Chapter 15: Let it bleed

Yuugi walked out of the jewelry store, smiling to himself. In his pocket he could feel the small box with his gift for Atem.

A welcome back gift. Just a little something he could keep on him at all times; something that could be his.

He set off towards home in a brisk pace. The sun had set a couple of hours ago; the numerous cars' exhaust pipes filled the night with a slight haze, blurring out the lights of the city. The cold that had settled over the streets was enough to turn his exhales white, but Yuugi did not mind. He kept smiling, his mind miles away.

He tried to imagine Atem's reaction to his gift.

Atem was still reluctant to buy things for himself, no matter how much Yuugi pestered him. It made sense, to a degree: coming back to life, out of nowhere, and having his own body for the first time in three thousand years… It must have been stressful. He probably did not feel like he belonged there yet. He was restless and nervous, especially when he thought Yuugi wasn't looking.

It was natural. It had been less than a month since his return and these things... took time.

Yuugi thought this gift would help. It could be a first step; Atem's first real possession.

It was a small scarab, sculpted in lapis lazuli. It was attached to small cord, to be worn as a bracelet—or a choker, maybe, if Atem was feeling like experimenting.

In Ancient Egypt, scarabs were a symbol of rebirth and transformation, so Yuugi thought it would be fitting. He didn't want to buy him something gold, nor something reminiscent of the Millennium Items; he felt they were past that. He wanted something that could symbolize... moving forward. Escaping from the past; rebuilding.

He patted his pocket as he walked, feeling the box's edges, and he smiled again.

They would both rebuild. That was what lay ahead for both of them.

And it was good. It was something to hope for. Something to-

His phone rang, snapping him out of his thoughts and stopping him in his tracks.

He reached for it with a sigh. He prayed it wouldn't be a call from work; although chances were it was just Atem, calling to see where he was and what took him so long-

He froze when he saw the screen.

It was Anzu.

His heart jumped to his throat, blocking the air from reaching his lungs.

Anzu.

…Right. He had not talked to her since-

Atem's return.

The last time they'd talked had been in that café, when she'd asked him to give their marriage a second chance.

In his mind's eye, he saw that night again: him in the old Burger World—now turned into a café, the rain pattering on the window, Anzu across from him. It felt like ages ago.

Yuugi bit down on his lip. All of his previous elation had seeped out of his limbs, leaving him with nothing but numbness.

She was probably calling to learn the answer to her question. Yuugi was supposed to have thought about it and have an answer by now—and he had thought about it, but he had also been thinking about a million other things, and he was no closer to an answer than he'd been two or three weeks ago-

The phone kept ringing. He couldn't ignore it.

For heaven's sake, it was Anzu.

He answered the call.

"Hello?" he said, still feeling numb and hearing it in his voice.

"Oh, Yuugi, hi! I was just about to hang up," Anzu's voice came through, relieved and a bit uncertain, but just as lively as always. "Is this a bad time?"

"No, no, it's okay," Yuugi said, trying to ignore the painful feeling that stuck in his throat upon hearing her voice. "I'm on my way home from work."

"Oh, shoot. I tried to time it right; I thought you'd be back by now-"

She sounded apologetic, and that playful nervousness was so much like the Anzu he knew that Yuugi was left nearly breathless.

He swallowed. "It's fine. I had to run some errands, so I'm kinda late."

"Do you want me to call later-?"

"No," Yuugi said at once; perhaps faster than he should have. He thought of answering that call in front of Atem; it would have certainly been a million times worse. "No," he repeated, firmly this time. "I can talk now."

"Okay."

There were a few beats of awkward silence.

"So…" Anzu started. "How have you been?"

There was no short answer to that question. It felt like the whole world had changed since the last time they'd talked.

"Good," he said. "Busy. The last few weeks have been… wild."

Anzu hummed. "I saw your new game is doing great already. You must have worked hard."

Right, the game. That had not been exactly what Yuugi had in mind when he answered, but he said, "Yes, we did."

"I'm so proud of you," Anzu said, and Yuugi felt his heart seize up. He had heard the pride in her voice: it had been warm and honest, like the sunshine that had spilled through their windows on the mornings when she visited, when they'd wake up together and she'd make pancakes with a sleepy smile on her lips-

"Yeah," he said, not really aware of what he was saying or why. His brain buzzed pathetically.

That spawned another silence, until Yuugi realized it and cleared his throat. "So, how… How have you been?"

"Oh, good! I quit the dance company."

"You did?"

"I'd told you I would," Anzu said. He could hear the smile in her voice. He could picture it.

Yuugi closed his eyes and took a deep breath. She was right, she had told him, but… He hadn't allowed himself to hope too much.

And yet, here they were. It was happening.

His lungs felt too small all of a sudden.

"So you are… coming back soon?" he asked faintly.

"Yes. My flight is in four days. I'm emptying my apartment right now."

Yuugi realized he was standing in the middle of the sidewalk, blocking the way to the flow of pedestrians. He walked to the side to lean against the wall of a bakery shop. He had to lean somewhere.

Four days. Four days.

He swallowed.

It was really happening.

She was coming back for good. It wasn't a lie or a hopeless dream; in four days, it would be reality.

She would be here, and they could be together, if they wanted to. They could be a proper couple. Yuugi would be able to come back home to her smile and her voice and her hugs, only this time it wouldn't end, it wouldn't be for just a weekend. She would be there, and-

She would see Atem.

There would be no way to hide his return from her. After all, Yuugi didn't want to hide him from her or the world. Sure, he had ended up doing it anyway, but-

He hated it. And it had to stop.

Anzu would be back, and Yuugi couldn't live like this. There was no way around it: he would have to tell her. No more excuses.

"Yuugi…? Are you still there?"

"Yes," he said, not recognizing his voice. "Yes, it was just… a lot to take in."

"I know. I can hardly believe it myself."

"Yeah…" Yuugi trailed off. All of it was hard to believe. Atem; Anzu-

He rubbed a hand over his face.

"So, I was wondering… Could we talk when I come back? I- I would like to see you."

He forced himself to reply before he'd start having second thoughts again.

"Yes. I want to see you, too. We do- We have to talk."

"Yuugi…" Anzu's voice was low and hesitant. "I've been meaning to ask… Is everything okay?"

Yuugi gripped his phone. "What do you mean?"

"I don't know, it's just that… Nobody's been talking to me lately. It feels like Jounouchi and Honda are avoiding me and… I don't know what to think."

Yuugi closed his eyes. She had sounded hurt, and he couldn't blame her. He tried to imagine being in her shoes: away from her friends, feeling left out and isolated, while at the same time sensing that something was wrong. By now, she was probably certain that something had happened: her intuition had always been remarkable.

There was no point in telling her that everything was fine.

"We'll talk when you get back," he said instead.

She let out a shaky chuckle. "Okay, now you are scaring me. What is going on?"

"Nothing bad, there's no need to worry, it's just… complicated. I can't explain over the phone."

She huffed. It was obvious that she was already worrying, but she said, "Okay."

Silence fell between them again. Yuugi looked at the sign over his head without registering what he was seeing. He could hear Anzu breathing on the other side of the line.

"So…" she said at last. "Umm… See you in four days."

"Yeah. Call me when you get here to… arrange a time and a place."

"Okay, I will."

"And have a safe trip."

"Thanks. See you soon. Bye."

"Bye, Anzu."

He disconnected the line and let out a long, heavy breath. He did not move away from the wall he was leaning at.

Four days. He had four days to prepare and… sort out his feelings. But how could he do in four days what he hadn't been able to in four weeks? He did not feel ready to give her an answer—any answer.

But maybe she'd understand. Maybe she would need some more time, too, after he explained everything.

Maybe, another voice told him, there will be no need for an answer after she finds out that Atem is back. Maybe there will be no more marriage to salvage.

He tried to silence that voice, but he couldn't get rid of the echo of that thought.

He had to tell her, no matter what. He had to let her know. Even if that would destroy any chance he had with her… he had to do it.

He rubbed his face with his hands.

Everything was moving so quickly. Just when Atem's return had sunk in and Yuugi had finally started breathing again-

Atem, his brain repeated numbly.

He had to talk to him about this, too. He could no longer avoid the subject. Anzu's return would affect both of them; he couldn't keep him in the dark.

He let his hands drop to his sides and his gaze roamed over the street, to the tops of the buildings and the night sky beyond.

That was not how he'd planned his evening to go. He couldn't even give Atem his gift under these circumstances.

If he told him about Anzu, the discussion would certainly lead to more questions… and to the topic that Yuugi wanted to avoid the most: what would happen afterwards?

Atem would be justified to wonder what Anzu's return would mean for him. If she and Yuugi got back together, Anzu would probably want to move in. They were still married, after all. Could all three of them live together? No, that was not possible. It would be… difficult for everyone involved.

But did that mean that Atem would have to leave? Yuugi couldn't do that, either. Atem came back from the dead and Yuugi was not about to throw him out, especially after trying so hard to convince him that he belonged there. He was the one who told him he would do anything to make him stay, and he had not changed his mind.

He didn't want him to go. Yuugi was not certain about a lot of things right now, but he was certain about that.

But he also knew that it wasn't entirely in his hand. There was another possible scenario: one that had been eating him from within.

What if Anzu decided she preferred Atem… and Atem realized that he liked her back? What if they wanted to get together?

Yuugi felt like collapsing at the thought; his knees grew weak.

He was embarrassed to admit that he was worrying about such a thing, and he tried very hard to avoid thinking about it, but he had to know-

He had to talk to Atem about it.

The walk back to his apartment passed without Yuugi realizing it; he barely registered riding the elevator up to the seventh floor and reaching his door. His heart was racing as he turned the key in the lock.

The first thing he saw when he walked in his brightly lit apartment was Atem's head sticking out from behind the couch. The moment he heard the door, he craned his neck backwards and gave Yuugi an upside-down smile.

"Hey, aibou! You were late."

Yuugi's thoughts came to an abrupt halt.

Atem was lounging on the couch, holding a controller and wearing a t-shirt and a pair of sweatpants Yuugi had not worn in years. His hair was pulled up into something that must have once resembled a bun—before half of his tufts escaped his scrunchie to fall around his face.

Despite himself, Yuugi felt a smile tugging the corners of his lips.

It was amazing how, even after all these weeks, he still had to do a double take each time he saw Atem—and how each time, without fail, the breath was knocked out of his lungs when he realized he was real.

"Hey, Atem," he said softly.

The apartment was warm, and there was a faint smell of jasmine tea in the air. A glance to the TV screen revealed that Atem was currently in the last stage of Super Mario Galaxy.

Affection surged in Yuugi's chest. He didn't want to lose this, no matter what—not when he'd just found it. He'd find a way to make this work.

Atem was staring at him. "Aibou?" he said, frowning. He paused the game. "Is everything alright?"

Yuugi took off his shoes and his coat with slow movements, to give himself some more time to prepare. As he was hanging his coat, he noticed the small outline of the box against the fabric of his pocket and pressed his lips together.

He couldn't give it to Atem now. He'd have to wait for a more appropriate moment.

"Aibou?" Atem repeated, now evidently worried.

"Yes, umm…" Yuugi, said, just to answer something. He approached the couch where Atem was sitting and tried to smile; he felt the expression coming off rather stiff, but it was the best he could do. "There's something we need to talk about."

Alarm flickered across Atem's features. He shifted in his seat to face Yuugi completely and murmured, "What is it, aibou?"

Yuugi lowered himself on the armrest of the couch and perched on its edge. "It's Anzu," he blurted out before he'd have the time to second-guess his decision to talk.

Atem blinked at him. He seemed unsure as to whether he should say something or wait. "Anzu?" he repeated at last.

"Yes. You see…" Yuugi rubbed the back of his head; he didn't know where to start. "There's a lot I haven't told you."

"You don't have to," Atem said at once. "I know you don't like to-"

Yuugi shook his head. "It's no longer a matter of whether I like to or not. I have to."

His tone made Atem sober up even more. His brow scrunched in a worried frown, but when he talked, his voice was smooth and calm. "Okay, then. I'm listening."

Yuugi's heart was beating hard; he could hear his pulse in his ears.

"Anzu called me today."

Atem kept staring at him. His face was blank, betraying no emotion. "Oh," was all he said.

"Yeah, she's… She's coming back to Domino. I don't know if I ever mentioned that," Yuugi added with a self-deprecating chuckle.

There was a small pause. "You didn't," Atem said in a very quiet voice. "But Jounouchi did."

