***AN: So, One Man Hide & Seek is a game you can find on Creepy Pasta. You'll never catch my ass playing it, and I wouldn't recommend anyone else playing it. Like, forget lemon disclaimers - don't summon things into your house because it violates all rules of common sense!

There's a Japanese horror movie about it as well, but I've only ever seen the first five minutes of it so I have no idea how it ends.

This was my attempt at horror - my failed attempt. I had to bump this to supernatural romance because it simply doesn't scare me. How do you frighten characters that used to play with Shadow Magic with the same ease as others play with Legos? Regardless, I still hope you like it. There won't be a whole lot of smut in this one (some, just not as much as there could have been?) because I got a challenge to write "more plot and less smut" so I accepted it, and then Googled whatever the hell plot was (j/k), because if you read my stories you'll notice they're more character driven than plot driven. I . . . tried to add plot . . . Yami Marik gets a puppy at one point, is that plot?***

Ryo made the doll himself, white cloth for skin and white yarn for hair. He fashioned white pipe cleaners into the yarn to give it a wild, spiked appearance. He knew he technically should have used brown cloth for skin, sewn a pink scar into the cheek and dressed the doll in red silk, but that's not how Ryo remembered him, so Ryo used white cloth and his old sweater and pants to make clothes.

He stuffed the doll with rice and a few nail clippings from his fingers, and then he sealed the doll closed with needle and scarlet thread. The seam looked like an autopsy scar marring the doll's corpse. Ryo used the extra thread to bind the doll. Finished, he admired his handiwork. A little too cute, but it would serve.

Ryo walked to his bathroom, setting the doll on the counter. He plugged his tub and filled it with cold water. As the water rose against the tub's porcelain sides, Ryo filled a cup with sea salt and water and set it in his bedroom closet. Ryo turned on the t.v. He changed the input from hdmi 1 to channel 3 in order to show static on the screen. By the time he finished the tub was filled enough to start the game.

The apartment stood dark and quiet, except for the bathroom light and the consistent, grating drip . . . drip . . . drip . . . of water into the tub. A chill licked down the back of Ryo's neck as he stared down at the doll. It was his last chance to forget the game, go to his living room, play Mario Kart, stay safe.

But Mario Kart wasn't as fun to play alone.

And even after five years of telling himself otherwise, Ryo still regretted how things ended with the spirit who once possessed him.

"Your name is Bakura," Ryo told the doll.

The rules warned against using the player's own name, but it wasn't really Ryo's name anymore. Not since the thief stole it from Ryo and wore it like a carmine cloak.

Ryo checked the time on his cell, 3:00 am. Time to begin.

Ryo looked at the doll. "Ryo is the first to be it. Ryo is the first to be it. Ryo is the first to be it."

He set the doll down in the water. He watched a moment as the doll sank to the bottom, white yarn hair reaching for Ryo like so many skeletal fingers. He wondered if that was what it was like, in the Shadows, cold and submerged in darkness.

Drip . . . drip . . . drip.

Ryo turned away and flicked the light off as he left. He jogged to his bedroom closet and hid, leaving the door open a crack in order to see the t.v. The snow crackled on the screen. It didn't look unordinary, just salt and pepper swarming across the screen.

Ryo closed his eyes and pulled a long, calm breath into his lungs before counting.

"One."

"Two."

"Three."

"Four."

"Five."

"Six."

"Seven. "

"Eight. "

"Nine."

"Ten."

Ryo walked back to the restroom. From his pocket he pulled out a pair of stainless steel scissors. With his left hand he fished the doll out from the water. Gooseflesh prickled up his arms from the chill of the water. Ryo shook the excess liquid from the doll and laid it dripping on the bathroom counter.

"I found you, Bakura."

The rules said to stab the doll once, but Ryo stabbed it seven times. Five in the sternum, once in the left hand, and one last time in the arm. He wanted to make sure he pulled the correct spirit from the void, so Ryo took extra precautions.

"You're it, Bakura. "You're it, Bakura. You're it, Bakura."

Ryo ran back to his hiding place. He filled his mouth with salt water. It tasted sharp on his tongue and he wanted to spit, but forced himself to keep the water in his mouth.

He waited a moment, wondering if he should search for the doll, but if he did the ritual correctly, summoned the right spirit, then Bakura would find him.

Ryo jerked when the soft hum of television static turn to a high-pitched whine. It trilled for half a minute and boiled down to a grumble. The screen flicked. Ryo thought he saw the distorted image of humanesque shadows creeping on the screen behind the gray and black snow. His heart convulsed in his chest. These games were never safe, but for a previous Item holder, one who knew the workings of Shadow Magic, they were akin to Russian roulette.

The closet door creaked open and Ryo almost screamed, but the salt water in his mouth was his only protection, so he suppressed the reflex to swallow and stayed still.

A sigh of relief hissed out his nostrils when he saw the crimson eyes staring down at him.

"Why are you hiding in the closet?"

Ryo patted the carpet beside him to encourage Bakura to sit. Ryo opened a memo pad up on his phone and typed, "we're playing hide & seek."

"Ah." Bakura narrowed his stare. "You're older."

Ryo nodded and typed, "I'm 23."

"Five years? Then why summon me back? Why now?"

Ryo tapped letters onto his phone screen. "I had to find the right game. I had to make sure I brought you back - not him."

Bakura nodded. "Smart. He's not very pleased how things ended, and since you wore the Ring it'd be easy for him to possess you if you made any mistakes."

Ryo nodded.

Bakura fell silent. He turned away from Ryo. Thanks . . . for not forgetting about me."

