Chocolat, Chokoreeto, Theobramaticus� Chocolate

Sekura: we're back!

Yup, and with another chapter

Sekura: oh yeah, and we've got a crazy chapter to boot!

Which reminds me, if anyone can tell me why I named this chapter Tapestry feel free to either e-mail me (ddristkingdom@hotmail.com) or leave it in your review, the first three correct answers get cookies!

Sekura: GOODIE GOODIE GUMDROPS!

Ok. A, you don't get cookies, you live in my head

Sekura: oh, poo

Second, NEVER do that again!

Sekura: Phantom, just get on with the damn fic and thank your reviewers already!

My, aren't we being testy? Fine.. the reviews are awesome, keep them coming please. And without further preamble, here's Chocolate, chapter II

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Chapter II - Tapestry: "I traced the cord back to the wall, no wonder -It was never plugged in at all."

I felt myself falling into time without end.

Then my body came into hard contact with the ground and it took me a moment before I was able to open my eyes and peel myself off the meticulously cleaned floor. Slowly, I get up and look around. White, absolutely everything is white; well, actually there isn't anything in here but it's all white, never-ending white. I feel as though I'm in the loading program from the Matrix, my world no longer exists and a new one hasn't been uploaded yet, so here I am, perpetually suspended in a limbo between life and death.

My physical appearance has also been altered, I've noted. Since I'm actually wearing clothing, it wasn't such a hard realization, really. I take a look at myself in an obviously high class, probably expensive black suit, the type Seto would wear-dammit, not him again. Why is it that I can never stop thinking about him, not even in the afterlife? Oh well, it matters not; I'm finally rid of him and everything else I hated about that mortal world. But something intrigues me.

I roll up one of the sleeves of my suit and am slightly shocked by what I find on my arms. Nothing. Absolutely nothing, not a single scar. This disturbs me a little, as whatever powers are at work here were able to heal my wounds, but I can't still be alive. There's no way, not even if someone had walked in on me, that I could have been saved. I took all of this into consideration! What could have possibly gone wrong?

All of these strange unanswered, unasked questions are starting to give me a headache. Where was this place? For some reason, I had the impression that the afterlife would be a much more shitty place to spend eternity because I had selfishly taken my own life instead of letting my life play out the way it was designed by the gods. Not that I believe in predestination or any of that crap. But I can't help think ironically in the back of my mind, what if the gods had predestined for me to commit suicide? What if, by trying to avoid the path set out for me, I've followed it to the letter?

I don't know what's going on, where I am, or what's happened, but at this point, I could really care less. I start to walk in some absent-minded direction, wondering if this is my fate. If, by some strange reason, I've merited to spend eternity walking around nothingness, fully aware and conscious, to contemplate my life. I don't know why I bother walking, nothing changes, the scenery is still all the same, white, white, and more white. There's still nothing to look at, just white. The things that surround me cannot even be described as walls, but a never-ending floor meeting a horizon of the exact same shade of white, so it seems as though it goes on forever. No furniture, no nothing, I don't know why I'm walking anymore, it's not like something is going to magically appear if I command it, I have a feeling I don't have that kind of power here. Not to say I had any kind of power before I tried to kill myself-no, I mustn’t talk like that. Before I killed myself. There, I said it.

Strangely, I am still walking, and I almost feel like I'm being pulled in a certain direction. I have to wonder, it can't be as if someone is looking for me, I'm wearing black in a world of white for Ra's sake. But never the less, I'm drawn farther into the white abyss. But finally I see the silhouette of something off in the distance and I break out into a run to try and rejoin it, whatever it is.

As I get closer, the faint form of a man is starting to manifest itself before me. I take a moment to study this phenomenon, wondering if it's actually for real, or if I'm simply hallucinating, either of which could really be the case. The figure seems to be dressed in a long, white robe, but I can't make out too many of the features because I can still only see white and the faint outline of this person before me. Suddenly, a hand is being reached out to me.

