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

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

Kaiba remembers pain. He remembers...drowning.

And he remembers smiling as he maliciously made it all worse and watched the life spill from his throat, spewing out with arterial force before him and creating a mess of wasted life all around him.

Then, he remembers--more pain? How could there be more pain after death? He knows he's screaming, but nothing comes out. He struggles against his bonds, but he's too weak, too weak, and even opening his eyes shows little besides the searing white lights of an operating room, the flash of a face that resembles an ape...and then, nothing. He feels something cover his mouth, inhales reflexively...then passes out. It's a release, freeing him from the delirium of the restoration and the pain of the experimentation that occurs in between.

He won't remember it. Perhaps that's a mercy.

---

When Kaiba finally does wake, it's in a new room, with aching limbs, a soured stomach, and a throat that feels poorly patched up.

He's too weak to sit up, but his tired eyes scan his surroundings, seeking out any familiarity at all. He has to do it slowly, so that the tracking of his own eyes doesn't nauseate him more than he already is.

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Kaiba's only response is a weak exhale as he closes his eyes.

You're touching me.

It seems obvious enough, but to someone who is currently prone to hallucinating due to his poor life choices, of course he'd say that. He's...confirming that those are Yuugi's hands.

Yuugi brushed Kaiba's hair away from his eyes, nice and slow.

Easy.

Slow and easy...

"Yeah," he murmured. "I am. It's just me."

You didn't hear it.

Another statement of truth. Kaiba's face is mostly impassive about it, though when Yuugi brushes his bangs slightly away, he'll note that the hawkish eyes are somewhat less sharp when you can see Kaiba's eyebrows.

Anyone would assume they'd constantly be drawn in a scowl. It seemed as much just a few seconds before.

But that wasn't the case now. His expression is one of pain, and his brows were knit together as such.

He was in so much pain...

What could he even do...? Yuugi's fingers tangled with the other's hair, trying to soothe, bring comfort, anything! Anything to ease that expression of pain from his face.

I'm sorry, He thought, If only I'd just eaten the stupid thing before his dumb pride got in the way...

"Can I do anything...? To ease the pain...?"

No. I chose it. I have to suffer.

And then, through the pain, Kaiba smirks coldly.

They want their Light.

After saying it, he winces and squirms in the bed...but it's out of stomach pain, and not another seizure. Without really thinking about it, he turns his head into Yuugi's touch. His mind is swirling, there's still whispers at his ear that he's trying to ignore and...even though he said no, Yuugi's touch is comforting.

It's grounding. Real. He wants it.

Still wouldn't eat parts of you, he adds stubbornly.

Yuugi smiled, but it was a wan little thing. Amused, but perhaps in a bit of a sick way.

He speaks softly:

"Well, I guess that means I don't have to worry about getting eaten again, then. Hehe, having someone's teeth sunk into you kinda sucks."

Gods, "light". To hell with the scientists' Light! They could rot in darkness for all he cared, if it meant that none of the people here would have to suffer anymore.

Value yourself more.

They won't.

Kaiba's lips move slowly on the last of those words. The hallucinations were one thing, but the seizure had drained him immensely. Pain or no pain...he was starting to drift.

But if he did...there was at least one thing he wanted. Weakly, he reaches for one of Yuugi's arms, fingers closing tightly on his wrist. Not enough to hurt. Just enough to convey intent.

Stay. Don't leave. He needs to know Yuugi's there.

"Okay." Yuugi murmured. "I can do that."

He could, but would he? That was the interesting question: he wasn't used to having to think of himself beyond the basics. He was used to being the shield, the barrier to protect those he loved.

To value himself...

Something in his stomach felt warm, distant and hazy.

With his other hand, he took Kaiba's other hand and squeezed it, just gentle enough to be an attempt at comforting.

Warmth.

How...was Yuugi so warm? It felt good, because he felt so cold. Even if that was his body lying to him, and the fever had him burning up, he didn't care. More...he wanted more of it.

Kaiba's eyes roll shut slowly, his breathing somewhat labored as he lays there, reveling in the warmth of Yuugi Mutou as sweat beads along his forehead.

