recolle | ( OPEN ) you believed in all your lies, didn't you

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yugioh: malik ishtar

( OPEN ) you believed in all your lies, didn't you

WHO: Malik Ishtar and Others (You!)
WHERE: Around, mostly in Freshens
WHEN: Mid to late April
WHAT: Malik is suffering the effects of the dreaded Magatus Mark
WARNINGS: Malik’s dubious mental health, teen angst, mentions of self injury in first prompt.

Magatus was disorienting in its newness. The blacking out that came after was more familiar to Malik than should be considered normal, but when he awoke and discovered that he hadn’t gone on another attempted murder spree and that things were relatively okay, he had ventured forth with a kinda-familiar person to see about getting rid of the new glowy mark on his skin.

He didn’t find the answer.

So he had left, huffing and pouting as he does, only to find that in the following days in returning to the city, the mark had started to spread. And sting. Like it wanted to remind him that it existed, and about the faint voices from the forest, whispering to him. He handled that the way he handled most other things: by ignoring it and hoping it went away. Like most other things, it didn’t go away, and it got worse.

ONE.
The mark had started on his forearm and had spread down towards his wrist. The glow was obnoxious, but not quite as bad as the sting. Malik had taken to picking at it, scrubbing it, and rubbed the skin red and raw. Still, the mark persisted. Even after wrapping it in bandaging (mostly to keep from ruining himself further), it still glowed.

He felt like people stared at him. Like they knew. Doesn’t matter where he was going or what he was doing, he couldn’t shake the feeling of silent persecution. It was really only a matter of time until he snapped at an unfortunate passerby:

“Stop looking at me!”

TWO.
Things continued to get worse. Malik found himself feeling ill and groggy. As completely wrong, delusional, and irrational he could be, he didn’t actually attribute this directly to the mark. More than he was getting sick in conjunction with being cursed. Being kicked while he was down, because that was definitely par for the course as far as he was concerned.

A simple illness requires a simple fix. Except with how tired and disconnected Malik felt, something as simple as getting cold medicine from the pharmacy inside of Freshens seemed a lot more arduous than it should be.

In fact, he doesn’t even know if he’s in the right aisle. Or the right store. Or the right plane of existence, as he stares blearily at children’s gummy vitamins.

Some of the store patrons plainly ignore him. Some get a bit unnerved. Because he just continues to stand there, unresponsive.

THREE.
The nightmare wasn’t over yet; in fact, you could say it was just beginning. A long, long series of nightmares. Everything Malik has been trying to push away, trying to ignore, hoping that it’ll solve itself and disappear on its own following him all hours of the day, beyond wakefulness and into his dreams. Everytime he drifted off, he had a nightmare. His cold was getting worse. The mark had spread further still. He was at rock bottom again, emotionally, despite making feeble attempts to put himself on the right path. However, he’s too exhausted, mentally and emotionally, to scream and tantrum about how unfair that is. He’s tired, he looks tired, as he zombie shuffles through Freshens, again, to get… something? Maybe? Out of his room, at least, so he doesn’t fall asleep again.

“Stupid… trees, stupid curse, stupid cold, stupid everything.” He repeats, several times as he goes up and down the grocery aisles. “They always want to make it my fault… I didn’t curse myself, it’s their fault.”

He picks a package of cheap, offbrand cookies from a nearby shelf and starts to tamper with the packaging. He’s unaware of anyone watching or scrutinizing his behavior. He keeps going, eating cookies as he does so: “Anytime I do anything, something goes wrong, that’s not my fault.”

In a stunning twist, he seems to recognize that people - at least one person - is watching him. This does not stop his cookie thievery, and instead he glowers, “The hell do you want?”

FOUR.
( choose your own adventure, or I’ll write something for you.)

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That's fine. I couldn't care less if I were dead.

[ ...That could have been worded differently. But permission has been granted, and Minato goes forward with bringing the gun up to his head— a flash of blue light on the opposite side like an exit wound, and then bright, blinding light in the form of a bird. ]

[ Well hey if that's how Minato feels.

Really though, with two consecutive bright lights filling the room, Malik covers his eyes - the faux carnage he watched passively, but now, he has an arm up to shield him from Horus' splendor. ]

Okay, so, what does this do exactly?

[ It kills things, for the most part. That's what Personas are mainly used for, but he tends towards the healing aspect of the ones who have the spells. ]

Mediarahan.