Hesitantly, I step forward and place my hand in the one offered, the snow-white fingers closing delicately around my own. The figure steps forward into a light, which allows me to see all of his features, large brown eyes, snow white hair and skin, I gasp as I realize who I've just run into.

"Welcome, Ryuuji." Yami no Bakura cooed.

I jerk my hand away, as though I've just been burned. This doesn't make any sense, I shouldn't be here, I shouldn't be seeing him.

"Who are you? What am I doing here? Why am I here? Where is here?" my questions are rapid and I sound like I've been threatened. Well, in essence, I suppose I have been. My figurative omniscience gone, I am the frightened little child of my youth again.

"So many questions, Otogi, shouldn't it be obvious? I guess not, so I'll address your questions as best I can. To put it bluntly, you're dead. This is the afterlife. And I'm god." Yami no Bakura replies smugly, in retrospect, I shouldn't be calling him that, more like Kami no Bakura.

I can't help but laugh in spite of myself.

"You are not god!" I spit out.

"Blasphemy!" he replies, "This body is just a mere manifestation so that I may appear before you in a form which you can identify with. I can assure you, if I wanted to show you what I actually looked like, I would have to rip out your eyes. Which I suppose is possible, should you desire it."

"Who are you?" I yell again, slowly so this imposter knows exactly what I'm trying to ask him.

"I've been called many things through the ages: Ra, Kami, Jesus, Allah. You may address me as you wish but know this, I am the semi-phenomenal, nearly cosmic being who owns the vessel in which your fate resides."

"I'll ask you again, why am I here?" I demand.

"I've already told you, you're dead and this is the afterlife. This is where people go when they die."

"No. I won't believe that. Where is all this eternal torment I've been told about? I should be suffering for my actions, unless this is some sort of punishment worst than that."

"Ryuuji, you misunderstand. This is simply where you will be judged, or rather you already have been, to decide whether you are truly ready to proceed to what lies beyond this."

"W-what do you mean?"

"See for yourself." Kami no Bakura snaps his fingers and suddenly all the moments of my life begin playing before me on hundreds of thousands of screens all around me. It was overwhelming to say the least to see my entire life played back in the space of thirty seconds, but every so often a screen would freeze at a particularly painful place in my life and refuse to advance. It confuses me. I feel my head spinning as I try to watch all the moments being replayed to me, but soon all the screens stopped showing my single split second parts of my life. I stare in awe when finally my companion cares to shed some light on the situation.

"Every one of those pictures represents something in your life that you've either done or not done, but have regretted ever since the event occurred. For example, when you first discovered the true nature of your sexuality and made a point of making that clear during a classroom discussion early on in high school. You ended up being hurt tremendously when you suffered the wrath of your classmates, ridicule at their blunt hatred for all that you had supposedly become and you finally ended up ruing the day you ever told anybody you preferred the sexual company of men." Kami no Bakura explains, pointing out a few other significant events in my life that were of importance.

The knowledge my very existence was an accident and therefore the reason for the deaths of my parents; how was I to know I was to blame for my parents purposely crashing the family plane with all three of us inside? I don't even understand how I was able to survive; a defenseless child, left alone in a burning wreckage, why wasn't I the one to die? It drove me to resent ever being born, to know I caused such hardship, such pain to the very people who brought me into this world made me hate myself and everything associated with me. It was only recently I learned to accept that I did survive that awful day and to try and make the best of it-shows how I've taken that advice to heart, I guess.