G...good. You can't...lose. You're my rival, and my rival has to be...

Kaiba winces again.

...has to be strong. Undefeated. For me.

Rival.

Nobody'd called Yuugi their Rival before. Of course he'd won games plenty of times and even earned the ire of some regulars in the game halls he'd been to, but...

...Rival?

Something in his chest shifted.

Something...something. Something he couldn't name, but was tangible just the same.

"I will."

When was the last time he'd spoken with such determination? When he met that...other person that looked a lot like Kaiba, right? During the gun experiment?

"I'll make you proud to call me your rival."

Gentle fingers carded through sweaty hair, soothing against dampening skin. Gods, the man looked so sick...

If only he could do more...

Kaiba doesn't try making words anymore. He breathes harshly, willing his body to relax as he lays there, shivering. Soon...soon it'll have to pass. The poison just had to work its way through his system, that's all. He had to pass it.

Lightheadedness finally overwhelms him, and the fever sweeps his consciousness away. He won't be the most still as he sleeps though; he tosses and turns, and he'd probably groan audibly if his vocal cords worked, but they don't. So it's hisses and heavy breathing.

Yuugi's suggestion that he sweat off the fever turns out to be what happens. For a few hours, he's squirmy and shivering...until the fever finally breaks and he can relax.

Somewhat.

He's still hearing things in his sleep. Feeling things on his skin...but in the rare instance he comes around briefly, as long as it's Yuugi's hands on him, he's able to slip back into oblivion with minimal anxiety.

It's hours later still, when he wakes up for good, his hair absolutely out of sorts, his body aching, and his insides feeling distinctly uncomfortable even now.

"Wh..."

...ere?

Oh. Ohh, that's almost a word, in almost a voice, but it's more wheeze than volume.

Yuugi's lap was numb.

Gods, he'd never thought he'd have a man in his lap for this long, petting his hair and shushing him as he woke up, feverish and shivering (before he went back to sleep). He'd never thought he'd have the man wake up with Yuugi's hands using...something to brush the sweat off his brow.

That something being Yuugi's own shirt.

Why yes, he was shirtless right now.

"You're in the cell; nobody moved you," Yuugi said, "I think your fever's finally broken."

Though Kaiba sweated so much that Yuugi's shirt was soaked through with it, and it was tossed aside in the corner of the room--

--When did two fresh sets of clothes get brought in through the bars? There wasn't anything else, but at the very least there were clothes. Did someone come in, or did they use some kind of machine or chute?

Kaiba lets out a shuddering breath, then tries to sit up, slowly. He doesn't want to be on Yuugi's lap anymore, although he still feels out of sorts. Not being feverish does help with that, but he's still not very strong. It takes him longer than he'd like, but he does manage to roll of of Yuugi and prop himself up onto one elbow.

More to the point...

Why aren't you wearing a shirt?

Somehow, his facial expression makes that seem accusatory.

"You were sweaty." Yuugi said, deadpan, as though that explained everything.

It didn't, obviously.

What was he supposed to do? Let Kaiba drown in his own pouring sweat and spit as he laid delirious in his lap with fever? No way! Making sure he was at least dry was probably the bare minimum, but...!

"Tch."

Quintessential Kaiba Reaction.

At the very least, that encourages Kaiba to try and scoot further away from Yuugi. Not that he didn't assume he should be thanking Yuugi for taking care of him while he was ill, but...

Well, he's Seto Kaiba. He's not going to say thank you, especially not to his shirtless rival.

I'm sure I'll have the opportunity to repay the favor.

See? That's not really thank you.

"You already have." Yuugi smiled shyly as he scratched his head. "You saved me during that game earlier, remember? That's..."

He paused.

"That's a lot, you know. Means a lot."

Given their circumstances, though, he knew that he was going to repay the favor eventually to his satisfaction; it was just the nature of their proximity, of the experiments, of...

Of everything.

I couldn't watch you hang.

That much is true. He couldn't have borne the loss without an incalculable shame that would have made it impossible to face Yuugi. Though...the words may as well have been taken out of his own skin, for how they ached.

