Mandatory thank-yous to everyone who has ever showed a little affection towards this! So that would be (in no special order other than messed-up alfabets)... AmeeraSakura, exploisve sugarberry, earthluva, Fluffy no Danna (Because I look up to her... ._.), Kiara victory Tatsu, Krazynkuki, MegaKiraraLover, Queen of the Silent Ones (Because you're so awesome), Ryou VeRua (Because first review ever will always be special), seira-g (Because I wouldn't complain either), TimeAndRhytmDoesIndeedSleep, Wamee, WolvesKey, yaslanagirl, aminaluvr4life, Bakurafangirl12, bewarethedark, , Dakurakushita Hasu, DBZ-Fangrl, jayrobb328, JessesBlueHairedTwin, Kagimine (Because I felt so welcomed and all fluffy~), KuraMalik, noffermans, Purpleshadowthief, RegalAngel, RiverTear980 (who really didn't creep me out :P), Shizuka dokuro (who is to be thanked for me updating now~), Silverinumiko,SilverWhiteDragon, staytruetoyou, Superkitty140, Tender Loving Care (who writes some of the epicest Tendershipping and faithfully reviewed~ Oh and pancakes. XD), TOD ZUYO, VampiresTDIfreddyfangirl, xXAnime4LifeXx, YamiBakura1988 (who reviewed so often~) and YoulookbetterwhenI'mdrunk
Heh. I love you guys, every single one of you. And the people who read or even clicked the link and then left without ever telling me about it. You're all my friends now~ *group hug*
I got careless towards the end. This was my first fic and I did not think it through before writing. The last chapters might've come out weird because I can't look back at this anymore. So many mistakes... XD
But you guys deserved an ending of some kind, so here; the thing I wrote before chapter 3. :)
If you ever want to chat, look me up. I wish to see you again with some other Tendershipping or anything else?
I'll start one Tendershippy once I decide which. XD
Bakura let his eyes open slowly, only to display a shining light. He blinked once or twice, waiting for his eyes to adjust, and suddenly something hit his head hard from behind.
He quickly turned around, and upon seeing the girl, his memories came back to him.
She had yellow clothes, wings of an angel, a halo on top of his head. But none of those features mattered like the last one. Her hair was pure white, a colour so familiar it hurt somewhere in Bakura's inexistent heart.
The tomb robber tried to remember her name. It had never really mattered to him, so it wasn't too easy.
"...Amane?" Bakura finally questioned, and saw the angelic face of hers turn into a scowl.
"Yes, Amane!" she all but screamed. "Ryou's sister! And do you have any idea of what you've done to my brother?"
Bakura flinched at the mention of Ryou, his memories flooding back to him again. How Ryou had wanted to convince him to stay alive, how Bakura (Zorc) had told him he didn't need the weakling's concern... If Ryou really cared for the tomb robber, that had to sting. But he hadn't even meant it! He had just wanted his hikari to not worry about him in case...
Wait.
Bakura's thoughts came to a halt here. "Am I dead?" he questioned the angelic girl without looking at her painfully familiar face.
"Yes. And in case you care, knowing him, he will refuse to keep on living without you there." came the cold answer from the girl.
"Fuck!" Bakura swore aloud. "I didn't even want to say it, and I left him at that..." he looked around for something to tear apart in his frustration, but the space was perfectly empty except for himself and the girl. "Fuck, fuck, fuck..."
"Couldn't agree more..." Amane muttered. "And there's nothing I can do to help, either. I sent him to the past once, and that took almost all my pow-"
"What?" Bakura asked, confused. "You really did that? He wasn't lying?"
Amane gave Bakura a glare. "Ryou is not a liar like some."
The glare didn't affect Bakura, and neither did the obvious insult, but another mention of Ryou's name did, causing him to stumble backwards. Bakura sat on the floor (orgroundorwhatever), not at all aware of any time passing before Amane laughed.
"I have an idea!" she said, a very Ryou-like sweet (and cheeky) smile on her face.
"Will it keep him alive?" Bakura questioned, not feeling like he really needed to say his other side's name.
