kittensinboxes | Hang My Head, Drown My Fear [Lab of Nature AU, Suffering Is Magic]

...

This was not the room Yuugi was used to.

How long had it been since he was taken away from his usual room -- his friends, his adopted father, his everyone -- and put to the cruel mercies of the scientists? Where they poked him, prodded him, shoved strange things under his skin and cut pieces off his flesh in order to...

Harvest "Light".

That's what they'd said. That he was the perfect specimen to harvest from, and they just needed to give him a few 'adjustments' in order to make him perfect...

Arms cut off that grew back hours later, as he felt each bone slowly grow back and sinew reattach.

Toenails removed, which took only a few minutes to regrow, but it didn't hurt any less.

Scars, thick and gnarled, ran up his arms to his shoulders, with some criscrossing up and down his stomach, and his neck...

Well.

His neck still had the mark of a man who ripped it out.

But his eyes were still warm. Still kind. He knew that not all people were horrible, even if the scientists themselves were.

What were they going to do to him this time...?

And who was that...person in the room with him? And why did he...look familiar?

"Um..." Yuugi mumbled, with a voice much softer, much more gentle than the Yuugi Seto knew from his world. "Hello."

Best start simply.

Yuugi would likely find, if he looked a little closely, that this wasn't the same person he'd met before either. Not quite.

The edges weren't nearly so sharp, and although he was tall, Kaiba looked oddly stretched out, like he's in the middle of a growth spurt he hasn't quite caught up with, or perhaps like he'd been sickly prior.

Though...maybe it's just that Kaiba's younger, really. Not much other context to have, is there? Except...

If Yuugi can read lips, he'll be able to see the other teen mouth the words When did you get here? before Kaiba realizes something dire.

Not a single sound was made by him when he said that. Or...didn't say that.

He reaches a hand to his neck, to the ugly scar at his throat, where the ceramic shard had lacerated past his Adam's apple and...ruined what lie behind it.

His voice box.

He can't...speak.

Azure eyes widen in surprise.

Could the man...not speak?

Yuugi didn't move closer; he knew better. He knew that test subjects often got skittish when they first came.

A scar around the throat. What did those monsters do to this man? This man who was familiar, why was he familiar? When did he see this man before?

No, boy. He was a boy.

"I...A while. I don't know how long I've been here."

He bit his lip.

"You...don't have to try to speak if it hurts, but...you can mouth it. I can read lips.

"Was this"

He tapped his throat twice.

"A death?"

Kaiba lets out an annoyed tsk that really represents the only sound he can make, since it's just clicking his tongue. Then slowly, he tries to sit up, which is somewhat of a mistake, as evidenced by his wincing.

No, he's going to keep a straight face. He's not going to let any of this get to him.

(he remembers dying. he remembers laughing until he drowned in his own blood, staring at the ceiling with an unhinged expression)

Not again. He won't.

Slowly, silently, he nods.

Yuugi smiled, but it was a sad one.

A smile of understanding. Sympathy.

Sadness.

He didn't deserve this. Nobody did. The more he suffered, the more light was taken from him, the more sure he was. Nobody deserved this...and this place deserved to burn to the fucking ground.

Dark, festering hate settled in his stomach for the people who hurt them, who dared to harm innocents and put them to this. His suffering was fine, he could deal with that.

Every meticulously removed organ.

Every finger cut off.

Every time he begged for them to stop, only for them to smile and take notes.

Every time he screamed and gurgled in agony.

He could deal with it forever, if it meant that nobody else had to hurt.

But others suffered here, and these bastards reveled in it...

"Me too. I've...I've died a few times."

More than a few.

"I don't know how long we're going to be here, but...I'm Yuugi. Yuugi Mutou. I hope we can get along while we're roommates."

I know who you are.

And by the look on his face, it seems he's offended not to be remembered.

I'm Seto Kaiba.

He mouths his name, and there's something harried and...upset, in his eye as he does. Forgotten...or not known at all? Is this a joke? Is he being toyed with, put in a room with a Yuugi who didn't even know who he was, or what he'd done?

Yuugi blinked.

"Seto...Kaiba?"

He spoke the name, sounded it out, as though it was foreign. The eyes that look at him are confused, but warm as he tilted his head and...

Sighed.

"Oh, you must know... the future me," he said. "I met...a few people who knew me from... my future. Or maybe another me entirely."

Of course. Of course.

Why not?