"I should have thought so," Yuugi murmured; Jounouchi had been telling him to set a few things right for a while now.

"I asked him to tell me," Atem said hastily. "I didn't want to bother you with an issue you didn't want to-"

Yuugi looked up to give him a soothing smile and let him know that he wasn't angry. Of course he wasn't; Jounouchi had simply done what Yuugi should have from day one.

Anxious lines crumpled Atem's forehead. Of course; that made sense, too. He no longer knew what to expect, or how much was still being kept from him. Yuugi had really messed this up. All he'd wanted was for Atem to be comfortable and carefree, and then he'd made sure to make him feel the exact opposite way.

Yuugi's intentions had backfired so majestically that he couldn't hold back a chuckle. "Remember how, after you came back, we promised not to hide anything from each other?"

Atem's lips curved, too. "We failed miserably at that, didn't we, aibou?"

Yuugi breathed out a laugh.

It was true. They had both failed, but now that Atem acknowledged it and still kept smiling like that, a knot of unease in Yuugi's chest came undone. He felt comfortable enough to approach him more, so he slid down the armrest to sit properly on the couch.

He sat there for a few moments, next to Atem, looking straight ahead. Gradually, the smile slipped off his lips.

"She'll be here in four days."

"Four days?"

Yuugi confirmed it with a slow nod. "Yes. And she wants to talk to me. You see, we've left some… unfinished business."

He could tell Atem's eyes were fixed on him."About the divorce?"

Upon hearing the word, Yuugi cringed. Half the papers were already done, and yet…

He shook his head. "No, see, that's the thing. She… She asked me to give our marriage another chance." He heard the dejected tone in his voice as he said that.

Atem noticed it, too, because his voice was uncertain as he said, "But… That's good, isn't it?"

He was asking as if this was an easy thing to answer. He was not aware of all the complications—all the things that had to be taken into account-

"Atem… She doesn't know you are back," Yuugi said in a small voice.

"I know, but still-"

"No, you don't get it." He finally turned to look at him. Could he really not see where he was going with this? "She might not-" Yuugi's voice died out, so he tried again. "She might not be interested in this marriage after she finds out you are back."

Atem frowned. "I know you believe she still has feelings for me, but-"

"You remember what she said before she asked me for a divorce, don't you?" Yuugi cut him off.

"Yes," Atem replied darkly, "but those could have simply been words spoken in anger and nothing more. It is possible that she did not mean them."

"Do you really believe that?"

Atem paused. "It's a possibility," he said, but the uncertain notes in his voice were obvious.

Yuugi shook his head. It would be nice if he could just believe that: it would solve a lot of his problems. "I don't know what to think," he murmured. "But, either way, I have to tell her the truth. I have to tell her you are back."

The prospect settled like a rock on his chest.

"Yes... I think you do," Atem said.

"The problem is…" Yuugi went on, and the weight in his chest became crushing, "I don't know what I'll do… afterwards."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean… If she says she still wants to give this-" he raised his left hand and his wedding ring glinted in the light- "another try, then…" He trailed off. He didn't know how to continue; no words seemed right to breach this subject.

After a few beats of silence, Atem spoke. "You want this, right? You want to be with her." It wasn't a question, it sounded more like a statement, and yet there was a note of anxiousness in his voice. Yuugi wondered if he was imagining it.

He hesitated. He shifted in his seat and looked at his hands again.

…Did he? If he took out all the problems, the what-ifs, the uncertainty, the fear, even that shameful, hidden jealousy, then…

"I think so. I mean… I've always wanted it," he said, as if that answered it.

"Were you happy with her?" Atem asked, his tone ringing more insistent than before.

"I…" Yuugi paused.

He remembered the good times again, the golden days, scattered across the years. How come those times were the only ones he could think of—the only memories that had really stuck with him?

"Yes," he replied. "Mostly."

"Mostly?" Atem repeated, brows drawing low over his eyes.

"There had always been problems, but they were mainly due to distance and… spending so much time apart. Now that she's moving back to Domino, maybe…" He didn't finish the sentence. He had sounded a bit childish, he knew, but he couldn't help the hope that fluttered in his chest.

It seemed enough for Atem, though. "There is your answer, then."

Yuugi shook his head again. Atem still didn't get it.

He tried to breathe past the weight that crushed his lungs and said, "It's not that simple. If I say yes and she says yes, then… What happens with you?"

Atem's look darkened. The worried lines around his eyes smoothed out, leaving his face set in a stoicand rather cold expression.

"I don't want to be an obstacle in your happiness. I'll go if I have to."

"No," Yuugi said at once.

"I'll move in with Jounouchi, or… someone," Atem went on.

"No," Yuugi's voice hardened. "I don't want you to go. And-"

He faltered; the panic in his veins turned to exasperation. What was nothing but a half-formed thought before, became clear now that he was looking at Atem.

"If I can't trust my wife to be in the same room as my best friend, then… Is there really any reason to give this marriage a chance?" he asked with a bitter smile.

This made Atem pause and stare at him, his face blank, betraying no emotion.

"This… This is all speculation at this point, aibou," he said at last. "You don't know what she will answer. Wait until you talk to her first."

He couldn't get how Atem managed to remain so collected. Yuugi fell back onto the cushions and rubbed his eyes with his fingers; his hand remained there, pinching the bridge of his nose.

"What if she says she wants you?" he croaked out. The pressure in his chest was getting unbearable.

He heard Atem move in his seat. "Well, then she will be disappointed, because I don't feel that way about her."

Yuugi lowered his hand to look at him. His pulse was pounding in his ears, but he could feel his lungs slowly expand again.

"You don't?" he said, and he hated that his voice sounded so hopeful.

Atem gave him a soft smile. "No, aibou. I really don't. So… Stop worrying about that."

Yuugi gave it a few seconds to sink in. He felt embarrassed—and, frankly, a bit pathetic—but it was impossible to deny that he was also relieved. He wouldn't be able to take it if Atem and Anzu got together. He wanted them both to be happy, but-

No need to think about it further. No need.

"Okay," he whispered.

He was being so stupid. Had he just admitted out loud that he was afraid Atem might steal his wife?

Ugh no, don't say it like this, he told himself with an internal wince.

He really was being stupid.

He rubbed his hands against his face, hoping to rub some sense into his skull, too.

"I'm sorry about this," he said, voice muffled by his palms.

"Don't be," Atem replied, fond as always. There were a few seconds of heavy silence, until he added, "Do you want me to come with you? When you go to meet her?"

Panic seized Yuugi's body and he sat up straighter. "No. No, I- I think it's best if I do it alone."

"Naturally," Atem said with a nod. "But I could come with you, if you want me to."

"Thank you, but…" Yuugi let out a cheerless chuckle. "It's stupid, but I'm afraid that if she sees you in front of her all of a sudden, she-"

He stopped talking. He could picture the scene, playing out in his mind. Anzu's shock, then the elation lighting up her face; her smiling widely, in that way that she hadn't smiled in years, her running to hug Atem—maybe crying tears of joy, maybe even kissing him-

He pressed his lips into a tight line and forced himself to stop, to stop that thought right there.

He noticed he had clenched his fists in his lap. He relaxed them slowly.

Atem spoke, voice warm and soothing.

"It's not stupid."

Yuugi shook his head. "See, I shouldn't even be thinking like that. This shouldn't be an issue."

"My return made everything more difficult, didn't it?" Atem said; there was a hint of self-blame hidden behind his words, and Yuugi hated hearing it.

He shook his head. "You weren't here when she said these things. No, you- You are not to blame for any of this."

"But my presence complicates everything. Don't deny it." This time the anxiousness was so clear in his tone that Yuugi didn't have to wonder if he was imagining it.

He sighed. This thought had crossed his mind, too—and he wasn't proud of it. It could certainly serve as a nice excuse, just to make Yuugi feel better about himself, but it wasn't true and it wasn't fair to anyone.

"If she's unhappy with me, your presence won't change that," he said, even though admitting that made his heart clench.

Atem remained silent for a while. "I hope you're right," he said. It was clear from the look in his eyes that he did not think Yuugi was right.

He looked at Atem's profile, the wild tufts falling around his face and the sharp set of his features. He thought he could smell the pine bubble bath he'd bought last week.

For a second, Yuugi wondered if talking to him was wrong; if he should have waited until after talking to Anzu. That way, he might have avoided plaguing Atem's mind with concerns he could do nothing about. Sure, he had made clear that he was not interested in Anzu, and that lifted an enormous weight off Yuugi's shoulder's, but-

He still had no answers about the rest. He couldn't figure this out. He felt like a kid; like that time he was trying to jam together two pieces of the Millennium Puzzle even though it was obvious they didn't fit.

"You should stop trying to find all the answers in your head, aibou," Atem said with a soft smile.

Yuugi blinked at him. Was he that easy to read?

He let out a chuckle that he didn't really mean, to lighten the mood. "I don't want to worry others with my problems," he said, but he could feel the strain in his smile.

"And I don't like to see you worry all by yourself," Atem replied. "I want to help, if I can."

"I know. And… I am glad." Some of the strain seeped off his expression and his smile became more genuine. "Thank you."

He was grateful, but he also knew that there certain things he had to do by himself.

Like facing Anzu.

Four days, he reminded himself.

At the very least, after talking to her, he would have a clearer perspective. No matter what, it would be better than hovering in this uncertainty.

The streetlamps glowed like orange halos in the night. Their light bounced off run-down buildings, muddy rain puddles and heaps of trash. People either hurried along their way or stood in small groups, hidden in the shadows of doorways.

Ryou had never been in this part of the city before. He kept his hands in his pockets, clutching at his phone and his money to make sure they wouldn't somehow disappear.

The night was cold, but he could barely feel it. He walked close to Malik, who in turn stuck close to Miyamoto—who was a friend of one of the Crow's barmen, from what Ryou had gathered.

Saying that Ryou wasn't nervous about this would be a lie. He was very aware of everything that could go wrong.

It had crossed his mind that all of this could be just a farce: that this guy Miyamoto wanted to lure them there as a joke. It had also crossed his mind that they might not find his yami; that this Diabound guy might not be him at all, that Miyamoto might have misunderstood, or that a million other complications might arise.

Okay, crossed his mind was an understatement. He'd been thinking about it for days. He'd laid out all his concerns to Malik, again and again, just to make sure they would both be alert. He didn't want to be caught by surprise again.

Malik had told him not to worry, of course.

Ryou glanced at the street around them as furtively as he could. He was certain a guy was shooting up behind some trashcans. In another corner, he saw the gleam of something metallic poking out of someone's jacket—a knife, or maybe a gun.

He bit back a gasp and returned his gaze to his feet.

He should have expected his yami would hole up in the shittiest of Domino's shitty neighborhoods. People like him thrived in these places.

Seeing this, he was glad he hadn't let Malik come here alone. Not that this had ever been an option: there was no way he would let Malik deal with his yami alone. He had proven to be… susceptible to his manipulation.

It wasn't that Malik was naïve or gullible—it was just that the yami was that good a liar. But Ryou knew better. He could handle him; he'd done it before. Years of conditioning had built him for this.

His yami did not scare him. This place, on the other hand… It set his teeth on edge.

He regretted not having his knife with him. He shouldn't have left it on the pavement, before his yami's feet, all those weeks ago. Hell, he'd kept that knife on him for years—he should have held on to it, if only for sentimental reasons.

Malik seemed nervous, too, despite all his optimism and his certainty that everything would go just fine. His shoulders were tense as he walked and he kept glancing at Ryou to make sure he was close. At some point he cleared his throat and said, "Um, Miyamoto? Are you sure this is the right way?"

Miyamoto looked at them over his shoulder. "Oh, yeah, don't worry. We're almost there."

Ryou did not feel reassured at all. If this went south, he would make sure to find his yami and skin him for their trouble. This was all his fault, anyway. If he hadn't been so annoyingly cryptic, they wouldn't be forced to come here in search of him.

"Almost there," Miyamoto said.

They made a turn to some alley with a couple of pawn shops and some dreary apartment buildings. Halfway down the alley a neon sign was blinking, painting everything around it in pink hues.

Miyamoto nodded towards it with a satisfied smile. "This is it."

"The Golden Egg," Malik read out loud as they approached. "Classy."

Ryou twisted his mouth. Was this the place they were looking for? It didn't look like much.