He reaches a hand up to his throat, to where the skin was still marred from where he'd been punished for his transgressions by Helios during that game. It doesn't ache so much as his abdomen anymore, distended with the poison that had settled inside but not been digested. Still, he'd rather draw attention to those bruises than the fact that he was still having trouble with the damnable cake.

Quiet whispers tickled at Kaiba's ears, but he did not heed them. The words were unintelligible anyway. The sounds were merely auditory hallucinations of a sort that he could ignore

(mostly)

as he glances around, catches sight of the clothing that had been left for them.

There. A shirt. Go on then, why don't you change? I will not look.

He isn't in the mood to speculate, actually, how the clothing got there. The fever is broken, but that's only step one, isn't it?

Yuugi chuckled, but it was not a mean-spirited one. If anything, it was...amused. Charmed?

Amused.

"Kaiba, we're both guys! There's no reason to be weird about me not having a shirt! I don't care if you look!"

It wasn't like Kaiba was this muscular god of a man who was miles above Yuugi; they were both scrawny young men in that awkward phase of their lives, not quite comfortable with their bodies yet (Though too bad for Yuugi, he didn't have much left to grow into)...

Still, he hopped off the bed, grabbing a shirt and pulling it over his head.

Do you think that matters? This isn't a high school locker room!

Someone's sure got his panties in a twist. Yuugi knows nothing about him, and that's incredibly frustrating, if he's honest. There isn't a single chance in hell that Kaiba will ever feel comfortable changing in front of Yuugi, and the thought of their relationship being so loose as to allow Yuugi to be so familiar with him? That's annoying too! This is the guy who had...apparently another guy inside his head that subjected Kaiba to repeated death, for a full 24 hour period, which gave him recurring, violent night terrors.

Of course, he's pretty sure he can't expect Yuugi to understand, or give a proper damn about that. Also annoying.

As it turns out though...Kaiba really wants to change out of his own clothes because as Yuugi had already pointed out, he'd been sweating quite a lot while he was unconscious.

What he would prefer is a shower, then a change. But this is a cell, not a room. They'll have to be let out for that kind of thing, right?

As he thinks that, a wave of nausea overcomes him and he squeezes his eyes shut. Damn it...even now? Isn't it enough that he's still hearing things?! It's been hours! What possible Light could they have left to extract from this situation...?

The poison hasn't left my body yet.

Better be transparent about it. It'll make the next part easier.

"You're right, it's not. It's a prison cell." Yuugi said, "So we're gonna be doing a lot together, you know?"

Where he was, there were a lot of bodily fluids. There was no toilet and everyone was expected to just go wherever they felt like. It was disgusting and hard to deal with, but once you got used to it...it became second nature.

Nobody was looking.

Nobody cared.

Nobody thought about the fact that you pissed in the corner and shat in the other one. The orderlies cleaned it when they were moved into another cell to start the process all over again. It was to keep them from finding a way out, but Yuugi...

Yuugi'd managed to get one of them out.

That was why when Kaiba said the last part, all he got was an understanding nod.

Would he react to it from the front or the back? Only time would tell, really.

Kaiba had not been subjected to such indignities in his whole time here. He has no point of reference for Yuugi's tolerance of such inhuman conditions.

What he does know is that even if there was a toilet in here, and he's too sick to confirm that, he wouldn't have had time to consider it. The poison still lingering in his body feels like a leaden weight in his stomach that hasn't moved at all. It's as if his insides have no idea what to do with it, freezing up entirely.

He's thirsty. Unbearably so. Dizzy, and still hearing things.

This...he wasn't entirely certain, but his education was...well-rounded. He's sure that he's read about poison like this, even if it wasn't one-to-one. If his guess is correct, this is an anticholinergic.

If his guess is right, the symptoms won't stop unless he expels the poison, and his digestive tract will not cooperate in the normal methods. That's fine. It's making him feel sick enough to get rid of it another way.

Shuddering, he peels his shirt off, whether he wants to or not. If the scientists want to fuck with him, he'll do it right back. He sets his wrinkled shirt before him, creating a buffer between the floor and what was to happen next.

Don't look at me, he manages to mouth, before curling over the bundled-up shirt and letting the illness win. It looks pathetic. He knows it does, but it has a purpose, to vomit up the barely digested cupcake back onto his shirt.