This is just to harvest more Light, isn't it? They put him with Yuugi, specifically to remind him of how insignificant and unimportant he was, surely that was the intent.

There's an immediate change, as Kaiba slams both fists onto the bed he's in, a low hissing sound emanating from his mouth, with not a hint of a voice. Is...is he crying?

No, he's trying to laugh, and failing, because of course he is, how can he make a vocalization without working vocal cords? How can he proceed any further, without his pen, his paper, anything at all that he'd had in his room?

These walls were naked--he knew what he'd paid for wasn't here.

Taken. All of it, taken.

He wants to laugh, and laugh and laugh, until his throat splits back open and gushes blood. But he knows that's not what'll happen.

The Light would be cheapened if it was that easy, wouldn't it?

You don't remember me?

Then let me help you remember.

He's smiling, such a cruel, off-kilter expression, as he tries to get to his feet, ignoring the pain, ignoring the way his surroundings tilt and blur before him. He's going to get to the desk, open the laptop if he can...and properly explain where it can be read on a screen, rather than his lips.

Yuugi's hackles rose immediately, and he did something the Yuugi Mutou Kaiba knew would never do:

He backed up.

Took a defensive stance by the wall.

Even as he laughed, even as he gazed at him cruelly, his gaze was so even, with only a sliver of that Mutou awkwardness.

His eyes, though.

They did not harden.

"Whatever you did..." he huffed out a hollow, humorless laugh. "I can promise I've dealt with worse."

Because that was why he looked at him like that, right?

But why did he look so familiar? Like someone...

Someone...!

Kaiba didn't like this.

This wasn't the Yuugi he knew, the one who almost took everything, in the service of teaching him some kind of lesson, a lesson that hadn't stuck because Kaiba wasn't so sure if he felt sorry for it anymore.

(he did)

What reason did he have to feel sorry for someone who took him upon one knee and shattered him, metaphorically?

(he struck first, he deserved it, he was the monster)

Better he was the monster, wasn't it?

Right? Better Seto Kaiba be the monster, than to allow anyone else to take advantage of him again.

He opens the laptop, opens a page and beckons Yuugi. His lips move again, words of assuagement, despite his expression being anything but calm.

I won't hurt you.

And then, if Yuugi does get closer, to see what Kaiba starts to type...

But I did. I stole from your grandfather. And when you put me in my place, I tried to kill you and your friends. Not that it worked. There's something in you, Yuugi Mutou. Something that I couldn't beat down.

Something that took me down instead.

And I won't bend to you, not again. Not ever. Even if you don't remember what transpired between us.

"Something in me..."

For a moment, Yuugi's face flashed with frustration.

Another, another mention of a life that wasn't his! A version of himself that didn't exist, or existed in another world. How much of his life was he just going to learn second-hand before it actually happened?

This man stole from his grandfather, and he 'put him in his place' somehow. With...something that took him down.

If he hadn't met his other self in person, he would have laughed -- though perhaps that was just a hallucination, with how few times they met -- but instead his brows furrowed.

"You mean...'Yuu'. I met him here, once. He told me that he was me. Another me, that I met after solving the puzzle. But I'm not anyone else. I'm me."

He shook his head.

"I don't want to make you bend. I don't want to make you break. Whatever you did, whatever you stole -- there are worse things you can do, and I've seen it here. The only thing I care about is..."

He stopped.

Bit his lip.

Then mouthed:

The only thing I care about is making sure this place can't hurt anyone anymore. I want to find a way to get us out.

Kaiba wants to tell him he's wrong. That what he'd done was worse than anything that happened here, and that Yuugi was a fool to trust him. He wanted to tell Yuugi all about Death-T, to paint himself as the villain that he knows he is, deep down, and rail at him for what this other self did to him.

He wanted to scream until his throat bled, to try and make the words have sound, when they won't.

He tries. He tries to type it out.

tHere is no way out,

THEre is no one I can trust

i Cant trust you i cant trust anyone here,

Suddenly, Kaiba's head whips around, as if he expects something to attack him. Like he expects someone at the door, calling his screen name and preparing to strike.

(Catch, Loser!)

It rings out in his ears, and he flings himself away from the desk with the laptop, away from Yuugi, his eyes wide and manic as he dodges--

--nothing.

Nothing at all.

He's in profile to his roommate, now, it'll be harder to read lips this way, but for the force in which he tries to push words out:

Stay away from me! Don't touch me!

