Yu-Gi-Oh! Fan Fiction ❯ If only for one moment, I could be like you... ❯ Midnight Moon ( Chapter 23 )

Ryou let Marik lift him out of the tank, it'd been many days now, and he missed his friends, and tonight was mating night. He was particularly gloomy. His hormones didn't ache for tender touches, his heart wasn't drawn to mate...he was forcing himself to accept the fact he'd never go home again...or see his friends or family. Marik had noticed, and despite how Ryou felt tattered and torn and broken inside, his fins still fanned out to show his brilliance. "Ryou my pet." He said tugging Ryou's chin up to force the small teen to look at him.

Ryou looked at him. "Yes?" Marik thought for a moment. "I've noticed a steady decline in your disposition. I've also taken note of how your fins have been fanning out and showing off your colors, though only half-heartedly. Tell me...it's mating season for you...isn't it?" Ryou looked at him dully. "Yes...it is. Today is the day when merfolk pick life-mates...if they fail to attract one before midnight when the moon begins to fall from the highest point in the sky, then they are to live alone...for the rest of their days."

Marik put Ryou down on the table and carefully examined his pet's scales, checking on their health. "I see. Is the water temperature good today?" Ryou looked at the tank dully. "It's a little cold..." he mumbled as Marik went about his daily examination. "Then I'll raise it a couple of degrees. Are the saline levels correct?" Ryou nodded softly. "Yes, the water is perfect..." he mumbled sadly. "Good little pet." Marik said gently pressing a thermometer into Ryou's more intimate places, causing him to gasp and shiver sharply. "I still suspect you're sick..." he said waiting for the thermometer to take the temperature. Ryou squirmed softly, looking away in half embarrassment. "I'm not sick...I'm fine." He said, a soft blush across his cheeks.

The first time Marik had taken his temperature, had been horridly mortifying. Marik pulled the thermometer from the orifice and jotted down the perfectly normal temperature. "Hnn. Perhaps you're not sick, but you ARE depressed. I warned you that Seto would react that way." Ryou whimpered softly at the mentioning of his lost lover's name. "Please Marik...I don't want to talk about that..." he said, hugging himself.

"What are you going to do little Ryou?" Marik said placing a patch on Ryou's chest, which made the soft line on the monitor next to him, display his heartbeats. "About what Marik?" Marik jotted down the beats per minute, and pulled the patch away, before taking Ryou's blood pressure. "About mating season? There are no Merfolk here, and you've made me promise not to hunt any down. Are you willingly going into a life of loneliness, my little pet?" Ryou sighed and closed his eyes. "It's all I have left. I've been cast out of my life-mate's life. I could never pass myself off as unmated to my family or friends...and no one would want a mate who couldn't manage to last with their first mate, I'm marked forever, as undesirable."

Marik laughed and wrote down Ryou's blood pressure. "That Jonouchi boy's been looking for you." He said pricking Ryou sharply with a needle, and checking Ryou's blood sugar and vitamin levels. Ryou winced and put his finger in his mouth. "Jono..." he looked at the windows mournfully. "Yeah, him. Seto and he have been fighting for a long time now, on where you are. Seto refuses to even acknowledge you were even in his life, and Jonouchi flat refuses to leave him alone until he finds out what happened. Funny how neither of them are actually looking for you though. It's because you're not human."

Ryou closed his eyes. "They don't care. You're nothing but an animal to them. You should have known you couldn't mingle with us. You know nothing of humanity. You have no humanity in you to even build off of. You are nothing more than a pet." Marik said as he worked, as he did every morning. "I know..." Ryou murmured, letting Marik stop for a moment, to stroke his hair. "And who's little pet are you?" Ryou smiled softly. "Yours." He said looking at Marik halfheartedly. "That's right." Marik chuckled and kneeled down to pet Ryou's hair more. He hadn't needed to break Ryou's spirit at all...Seto had done all the work for him.

It was now, all a matter of repetition. Ryou didn't have the heart or will to fight Marik anymore, he had given up. "No one in the ocean loves you, for what you've done...no one on land loves you for what you are..." Marik said, looking into Ryou's eyes. "The only one who cares about you now, is me." He said, watching as Ryou nodded, two shining opaline tears falling from his cheeks, before clinking to the laboratory table. "What beautiful tears Ryou..." he said picking up the perfect rosy pearls and smiling. "Your beautiful tears make me very happy."

