[He doesn't mind the hand-holding. Actually, it reminds Atem a little bit of the time he'd died, his body torn to shreds in the back room of a casino, left a wreck in the wake of a mind-controlling parasite, when Ryou had taken his hand, and Atem had seen it, but he hadn't been able to feel it, and one of his last thoughts had been about how that made him feel sad...
But he can feel Ryou's hand now. Even if everything isn't okay, even if that's clearly not true and the lie makes him think of Kaiba, body changed into something unlike himself, working on a hope for escape, and of Noa, who threw himself into the vortex to give the Fog back her power, and Yugi, who's going to have to feed eventually but won't choose how, and Marik, who says he can handle what this place will do to him but Atem's not so sure, and David, who just doesn't want to go back to where he came from, and Mr. Mobius, who doesn't deserve any of this, and Mukuro and Horatio with their one-eye-apiece and Celeste who cut off her wings and Triffany who just wants her husband to live and everyone else whose happiness he'd fight for with everything he had who are stuck in this cruel, cruel game--
--holding hands is okay.]
It isn't.
[Fingers with claws on the end wind around Ryou's.]
But it's enough.
[Enough, for now, to have this support. Things don't have to be okay for him to keep going, and he doesn't even need to have someone else beside him to force himself onward, most of the time...but, right now, "Ryou Bakura being there when he wakes up to tell him he didn't actually just dismember Yugi or Kaiba or Celeste or Ima or any of the other friends he's dreamed about and that he's awake now" is close enough to "okay" to work.]
Like a wildcard...
[That sure does just slip out of his mouth with no context. No-Sleep Atem is inches from rambling about The Light.]
no subject
But he can feel Ryou's hand now. Even if everything isn't okay, even if that's clearly not true and the lie makes him think of Kaiba, body changed into something unlike himself, working on a hope for escape, and of Noa, who threw himself into the vortex to give the Fog back her power, and Yugi, who's going to have to feed eventually but won't choose how, and Marik, who says he can handle what this place will do to him but Atem's not so sure, and David, who just doesn't want to go back to where he came from, and Mr. Mobius, who doesn't deserve any of this, and Mukuro and Horatio with their one-eye-apiece and Celeste who cut off her wings and Triffany who just wants her husband to live and everyone else whose happiness he'd fight for with everything he had who are stuck in this cruel, cruel game--
--holding hands is okay.]
It isn't.
[Fingers with claws on the end wind around Ryou's.]
But it's enough.
[Enough, for now, to have this support. Things don't have to be okay for him to keep going, and he doesn't even need to have someone else beside him to force himself onward, most of the time...but, right now, "Ryou Bakura being there when he wakes up to tell him he didn't actually just dismember Yugi or Kaiba or Celeste or Ima or any of the other friends he's dreamed about and that he's awake now" is close enough to "okay" to work.]
Like a wildcard...
[That sure does just slip out of his mouth with no context. No-Sleep Atem is inches from rambling about The Light.]