Gods...

What did this place do to this guy? He already seemed...messed up before he came here, and all this place did was make him worse.

He tried to kill him and his friends?

That was nothing compared to what he'd been through. What he'd seen others go through...

He stood, taking a step closer.

We can. He mouthed. I'm not giving up. They're trying to break us. They want us to believe there is no hope. They haven't broken me yet. And they don't have to break you.

Another step.

I want to help you. You don't have to trust me, but at least trust that I don't want to hurt you. I want to get us both out.

Another.

Could Seto read his lips? Could they still communicate? They had to be careful, or else their captors would be able to see what he was trying to do...

YOU SHATTERED ME!

You want me to believe you'll help me? No one would do that for an enemy! Just because you don't know we're enemies yet, doesn't mean we aren't!

Kaiba has never been the sort to cower. There's no reason for him to cower from Yuugi like this, without his imposing persona. This Yuugi wasn't the one who had fractured his mind and left him to try and gather the pieces and try to figure out who and what Seto Kaiba really was. But here, he cowers back, towards the bed he'd woken up in, because those pieces were still disjointed, uncertain. Weak, like his heart in this moment.

Who...was he? He thought he knew. He was a winner. A survivor. A brother, perhaps?

That one strikes hard, finds its way into his incomplete heart and drives in like a poison. No, he's not a brother. Not a good one, anyway. A good brother would have defeated Pegasus. A winner? Hardly.

He's a loser. He's The Loser.

(he's jerked forward, towards a conniving face that watched as he was cleaved apart, choking on his own blood, he couldn't breathe couldn't breathe couldn't)

Kaiba looks...lost. His eyes are unfocused, his throat working as if he can't draw a breath in, like he's forgotten how.

No.

That frustration again. For all the times they kept insisting that 'he' did something, his stomach churned, his chest felt hot. It was always 'he was this' or 'he was that'.

Yuugi shattered him.

Yuugi was his enemy.

Yuugi was someone else's enemy.

Yuugi was the spitting image of a King.

Yuugi was, Yuugi was, Yuugi was--

"I didn't do that to you. Whoever did that to you, that was not me.

"We're not enemies.

"We barely know each other.

"We're two people who are stuck here, and you happen to know a version of me that may exist somewhere."

He wanted to run to him. He wanted to comfort him, to chase away that unfocused fear in his eyes, he...

Sorry, Kaiba.

Yuugi gently touched his shoulder, so, so close to him.

He was so small, smaller than what Kaiba would have remembered. His baby fat was thicker, rounder, even the scars on his arms and neck crisscrossed around and tried to harden him.

"Kaiba." He whispered, "Kaiba...Kaiba, you need to breathe. You can't hold your breath like that or you'll pass out."

Kaiba's eyes flitted from side to side, seeing nothing at all, hearing nothing, feeling nothing for the longest time. His face is darkening, for lack of breathing. This is where he dies, isn't it? He can't stop it, he's tried it all, but the truer he is to himself, the more he bleeds. The more the others threaten, the harder he falls--

--Yuugi's hand on his shoulder is what pulls him out of it, making his eyes regain the slightest focus, and his seizing throat finally draws in an aching, desperate breath as he realizes he has fully working lungs. Not the ruined, split things that only choked him on his own lifeblood.

He could breathe, even if it hurts, even if his eyes had gone red already as if someone was strangling him.

"Hhhhh...!!"

It's such a thready, thin sound. Voiceless. Powerless.

But the way he reaches an arm out, shoving Yuugi away? That's not so powerless. He's still reedy and weak, unable to have recovered by being in this hellhole...but he still has some strength, despite it.

Don't. T...ouch me.

Yuugi stumbled back with a high-pitched squeak -- no matter what, that voice never seemed to grow deeper -- but managed to stay on his feet.

Kaiba didn't like to be touched.

...Good to know.

"You..." He didn't step forward, instead shuffling a single foot against the floor with a soft scrape. "You weren't breathing. I had to get you to breathe."

He tapped his foot against the floor.

Again.

Again.

And again.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to overstep anything, but I'm not going to just stand by while someone is in trouble."

He couldn't. He wouldn't.

Because that was the right thing to do.

Right, Ryou?

Right, Dad?

Right, blue-eyed stranger...?

Kaiba wants to scoff, but doesn't. He instead lets his head droop forward, focusing on evening out his breathing and trying to determine whether he was experiencing some kind of mental trauma.