The establishment was several stories high and seemed to be at least fifty years old: one of those hastily-built and poorly-designed buildings that had cropped up everywhere in Domino during the years of its industrial bloom. Tens of windows looked down at them, most of them with their curtains drawn or their shutters closed. The façade did not look appealing in the slightest, and the pink sign with the awful cursive letters just made everything worse.

On the ground level the entrance door stood open, but the way was blocked by a massive man. He was well-built enough to cover most of the doorway by himself, and what little was visible of his neck muscles and his hands was densely tattooed. From the depths of the building behind him came the steady beat of music, muffled and distant.

"Stick close to me and keep your wallets ready," Miyamoto murmured. He approached the man and waved a hand in a casual greeting. "Good evening."

The man fixed him with a severe look; his eyes were too small for his face, which made his expression even more unnerving. His gaze travelled from Miyamoto to Malik, and then it paused on Ryou.

Perhaps it was just the poor lighting playing tricks on him, but Ryou thought the doorman narrowed his eyes. He seemed perplexed.

Ryou's throat went dry.

Of course. Of course.

If his yami was actually working there, then the doorman must have seen him—perhaps even knew him. And here Ryou was, strutting around and displaying their resemblance for everyone to see. He should have known he would have no chance of going unnoticed.

The doorman scrutinized him for a bit, but it didn't last. He turned to the rest of the group and said in a deep, bass voice, "It's a twenty thousand yen entrance."

Malik and Miyamoto took out their wallets at once. The man's gaze kept flicking back to Ryou, who did his best to appear unfazed as he reached in his pocket for cash. He was expecting an inquisitive question, or the man's large hand to clamp his shoulder and stop him from entering, but none of that happened. Once they paid the entrance fee, the doorman let them in without another word.

The moment they were inside, Ryou pulled his hood over his head. He tucked his hair in as best as he could and kept his head low to keep his bangs out of sight. If he managed to get through the night without anyone associating him with his yami, he would call it a win.

They walked down a wide corridor, straight to a set of heavy doors. The music grew louder as they approached, despite the soundproof layers that separated them from it; the whole building seemed to quiver in time with the beat.

It looked like they were headed to some kind of club, even though everything around him reminded Ryou of a hotel: there was a deserted reception desk and a staircase that led to upper floors. If it was a hotel, it must have been out of service for years; the décor was obviously dated and worn.

When they reached the soundproof door, Miyamoto paused with one hand on it. "Stay close to me, alright? We are just passing through."

Before Ryou had time to ask what that meant, Miyamoto pushed the door open.

It was like diving underwater. The music was loud and all-encompassing, stomping out everything else. It swept over Ryou like a wave, almost making him stagger.

He walked in a huge, high-ceilinged hall, full of blinking lights and people. Waitresses and waiters swayed, dressed in crop tops and hot pants; on a stage, a dancer was gyrating around a pole. On the other side of the room stood a bar, with its numerous rows of bottles glimmering in ever-changing colors.

Everything smelled of smoke and alcohol, but not in the way the Crow did. This place had nothing of the Crow's coziness—especially the people. They were leering at everyone, from the dancer on the stage to those around them, even—Ryou noticed with a small quiver in his stomach—them. They were staring at him and Malik in a way that made him feel as if they were pieces of fresh meat thrown in the midst of starving jackals.

He pulled his hood even lower, despite the fact that in washot enough in there.

Miyamoto gestured at them to follow him and started making his way towards the bar. Ryou tried to keep up, keeping his eyes fixed of Malik's back. It was a struggle, pressing against bodies and trying to avoid the stares and the hands and the chilling grins that were flashed his way. At some point, Malik reached out and grabbed his sleeve, and Ryou focused on the slight pulling sensation to block everything else out.

What was this place? It was nothing like what they were looking for: it was no gambling joint nor underground casino. This was a plain old sleazy club. It seemed too low a place, even for someone like his yami.

What was Miyamoto playing at? Was this, indeed, a joke? Or something else, more sinister?

Then again, he had mentioned they were just passing through—whatever that meant.

Ryou clenched his teeth and kept following Malik. They pushed their way through the crowd until they reached a door in the far back of the room. Miyamoto ignored the blocky red letters that read Staff Only and pushed it open.

They stepped into a dark corridor full of crates with bottles and spare sound equipment. The corridor stretched long in both ways; Ryou could make out more doors lining the walls, all closed. It looked like a backstage area. They could still hear the music from the club, but it was no longer deafening.

Ryou did not have enough time to feel relieved. A few feet away, two men were standing beside what looked like a cellar door; he could see they were hiding guns under their suits.

The weight of the guards' somber gazes pressed on Ryou, making all his instincts scream in alert. He couldn't help feeling that he was getting into something much more dangerous than he'd like to—and on the account of his yami, no less. He cursed him inwardly, but he kept his exterior cool and impassive.

Miyamoto approached the guards first. This time, he did not bother with greetings. "Cobalt Velvet," he said, and then he pointed at the duo behind him. "Guests."

One of the guards turned to Ryou and snapped his fingers at him. "You! Hood off." His tone left no room for arguments.

Ryou reached with tentative fingers and lowered his hood. He searched the guard's face for any sign of recognition, but the man showed none; he simply nodded his satisfaction at Ryou's compliance and gestured at them to proceed.

Miyamoto went through the cellar door first and Ryou hurried along, allowing himself a small exhale of relief.

They went down another flight of stairs and crossed another corridor. More security.

Another soundproof door greeted them.

Miyamoto glanced back at them over his shoulder. "Here we are. Ready?" He opened the door without waiting for an answer.

The first thing that Ryou noticed was that what stretched beyond was no mere basement. The place was huge; not as high-ceilinged as the club upstairs had been, but wide and spacious.

The second thing that grabbed Ryou's attention was the octagon cage that stared straight at him from the center of the room.

He blinked. It was a different atmosphere down there; almost a different universe.

Everything was swathed in shadows—some deeper, some softer and blurry. Gambling tables were lined up, each one surrounded by a small cluster of people. The music that played through the speakers was loud, but not enough to drown out all the other noises: the din of chatter and laughter buzzed in the air, mixing with the cigarette smoke swirling above their heads. A bar took up one side of the hall, shining like a well-lit harbor in a dim sea.

The place was fairly crowded already: those who weren't gambling were either lining up at the bar or gathered around the cage. A few people were huddled around private tables, tucked in dark alcoves away from the rest of the crowd.

"This is it," Miyamoto said, clapping his hands once. He nodded towards the cage and smirked. "And that's where your guy will be in a while."

"Wow," Malik breathed. He looked around, visibly enthralled; a smile flickered on his lips.

Ryou's eyes turned to the cage. Its chain-link walls glimmered like a crown above the crowd. It looked other-worldly; surreal.

He gulped. His throat felt dry again.

"We have enough time for a game," Miyamoto said, pointing towards the roulettes. "A couple of friends are waiting for me. Wanna come along?"

Ryou caught Malik's eye. He was grateful for Miyamoto's help, but he couldn't wait to shake him off and be able to talk to his friend openly.

Malik must have read it on his face, because he gave Miyamoto an apologetic smile and said, "Uh- I'll think we'll head to the bar. If you don't mind."

Miyamoto didn't seem to bother—if he'd paid any attention to Malik at all. He kept one eye on the roulettes as he waved a hand. "No problem, no problem. You'll know where to find me if you need me."

"Okay. Thanks for everything, Miyamoto."

"Nah, don't mention it. See ya later, okay?" He gave them a hasty wave and disappeared in the crowd, only to reappear a few seconds later right next to the roulettes.

Ryou pulled his hood back on at once. He realized it probably looked weird, or even suspicious, but he preferred it over the alternative.

They had already started attracting a few curious gazes the way they were hovering on the threshold, so he patted Malik's arm and murmured, "Come on, let's not just stand here."

They made their way towards the bar. Ryou tried to keep his eyes low and his face out of view. He didn't know why the idea of someone mistaking him for his yami made him feel so nervous, but it was better to be safe than sorry. It wasn't like he knew what to expect from a place with armed guards on all entrances, after all. If his yami had taught him one thing, it was that attracting as little attention as possible could be unexpectedly beneficial.

They found two free stools by the bar counter and perched on them. Ryou kept his limbs close to his body, trying to take up as little space as possible and hoping for the shadows to render him non-descript and unremarkable.

Malik looked a lot more relaxed. He leaned with an elbow against the counter and let his gaze leisurely roam the place. He was incandescent in the light of the bar: his hair and his earrings gleamed gold, contrasting with the resolute darkness of the kohl around his eyes. He hadn't painted the old Tomb-Keeper pattern, but the simple black lines he'd drawn suited him nonetheless.

It was hard not to admire the way he retained his confidence even in an unfamiliar place like this. He radiated ease, as if this was his typical Saturday night.

Well, perhaps that shouldn't surprise Ryou this much. This was Malik, after all. Despite all the meditation and the yoga and his unwavering calmness, he was still the guy who performed stunts with bikes for a living and had organized an underground crime ring at the tender age of sixteen.

And if he were to be honest, Ryou wasn't a novice, either. There was a perverse sense of familiarity in all of this. It was like walking backwards right into something from his past.

He'd never been in a place exactly like this one, but he had seen his fair share of questionable dives—and not by choice. There had been that time in his life when waking up in unknown corners of Domino had been the norm. He'd grown used to finding himself in underground bars, with the Millennium Ring heavy around his neck and his pockets full of cash that hadn't been there before he'd blacked out. Normally, all the explanation he'd get would be a single word, hissed maliciously across his brain.

'Rent.'

Maybe that was why Ryou didn't like this place. It was way too fitting.

"Hey, I think they are playing Duel Monsters over there!" Malik said, pointing at one of the tables.

Ryou curled in on himself a bit more. "Not really interested."

"Yeah, me neither," Malik said. He gestured towards his hood instead. "Are you gonna keep this on?"

Ryou pulled it a bit lower, making sure his hair was covered. "Yes."

"Why?"

Ryou bit his lip. "I don't want anyone to think I'm him."

He expected Malik to tease him, or to say he was being paranoid, but he didn't; he merely gave him a sympathetic smile. "I get that this must be very weird for you."

"It's not weird," he said, but he tasted the lie on his tongue. The truth was that it was weird, and uncomfortable, and both familiar and unknown to the point of being scary. He felt exposed, even though he knew that it was not likely that anyone was paying any attention to him. How did Malik manage to handle it so well?

"I just don't like this place," he murmured at last.

"I get it. It's… shady," Malik agreed.

"You seem comfortable enough," Ryou said. He hoped he hadn't sounded too accusing; he didn't want a repeat of their argument about Battle City or something of the like. He'd made the decision to trust Malik fully, and he would.

"I'm just used to all sorts of crowds," Malik said with a shrug. He chuckled and gave Ryou a playful nudge. "Come on, treat this as a job! Let me see your customer service smile."

Ryou stared at him blankly.

Malik laughed. "Okay, okay, I'm kidding. But do try to relax. How about a beer? My treat."

Alcohol did not sound like a bad idea. In fact, it sounded like a very, very good one. It might make the night go by a bit easier.

"Sure."

Malik gestured at the barman and ordered two beers, while Ryou tried to not think too much about how he would prefer something stronger, or how comfortable the buzz in his veins would be after a shot or two.

But Malik was right. He should try to relax a bit.

It was okay. He could do it. He would simply sit there and wait until his yami was done with his… match, or whatever, and then they would talk. A clean, straight-forward discussion; a cold array of facts followed by a proposition. They would get an answer, yes or no, and that would be it. Simple enough.

And, if he was lucky, he might even get to see his yami bleed.

The barman left two beers in front of them. Malik picked one of the foaming glasses and said, "Cheers!"

"Cheers," Ryou mumbled back.

The drink was cold and did somehow help with the dryness in his throat. He sipped at it and scanned the crowd as discreetly as he could, searching for a white mane of hair. No recognizable characteristics stuck out from the sea of faces; all he could see were unfamiliar figures, men and women, ghostly in the subtle illumination.

The noises around them grew louder as more people arrived; the music was a steady, senseless pound in his ears.

He leaned towards Malik to be heard over the commotion. "Where do you think he is?" he asked, loading the pronoun with the necessary amount of distaste.

Malik blinked once, then caught on.

"Uuh… Probably backstage? With a coach or something?" He shrugged. "He didn't tell me much. I don't know how this works."

"You think we could get to him somehow?"