[ It's a group healing spell, so Minato gets to enjoy the effects of it too, a warmth that settles about his body, limbs less heavy with fatigue and mind a little clearer for it too. Any cuts, scrapes, and bruises stitch themselves up together, and he can breathe slightly better. All of this comes at a cost of being spiritually drained in Minato's case, but it's like riding a second wind: he feels great. ]

[ This is new, this is not anything near what Malik was expecting- even though he wasn't sure what exactly to expect from a big glowing bird. He does feel better, though; his tension headache receding, the old scratches on his arm disappearing, all in all feeling more lucid and aware.

He feels good enough that he does pull back some of the bandages to check- and yes, his skin is healed, but the mark remains. He can't help but scowl. ]

I don't know what you did, but it didn't fix everything.

[ He lets Horus fade away as soon as the spell is finished being cast, with no point of keeping it around and continuing to blind them. ]

That's why I called it a bandaid. Masking the problem without fixing it. I don't think it's poison, or else I could try curing that... so this is the best I can do for now. Anything you buy on the shelves would be the same, probably. Taking the pain away three times a day or whatever the dosing schedule is.

But then how do I... [ He glances down at his arm. The mark has spread further since he first got it, sure, but it started there. Like he's looking at the source of his woes instead of some unrelated tendril. ]

This. How do I get rid of this?!

[ He finally shows Minato, pulling his sleeve up to show his left arm covered turquoise-blue mark. It seems to glow softly, even as it sneaks up and around his arm to his shoulder, casting eerie light through the fabric. ]

[ Minato wishes he had answers for him, but there's nothing concrete he can offer besides trial and error, comparisons between the cases he's seen and its limited sample size of three not giving him much to work with. He rubs at the back of his neck a little, staring as if burning the mark into his vision would give him answers, but it doesn't. ]

...Are you hearing voices?

[ Let's start with that. His personal experiences, and see what matches up. ]

Y...es? You're going to have to be more specific.

[ Sometimes his thoughts get out of line because he has an alternate version of himself floating around in there, so he's not quite sure what Minato means; he's giving him the benefit of the doubt that this isn't some armchair psychoanalysis because believe you me, Malik already knows how messed up his brain is. ]

[ This might be some armchair psychoanalysis, but it's backwards, with Minato being put on the spot to explain what he means by voices. In relation to the curse marks, anyways, all he can provide is what he heard back in the forest, and hoping it matches up. ]

Voice saying stuff like... you're selfish, or that you abandon people. That you don't care enough about people to think they're worth the effort. That you hide from the world because you don't want to deal with it. That you're broken. Stuff like that.

[ The voices had a lot of things to say to Minato, evidently. ]

[ Even for being a Minato-specific example, it hits pretty close to home. The expression on Malik's face pretty much gives it away. ]

...Yeah.

[ Maybe Malik doesn't think it's a good thing, but Minato does- it means their experiences might have some overlap, and his time with that curse was mild and short. ]

That's easy, then. All you have to do is tell that voice, "Yeah, that's right."

What? That... Doesn't sound right. How is that going to solve anything? That's too simple.

Edited 2018-04-27 21:39 (UTC)

[ There's not much more he can offer but a shrug, and the belief that one should try whatever they can instead of dismissing options. ]

It's hard to argue against "Yeah." The curse's voice will shut up, and maybe it'll find somebody else to contaminate.

[ That’s where they differ. Malik is dismissive. He’s avoidant, running away from things he doesn’t like it doesn’t want to deal with. Burying thoughts and memories that plague him instead on processing them; they’re conduming him, and that’s all too apparent with how widespread the mark is. He harder he ignores and denies, the further it spreads. It’s hard to accept the things the voices are saying - it makes him vulnerable. A target. Weak. ]

I... I can’t.

[ Despite his denial, his facade is cracking. Minato is getting through. ]

I don’t want those things to be true.

They don't have to be.

[ He leans back against the wall, staring down at Malik's shoes, wondering why these faults seem so universal to people, that they can be shared between him and another person he barely knows. But if the faults are shared, the solution can be too- his solution, maybe still just temporary, but one nonetheless. ]

Those are all things that can be changed, if you don't like them. You can take your time with them, and go about them however you want. But the first step still saying yeah, it's the truth, if only in this transient moment.

