can I ask you something?

"What is it?"

"Will you stay with me tonight? I. . .I don't want to have any more nightmares tonight." He sounded so sad and alone and it pained her to hear such a phrase. Nobody should ever have to ask that.

"I would never leave you alone like this."

"And nor would I." He kissed her softly on the lips. "Thank you."

.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-

He woke up a few hours later with a noseful of hair, nearly making him sneeze. He groaned and shifted to his left side and saw the silhouette of Sivya soundly asleep a few inches away. She was snoring softly, her long hair nearly everywhere. He smiled and reached across, drawing lazy patterns on the bare skin of her arm, in the dark. The alarm clock read 5:30 am, which would explain why the room was still so dark. He let his hand shift from her arm to her waist as he pulled himself closer to her. She stirred a little, but fell back asleep right away.

"I do not know how I managed to walk on this earth for so long without you," he muttered to himself before falling back to sleep.

He did not have nightmares for the rest of the night.

I think that Marik was very guarded about his scars for a very long time, probably since he was a child. One of the things I noticed over the course of the series is how he doesn't let anybody touch him. Maybe a handshake or two(although it has been so long I may not be completely correct in this regard) and that would make sense, considering the trauma he's been through, suffering extreme physical and emotional abuse during his childhood. I doubt that he let anybody near his back for the longest time as well and probably the only time he let someone near the scars were Odion and Ishizu to help Marik heal—after all, he probably couldn't clean the fresh wounds by himself. He would need someone to wrap and disinfect the marks multiple times a day. Yes he let the Pharaoh and his friends see the marks, but never did he let him touch them.

So letting Sivya touch them is an expression of him changing, and possibly for the better. He lets his guard down for once because he knows that she would never intentionally hurt him. He trusts her to not judge him and he allows himself to be vulnerable for once.

I mean, would he do such a thing to Tshilaba?

Nope.

. . .And there's my two cents.