They both did. The whole gambit was to trade the Millennium Rod for the God Card in your deck. It's funny...they were following the ante rules to the letter. Everything they worked together on, and the most artful move my spirit could think of to help Marik was to stab my arm and thereby make--
[Ryou flinches, because...his next words are pretty much lacking in any self-esteem. It takes him aback that he could say it...but he's committed at this point.]
...make his vessel weaker.
[He's aware of Atem's coil wrapping securely around his foot and he might wonder about it more, but this story is hard to tell, and he's still not up to full energy. Maybe it's because of the story itself.
Nevertheless, he doesn't mind it, and it does comfort him somewhat. He feels like he can get through this, maybe.]
Anyway...my memories terminate sometime before you and I were chosen for the preliminary semi-final duel, which means the Ring-Spirit was in control. Like I said, he takes over completely, and I sleep. Maybe it was a mercy at the time.
But it wasn't a mercy when I came back to myself. When I woke up I felt as if...someone had reopened the wound in my arm.
[Which is the nicest way to put it. Actually it felt as if someone had jammed the knife back in, twisted it and broken the blade off. Later, once he'd had time to think about it, he realized that the weight of the duel disk and the repetitive movements required for playing a card game off of it were likely the culprit for opening up the wound. The Ring-Spirit was, after all, quite expressive, and he tolerated Ryou's pain far better than Ryou could ever tolerate it himself.]
There was blood...and the weight of the duel disk felt like a thousand pounds. I couldn't...I couldn't breathe because the altitude, I wasn't used to it yet. I couldn't catch my breath without it hurting, not nearly as much as my arm but it was all too much! Who would tolerate it?! I should have been in the hospital...
Th...then when I looked up, there was a creature. A monster.
[He can't help it. He finds himself following the contour of Atem's body where it terminated from human to snake, the colorations of his scales, the way the form shifted softly. He sees those red and black scales and it makes his heart beat faster whether he wants it to or not. This isn't Atem's fault, it's not...!]
That was the first time I saw an Egyptian God Card. The Saint Dragon, God of Osiris. It was just a hologram, of course. H-hah...haha. It wasn't real, but...the Gods don't feel like holograms, and they're massive...when I saw it, it was looking at me. Atem, I...saw...this massive sky serpent and its big eyes and you'd think that I would find it interesting, because it had two mouths and it was wrapped around the blimp like a python--
[Ryou's rambling now, with no discernable endpoint as of yet. It's very clear that waking up, being in pain, and not being able to catch his breath had already frightened him, but seeing Osiris staring down at him and not feeling like it was a projection...it had affected him strongly.]
They pushed me out...so you wouldn't attack me. The spirit was going to lose in his next turn so...because my soul and body were weak, Marik and the spirit put me there. Your choice was surrender or...
[He doesn't finish that sentence. He doesn't have to.]
no subject
They both did. The whole gambit was to trade the Millennium Rod for the God Card in your deck. It's funny...they were following the ante rules to the letter. Everything they worked together on, and the most artful move my spirit could think of to help Marik was to stab my arm and thereby make--
[Ryou flinches, because...his next words are pretty much lacking in any self-esteem. It takes him aback that he could say it...but he's committed at this point.]
...make his vessel weaker.
[He's aware of Atem's coil wrapping securely around his foot and he might wonder about it more, but this story is hard to tell, and he's still not up to full energy. Maybe it's because of the story itself.
Nevertheless, he doesn't mind it, and it does comfort him somewhat. He feels like he can get through this, maybe.]
Anyway...my memories terminate sometime before you and I were chosen for the preliminary semi-final duel, which means the Ring-Spirit was in control. Like I said, he takes over completely, and I sleep. Maybe it was a mercy at the time.
But it wasn't a mercy when I came back to myself. When I woke up I felt as if...someone had reopened the wound in my arm.
[Which is the nicest way to put it. Actually it felt as if someone had jammed the knife back in, twisted it and broken the blade off. Later, once he'd had time to think about it, he realized that the weight of the duel disk and the repetitive movements required for playing a card game off of it were likely the culprit for opening up the wound. The Ring-Spirit was, after all, quite expressive, and he tolerated Ryou's pain far better than Ryou could ever tolerate it himself.]
There was blood...and the weight of the duel disk felt like a thousand pounds. I couldn't...I couldn't breathe because the altitude, I wasn't used to it yet. I couldn't catch my breath without it hurting, not nearly as much as my arm but it was all too much! Who would tolerate it?! I should have been in the hospital...
Th...then when I looked up, there was a creature. A monster.
[He can't help it. He finds himself following the contour of Atem's body where it terminated from human to snake, the colorations of his scales, the way the form shifted softly. He sees those red and black scales and it makes his heart beat faster whether he wants it to or not. This isn't Atem's fault, it's not...!]
That was the first time I saw an Egyptian God Card. The Saint Dragon, God of Osiris. It was just a hologram, of course. H-hah...haha. It wasn't real, but...the Gods don't feel like holograms, and they're massive...when I saw it, it was looking at me. Atem, I...saw...this massive sky serpent and its big eyes and you'd think that I would find it interesting, because it had two mouths and it was wrapped around the blimp like a python--
[Ryou's rambling now, with no discernable endpoint as of yet. It's very clear that waking up, being in pain, and not being able to catch his breath had already frightened him, but seeing Osiris staring down at him and not feeling like it was a projection...it had affected him strongly.]
They pushed me out...so you wouldn't attack me. The spirit was going to lose in his next turn so...because my soul and body were weak, Marik and the spirit put me there. Your choice was surrender or...
[He doesn't finish that sentence. He doesn't have to.]