But perhaps the most shocking picture, as every screen flicked off as it was addressed one at a time, was the one of me at home. I'm naked and laying in my bathtub in a deep pool of blood. My skin is deathly white and thick red lines mar the length of my forearms, I'm seeing the after effects of my suicide attempt-I really shouldn't call it that, it wasn't an attempt, I succeeded. But if I finally achieved what I wanted, why am I feeling so sick so my stomach at the sight of my own dead body? My question is answered all too quickly when I take another look at the picture before me. Somehow, the first time I looked at it, I had neglected to notice the shocked and distraught Yami no Bakura a sid side. I had never seen the thief cry, but there he was, my blood soaked hand in his, sobbing as though part of his very soul had been ripped out of his chest. I feel something tear at my heart as the image starts moving and I see Yami no Bakura move to pick me up out of the tub and cradle me against his chest, not even caring that he was getting my blood all over him. I have to shield my eyes as a bright light filled with warmth came through the screen, I should have known Yami no Bakura would have tried to use the power of the Sennen Ring to try and bring me back, albeit futily, and I know that he knows that.

That little pain in my heart keeps magnifying until I collapse to my knees in my suit and gasp when I finally place this strange feeling. It was the same feeling I felt when my parents died, the same feeling when I got rejected and repeatedly beaten by my classmates for being an inferior class of human being because homosexuality was misunderstood and frowned upon. I know it now, remorse, guilt, regret. I can't believe it; I regret the very act that gave me release from the life I could not live. I see small traces of water on the floor beneath me and I realize dumbly that I'm crying, Kami no Bakura sees this and casually walks over, taking me in his arms and letting me cry against him.

"I wish I didn't have to do that. I wish I could have lived my life and by happy, like all those ignorantly oblivious people in the movies, why couldn't I be like them? Why did my life have to be so miserable?" I sob into his white hair as his arms move to rub slow circles against my back.

"It's alright, little one." He says, as if he will magically release me from my pain, even in death, I cannot escape the unbearable pain of my life, "However, I have to tell you, that you cannot stay here. I cannot allow you safe passage to the underworld because you did not arrive here by means with which you are satisfied. Because you lament over your own actions which caused your death, you will not be able to obtain the release death would provide."

I look up at him curiously, what does he mean?

"Little one, you are not meant for this realm yet. Your time is still far away, you are far too young, a light too bright to be darkened."

"What do you mean?" I ask, confused.

"You will know in time, little one; you will know in time." He said, just as two massive white, feathered wings appeared almost out of nowhere and enveloped me in their light.

* * I g I gasp as I awoke with a start to sit straight in the bed I found myself in, gripping my head in pain. It takes me a second to calm my racing heart and regulate my panting breaths. I hold my head in my hands as I am too disoriented to really know what's going on around me, at least, not until a pair of arms fly around my waist and hug me tightly. I raise my head curiously to find a crying Yami no Bakura at my side, I can hear him saying he missed me and thought I was dead and telling me never to hurt myself again. It's then I finally realize the full seriousness of my situation. I'm back in the realm of the living, if I even was dead before, it would seem as though I've been brought back to life somehow, but how?

Then slowly, the events I just experienced with the supernatural version of the Kami no Tomb Robber in my arms return to my mind and I'm initially overwhelmed. I remember my appearance and look at my arms to see if the evidence is still there, but what I see astounds me. All the little drawings I had made on my arms are gone and all I can see are two faint white lines along my forearms, probably left to remind me what I had done and why I was given this second chance.

But second chance at what? I've already established that I have absolutely no desire to live. I see an intravenous tube, likely containing medication or something, running into my arm and I forcefully pull it out, not wanting any help from these doctors, or anybody else. Why can they not understand my life is not worth living and no creature should have to endure what I've had to tolerate over the course of my young life. Is this what the future holds? Is this what I have to look forward to? More suffering? No thank you, sirrip rip off all the monitor chords attached to my chest and collapse on the bed, defeated as the machine's regular beeping is reduced to one solid pulse of sound; it seems as though I'm just as strong and healthy as I had been before I had started cutting myself. Who would have thought such an innocent activity would be so good for relieving stress, yet so harmful to one's immune system? More than once, I had to lie to my few friends as to the true cause of my illnesses, blaming everything from the flu to SARS, just to get them all off my case. As much as I did enjoy their company, more often than not, they're more work than they're worth, always with their meddling and trying to think for me.