He's doing it for a reason.

It doesn't matter that it burns like fire once he can't stop himself, and there's nothing else coming up.

It doesn't matter that Yuugi can see his skin stretched more tautly over his bones, as if he hasn't had a proper meal in a year. It's not for lack of trying, but...his health was poor before he came here, made worse by his time in the facility, where the food was a step above animal grade, certainly not enough for a recovering coma patient.

It didn't matter.

It shouldn't matter.

But Kaiba doesn't straighten back up, even when the nausea subsides, and he's expelled as much of the poison as his body could manage. So clearly, there's some shame there.

What kind of rival is he, reduced to this state?

What kind of rival was he?

A human.

A man who was suffering under the inhuman treatment of monsters who were willing to mess around with them for the sake of their own selfish gain.

At the mouthing of those words, Yuugi turned his head, but he couldn't help but hear Kaiba's retching and the splash of emesis against the floor. From the sound of it, it was thin; he hadn't really had much to eat or much in his stomach at all, really. One thing about the pens he came from was they were borderline overfed; they needed to be in order for their bodies to handle the experiments they were put under and their overactive metabolism. They were useless if they didn't have energy, especially if they passed out in the middle of an operation.

You couldn't get any light if the patient was unconscious.

He was on the floors, though, and he knew they didn't eat much in comparison. Not that anything anyone ate was particularly edible. Slop was a kind word to describe it.

"...You okay?" Yuugi asked, softly.

Don't turn around until he asked him to.

Don't turn around until he asked him to.

It was the least he could do to preserve his dignity while they were stuck together, even though 'dignity' was barely a thing he held onto when he was...there, with everyone else.

For a while, there's nothing but Kaiba's haggard breaths, thin and soundless that they were. He can't ask Yuugi to turn. He can't do anything without expressly conveying himself in any way but vocally.

So yeah, it takes a while before thin, trembling fingers touch against Yuugi's shoulder, then pull away from him just as quickly. It's a momentary communication, in a way he has no other way to do. But by the time Yuugi turns back around, the mess is bundled up in Kaiba's shirt and all that's left is the man shifting to sit on the ground, knees up, arms curled forward. His gaze is distant.

He has no answer for Yuugi as of yet, as to whether he's okay.

Really, are either of them?

Yuugi seeing him like this is his greatest shame. Weak. Emaciated and sallow skinned, not exclusively from the cupcake either. What could he have to say to the man in this state?

Does he expect answers for why he's so thin? Does he expect answers regarding every scar on Seto Kaiba's body? Will he be able to suss out how each one was caused?

(cigar burns. small cuts here and there and everywhere. a strange, tearlike scar grazing just above his hipbone. more still. mostly insignificant, but still visible.)

Kaiba doesn't mouth anything. Nothing at all.

He didn't mouth anything, but that didn't matter.

Yuugi had seen far worse, you see. Bodies that suffered far more under the oppressive body of the Facility, so such marks, such scars...all they did was break his heart, but he had no context with which to place any of it.

Nothing could be placed, everything could be worried over.

The Cigar burns, though...nobody in the facility had cigar burns, did they...

Did that mean...

Did that mean this mark came from before his time at the facility...?

He knew better than to ask.

He didn't ask.

Instead...

"Do you think you passed it all? Or do you think there's more in you?"

Focus on the important details. Try not to think about the fact that there was that gentleness to his voice, and that sympathy in his eyes. Try to focus on the now and what can be changed rather than what couldn't, and what the facility could listen in on and use for later 'experiments'.

Kaiba gives a faint nod in affirmative. Yes, he's certain that the poison is out, as long as it's of the sort he thinks it is. At least any traces will cease to affect him as soon as what has wears off.

I can still hear things. They're not voices, though.

Sounds. Taps and shuffles. His pupils are still slightly enlarged, but nothing like what they were.

They have to feed us. Unless they want us to die.

Which they might. Dying was not permanent, after all.

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

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a little skip. as a treat.

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CW: Mention of bodily functions (Toilet use)

cw; emeto, malnutrition

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