Amane nodded, suddenly looking very serious again. "If it works."
"I'm listening." Bakura said and sat up again.
Amane looked at him for a short while. "You don't have the Ring anymore, right?" she then asked.
Bakura's right hand automatically found it way on his chest, and he shook his head sadly. His only physical connection to Ryou, the Millennium Ring, was indeed not there.
Amane scowled, but shrugged afterwards. "Fine then. I don't think that's a problem, since we can use this instead..." she took a necklace with some shining blue stone on it from her neck.
She must've seen the weirded-out stare on Bakura's face, for as she continued. "I got it from Ryou for my birthday. I wore it when I died."
"Ooh, great." Bakura said with sarcasm, rolling his eyes in spite of himself. "How does this pretty little necklace help Ryou?"
Amane ignored this, placing the necklace on the floor - or ground or whatever it was supposed to be. "I can't bring you back to life, but I can still curse you to stay in this necklace to make up for all your bad deeds." she said with a smile despite the word "curse".
"What?" Bakura asked, dumbfounded. How would that help his yadonushi?
"Because I think - I believe - I know you and Ryou are connected." Amane stated, nodding to herself. "And you've been too long gone to be reborn on your own, so I can curse you to stay in the necklace, toss it away and hope your bound to Ryou helps your spirit to find him." Amane kept a pause. "When your host - Ryou, if all goes well - dies, you'll die too. And be reborn and live happily ever after with him blah blah blah." She looked at Bakura here. "Got it memorized?"
"Mostly... What if it fails?" Bakura asked, only slightly concerned.
Amane shrugged. "You'll be stuck in there forever?" she took some kind of dust from her pocket and threw it around in a circle.
Bakura shrugged the thought off. "If you think it helps him..."
"If it works." Amane repeated. She had probably finished all the preparations for whatever she was about to do, as she stepped back and assured Bakura. "This will hurt. A lot. But you deserve it all for hurting him like this."
Bakura growled at this, but closed his eyes, the last thing he saw being nothing but white blankness.
Like he had died, he would be revived… Maybe.
Ryou Bakura woke up to see the sun shining into his bedroom. He started blinking rapidly so his eyes would get the chance to adjust. After he could see something again, Ryou slowly got on his feet, which, to his surprise, didn't give in as soon as soon has remembered what had happened.
He had gone to the past - had that been reality or just a painfully realistic dream? He absently sat on one of the chair surrounding the kitchen table. He had wanted Bakura to stay alive - he had failed, and Bakura had died again. Bakura had said he didn't need concern from a weakling like Ryou.
Then he recalled how Bakura had hurt him. Physically. He quickly tugged his right sleeve up and stared at the cuts his yami had made. They looked pretty old, as it had been over half a year since they were made. But Ryou was sure him going to the past had caused them. Maybe he was still dreaming, though.
"I promise I'll treasure these scars forever, Bakura." he said with a sad attempt of a smile.
Here Ryou cracked and started crying again. His eyes already felt like crying was the only thing he had done in the last few weeks (which might indeed be the case, actually), but the tears still kept rolling down his cheeks nonstop.
He was briefly aware that it was Monday, that he had overslept horribly, that he should be on his way to school right at that moment, but that felt awfully insignificant. Nobody would notice his absence anyways.
Then his blurry eyes caught sight of an envelope on the kitchen table. He reached for it half-heartedly, slowly taking it in his frail hands.
There was no address, and it only read the words "Someone's thinking about you"in a curly handwriting.
Ryou was confused - how had the envelope ended up on the kitchen table in the first place, was it for him, what was inside? Deciding there was only one way to find out, Ryou opened the envelope, dropping its insides on the table.
What it had contained shocked Ryou. He was positive that necklace was the same one he had given his sister shortly before her death. He took it in his hands, and it felt warm in a oddly comforting way. He let some sunlight shine on it, and it glowed softly.
He slid the necklace around his neck, feeling something that should've been long dead, literally. Another conciousness in his mind.
/Yadonushi?/ Ryou was in a loss of words. He was absolutely certain that he was imagining things. He had tobe.