Ryou let a few more soft tears spill from his eyes, each clinking to the table, as perfect pearls, varying from opaline, to rose, to cream colored. "What a good pet." Marik said pocketing the jewels and picking up Ryou. "You've been such a good little pet." He said putting Ryou down and patting him dry." Ryou blinked and looked at Marik curiously. "If I become dry, my legs will appear." He said tilting his head to the side. "I know. I have to take care of some business outside little one, and I need you to take care of my home, while I am gone." Ryou blinked and nodded a little. "Since you've given yourself to me as my little pet, I expect to see you when I return, or I'll be out to your people's home and trapping them before dawn tomorrow.

Ryou shuddered and shook his head. "I wont leave Marik. A promise is a promise." He said softly, pulling his newly formed legs to his chest. "I have some clothes for you." Marik said pulling a soft violet ribbon from his pocket, and tying Ryou's hair out of his eyes, and pulling a green shirt over his head. "You'll be dressed like I am, incase a guest arrives, if that happens I expect you to take good care of them until I arrive." Marik said pulling Ryou into a pair of Black pants, and putting a smaller lab coat onto him and buttoning it closed. "Perfect." He said putting a pair of shoes on Ryou. "Now come on."

~~~~~

Ryou watched Marik leave, and looked around the house, before catching sight of a mirror, he stared into the eyes of the broken soul before him. His hair had grown out a bit; since he'd first come to the land, and his eyes had light circles around them...he also noticed how pathetic he looked. "It doesn't matter how I look...I can never go home...no one loves me." He pulled his gaze from himself, half in disgust and half in shame. "What have I become...? I'm not human...I'm not merman..." He sat down on one of the couches and longed for the sea. "Oh Yugi...Ootogi...I'm so sorry...Please mate with someone who loves you...please don't wait for me."

Ryou sniffled softly, shaking his head. He'd cried so many tears now, since Seto had torn his heart away...the precious rare mermaids tears. Every so often Marik would leave him, to sell the perfect tears to jewelers. "All I am now...is a pet...and a way for Marik to make money..." Ryou had learned a lot in the days he'd spent with Marik. He'd learned how horrible humans could be. Greed, violence, murder, theft, lying, cheating, gangs, kidnapping and rape. He'd learned it all...most from the `television' and `tapes' Marik had let him out of the tank to watch with him. Movies where people would kill others, just because they felt the urge to do so...or because someone asked them to kill.

Ryou shivered and looked away from the television. Marik brought him out of his tank once a day, usually at night to watch movies. Often times, Ryou would try to bury himself behind Marik, to avoid seeing the gore, or the sadness he now harbored for humans. They were not the glorious things he'd seen in the artifacts from the ocean...they were as Yami had warned. Horrible corrupt creatures, but not all of them were as such.

"Oh great god of the seas, who guards and protects the waves, and the souls beneath them...I have done wrong." Ryou said closing his eyes. "I beg, that by giving my freedom to the hands of my captor, that I have made right the wrongs I have committed against the sons and daughters of your seas. Please...forgive me, even though I do not deserve even the softest touch of forgiveness or love. Please take care of my dear friends and family...help Yugi and Ootogi find good loving mates, and forget about me." Ryou looked to the windows. "I pray, that you, great mighty god of my home...with your never ending love and boundless forgiveness, could find my atrocious act of leaving the sea forgivable, despite being discovered and seen for what I truly am."

Ryou bowed his head and shook his head. "I hope, that Neptune is still listening to the prayers of a wretched horrid little merboy such as me..." he whispered hugging himself.

~~~~~

Hours passed as Ryou waited for Marik. The sun was setting in the sky, and Ryou could feel his body wailing in agonized defeat. He'd not attracted a mate, and the moon would be in the sky soon. He sighed sadly and shook his head. Memories of his past played through his mind, taunting his inability to return to sea.

"Ryou come on! Lets go chase the sardines!" Yugi chirped grabbing his friend's arm. "I bet I could catch us some to eat afterward and then we could go explore that cave you like to look at!" Ryou giggled and practically danced in the water at the idea. "Oh that sounds great! I don't know if I can catch sardines...I'm kind of slow but I still want to try!" Ootogi laughed and shoved Ryou forward. "That's the only way to find out! C'mon, Yugi and I will catch some for you if you cant, or we'll chase them to you to catch."