"I doubt they'll let us see him before the match. But there's bound to be a schedule or something." Malik glanced around, probably looking for some kind of announcement board or a poster. When he found none, he slipped down from his seat and said, "Wait."

He left Ryou alone for a bit and approached the barman. He leaned against the counter and started chatting with him, all while wearing a dazzling smile on his lips. He was such a natural at this that Ryou couldn't help but feel another small twinge of admiration.

Malik returned a minute later and hopped back on his stool. "Yes, well. Diabound is scheduled for the night's third match. So we wait."

Ryou deflated. "Oh, great."

The third match of the night. That meant that Ryou would have to watch his yami's match and two more on top of that. If his yami were there at all.

"It shouldn't be long now," Malik said and took out his phone. "It's almost midnight. It should start any minute n-"

His sentence was cut as the lights in the hall dimmed. As if on cue, the chatter grew louder and more excited: its buzz filled the air like electricity. Everybody abandoned the blackjack tables and the roulettes to huddle around the cage. In less than a minute, the space around it was packed.

"Wanna go closer?" Malik said.

Ryou looked at the centre of the room. Despite the sea of heads that stood between him and the cage, he still had a clear line of view. It was more than enough. He wasn't sure if he wanted to see the match at all.

He shook his head no.

"Ladies and gentlemen," a voice boomed from the speakers, "welcome to another of Saturday's special fight nights!"

A round of cheering and applause shook the hall. The spotlights hitting the cage grew brighter, practically cancelling out all other sources of light.

"I hope you placed your bets," the announcer went on, "because tonight is bound to be exciting, with not one, nor two, but five matches in a row! Gather around and get ready to welcome our first pair of fighters!"

A door across the hall opened. The sea of people shifted a little and allowed a man to pass through them. He climbed in the cage while the announcer shouted his name with a surplus of pompousness.

He was exceptionally fit, dressed in nothing but a pair of fight shorts. He had no protective gear on, nor gloves—just some tape wrapped around his wrists and hands. He jumped around to keep warm while the crowd cheered and shouted his name.

Ryou tried to keep his face impassive. He pretended he didn't care—he wasn't there for the show, anyway—but he did not take his eyes off the cage.

Another name was announced and a second man joined the first, just as toned and eager-looking.

Ryou noticed the fighters' buzzed heads and absently reached for one of his own long tufts. Despite of him, he wondered how his yami would fare with his long hair. Then again, the hair would probably be the smallest of his problems. The yami had Ryou's body. He would be doomed.

A bell rang, indicating the start of the match.

Ryou's stomach clenched. He contemplated looking away and focusing on his drink, but the moment he noticed the fighters moving, he found himself unable to avert his gaze. Watching them was… addicting.

It wasn't like the fights he'd seen in movies. This one was messier; there was lots of moving around, lots of unclear hits and lackluster blows. Most of the time the two fighters measured each other up, calculating their movements despite the impatient shouts of the crowd.

As the seconds and the minutes ticked by, the sight became vicious. When the first traces of blood appeared, Ryou felt his stomach flip. He took out a cigarette and lit it, without taking his gaze off the fighting men.

This was even more surreal than looking at the empty cage: this was a piece from another world. A louder one. Intense. Sharp.

He took a drag from his cigarette to calm his racing heart.

In the cage, the two men had started struggling. The violence made the atmosphere heavier; the crowd went wild, jeering and booing and whistling all at once.

The match ended when one of the fighters caught the other in a headlock.

"Nice move!" Malik exclaimed, clapping along with the others. "Did you see that, Ryou?"

Ryou took his time to finish his cigarette before answering. "Yeah."

One match down. Two to go. He could do this.

The fighters left the cage and a man with a mop went in to wipe the blood off the floor.

The hall was turning more crowded with each minute that passed. Everyone was jostling around the cage, filling the hall with excited chatter and shouts.

"I wonder if Bakura is as popular as Miyamoto claims," Malik pondered.

Ryou pressed his lips together. It was true that Miyamoto had raved about Diabound all the way there; he'd told them all about his previous match, his trick with the wrapping tape and the odds for tonight's fight.

"I guess we'll find out soon," he replied. Or not, he added inwardly. Now that he'd seen what it was all about, the idea seemed more absurd than ever.

Getting in that cage to fight in front of all these people required a level of bravery he wasn't sure his yami possessed. He'd never been the upfront kind: he had always worked from the shadows, with tricks and cheats. It seemed unlikely that he would expose himself like that. It simply wasn't to his character.

The man with the mop left, leaving the cage sparkling. The blood on the floorboards might as well have never existed.

When the lights dimmed again, Ryou felt the thud of his heart against his ribs.

"Second match!" Malik said, straightening his back. It was obvious he was having a blast; his cheeks were flushed and his eyes were gleaming with enthusiasm.

Ryou took out another cigarette. He didn't want to speak. A tightness in his throat made it impossible.

Two more men went in the cage, almost exact copies of the first ones.

Surely his yami would not be stupid enough to go in there. He would get his ass handed to him. Not that he wouldn't deserve it—no, the man deserved all the pain he could get—but it would still be a stupid move. His yami was a lot of things, but he wasn't an idiot.

He barely felt the smoke drifting down his throat. His eyes were fixed on the cage.

The bell sounded again and the fighters started moving. The crowd roared as one.

Ryou tried to pay more attention, to understand what was going on and perhaps map out what would come next, but it was too hard to keep up. Every now and then, Malik leaned towards him and shouted things like, "Did you see that move?" or, "I can't believe he got out of that!"

Ryou never knew what to answer. It was hard to believe that this was actually happening. It all felt like a wild, vivid dream. It was too far from what he was used to. Too far from his reality.

Then again, everything had felt like that as of late. Everything ever since he had returned. This was part of the norm now. Reality upside down.

He brought his cigarette to his lips and wished for the smoke to calm his pulse. The air under his hood was getting suffocating.

This match was bloodier than the previous one. It ended with a knock-out and the crowd went crazy. The loser stayed out cold for just a couple of seconds, but it had been enough: the match was over.

Ryou put out his cigarette, but a twitch remained in his fingers. His brain felt stuck.

He knew what was next.

Malik knew, too; his previously excited smile was frozen on his face. He turned to Ryou with unease shifting in his lavender eyes. "It's Bakura's turn," he said.

He was visibly nervous. He was fiddling with one of his gold bracelets as he glanced from Ryou to the cage and back.

The man with the mop had gone back in to clean the blood.

"Yeah," Ryou said. His voice sounded distant.

His yami's turn.

Would he really be there? Would he actually climb in that cage and do something so brutal and reckless and-

Primal, and-

Dangerous?

"Do you think… we could go closer?" Malik asked.

Ryou didn't have the heart to say no to him. And…

Well. He was curious.

"Okay."

They hopped down from their stools and squeezed in the crowd, pushing and elbowing their way through until they managed to get as close to the cage as possible. It was hotter there; Ryou could feel beads of sweat form on the back of his neck. The air was sticky, dense with many breaths and smoke.

Ryou looked at the cage, the lights above it, the faces around him. Bodies were pressing against him on all sides, but the sensation barely registered. He felt detached. Far-away.

When the lights dimmed, cheers erupted all around, almost covering the announcer's voice.

"Ladies and gentlemen, place your final bets, because the third match of the night will be fiery!"

More cheering.

"Our next fighter needs no introduction. You know him. You've seen what he can do. One of this ring's favorites, with five consecutive victories… Please welcome… Kenjiii!"

The crowd parted enough to allow a single figure to cross the room. The new fighter climbed in the cage and paced around, urging the crowd to make some more noise.

"And now… The one everyone has been talking about," the announcer dropped his voice a bit, for effect. "He looks like an angel, but he fights like a demon. He won't stop. He won't hesitate. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome… Diabound!"

And then there he was. Walking through the crowd without throwing as much as a glance around. Gaze low, shoulders hunched. Red fight shorts. White hair gathered up in a ponytail but still, somehow, still looking wild and untamed.

His yami.

Bakura.

Ryou was pulled back into his body so forcefully it hurt. There was a fiery pang right in the centre of his chest; a blow that felt like fury and loathing and a dozen other emotions all mingled in one.

He was there. Right there. He had been telling the truth, after all.

Ryou didn't know if he would prefer the alternative. He didn't know what he would prefer. His brain had short-circuited, repeating three words, over and over.

He is here.

He is here.

The yami climbed the steps to the cage. He walked under the spotlights and his muscles were thrown into sharp relief.

Ryou's breath caught in his throat.

The sight should have been familiar. It should have been a reflection of Ryou's body—and yet it wasn't. Ryou's body had never looked like this. He'd never thought it possible.

The scars were still there: the semi-circle on the abdomen, caused by the prongs of Millennium Ring, and the jagged line on the left bicep. Everything else was completely different. He saw muscles he did not recognize wrapping around familiar bones. Shoulders, arms, legs, torso, all were sharp and defined. This wasn't Ryou's frame, gaunt and spindly: this body was sturdier, and standing slightly curled in, compact and solid.

The muscles writhed under his skin as the yami moved. He rolled a shoulder and cracked his neck, and his shoulder blades jutted out to catch the light.

The hall was chanting 'Diabound', but Bakura paid it no mind. He stood on one side of the cage and examined his fingernails, as if he was above all of this.

Ryou gazed at him, even though the sight was burning him. He could feel it, scorching his insides inch by inch, slowly; it charred the back of his throat and the pit of his gut. It was beyond loathing: it was seeing his worst reflection in the flesh. Every wrong step, every bad decision, everything that had gone wrong in his life had a face, and it was his.

He tried to take a deep breath. All the bodies around him were moving, pushing and cheering, but he stood unmoving in their midst, rigid and ice-cold.

Two more men climbed the steps of the cage, but they did not go in; they lingered by the door, somber and dispassionate like sentinels. They hadn't been there before.

The moment they closed the door of the cage, Bakura changed: like the flick of a switch, he stopped acting smug and indifferent. He turned his gaze to his opponent and locked it on him with such intense focus that Ryou could practically feel him blocking out everything else.

Bakura shifted his weight to the balls of his feet and rolled his shoulders in ever so slightly. The muscles on his abdomen tensed and tightened, making the shadows on his body crisper. His red eyes shone behind the white bangs.

The sound of the bell was shrill: it pierced through the shouts and the cheers, shattering the stillness in the cage.

The other man lunged first, and Ryou flinched without meaning to.

He did not know what he expected. Perhaps he'd thought Bakura would keel over after a few hits—they shared a body, after all—or retreat and give up. When the first hit landed, Ryou half-expected for the match to end.

It didn't.

Bakura took it all with a clench in his jaw. If there was pain, he didn't show it: his eyes remained on his opponent as he blocked the hits with his arms and thighs. When he struck back, it was fast and calculated.

Ryou was quiet—perhaps the only quiet one in a mass of shouts and cheers—but his eyes were wide and unblinking.

His yami was fluid like a feline, bouncing on the balls of his feet. He could see his white hair whipping the air, his ribs sticking out with each inhale. The floorboards barely sank under his weight, as if he were a ghost again. He kept moving, never standing still, and all that was left behind was the impression of a glare, like a red afterimage.

Ryou's spine stiffened each time a hit landed. He didn't care about whether his yami would win or lose—he didn't care —but he couldn't control the reaction. There was a tightness in his lungs, a shortage of breaths; inhales too shallow, heartbeat too fast.

His yami would bruise. Ryou knew it; he knew his skin. He could almost feel it himself, like phantom pain from imaginary blows.

Bakura didn't seem to care. If he did, it didn't stop him.

He didn't stop when he took a fist to his stomach or when the shin of his opponent connected with his thigh with a hair-raising slap. And he didn't stop when things started getting bloody.

At first it was nothing but tiny cuts on both their bodies, brought on by the sharpness of their knuckles. The beads of blood that appeared were quickly washed away by their sweat, trickling over their muscles in pinkish rivulets.

Until a knee was planted in Bakura's stomach, right where the scars from the Millennium Ring were. He doubled over, drawing his arms close to him a moment too late. He staggered on the spot, gasping for breath, but that moment of immobility was enough for his opponent: his fist flew upwards and struck the yami straight in the face.

Ryou's gasp caught behind his teeth.

Blood sparkled in the light as Bakura was sent reeling back.

A shout pierced through the noise, and it took Ryou an absurdly long second to realize the voice belonged to Malik. He had almost forgotten about him; he had forgotten all about where he was. All he could do was watch.