[ They don't have to be, but they are. That's what's eating at him. That's he's a horrible, horrible thing; a monster, not even worth being called human after all the cruel things he's done. And he knows it: He knows he's turned away from help, he knows he blames everyone else for the trouble he gets himself into, he knows he's dug himself deeper and deeper into dark hole away from the rest of humanity because he is mortified at the idea of being close to another person. He wants to be praised, loved, and accepted, but his deep seated fear of rejection and failure has put him on an entirely different path, one where he made himself unlovable to minimize the risk of his insecurity getting out, to minimize contact with other people who could take advantage of everything he's tried to hide. He knows all of this, deep, deep down. Buried with all his memories and secrets and everything else he's never wanted to address.

He also knows that Minato is right, even if Malik is doubtful it'll solve the immediate problem he's suffering from. He's visibly quivering, and while he shakes his head, he really can't hold out anymore: ]

I'm a monster. All I do is hurt people.

[ He hates admitting it. That eats him up in other ways than anything these voices are saying, but is also makes him feel a tiny bit better? The mark isn't really stinging as much. It's a start. ]

I'll always be a bad person, I'm not... meant for anything good.

[ Minato falls silent at these words, letting them extend in between them. There isn't very much he can honestly say he knows about Malik, other than what's been told to him secondhand: something about a jail, something about threatening to shove people into lava, something about not having a home. By principle, Minato never asks questions, accepting these things and not prying any further, but hearing these words...

They're echoes of words he used to tell himself. His parent's deaths were somehow his fault, he was nothing but a burden to his grandparents, all he was good for to his sister was somebody who makes her cry. He didn't have the energy to care, didn't have the ability to return affection, all he was was a drain on everybody around him, and his existence would never be good. ]

Is that what you believe?

[ It's what Minato believed for himself, for almost fifteen years. And he was wrong. ]

What is it that you want to be? That's more important than what you are, I think.

[ Malik is silent. He never thought past the status quo, he never thought of who he could be, just who he is. He accepted that as who he'll always be: a bad kid. So why bother trying to change that, to change everyone's minds, when everything seemed to feed into his confirmation bias? He was bad, everyone thinks he's bad, life goes on. ]

I don't know. I don't think I can be anything else... I can't be anything other than me. Even my past self was...

[ He trails off, leaving that half statement hanging in the air. ]

The past can influence the future, but it doesn't determine it.

[ Past selves, past lives, all of that shouldn't matter— but it does, it imposes upon people's lives with what could be and would used to be. The future, though, is never so concrete. ]

"You" are not defined by a word, or concept, or a role. It's a lot more than that. It's... an entire life. Which is constantly changing.

Do you really think I'm capable of change?

[ His instinct is to be stubborn, to push back - no, you're wrong - but if he is going to change, he has to show that potential. He has to show that he wants to. And he does, he really, really does. Especially if it means that he won't feel like this anymore. ]

Yeah.

[ The answer is simple, and immediate, with no deliberation behind it at all. Of course Malik is capable of change. ]

Change isn't a complete 180. It can be little things, bit by bit. So yes, I think you're capable. I think everybody is.

[ The look he's giving Minato now is indescribable. Somewhere between desperate and hopeful, but there's still that positive glimmer. ]

I don't want to feel like this anymore... I'm tired of being miserable. I know I've hurt a lot of people, and I can't undo that, but maybe... I can still differentiate myself from the person I see in my memories. I always thought that there was a predetermined line between good and bad, and I was already chosen to play the role of 'bad' when I was born... But I'm starting to see that is not the case.

[ It's relief that settles upon Minato's shoulders. There's pride in there too— he's proud of Malik, for deciding this for himself, for being unhappy with his life and wanting to change it rather than accept it- he's proud because it took himself too long to get to where Malik is now; he knows how hard it is, and knows how freeing it is to make that first step. It's scary, directionless, but freeing all the same, to shake off the shackles of "how things are supposed to be." ]

I believe in you. That you'll find things you like, people you like, people who like you. It all comes in time.

[ "I believe in you."

In this moment, this is the first time Malik isn't reading this like pity, or as a disingenous comment, like he has so many times before. It doesn't matter that they aren't close. He's hit that point where he's ready to change, he needs to support, and for there to be someone who isn't afraid of him or doubting his abilities, it means a lot. ]

Thank you.

[ That's all he can really say. He's still processing this revelation: he has the ability to change for the better. He can pull himself out his hole and towards the light. ]

You're welcome.

[ It's a simple exchange— thank you, and you're welcome— but things can sometimes be that simple. For all the insecurities Minato holds close to himself about not being able to reach people on the account of not knowing them well enough, it's a revelation for him too. He doesn't have to understand everything. He just has to understand enough, to be able to relate in some way, and just that much is fine. ]

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godcards - 2018-04-29 17:47 (UTC) - Expand

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