He remembers how it felt, to be sliced in half by the elevator, and to be stabbed in the throat with the ceramic shard. Neither situation was pleasant, but he knew they were over with now.

So then why...did it feel so real in his mind just then? Almost as if he were reliving that moment. Like the nightmares of dying at the hands of Duel Monsters, over and over.

He shakes his head violently. Now, the nightmares struck while he was awake, huh? A fitting punishment for his insolence, he's sure their captors believe that.

Finally, his lips move with purpose.

Don't waste your time. It won't stop them. Even if I didn't breathe again, I'd be put back once they fixed me.

I have died so many times. It does not matter to me anymore.

But it does hurt. Every single time.

It didn't matter.

It didn't matter.

It

Didn't

Matter.

Breathe, Mutou. Breathe. Let the anger leave your body so you don't lose yourself. He doesn't know. Nobody in the experiment floors know.

Yuugi lowered his head, wheezed ragged breaths as he tried to keep himself upright.

Now Now, don't cry. Your Light is going to help others.

He had his trachea ripped out last time, before he was thrown in here.

A regenerator like him could heal wounds so quickly, after all. So long as his heart or brain were undamaged, he could keep living and living and living--

Who was his trachea given to?

"Kaiba."

His voice quivered... before knocking on the wall to get his attention.

Do you know... how they keep you coming back...? I can tell you.

Kaiba looks up when Yuugi says his name, even though he doesn't care to. He's tired, his mind is buzzing, and he's not in the mood for anymore conversation. But, just as he'd tried doing with Sunny, he exercises a modicum of patience and flicks his gaze to Yuugi.

To what he was mouthing.

...?

What are you talking about?

Yuugi smiled, but it wasn't a happy one.

There are other experiments here, away from the cells. The scientists use them to 'harvest light' in a different way than how they do it with you and the others.

And when they harvest light...they make sure to get the most out of it.

He didn't want to say it; it was insane to say it out loud, even though he lived it. This couldn't have been his reality, right? He wasn't strapped to a gurney, stared down at by a halo of doctors as they--

Yuugi's throat twinged, and for a moment, he winced and touched it with his right hand.

Are you making fun of me?

Kaiba mouths it without thinking, when he sees Yuugi touch his throat. He's ever the same, self-centered, and being keyed up over the situation isn't helping. But again...experience with Sunny tells him that's a fucked up thing to ask, all things considered.

Yuugi just told him that there were other experiments.

He...was telling Kaiba because there was a point, right?

Never mind...what's important is that you are talking about another way of getting Light. A way you know.

Is that why I have not seen you until today?

A bit interrogative, but what the hell else are they going to not-talk about?

I'm not.

Yuugi shook his head.

And.... yeah. I used to be like you, but, I...

A deep, shuddering breath.

They told me I was better suited somewhere else. With the others.

How could he describe it without this guy thinking he was faking? He glanced around, searching...searching for something sharp--

Oh. There was a little sharp edge on the bedpost.

We...

He walked to the bed, motioning for Kaiba to pay attention.

They did something to us.

... before he sliced his own hand, deep.

Yuugi didn't even flinch.

As the blood poured down his palm, the wound was already starting to knit together.

With what others?

He asks it, but Yuugi's already moving towards one of the beds, and before he could get an answer to the first question, there's more being laid out for him to think about.

Not the least of which is...Yuugi laying his own skin wide open with the edge of the bedpost, which makes Kaiba flinch. He's not even sure if it's sympathy so much as disgust, seeing his rival split his own skin open without so much as a sound of pain.

And then...his eyes widen, as he looks at the flesh stitch itself together like an invisible zipper being tugged shut.

What...happened to you?

"It's complicated."

Yuugi shook his head, sighing at the wound. It was like he was getting a papercut, rather than a deep wound.

He mouthed:

I wasn't breaking under the usual experiments. I kept surviving. I made friends. They wanted to see if I could break. So they put me with the others, who...

He swallowed.

We were kept in pens, like animals. We had to go to the bathroom in the corner and eat whatever they gave us.

Hunger strikes didn't work.

He tried, and now he knows how geese feel when they make foie gras.

They called us 'Harvesters'. Harvesters of Light, and...

A swallow.

...flesh. For the other experiments, in case they... you know.

Died.

Edited 2025-03-13 02:45 (UTC)

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