Blood, thick and dark, poured out of the yami's nose. He tried to take a few more steps away, but it was obvious the blow had left him dazed.

"No- shit- move! Move!" Malik yelled, but his shouts were lost in the pandemonium.

Ryou couldn't judge him. His skin crawled as he saw the blood dripping down Bakura's chin and around his feet.

The other fighter saw the chance and went in for a grapple. Bakura tried to dodge, but he was not fast enough. His opponent managed to grab him by the hair: he fisted his palm in the white tufts and pulled roughly enough to make the yami stumble back.

Everybody was shouting; Malik was screaming instructions.

Ryou couldn't shout even if he wanted to. His voice was lost somewhere in his throat.

Pain and shock crumpled the yami's features. Panic flashed in his eyes, but it lasted for barely a heartbeat.

He whirled around with a snarl in his lips and brought a clawed hand down on his opponent's face.

The man released him at once, sending several uprooted white hairs flying in the air. He clutched at his face and back-stepped, while the crowd roared and cheered.

Bakura took the opportunity to put some more distance between them. He wiped the blood off his face with the back of his hand, staining the red wrappings with darker crimson. Then he turned his head to the side and spat something out—something that bounced across the floorboards and landed a couple of feet away. It remained there, sparkling under the spotlights, semi-transparent in the spots where it wasn't covered in blood.

A mouthguard, Ryou realized. He had spat out his mouthguard.

Across from him, the other fighter lowered his hands, revealing three deep, bloody scratches running across his face. He looked furious.

Bakura wiped his chin again, breathing hard through parted lips. His chest rose and fell with the force of his panting, and his eyes burned over the bloody half of his face, reflecting the livid hue.

When the next blow darted towards him, Ryou thought that this would be it, that there was no way his yami would be able to keep going after that.

Bakura swerved and dodged. He moved, his feet smearing red over the floorboards.

The air in the hall was heavy and hard to breathe. Elbows dug in Ryou's torso as everybody tried to get a better view, but he didn't give in; he pushed and craned his neck, trying to keep his gaze on the cage.

Sweat was dripping from the tips of the yami' bangs, sparkling in the light. His limbs had started to drag, just barely, but he was still fast.

His opponent closed in, throwing punches in earnest. There was a determined edge on his eyes; he kept punching, without stop, until Bakura could do nothing but block and wait it out.

They were close to each other: so close, that Bakura ventured to retaliate by driving his knee in the man's ribs. The other fighter reacted quickly: he swiped Bakura's leg from under him and the yami hit the floor of the cage with a thud that Ryou felt all the way to his bones.

Noise erupted all around.

The other fighter climbed on top of Bakura, trying to both keep him there and get more hits in.

"Shit- Get out of there! Get up! Get up!" Malik screamed.

Bakura drew his knees close to him in an effort to cover himself, or perhaps to control some of his blows with the rest of his body. Everything was a mess of limbs and blood and sweat, but even in this chaos, Ryou saw Bakura wrap a leg around the man's waist.

He didn't quite catch what happened next. There was a shift of legs and a twist of Bakura's hips and, in the blink of an eye, the positions were reversed; his opponent hit the floor instead, face first, and Bakura climbed on top among the deafening shouts of the crowd. He pinned him with his weight, holding one of the man's arms in a secure grip.

The angle looked painful. Way too extreme for any shoulder.

Ryou's stomach dropped. He understood what was about to happen a split-second before it did.

With an abrupt movement, Bakura pulled. If there was a sound, it got lost in the noise; all that was heard was a howl of pain, slicing through all other voices as the man's arm settled in an even more unnatural angle than before.

Bakura remained on top of him, pinning him with a knee between his shoulder blades. He did not let the arm go.

The man couldn't move. When he tried to squirm, he let out another cry of pain.

"Tap out!" someone close to Ryou shouted. Others joined in, until it turned into a chorus.

"Tap out! Tap out!"

Ryou wished the man would tap out. His face was contorted in pain to the point where it was hard to watch. He wanted to shout, too, because this had to stop. There was no point; it was over. Everybody could tell.

The men outside the cage were moving towards the door. Bakura glanced at them but did not move, and Ryou's hair stood on end.

In that moment, he was certain that nothing could make his yami stop. Not a tap-out, nor the men outside the door. The expression on his face was raw; nearly crazed, but still set, impossibly determined.

A small movement caught his eye. The trapped man's free arm snaked out from underneath him and tapped the floor repeatedly; frantically.

The scene changed at once.

Bakura let the arm go and slumped backwards at the same time that the door of the cage burst open. The two men that were standing outside stormed in and rushed to the fallen fighter.

Bakura crawled away from them. He dragged his body to one of the chain-link walls and rested against it, heaving; his chest was rising and falling fast, slick with sweat and blood. He kept watching his opponent without blinking, as if he was expecting their fight to resume any second now.

The noise in the hall had no precedent. Everybody was shouting, some were booing; Malik was cheering and punching the air.

Ryou felt like being in the middle of a wild, celebratory tide, pushed from all sides by bodies an arms. Fists and hands were raised everywhere, clapping and whistling. Everything was moving, but he felt suspended. His voice was still lost in his throat.

A short and rather heavy-set man went to Bakura. He leaned over him and said something, but the yami shook his head. He tried to get up by holding on the wall of the cage and almost fell. In the end he accepted a helping hand.

Ryou watched as Bakura was declared the winner. He watched his yami wince at the outbreak of cheering and scrunch his eyes shut.

He would have expected him to celebrate. It wasn't like Bakura to miss an opportunity to show-off. If nothing else, his smugness would be justified for once.

Bakura didn't. When everything was over and done with, he shuffled out of the cage, trying and failing to walk without holding on to the short man next to him.

There was pain in Ryou's jaw. Slowly, with gradual realization, he unclenched his teeth. A similar pain in his hands told him that his nails had sunk into his palms.

He raised a hand to wipe at his brow. His fingers were shaking.

He blinked at his surroundings, noticing how many people he was squeezed among and how little space he had to breathe. In the half-light, a white head was moving through the crowd, headed for the locker room.

He watched his yami leave, numb.

Malik leaned towards him and nudged him with his elbow, pointing to the yami's retreating figure. "Hey, should we-?"

Ryou shook his head. He was certain that approaching Bakura like that was not the best idea—there were too many people around and too much noise and Ryou needed some time to breathe first.

He grabbed Malik's arm and started pulling him to the opposite direction, out of the sea of people. Thankfully, Malik did not resist.

Ryou did not glance back to see where his yami was going—he did not care whether he had already left the hall or whether he had lingered around the cage to hand out autographs or something. He fixed his gaze on the bar instead and let it lead him like a lighthouse in the dark.

He noticed an empty spot by the counter and made a beeline for it. He reached it and grabbed the wood with white fingers, grateful for its solidity.

Malik leaned against the counter next to him and ran a hand through his hair. "That was wild!"

Ryou didn't speak. The alcohol they had drunk before might as well have never existed; there was no buzz in his veins to blur out the images of what he had just seen. Everything replayed itself in front of his eyes in striking vividness.

There was a tremor in his hands and too much cold sweat drenching the back of his neck. He couldn't get why. He'd gotten what he wanted. He saw him bleed. He should feel satisfied.

But maybe it was reasonable. It had sort of been his body he had witnessed getting beaten up and bleed.

It made sense. It was normal.

It was logical.

It was-

It was too much. He needed a drink.

He raised his hand and asked for a glass of vodka.

"Hey," Malik leaned closer and examined his face. "Are you okay?"

The 'I'm fine' leapt on his tongue like a reflex, but he held it back. He tried to blink the image of his bleeding yami from his eyes.

The barman left a glass of vodka in front of him. The clear liquid sloshed a bit, looking as innocent as water. No ice, no lemon. At the moment, it didn't matter.

Ryou brought the glass to his lips. For a few blissful seconds, he focused on nothing but the way the alcohol spread all the way to his brain.

"Ryou?" Malik asked again. A concerned crease had appeared between his brows.

"Yeah, I'm fine," he finally managed to reply. "You?"

Malik seemed surprised by the question. "Me? Yeah, sure. I'm just-" He let out a breathless chuckle. "That was kinda scary, wasn't it?"

Ryou clenched his jaw."It was," he murmured, so quietly he wasn't sure if Malik had heard him.

Malik ran a hand through his hair again, laughing awkwardly to nothing in particular. "Damn. He was good. Some of those moves were…" He trailed off, shaking his head in awe.

Ryou did not know what to answer. He didn't want to start praising his yami's skills, but denying them altogether would be plain stupid. He wasn't blind; he had seen the match.

He decided to say nothing.

He couldn't help but wonder why Bakura hadn't done something like that on the night he'd ambushed Ryou outside his workplace. They had been alone; no witnesses around, no one to stop him. It wouldn't have been hard for him, and Ryou would not have been able to fight back. Instead, all Bakura had done was sneer and spit threats.

No—he shouldn't be thinking about that now. It really wasn't helping.

He took another generous swig of vodka. The hum of alcohol was a blessing on his brain.

He set his glass on the counter with a hollow thud. "What do we do now?" he asked, keeping his voice cool and emotionless.

Malik pointed towards the door to the locker room. "We wait for him to come out, I guess."

Ryou turned to at the door. His vision swam a bit, and he blinked to steady himself. "There could be a staff exit back there," he pointed out.

Malik's face fell. He muttered something in Arabic as he glanced around the room for alternatives.

"Okay, how about this: I'll go and knock on the door and leave a message for him. Let him know that we are here."

"You think that's a good idea?"

"I'm open to suggestions."

He hesitated. He fumbled with his glass a bit, but he couldn't come up with anything more efficient.

"Okay. Just be careful. Don't give our real names to anyone."

"Don't worry; I know how to handle this."

Malik fixed his hair until his tufts settled in a somewhat more tidy disarray. Then he dived in the crowd again, squeezing his way through to the other side of the hall.

He knocked on the locker room door and a man answered; Ryou couldn't be sure from this distance, but it looked like the short man that had helped his yami out of the cage. The man listened to Malik for a while. In the end, he gave him a nod and closed the door again.

Malik navigated his way back to Ryou with a triumphant grin. "Done," he said when he reached him. "Now we just wait for him to come out."

Ryou sighed.

Good. Waiting. Again.

He could do it. He needed a bit of time, anyway. Perhaps another cigarette, for the nerves.

No more alcohol for tonight, though; the world was swaying at the edges.

He ordered a glass of water and waited.

The rest of the matches passed in a blur. The crowd had started dispersing and the man with the mop was cleaning the last traces of blood off the cage, when Ryou saw the door of the locker room open.

Bakura appeared on the threshold, ghostly pale in the shadows and with something white plastered on his nose.

His gaze searched the bar; the moment he spotted Malik, his face crumpled in an expression of fury. He started making his way towards him at once, shoving and tackling aside whoever stood in the way.

Then his gaze fell on Ryou.

Ryou saw the exact moment he recognized him, because the yami froze. There was a pause in his steps; a few seconds of something like disbelief.

Ryou didn't dare blink. Loathing and nervousness mingled together and sent a shiver through him, but he did not move. He tried to keep his face unchanged.

Bakura lowered his head, just enough to allow his bangs to hide his eyes, and resumed his advance. It was hard to miss the way his shoulders curled in and settled into a tense line.

Ryou did not take his eyes off him as he approached. The closer he got, the more Ryou could make out. Water was still clinging at the tips of his hair, leaving wet patches on his hoodie, and a dark bruise wrapped around one of his eye-sockets. Multiple cuts littered his face, stark crimson against the pale skin. The tape and bandages on his nose made everything worse; combined with the bruising and the swelling, it made for a grotesque result.

Malik remained as composed and unruffled as ever. Once the yami was close enough, he waved a hand in greeting hand and said, "Hey, Bak-"

Bakura shot him a deadly look and Malik stopped talking at once.

He came to a halt in from of them without a word. He did not look at Ryou again. He glared straight at Malik, his jaw working as if he was trying to hold back a rant. Then, with a loud huff, he pushed his hands deep in his pockets and turned his gaze to some random spot on the bar. His entire body was taut like a wound up coil.

"What the hell are you doing here?" he asked in a choked-off growl. He was furious, but a pinch around his eyes hinted at pain.

Surprisingly, Malik smiled. "Hello to you, too, Bakura. Nice to see you."

Bakura's head snapped towards him. He took half a step closer to Malik, just enough to make him recoil. "You think this is funny?"