In the background to my musing, I can hear Yami no Bakura trying to talk to me, probably wondering why I'm so engrossed with my demanding inner monologue. With good reason I suppose, the last time I isolated myself like this, I ended up in a bathtub full of my own blood.

"Gods Otogi, you scared me so much." I hear Yami no Bakura say through tears, "I thought I lost you."

"Would it have mattered?" I reply coldly.

"What are you talking about? Of course it would have mattered, I care about you, Otogi. You're one of my closest friends and I don't even want to think of what would happen if you died-"

"I did die, Bakura."

"What?" I can see he's shocked and doesn't believe me. He pulls away from me and draws his chair close to my bed, sitting down and setting his hands in his lap. He knows this is likely going to be a long conversation.

"I died. I was dead. The doctors and all of these fancy machines probably told you that. Hell, you probably knew even before you called for an ambulance. I would bet you knew I was dead the second you found me."

"No, Otogi. I always had faith that you would pull through and you would come back to me."

"Save it."

"Pardon?"

"I told you to save the sappy excuses. I honestly don't know why you're here, but it's not because of the grieving boyfriend routine." I look at him with tears in my eyes, so much pain I have to live with every day, I'm staring to think this was actually a form of punishment, a hallucination, perhaps I'm still dead, "When were you going to tell me you were cheating on me with Seto?" my eves and my words are cold, and Yami no Bakura knows he's caused me some of the pain from which I draw my justifications for taking my own life. Not really caring about anything at this point, I reach over to a nearby table and retrieve my jewelry to slowly put my armbands and necklace on before taking a few moments to replace my earring and letting it dangle happily.

"Otogi." He casts his eyes away from me, here it comes, "This is not the situation I had envisioned in which to tell you this. But you're right, I don't think I will be able to date you anymore. But I swear I'm not cheating on you with Seto. Truth be told, I'm only using him."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, I don't love Seto. I'm only using him to get to the one I truly have found myself falling for, and if I have to go through Seto to get to him, than so be it."

My eyes go wide as the implications register in my mind.

"You want Mokuba."

He nods. I continue.

"Don't you think he's a little young for you?"

"Don't you think you're a little young for me? Honestly Otogi, five thousand years versus five thousand and three, it's not such a big thing." He retorts, silencing me.

Even though I knew this was coming, even though I knew I was going to force him to tell me he was going teak eak up with me, it still hurts. It always does, kind of like when I cut myself, the sting is familiar, but it hurts nonetheless. I turn my head from my ex-boyfriend and temporarily allow myself to sink farther into my depression.

"Otogi, you knew about this, so why are you crying? What's wrong, and I know it's not because of my plans for getting close to Mokuba."

Damn him, he's so good at prying into my inner thoughts. But I can't gratify him with an answer because I truly don't know what the answer is myself.

"I-I don't know, Bakura. I'm just so confused; I don't know what's going on. I don't understand why I've been given this second chance at life, and part of me is telling me I'm unworthy of it and wants me to go home and put a gun to my head, hopefully getting it right this time."

"Don't say that."

"Why not? It's not like I have anything substantial worth living for. Before I committed suicide, I destroyed everything, I have nothing left." I said, again defeated, silently wishing a doctor would come up and euthanize me right now.

"Do you know what you need? Take the summer off and try to find yourself, get away from everything and sort some stuff out. Then hopefully, you'll be able to come back in the fall to university with all of us and we'll be one big giant crew again." Yami no Bakura's words are sincere, he really does want the best for me. And I have a feeling trying to take my own life again will result in nothing but pain for me, I nod. Perhaps taking him up on his offer will be the first step in regaining my sanity. I wince only slightly as he throws his arms around me again, hugging me tightly before telling me I should get some sleep, which I do promptly.

* * *

A few days later, the doctors allow me to be released from the hospital after my miraculous recovery, and I find myself face to face with the beginning of the end of the beginning of my life and the many challenges which lie before me in my quest for answers.

And so I board the boat.