Ryou smiled softly. "I remember...how it used to be..." He said biting his lip a bit to keep from crying. "I wish I could go back. I wish I had never liked the land at all..."

"I'm making my famous waffles! Duh." Ryou blinked. "Um...what's a waffle?" Jono laughed. "Sorry, I keep forgetting you haven't a clue what anything manmade is." Jono said, breaking off a piece of an already made waffle and shoving it into Ryou's mouth. "Here." Ryou blinked as he chewed, a grin spreading across his features. "Mmmm"

"No...I don't really wish that. Jono was so kind to me...and his friends all treated me like I mattered..." Ryou said a sad smile gracing his face.

Seto pulled Ryou close and gently ran a hand through his silken locks. "Tell me where. Anywhere on Earth you could have lived, I'll buy land there and begin construction of a home for us immediately." Ryou looked at Seto shocked at his words. "But..."

"No `but's Ryou, anything you could possibly want, I'd strive to get for you. If getting your vow of love back meant buying the moon, I'd be out in an instant looking for a way to do such a thing." Seto said in a serious tone.

"Seto...you don't understand...you could never live where I lived..." Ryou muttered shaking his head. "And why not?" Ryou sighed. "Because..."

Ryou sighed and hugged a couch pillow. This was how fate had intended him to be. "If I had never come to the land, I would never have met someone I could love so dearly...and if I had never come, I never would have learned." He said softly.

~~~~~

"Ryou! I'm home!" Marik said loudly from the door, causing the pale haired teen to jump. "Marik." He said standing up immediately. "You came home...it's so late. I thought you might not be coming back at all."

Marik smiled and put down the bag of groceries, and opened a neatly folded package. "Look what I've bought for you today. It's a special gift, so you wont be so down about being mateless." He said revealing a treat that in the ocean, only Royalty got to eat. Sitting within the wrappings was a finely cut squid, lobster claws, pieces of the puffer fish, and an especially delicious looking cut of Flounder. Ryou squeaked and looked at Marik curiously. "Why...would you go out and get that for me?" Marik smiled and folded the paper back around their dinner treat. "Pick up the bag and follow me please." He said taking the package of fish to the kitchen, followed by Ryou.

"I got them, because I felt like treating you to something special." Marik said softly, pulling a few pots and pans from the cabinets and heating them. "Tonight is a special night for you, and since I am not a merman, I have to think of another way to satisfy your desires for the sea." Ryou blushed lightly, at the unexpected show of affection. "Marik I..." he stammered carefully taking the items from the brown shopping bag. "Hush now pet. I know you didn't expect me to act kindly to you. Did you expect me not to love you just because of what you are? Seto was a fool." He said flatly, looking over at Ryou with an unreadable expression. "I on the other hand, will love you regardless of whether you return those feelings. You are the realization of my dreams, and you've all but promised to spend a lifetime with me."

Ryou blinked confusedly. He was all but blown away now. Where in the great oceans had THIS come from?! Marik chuckled a bit. "Oh quit acting so surprised. Come here, and I'll teach you more of humans. Today, you'll learn to cook."

AN: WHOOOOOOEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE lmao, where did THAT come from? Oooh seems interesting. Does marik REALLY `love' Ryou or is he just tricking the small merboy again? What about midnight? What will happen if Ryou doesn't make it back in time?

Oh I bet you all are thinking that. ::snorkel:: oh, and snorkeling is actually snickering with a snort. I've made it myself. Lmao.

I'd like to thank the two people who were on the ball, and reviewed before the rest of you. Congrats for bein on the ball Enjeru and Orangeaura868!

Ryou thanks you, and in consolation of reviewing so nicely get cookies (not incorporated with me, nor named by me.)

1 box of icky stinky doodies

1 box of poopy gooey doodles

and 1 box of dookie gloopy ookies

weeeeell that was fun and look, the chapter was significantly longer than the others. See what happens when I get fast reviews? I update the next day, and with MORE than usual. That means you should ALL review and make ME happy ::insert dinghy smile::