Malik's smile was wiped from his face. "What?" he stammered. "No, w-"

"You think this is clever or something? Coming here to watch the show? Must have been real entertaining, huh? Real fun." He did not shout, but his voice was rough with restrained fury.

Malik lifted his hands in a placating gesture. "Hey, no. You got this the wrong way. We didn't come for the match-"

"Like hell you didn't."

"No, listen to me. We need to talk to you."

"Talk to me?"

"Yeah, we-"

"And you had to come here?"

"Well… You left me no phone number."

"There was a reason I didn't!" Bakura hissed, looking at him as if he were a complete idiot.

Ryou would interfere, but something stopped him. He saw the cage before his eyes again, the yami punching with a feral snarl in his lips, and he hesitated.

He wasn't afraid of him. He wasn't—he assured himself of it.

But he still didn't speak.

Malik kept his calm and returned Bakura's glower with a steady look of his own. "And how was I supposed to get to you? It's important, you know."

"I don't-"

"It's about the Spellbook."

Bakura faltered at that. For a few beats, he stared at Malik. Then he rubbed his fingertips into his eyes, careful to avoid his bruised nose. "Shit," he whispered under his breath. He glanced around, and his gaze paused on one of the private tables on the other side of the room. "Shit," he repeated.

His eyes did not skim over Ryou even once. His body was poised away from him in a deliberate effort to keep him out of this, or perhaps to pretend that Ryou did not exist. If their gazes hadn't met before, he might believe that his yami hadn't realized he was present.

There was something odd about it; something that threw Ryou off. This wasn't the Bakura he'd met the last time. There was no arrogance, no smugness. He didn't even look angry anymore; there was unease in the way his shoulders curled up and in.

"Okay, listen," the yami said in a low voice. His gaze flickered to the private tables again, quick and furtive, without moving his head. "Go upstairs and wait for me by the bar. I'll come and get you in ten minutes, tops."

Malik frowned. "What? Why go-?"

"We can't talk here, you idiot," Bakura hissed under his breath.

At that, Ryou finally found his voice. "Why not?"

Bakura's shoulders crawled a bit closer to his ears. "Just do as I say," he said without looking at him.

Ryou opened his mouth to demand an answer, but Malik stopped him with a hand on his arm. "Okay, we'll go upstairs," he said in an appeasing voice. "We just have to find a friend first and let him know we are leaving without him."

"Whatever, just be quick about it."

"Okay, okay. Come on, Ryou," Malik said with a gentle tap on his arm.

Ryou made to follow, but Bakura's voice stopped him.

"Wait."

He turned around and found the yami's eyes piercing him. The red eyes bore into his, no longer bothering with pretending to ignore him. There was such intensity in that glare that Ryou was rooted to the spot.

He tried not to falter and returned the look.

"Yes?" he said coldly.

Bakura pointed a finger at him. "Keep your hood on."

Ryou stared at him. He might have scoffed, simply because he was not about to start accepting orders from him, but something in the yami's tone made him pause. There was an urgent edge in his voice: an anxiousness that made it sound more like a warning and less like an order.

Surprising himself, Ryou nodded. "Okay."

"Good," Bakura growled. "Now get the hell out of here." With one more dirty look at Malik—one that clearly conveyed he still thought he was an utter idiot—he left.

Ryou watched his hunched back and white hair dive back in the shadows of the hall.

His warning kept ringing in his head. Automatically, Ryou raised a hand to make sure his hair was still safely tucked in his hood.

Why did he warn him, though? Why bother?

"Hey, come on," Malik said and pulled him gently. "Let's go find Miyamoto."

Ryou peeled his eyes off his yami's back. "Yeah, okay."

Locating Miyamoto wasn't hard: he was at the roulettes, just as he had told them he would. He didn't seem to care too much that they were leaving, although he did try to convince them to stay for a couple of games. When he started asking whether they'd found Diabound and exclaiming how awesome the match was, Malik pretended they had a cab waiting outside and sorry, we really gotta go, catch you some other time, okay?

They went back upstairs, back into the garish lights and the flickering shadows of the club. The music was even louder than before: Ryou could feel the bass down to the roots of his teeth.

The heat was heavy, but he kept his hood on. He would have done so even if his yami hadn't told him to, but the fact that that he had bothered enough to warn him was… perplexing.

Then again, the yami was probably saving his own skin. Avoiding unwanted questions, etcetera. No reason to think about it further.

He and Malik huddled in a corner of the bar, as far away from the lights as possible, and waited.

After a few minutes, Ryou spotted Bakura. He recognized him the moment he walked into the club, even though he had his hood on and his head low. He was nothing more than another shadow in a dark, writhing mass, and yet there was something about the way that he moved that left Ryou no doubt that it was him.

Bakura approached them and gave them a long, smoldering look. Without a word, he gestured at them to follow him.

He slithered through the crowd, barely disturbing it. Ryou and Malik struggled to keep up, elbowing their way through and breathing hasty apologies that got lost in the noise.

They walked out the heavy soundproof doors and into the entrance corridor. Surprisingly, there was a small crowd there , too: people were huddled in small groups, talking or smoking, while others were going up or down the big staircase that led to the upper floors. A couple of bouncers were standing by the exit, but their focus was mostly on the street and on the line outside the door.

Bakura grabbed Ryou and Malik and pulled them to the side, behind a group of men that chatted loudly. His grip was hard and bossy, and Ryou had to consciously swallow the urge to shake him off.

"Okay," Bakura breathed without taking his eyes off the door. "Go up the staircase to the third floor. Talk to no one, even if they talk to you, and look no one in the eye. Just go straight up. If anyone asks why you're there, tell them you have an appointment. I'll be right behind you."

Ryou frowned. He couldn't help but glance back towards the bouncers, wondering why they made Bakura so nervous. He was supposed to work in this place—being so secretive made no sense. It made him feel like being illegally smuggled in an already illegal place.

"Move it!" Bakura growled.

Ryou and Malik jumped out of their impromptu hiding spot and headed to the staircase. A couple of men were climbing up so they followed them, trying to look as inconspicuous as possible.

Ryou gazed at everything from under his hood, keeping his head low. They crossed paths with a few half-dressed girls and a couple of men in suits, but nobody paid them any mind. When they reached the first floor landing, they saw a long corridor lined with numbered doors. More scantily clad girls were standing on doorways, talking to each other or to the men that came and went.

"Malik," he murmured, inching closer to him. "Where the hell is he taking us?"

"No idea," Malik murmured back, and Ryou was not at all reassured to hear a note of worry in his voice.

They kept going up until they reached the third floor. They stood by the staircase, at an obvious loss of what else to do, and tried not to look suspicious.

At least, this floor was not as busy as the previous two. It wasn't much, but it was enough to make Ryou breathe a small sigh of relief.

He surveyed his surroundings. There were about twenty rooms on this floor, each one marked with brass numbers. It looked as ran-down as the rest of the building: the carpet was worn and dirty and the paint on the doors was flaking off.

A girl stared at them from the doorway of a room. When she caught Ryou's eye, she batted her eyelashes and smiled. He had no time to panic about it, because at that very moment he heard hurried steps on the stairs behind him.

Bakura showed up, looking stormy. He rushed past them without a look or a word, but Ryou and Malik took the hint and followed him.

"Oh, hey, grumpy pants," the girl called to Bakura with a giggle. "Are these two with you?"

"Mind your own business," Bakura snapped at her.

The girl caught Ryou's eye and arched her eyebrows, as if to say, can you believe him? Then she giggled again.

Ryou looked away at once and hurried to keep up.

Bakura led them to the door with the number 308, unlocked it and gestured at them to get in.

The inside looked tiny and cramped. Ryou walked in hesitantly, with his hands safe in his pockets and his elbows locked to his sides.

In the light coming in from the corridor, he made out the scant furnishing: a bed pushed against a corner, a bed-stand, a desk with a single chair and a small refrigerator. The room's sole window was open, letting drafts of freezing air in.

On the wall to his left, above a sink, was a small stained mirror; Ryou saw his face reflected back at him, pale and uncertain. The carpet on the floor was as dirty as the corridor's outside, and a quick glance upwards revealed mold crawling along the ceiling.

Despite the meager furnishing, it was obvious someone was living in this room—not just casually occupying it or working in it. A bunch of clothes were tossed all around, the bedcovers were messy, and a few food wrappings were in a cardboard serving as a trash bin.

A glint caught Ryou's eye. Under the bed-stand, half-hidden by the shadows, lay an empty glass bottle. He recognized the label on it: vodka.

His body tensed. His gaze travelled to the desk, where he noticed an ashtray full of cigarette butts.

Ryou did not move. In the back of his head flickered tens of similar images. The sight was too familiar; a continuous déjà-vu.

The scene could have jumped straight out of Ryou's past. Not the room, not this room, but other rooms like this, more empty bottles, more full ashtrays; dark, depressing apartments, and Ryou adding another empty bottle to the pile, another year off his face, another night, another day-

He felt like throwing up the vodka he'd drunk.

Bakura got in the room and closed the door, plunging the room in darkness. With the light from the corridor gone, all that remained was the feeble, second-hand illumination that came in through the window.

Ryou blinked, remembering where he was and with whom. He was standing too close to his yami; the room was too small for all three of them. He cringed to the side, almost leaning against the sink to get out of the way.

Bakura did not pay him any attention. He strode to the window and closed it with a small thud. He did not turn on the light.

Ryou's eyes flicked to Malik, who disliked the dark and downright panicked whenever he found himself in small enclosed spaces. He was standing in the middle of the room, pressing his lips together in what Ryou clearly recognized as a sign of displeasure. He did not seem uneasy; if anything, he seemed exasperated. The more he looked around, the more unhappy his expression turned.

"Is this what you meant when you said you had a place to stay?" he asked in clipped tones.

Ryou's stomach clenched.

Did this mean… that this was where his yami lived?

The yami did not respond. He grabbed the room's only chair, dragged it by the window and plopped himself down.

That, for Ryou, was as good as an answer. He didn't get it, though. Why live here, of all places? Surely he could do better than that. The place was a hole: worse than the studio Ryou had moved into after high-school.

He swallowed. He had never stopped to think about where his yami spent the nights. In his head, he had held a sort of otherworldly status; still spectral, half-spirit. Not someone who would have to worry about such mundane things as food and shelter—or having a job.

But of course, now he realized that could not be the case. Bakura had a body now; he was bound to have the same mortal needs as everyone.

But still, Ryou would have never expected this. He would have expected-

He didn't know what. Something fancier. The man could steal whatever he wanted, for fuck's sake. Surely he could do better.

"Sit down, will you?" Bakura grumbled suddenly.

Apart from the chair, the only other place one could sit was the bed.

Ryou looked at it with apprehension: a blanket lay in a heap at the centre, along with what looked like a couple of hoodies and a sock.

Malik pushed the bundle of bedcovers and clothes to the side and sat down. Ryou approached and sat down next to him, touching as little of the bed as he could and keeping his body stiff and upright.

He was still too close to Bakura. If he stretched out his legs, he would touch his feet. He made sure not to.

Bakura did not seem to care. He settled more comfortably in his chair and took off his hood; his white hair spilled over his shoulders in a tangled mess.

Ryou could feel his own scalp melting from the heat, so he mimicked him. He ran his fingers through his hair and shook them, finally allowing his head to breathe.

He caught his yami staring at him out of the corner of his eye. The moment their gazes met, Bakura turned away. He looked out of the window instead, even though all that could be seen were the walls of the opposite buildings.

Nobody spoke. They could still hear the music from the club; it seemed to run through the walls of the building the way veins ran through a body.

Malik broke the silence first. He spoke in a quiet voice, as if afraid to make too much noise.

"How are you?"

Bakura turned towards him. The light hit half of his face, letting the worst of the bruises and the bandages hide in the shadows.

"Fine," he muttered. His voice was hoarse, like the voice of someone who has to rip through layers of exhaustion and pain to speak.

"Is your nose broken?" Malik went on.

Ryou knew that tone: it was the same Malik used whenever he was worried but did not want to show it. It made jealousy twist low between Ryou's ribs.

"It's fine now," was all the yami said.

"Do you need a painkiller? I think I have some with-"

"I said I'm fine."

Malik frowned in a way that clearly said he didn't believe him. Bakura went back to gazing out of the window. A crack ran across the glass, catching the light of the street and breaking it into tiny threads.

"How did you track me down?" he asked suddenly.

