A/N: Finally, a multichaptered YuGiOh fic from me…and from the looks of things, it won't be terribly heavy on duelling like my GX fics tend to be. I'm going to have a blast writing Bakura…

That reminds me. This is set after Battle City. Can't say how much after at this stage though.

Façade

Prologue

The door slipped shut with a small but final click.

It – the darkness, the sun shut outdoors with door closed and blinds down – gave him a claustrophobic feeling, but he accepted it. It was easier, always easier, when there was no-one to see the true him.

He could breathe, even as the chains around his chest tightened their grip.

No-one bothered with the light, because it was only him. At least, it was only his body. If he tried to count the spirits he suspected…. Well, he had tried, but he felt sure after the first ten or so he was counting a certain spirit for more than it deserved.

The Spirit of the Ring had chuckled at him: a sinister, mocking chuckle designed especially to put his nerves on edge. Even if he no longer owned the ring – but he wished he did, because then at least the weight around his neck and the small pricks to his chest were proof.

It was easier to pretend he didn't remember. Easier to pretend that it had never happened, to laugh it off and say that hunger was his biggest problem. To think that it was over, and he would never hear that voice again…

'Ah, but you won't escape me so easily…'

There was frustration laced in it; ironic really, as surely a thief who stole about in the darkness would not be unnerved by it. Except the Spirit of the Ring was, and in turn Bakura found his comfort warped as well.

He muttered something unintelligible and moved away from the door and the light switch that was all too close to its frame. He would need light…eventually. It wasn't as though anything in the small apartment was arranged in a way to trip him up, or was it that someone else would be arriving to wonder why the rooms were in total darkness. His father was overseas once again, and the only light his mother and sister needed were was a light that couldn't be found by flipping a switch.

A tremor of pain ran down his shoulder as he stood still for too long, and he reached to rub it. His injuries were yet to heal, only made worse by their ride on the blimp and the duel that secured his little trip to…wherever. The others assumed it was the Shadow Realm, and that is what he told them, but the truth of the matter was that he hadn't been the one to lose the duel.

The Spirit of the Ring managed to bypass its laws, but they hadn't even applied to Bakura, simply a puppet pulled along by its strings and stuffed in a bag until needed again. A broken puppet, or perhaps one who had outlived his usefulness, as the Spirit of the Ring seemed oddly quiet of late: Threats that promised something bigger, but otherwise nothing much at all.

Or maybe it was because he was now fully aware of the spirit's presence, and not knowing what was going on at the back of his own mind…

He felt like laughing, because the idea sounded so crazy in itself. Sadly, it was an unmistakable fact, and one he had absolutely no control over. Part of him wondered if he could instead drive his rather unpleasant (and he would add invited, except he wasn't sure if it were entirely true to say so) alter ego insane instead, but considering the impacts on his own health he didn't think that would work particularly well.

After all, he'd wound up in the hospital simply being an accessory.

His shoulder tingled again and he tried to roll it, the other hand cautiously feeling for his desk chair. While he had no intention to catch up on the work he had missed – and that Yugi had so kindly dropped off – at that present time, but it did serve as a good landmark: a place to toss his coat and deposit himself onto the bed.

The musty smell of flowers and dust caught his attention, and he grimaced to the darkness. The roses he had brought the last time he had stepped into his own apartment had long since wilted into blackened stems. All it needed then was the scent of soil and rain, and he'd have a graveyard in his very home.

If one chose to call it his home. There wasn't anything particularly personable in it after all, and even his deck had been…influenced, although that was a poor choice of words in retrospect.

The cards were still in their case, digging slightly into his hip but elsewise barely noticeable thanks to the worn mattress he lay upon. Once, it had been soft and fluffy and in a far happier home, and he and his sister would bounce merrily until they heard a spring snap, from which point they would declare their fun over for the day in fear of being caught or else breaking the bed. Most of the furniture in fact hadn't been replaced, although they had sold far more; his father insisted on shipping the salvageable contents of their old life (enough to fit into a two bedroom apartment) whenever they moved. Although the sentiment was lost, as he was barely in said apartment thereafter.

He closed his eyes and breathed slowly: in, out, in out… He wondered if he should put some music on, before deciding against it. As ill-content the sound of soft giggles were, they were hardly nightmarish and the effort to get up and complete the chore seemed a waste. Particularly as the mix of drowsy smells seemed intent on keeping him where he was.

The giggles grew more pronounced but kept their volume, beckoning him from far away. Another set began, though this one he knew to be behind his eyes and buried – for the moment anyway – in his subconsciousness. But it failed to drown the female, whose gentle yet boisterous laughter filtered through a blanket of haze, and as Bakura closed his eyes in the hopes of some peace, he knew that no matter whether the demons of the past or the present won, he would be getting no rest that night.