/Ryou?/another try.
Here the situation started to be too much for Ryou, and he fell back on his chair, falling unconscious.
/Ryou? Ryou? Ryou! Fucking answer me, Ryou!/
-Bakura's POV-
What if Ryou wouldn't wake up? What if he died? What if… Would Bakura float forever in nothingness, without a host to possess ever again?
All of those were such gloomy thoughts, but Bakura only found himself returning to the first ones over and over again.
What if Ryou wouldn't wake up ever again?
Would Bakura have to bury him? Wasn't that how people took care of corpses these days?
He didn't want to do that.
-Ryou's POV-
Ryou let his eyes flutter open, finding himself laying on his back on the floor, his back hurting awfully, an angelic voice yelling to him in his mind.
/Ryou?/the voice asked once more, close to screaming actually.
/Yes, me, what, Bakura, are you alright, are you really real?/Ryou said in his mind, his answers and questions turning into a weird mess.
/I did not just fall back on a chair and faint.../ the spirit muttered. /What do you mean, am I real?/
/You should be dead./Ryou blurted out without thinking about it.
/Is that what you want?/the spirit asked, sounding indifferent and hollow.
/NO!/ Ryou screeched. /No way, no, never, I don't want you to be dead, I want you to be here with me but you died and you said that you didn't need me or love me or-/ his comeback came to a sudden end because he started sobbing violently.
/Fuck./the spirit sounded deeply annoyed, and Ryou started whimpering. He did not want the spirit to hate him.
/Ryou, I'm s-so-sorry!/ he suddenly stammered. /I didn't mean anything I said and.../
Ryou's head snapped up. /What? You didn't?/
/No, I was being possessed. Didn't your "friends" tell you?/
Ryou shook his head here. He ignored the fact that his -friends- had lied to him, and he ignored the little detail about Bakura being possessed. He'd tell Ryou when he was ready - if ever. And if not, it wouldn't be important.
/No, I guess they thought it would be better if I hated you.../
Ryou felt Bakura smirk mentally at this. /Did it work?/
/Not in the slightest./
/That's good./
The was a short silence, which Ryou decided to break. /Well?/
/Well what?/Bakura sounded confused.
Ryou chuckled. /Like, well are you going tell me how and why you're back from dead?/
Another short silence.
/Oh. Amane - your sister, kinda nice, little devious, quite evil, yeah, her - cursed me to stay in the necklace around neck for an undefined amount of time./Bakura muttered.
/...what? Why would she do that?/the white-haired teen asked, dumbfounded.
Bakura laughed, without any sarcasm or cruelty, just this once. /Why do you think? So I could be with you forever, stupid little Ryou./
Epilogue
Ryou walked inside the classroom, almost glowing with fuzzy happiness.
"Ryou-kun!" Yugi beamed at him, a hardly concealed question in his eyes. "Did something happen?"
"Yugi-kun," Ryou acknowledged with a nod and a smile. "Nice to see you!" He leaned to ruffle the other's pointy hair affectionately.
"You too. I'm really glad you're..." he seemed to consider his words carefully. "...recovering."
/You're being too nice to him. He's the PHARAOH'S VESSEL!/
/He's my friend./Ryou insisted.
/...fine, but if he lays one finger on you-/
Ryou sighed happily. /I'm just happy you're back./
/…me too./
As Yugi noticed Ryou giggling lightly, he cocked his head. "What's so funny?"
"Oh nothing. I'm just happy."
"I'm happy to hear that."
/Ryou./
/Yes?/
/You can be with him as long as you come to my soul room later today./
/Trust me, yami, I wouldn't miss it for the world./
/…I like you. A lot./
/I love you too./
/…don't say the l-word…/
There. Like I said. :D
Also, even if you're reading this in 2076 or something, review if you liked it... Or if you didn't. Either way.
(The title refers to the necklace, by the way. Bakura did't want to get lost in nowhere. Plus, wrapping the story up and securing it with a safe knot, ne?)
We'll meet again with another Tendershipping, right~?
~Tiikerikissa