"Uuh…" Malik hesitated. "One of the regulars in the Crow likes gambling." He shrugged. "We just tagged along."

"I hope you realize how stupid that was."

"Why?" Malik asked at once.

Bakura didn't speak.

"You know, I could really use an answer. First you tell us we can't talk in the club, then you-"

"And I could really use some peace and quiet, Tomb Keeper, but we don't always get what we want," Bakura cut across him.

He sat up a bit straighter with a small pained grimace and reached into his pocket. He took out a small handful of things and left it on the desk next to him: a tobacco bag, a lighter, a packet of filters and cigarette papers. Then he set out to roll a cigarette.

Ryou froze at the sight.

Bakura's fingers seemed to know what they were doing; he was clearly no first-timer. He must have been doing this for weeks. Perhaps even for a month—ever since the night of his return.

Ryou swallowed. He knew he should have anticipated it, he should have put two and two together the moment he saw that ashtray, but witnessing it was different.

How the hell…? How had his yami picked up this specific habit? How had he guessed?

Had he felt an unexplained craving, or perhaps a pull towards nicotine? And, if that was the case, had he inherited all of Ryou's addictions, old and new alike?

That would explain the vodka bottle, too.

Or it could just be a coincidence.

Ryou didn't like the thought. He liked to think he was as removed from his yami as possible, but the evidence was there. The similarities were staring him in the face, like a reflection gone wrong. Upside down, but still a reflection.

This wasn't just sharing a body, or an appearance. This was sharing a quirk, which somehow felt much more intimate. It was less of a thing that Bakura had copied, and more of a thing that they had in common. The difference was small, but it was there.

Bakura lit his cigarette and took a drag, and for a few seconds the blazing tip was the only thing Ryou could focus on.

A twitch in his fingers demanded of a cigarette, too, but he did not dare take out one. This was no place to relax. Later, perhaps; once he would be back to the safety of his home. Away from here.

Malik twisted his nose. "If you're gonna do this, at least open the window."

Bakura smirked behind a cloud of smoke and reached for the latch.

Cold rushed back in at once, but Ryou didn't mind. He preferred it, even, after the heat and the sticky air of the clubs downstairs.

Bakura leaned back in his chair and took a long drag before speaking. "Now, Tomb-Keeper… Tell me about the Spellbook."

Malik sobered up at once. He sat straight in a serious, business-like manner, and cleared his throat. "Right. Okay. So… remember how I told you we were trying to get our hands on the book?"

Bakura nodded.

"Well, we did manage to get a few pages. Copies of them, anyway."

Bakura's hand froze with his cigarette half-way to his mouth. He stared at Malik, as if trying to determine whether he was telling the truth. "How?" he asked at last.

"Seto Kaiba helped us. He hacked the files of Thomas Blackwood and-"

"How many pages?"

"Fifteen."

"How many more are there?"

"We don't know."

"Do you have them with you?"

At this question, Malik's expression turned stern. "Of course not. I'm not carrying them around."

Bakura breathed out a few curses and ran a hand through his hair. "What was on these pages?"

"That's the problem. We don't know. We can't read them."

Bakura blinked at him. His cigarette had gone out between his fingers, smoked half-way through.

"You can't read them?" he repeated.

"No, it's… some form of code, or a language we don't know."

A dark frown settled on the yami's face. "Why did you come here, then?" he snapped, the bite returning to his voice. "Was that so urgent?"

"Kinda. We-" Malik hesitated. "We are here to ask for your help."

Bakura stared at him. Then he spat out a laugh. "My help? How come?" Something like bitterness colored his sneer.

"I-" Malik started, but he paused and threw a quick glance at Ryou. "We think that you might be the only one who can read it."

"Me? Why?"

"Because-" Malik hesitated again. He sighed and his whole body deflated. "It's a long story."

"I've got time," Bakura said. He emphasized that by lighting his cigarette again and leaning back in his chair.

Malik sighed. "Alright." He rested his elbows on his knees and his earrings swung forward, gleaming in the half-light. "You see, the thing is… the pages are not written in any of the languages any of us can read. Or anyone, for that matter. Not even Seto Kaiba's computer could translate them."

"What about your sister?"

"No, not Ishizu, either. But wait, it gets worse. You see, we… We can't even look at those pages. Every time we try to, they just…" He huffed and threw his hands in the air in an exasperated gesture.

"They what?"

Malik seemed to have trouble explaining it. He opened his mouth and closed it again, shaking his head.

Ryou jumped in to help him. "They make them dizzy," he said. "They cause them hallucinations and nausea, or something like that."

"It's as if whatever's on the page starts moving," Malik confirmed.

Bakura turned towards Ryou with a tiny move of his bangs.

"Them?" he repeated curiously.

Ryou's heart gave an anxious thud, but he kept the eye contact.

"Yes. I was not affected."

The yami did not speak. He contemplated Ryou, watching him behind heavy eyelashes and a veil of smoke.

"So, you see…" Malik went on, "We thought that, if there is anyone that can actually read it, it's you."

Bakura's frown deepened. "Me," he repeated. Something like anger crossed his features. "How are you so sure?"

"Well, we're not," Malik admitted. "But it's worth a shot. We won't know until we try it."

Bakura took a long drag from his cigarette, until there was nothing left but the butt. He put it out with slow, deliberate movements.

"There's nothing of Zorc left in me," he said in a low, rumbling voice. "I've told you."

Ryou had to hold back a scoff. There it was: the usual story. 'I am changed.' 'I am not the same as before. '

He bit his lip to avoid saying something that would lead to an argument.

"But… you have all your memories, right?" Malik asked. "You remember everything."

Bakura struggled with words for a while. "Yes," he said at last.

"Then perhaps that's all we're gonna need," Malik said.

The yami did not respond. Ryou was getting used to that by now, but this silence was different than the previous ones.

Bakura shrunk in his chair, curled in himself. He turned his gaze away from them, but focused on nothing in particular. His features twitched: the corner of his mouth, his eyes, the muscles in his jaw. Ryou might attribute it to nervousness, or fatigue, but he identified the reaction as something else. His yami looked the way someone does when expecting pain—or perhaps remembering pain.

Ryou knew what it meant to be haunted; he knew how to recognize it. But he didn't know that it was possible for someone to fake it so efficiently. There something too genuine in the way his yami's shoulders hunched and in the way his gaze jumped around without settling anywhere.

Ryou bit the inside of his cheek. At this point, he wasn't certain whether his yami was faking it or not. Somehow, that unnerved him even more.

And for what? What had Malik asked that had was so upsetting? He'd only asked about his memories. He'd asked him to read the book he had written. No big deal.

Even if Zorc was indeed gone-

Ryou stopped himself at once. No. He wouldn't start believing his fairy tales now. That was what he was trying to achieve. Perhaps that was what this act was for: convincing him and Malik.

Ryou took a big, steadying breath. His face hardened.

He should be more careful. He could not afford to be tricked.

Next to him, Malik was carefully observing Bakura, too. "So..." he said in a soft voice, as if he didn't want to startle him. "What do you say?"

Bakura shifted in his seat and the haunted look slipped off his face. "What exactly is your plan?" he asked roughly.

"We have a copy of the pages. You can come over and take a look at them."

"Come where?"

"At my place," Malik said. "We thought my flat is more of a… neutral zone." He gave an awkward chuckle that fell flat in the glum of the room.

Bakura shrugged and slumped against the back of his chair. He seemed exhausted again; he rubbed his eyes and murmured, "I have a question."

"Yes?"

"What about the Pharaoh? Did he agree to-" he gestured vaguely between the three of them, "this?"

Malik cleared his throat. "No. No one else knows that we are here."

"Hmm. I wonder what they'll say when they do find out about it."

"We'll handle it when the time comes, don't worry," Malik replied.

Bakura breathed out half a chuckle, as if to say that of course he wasn't worried.

"So, will you help us?" Malik asked.

Bakura looked at him as if he were dumb. "Of course I will. I told you: I want this to get over with. And I meant it."

Malik paid no mind to the yami's scathing look. Instead, he gave a small, satisfied nod. "Okay, then. On to the important stuff. We'll have to able to contact you."

Bakura opened his mouth to argue, but Malik cut across him.

"We can't come down here each time we want to talk. So, enough with the secrets; you'll have to at least give us your phone number."

The yami let out an exasperated huff. "I told you, there was a reason I didn't give it to you."

Malik arched an eyebrow. "Enlighten me."

Bakura simply scowled. He fiddled a bit with the drawstring of his hoodie, looking for words.

"Forget it," he murmured at last. "I'll give you my number, but don't call unless it's absolutely necessary."

Ryou had to keep from rolling his eyes. Malik, however, seemed pleased; he took out his phone and saved the number Bakura recited to him.

Once that was over and done with, Bakura put his phone back in his pocket, grumbling something that sounded suspiciously like, 'Fucking Tomb-Keeper.' He crossed his arms across his chest and sulked, looking at nothing in particular.

Malik tried to hold back a grin. "Stop complaining. It's for the best. Unless you want us to come all the way here next time, too."

"Do it again and I'll rip your legs off," the yami threatened.

"Ooh. I'm shaking," Malik said with a giggle.

Bakura rolled his eyes, but he didn't speak. Instead, he searched the back of his head with his fingers. After a few seconds of prodding, he hissed in pain and lowered his hand. "Motherfucker ripped out a chunk…"

"Isn't hair-grabbing forbidden?" Malik asked with a frown.

"Not much is forbidden in there."

"Don't you have rules?"

Bakura shrugged. "A couple. No hooking fingers in someone's mouth or eyes. No biting. Oh, and…" A faint smile curled his lips. "No using our wrapping tape, or our clothing. That's a new one."

Ryou knew what he was referring to, thanks to Miyamoto, but he didn't say anything. The yami kept smiling, seemingly very satisfied with himself.

"Well, they were right to," Malik said, piercing Bakura with a stern look. "It was a dirty trick."

"Oh, so you heard about it," he said with a chuckle. "Am I that famous?"

"Surprisingly, yes."

"Surprisingly?"

Malik shrugged. "You are memorable, but not that good."

"Not that-?" Bakura repeated, affronted, and sat straighter in his chair. "Didn't you see how I popped that guy's shoulder?"

Now Malik was laughing quietly. "I could take you on any day."

"What? Okay, you know what? I accept your challenge, Ishtar."

"Don't make me kick your ass. You look like shit already," Malik said, still laughing.

"Fuck you," Bakura said and crossed his hands over his chest, but the corners of his mouth had lifted somewhat, too.

Ryou tried to hide his astonishment as he looked from one to the other.

For a moment there his yami had sounded so… normal. Even his usual roughness had bled out of his voice, leaving behind something smoother and friendlier. As for Malik, he chatted with him with remarkable ease, the way he did with everyone else. Ryou had never seen anyone talk to his yami like that.

He knew these two had a different history, as he knew that Malik did not hate Bakura—he probably never had. But seeing them banter like two old friends… it made Ryou's chest feel oddly constricted.

He shifted in his seat. His body hurt from sitting so still for so long, but he did not relax.

He knew he couldn't ask Malik to hate Bakura. It was selfish, and petty, but Ryou couldn't deny that it would make him feel better. It would make everything simpler, somehow.

He sighed quietly. Gods, he wanted a cigarette. And he wanted to get out of there.

He didn't even mind leaving these two alone, to keep talking, if they wanted to. He contemplated going outside for a smoke, just to clear his head. He could use a few moments of alone time.

Malik beat him to it, though; he got to his feet and said, "Is there a bathroom I can use?"

Bakura gestured towards the door. "If you don't mind communal bathrooms, there's one in this floor. At the end of the corridor, last door on the right."

"Thanks."

Malik climbed over their legs to reach the door. Ryou made to follow him, but Malik arched a meaningful eyebrow to him.

"I will only be five minutes," he said. There was a challenging edge in his tone; it was as if he was daring Ryou to stay.

Here. With his yami. The two of them, for five minutes.

Ryou scowled at him, but Malik's look turned even more stubborn. Ryou didn't want to give in, but he also didn't want to argue in front of his yami—and, most importantly, he didn't want to look like a coward. In the end, he huffed and remained on his seat.

Malik's mouth curved in a self-satisfactory smile. He left, closing the door behind him with a soft click.

The sound seemed to echo in the silence that followed. It hovered a bit in the dark room, between Ryou and Bakura, dissolving slowly.