Ryo rested his hand on Bakura's shoulder.

"How long do I have?"

"An hour," Ryo answered via the phone.

A pained sound escaped from the back of Bakura's throat. A strangled noise he failed to hold in.

"So it's that bad? In the Shadows."

Bakura winced. He avoided Ryo's question by asking his own. "Why aren't you speaking?"

"Salt water. The game ends when I spit it out."

"Idiot. You're going through all that trouble just so I can visit?"

Ryo nodded.

"Idiot."

The insult made Ryo smile. He knew Bakura needed a change of subject, so he wrote, "speaking of idiots, guess who's in my advanced comp class?"

Bakura shook his head. "I don't care about any of them. Now that the Pharaoh's gone, his adoring servants are inconsequential."

"Even Marik?"

Bakura couldn't mask the raw emotion that bled through his expression as he read Marik's name. "He's here? In Domino?"

Ryo nodded. "For college. He lives in this apartment complex, two floors above me."

Bakura stared at the carpet. "So, he's doing well?"

"I think he misses you. He always seems sad when he looks at me."

Another silence stretched between them. The t.v. made the shadows scramble across their faces. Bakura jerked to his feet. "Why are we sitting in the dark? Don't you still have your Duel Monster cards?"

Ryo did have all his old cards - shoved in binders in a closet somewhere. He stood to follow Bakura. As they walked past the t.v. the static flarred on the screen and through the speakers. Ryo saw a not-human face glaring at them through the t.v. snow. Zorc. Ryo jumped and grabbed Bakura, burying his face in Bakura's side. He wasn't sure how he kept the water in his mouth without choking.

Bakura pulled Ryo out of the bedroom and into the hallway. "On second thought, I think it's time you spit out that water and end this game."

Ryo shook his head no. Bakura didn't show emotions easily; the fact that he'd winced when Ryo spoke of the Shadows confirmed every dreadful scenario that ever kept Ryo awake at night. How could he end the game early and send Bakura back to the darkness? He couldn't. That's why he kept the salt water in his mouth although it made his mouth water and his throat dry, although the thought of Zorc ever returning turned his bowels to icewater.

"You've grown impudent since I've been gone." Bakura crossed his arms over his chest. "I told you to end the game. I didn't ask."

Ryo shook his head a second time.

"Ryo."

Ryo swiped words on his phone as quick as he could. "Fuck you, Bakura. The summon doesn't decide when to end the game."

Bakura opened his mouth to argue, but paused and then asked, "when did you start saying fuck?"

Ryo smiled, taking a moment to answer on his phone. "Well, you see, there was this spirit who used to possess me, and all he ever said was fuck, fuck, fuck, in my head - every day - and it kinda stuck in my mind."

Bakura read Ryo's phone and started laughing. Ryo covered his hand over his mouth. Water dribbled from his lips, but he kept more than enough in his mouth. He lead Bakura to the kitchen table. In better circumstances, Ryo would set the kettle on for tea, but he couldn't drink it, and Bakura wasn't one to sip tea at a kitchen table.

Instead, they sat from across each other in amiable silence for a moment. Ryo tried to think of something to type on his phone, but everything that came to mind seemed trivial.

He settled for typing, "I'm sorry."

Bakura glanced at the phone. "Why?"

Ryo shrugged. "For everything. Everything."

"Quit being stupid."

"We only have fifteen more minutes. Tell me a story."

"Do I look like your mother? I'm not going to tuck you in and tell you a bed time story."

"What was your life like?"

Bakura sat quiet for two minutes. "Hard. It was hard."

"Tell me something. When's the first time you ever summoned Diabound?"

A twitch of smile (smile, not smirk) turned up the corner of Bakura's lips. "It was three days after my village burned. I was starving. I could see the fish in the river, but couldn't catch them. Not sure exactly how I did it, but the next thing I knew Diabound was in front of me with two fish. Even then I knew I had to survive . . . to get revenge." Bakura shook his head. "For all the good that did."

"I'm sorry."

"Stop it."

Ryo stared at the table.

Bakura lifted up his shirt, revealing a line of red thread sown into his cloth-flesh.

Again, Ryo thought of autopsy scars.

"You know, the irony of you bringing me back as a doll didn't go unnoticed."

Ryo smiled. "That was one of the charms of this game specifically. I'm good with dolls and magic."

"Me too." Bakura snickered. "Putting souls in dolls is fun, isn't it?"

"You're such a dick."

"And you're the idiot that brought me back."

Ryo dropped his gaze.

"Yeah, I know. It's been a little over an hour."

Ryo retrieved the other half of the salt water to close out the ritual. He barely dribbled the water out of his mouth, allowing the drops to roll down Bakura's clothes. He was a vengeful spirit possessing a doll, the salt water would feel like acid on his skin, so Ryo was careful.

"I win." Ryo sniffed, tears pooled around his eyes. "I win." A sob choked out of his mouth.

"Christ, quit sniveling and banish me already."

"We'll play again."

"Whatever."

Ryo swiped at his eyes. "I win. "

He poured the last of the water on Bakura's head. Ryo couldn't really tell when Bakura stopped being himself and started being a regular doll, but by the time the last of the water left Ryo's glass, only a doll of cloth and yarn lay on the floor.

***Tsk-tsk, not a single one of you put on knock-knock joke in the reviews of Supersteffy's story, "Dark Room of Nightmare" what kind of facetious, Bakura fan girls *are* you if you can't even sandbox a review section for a ygotas fic? Florence is disappointed in you.***