For a few minutes—or maybe it was seconds—nothing moved. Ryou held his body still and taut, ready to react at the slightest provocation. He realized once more how close the two of them were; he could smell the cheap shampoo and the cigarette smoke on his yami.

Bakura did not look at him. He was lounging back in his chair, in the same way he had all this time, gazing outside the window.

Time ticked by, punctuated by the beat of far-off music. Ryou had started wondering whether the yami would keep ignoring him until Malik came back, when Bakura moved.

Ryou's spine stiffened out of instinct, but the yami simply reached for his tobacco bag. He rolled another cigarette and lit it; the orange glow of the lighter revealed more tired lines on his face.

He leaned back and breathed out a cloud of smoke. It created mesmerizing shapes in the light filtering in from the window; Ryou's eyes followed their movement without realizing. His lungs itched with craving.

All of a sudden, the yami moved again. He reached for the tobacco bag he'd just left on the desk and, without a word, held it out to him.

Ryou's brain stuttered.

He stared at the yami's extended hand without registering what he was seeing.

Was he… offering him a cigarette?

The tobacco bag hovered in front of his nose. Bakura held it there patiently, without talking. He seemed nonchalant; with his free hand, he brought his cigarette to his lips and took another drag, waiting.

Ryou couldn't get it.

Why was Bakura doing this? What was his plan?

He tried to find the trap behind the gesture. There had to be something. Maybe it was Bakura's way of mocking him—although Ryou couldn't really follow that reasoning.

But when had he ever shared something? It had to be a trap.

Ryou thought of declining, if only because accepting that he had anything in common with him was weird. But that was pointless. It wasn't as if Ryou would quit smoking because of that. And he wanted a smoke so badly he could feel his hands shaking.

Still, he wasn't used to rolling his cigarettes. He'd never gotten the hang of it.

"Thanks. I've got mine," he said, and his voice sounded hoarse after being silent for so long. He took out his pack of cigarettes and picked one.

The yami withdrew his hand with a shrug and threw his tobacco bag back on the desk.

Ryou took his time in lighting his cigarette and inhaling. The smoke burned beautifully in his lungs. He breathed it out, and he thought he caught his yami's eye again, but he wasn't sure; it could have been a trick of the smoke and the low lighting.

Their cigarettes' sizzling was loud in the silence. Ryou felt his body relax, albeit by a fraction. His pulse calmed down, and his breathing turned deeper, slower.

He almost jumped when the yami spoke.

"So… What did you think of the match?"

Ryou blinked at him. Bakura was not sneering or mocking him—his tone was calm and conversational. He brought his cigarette to his lips with a languid movement, looking at Ryou with polite expectancy.

Ryou thought he shouldn't answer. Not encouraging him would be the wise thing to do, but staying silent sounded too much like weakness. After all, Ryou had no reason to fear him.

He flicked his ash off his cigarette. "I hope you enjoyed your time in the spotlight," he replied frigidly.

Bakura stared at him. Even in the dark it was hard to miss the look of incredulity on his face.

"You think that's why I do it?"

Ryou took a drag to bid for time. Fragments of the match flashed before his eyes and he tried to suppress a shudder. No one in their right mind would go in that cage simply to show off, and yet-

"What else?" he said with a shrug.

For a few beats, Bakura stood still. Then he breathed out a sharp chuckle. "Right," he said. He returned to his cigarette, but his movements were jerky; he blew the smoke out in a furious hiss.

If Ryou didn't know any better, he might believe he had insulted him.

He swallowed. Once again, he was not sure whether his yami was acting or not. The nuances in his posture and his expression made it hard to believe it was all faked, and he hated that the yami was confusing him this much. He could see now why Malik had fallen for it.

"You are doing a pretty good job, you know," he said before he was able to stop himself.

Bakura arched an eyebrow. "With what?" He was trying to sound as casual as he had before, but his voice was distinctly rougher.

Ryou ignored the little cautious voice that warned him to stay silent. He did not care if this made his yami mad. All the better; if he got a rise out of him, maybe he would finally drop his mask.

"Pretending to be human," he said. "But that had always been your strong point. You always knew how to be convincing."

Bakura took a drag of his cigarette, his brows looming low over his eyes. "You still think I'm pretending?"

"I'm certain of it."

There was another pause. Bakura seemed to be contemplating his next words. "The faster you accept I'm telling the truth, the better," he said at last.

"The better for whom?"

Bakura took his time to blow out the smoke; his face hardened in the half-light.

"Whatever."

He turned away from Ryou. He looked exhausted again; closed-off. Everything about him said that he was done talking.

Why wasn't he arguing? Why wasn't he snapping and sneering at him, like he'd done so many times before? It couldn't just be fatigue. That hadn't stopped him on the night of his return, when he'd been weak and naked in the rain.

No—it was an act. It had to be. And Ryou had enough of it.

He opened his mouth to say something scathing, but he stopped. Malik would be back soon, and Ryou didn't want him to find that he had just undone all they had achieved this evening. They still needed Bakura's help.

He sighed heavily and took a long, calming drag from his cigarette.

"Look," he started, "for the sake of this… collaboration, let's say I believe you."

The yami's mouth twitched in a humorless smirk, but the expression didn't last. "That's so gracious."

"I'm only doing it because arguing all the time would be counter-productive, and I want this parody to end as soon as possible."

"Finally, something we agree on," the yami said. Surprisingly, he wasn't mocking; his tone was dead-serious.

"However, I'm warning you," Ryou went on firmly." The moment I notice something unsavory, this whole deal is off."

Bakura waved a hand. "My whole existence is unsavory to you, landlord. You'll have to be more specific." His tone might have been biting if he didn't sound so damn tired.

Ryou narrowed his eyes. "If I so much as suspect you are plotting something, you are out."

Bakura shrugged. "Fine by me."

"And stop calling me landlord."

"Use my name and I'll use yours," Bakura shot back.

"You mean the name you stole from me?"

Bakura's head snapped towards him. His fatigue seemed evaporated all of a sudden; his eyes were almost spitting sparks.

"I did not steal it. It is my name, too. It's one of the few things that are actually mine." He growled the last word, and Ryou had to suppress the wave of alarm that instinctively rose in him.

He managed to stand his ground and glare back. He was by all means ready to keep arguing, but doubt started scratching the back of his thoughts.

It was true that even the Pharaoh was calling him Bakura—even after he'd got his memories back. It could be that, for once, his yami was telling the truth… And it could be that Ryou had been wrong about it.

Unease prickled in the back of his neck. Bakura was glowering at him, his red eyes blazing.

Ryou didn't speak. What was he supposed to say? Certainly not apologize. His yami had wronged him in worse ways, anyway—if anyone should apologize, it was-

The door opened and orange light spilled in the room.

"Hey, sorry I took so long, there was a line in the-"

Malik walked in and paused with his hand on the doorknob. He looked from Ryou to Bakura and back. "Is everything alright?"

Bakura slouched in his seat and crossed his arms across his chest. "Fan-fucking-tastic."

Ryou scowled at his lap.

For a couple of seconds, Malik kept looking at them. When it became obvious that no one would say anything more, he murmured, "Okay…" and closed the door. "You know," he said as he jumped over Ryou's legs to get back to his seat, "I met this girl in the bathroom. Monica."

"I hope you kept your mouth shut," Bakura grumbled.

"She was very nice," Malik said. "She called you the weird brooding guy from 308."

"Why the fuck did you go around talking about me?"

"Hey, she started it. And she invited us over for poker."

Bakura rolled his eyes. "Not a fucking chance."

"You are not very friendly, huh?"

Bakura glowered at Malik as if he would murder him. "Is it time for you to fuck off already?"

Malik lifted his hands in a placating gesture. "Hey, I'm just trying to lighten the mood."

"It will lighten if you leave me in peace."

"Fine, fine. We should go, anyway. It's late."

Ryou could barely contain his sigh of relief. He got to his feet at once; his rigid muscles protested at the sudden movement, but he didn't care. He put his hood back on before giving his yami the chance to order him to, and tucked his hair in.

"Well…" Malik said as he put on his jacket. "This was fun." Nobody replied anything to that. He rolled his eyes. "Alright, point taken. Come on, Ryou, let's go."

Ryou turned to the door, but a scrapping of chair legs behind him made him pause.

"Hang on."

Bakura rose from his seat and grabbed a leather jacket from a pile of clothes.

Malik beamed at him. "Oh, you are gonna escort us out?"

"Yes," the yami hissed. "You are not leaving through the main door. Going through it once was stupid enough."

"There's another exit?"

"Several. Come on." Bakura walked to the door first and gestured at them to follow him.

Malik took something out of his jacket pocket and left it on Bakura's bed-stand before hurrying after him; in the light coming in through the door, Ryou saw the familiar gleam of a packet of painkillers.

It turned out that one of the alternative exits was through an abandoned clothing store. It was quiet there: there were no guards and everything seemed locked up. Beyond the bars of the shutter, Ryou could see a different street than the one they'd arrived through.

Bakura fished a key from a cupboard and rolled the shutter up just enough for Malik and Ryou to slink out.

"Make a right at the end of the street, call the first cab you see and get the hell out of here," he told them.

"Alright, thanks," Malik said. "See you soon, okay?"

Bakura did not answer. He rolled the shutter down with a loud rattle and disappeared from view.

Malik and Ryou stood outside, looking at the closed up store front.

"That was... interesting, huh?" Malik said at last.

Ryou turned to glower at him. "What was that?" he demanded.

Malik's eyebrows shot upwards, but his expression looked too innocent to be genuine. "What was what?" he asked with a smile. It was evident he knew exactly what Ryou was talking about.

Ryou's expression darkened. "You, leaving me alone with him."

"Oh. That," Malik said without losing his smile. He shrugged. "I wanted to go to the bathroom."

"Stop messing around," Ryou seethed as they started walking down the street. "You did it on purpose."

"I might have."

"Why?"

"Well…" Malik shrugged again and his smile widened. "The three of us are partners now. We are about to work together." He gave Ryou a sideways look. "I might not always be there to act as a mediator. I just wanted to see if you could last ten minutes without biting each other's head off."

Ryou scowled. "You could have warned me."

"Would it make any difference?"

"Yes," Ryou said. If he knew, he'd have ignored Bakura altogether. He wouldn't have answered at all; he would have remained silent until Malik came back.

"I'm guessing you did bite his head off," Malik said.

"Me?" Ryou said, indignant. "I did nothing, he started-"

Malik chuckled to himself. "You are almost biting my head off right now."

Ryou snapped his mouth shut. Then he huffed. "I'm in no mood for games, Ishtar."

"And now you sound like him."

Ryou froze in his tracks.

Malik took a more couple steps before he realized Ryou had stopped. He turned around to look at him.

Ryou was glaring at him with his fists clenched at his sides. "I am not. Like him," he said, voice trembling.

Malik was not fazed. "Prove it, then," he said simply. "Work with him, like an adult. Stop trying to spot every single annoying detail about him and do what has to be done."

"I am not-" Ryou started in a high-pitched voice, but he stopped again and tried to swallow his fury. "Alright, you know what? I can do it. I can be civilized and work with him. But are you so sure that he can?"

Malik grinned. "I think he'll play nice if you play nice."

"I don't trust him," Ryou spat.

"You want the same things. Just give him a chance."

"He doesn't deserve one."

"You gave me a chance."

Ryou pointed a warning finger at him. "Don't you- Don't you compare yourself to him," he hissed.

"Why not?" Malik said calmly. "You had reasons to hate me once, too."

"It's not the same! You were not the same! I could see you were trying to change and be a better person, whereas he-"

"He didn't seem different to you?" Malik asked in a curious voice.

Ryou clenched his teeth. "He was acting," he ground out.

Malik shook his head. "Man, you are stubborn," he muttered and resumed walking.

Ryou followed him, bristling silently and keeping his hands in his pockets and his face low. They turned right on the end of the street, as Bakura had instructed, and hailed a cab.

They did not talk on the ride home. Ryou stared out of the cab's window at the lights that zoomed by and kept his mouth shut.

Give him a chance.

Ryou had given him so many chances already, and Bakura had thrown away each and every one of them. The man couldn't change. It wasn't in his nature.

And yet, as Ryou got out of the cab and climbed the long, dark staircase to his apartment, he wasn't thinking of all the chances his yami had thrown away in the past, or all the times he had tricked him. He wasn't even thinking about the cage, or the blood, or the talk afterwards.

All he could think about was his yami offering him a cigarette, for no discernible reason other than that he'd assumed Ryou might want one.

.

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