Absolution

Chapter Six: Falling Away With You.

"Staying awake to chase a dream,

tasting the air you're breathing in,

I know I won't forget a thing."

To say it had been a strange night would have been an understatement—Ryou had discovered himself to be hideously dependant on things that were bad for him, had also found himself to be a fair, albeit nervous, thief, and now he was arguing with a piece of jewelry.

"I can't put you on," he stressed, gesturing wildly at the Sennen Ring, "there's no cord left in the apartment."

Don't be foolish, Bakura's voice echoed back to him, I brought you more than enough silver to handle this.

"There are two problems with using the silver necklaces," Ryou countered, pacing in front of the small table the Ring was resting upon. "One: silver is delicate, I don't think it could handle the weight of all this gold. And two: don't you think that's drawing just a bit too much attention? It was hard enough to hide the Ring when it was just on a piece of twine—if I thread it with silver, you can bet not a single person is going to miss it!"

There was a pause, as though the spirit were thinking something over. Why do you never wear any of your jewelry? he finally asked.

The pale boy stopped pacing. "What do you mean? I wear it often enough."

With the exception of the Ring and a few trinkets, I've never seen you wear any at all, the spirit mused.

Ryou shrugged. "Jewelry is considered feminine, and I already look girly enough—why give bullies more to notice? Besides," he snorted, "the jewelry you brought me was stolen; I can't very well wear any of that out in public."

But you wore the coat, Bakura replied.

"That was different," Ryou murmured. "I needed to look and feel the part of a thief, or I never would have even made it to Yugi's."

Bakura snorted. You need to worry less about how you appear to others. There's a brilliant exhilaration that comes along with wearing your ill-gotten gains. After all, treasure was meant to be flaunted.

"I think it's bad enough that I resorted to stealing," the pale boy hissed. "That's more than enough corruption for one night."

The spirit sighed. All right, he relented, but you still need to find a way to put the Ring back on.

"Why are you so adamant about this?" Ryou asked. "It's four in the morning; can't it wait until a more decent time?"

No, Bakura snapped. Something unusual happened while I was in the hands of little Yugi and his Other. His voice grew quiet, distant. The Sennen Items will always resonate with one another—last time, it gave me the power to understand your world. I don't think we were that lucky this time.

Ryou's eyes widened and, panicked, he snatched up the Ring. "Are you hurt?" he asked quickly. "What's wrong?"

But the spirit didn't answer.

Icy fear began to lick its way up Ryou's spine. From the moment he had reclaimed the Ring, he'd known something was wrong—there had been a troubling distance between him and the spirit—and, even though he could still feel the Ring's innate power, the grounded center that was Bakura was stifled and fading. What had happened at the Mutou's; what had the Other Yugi done?

Desperate now, his heart beating out of his chest, Ryou dashed through the apartment, slamming through his bedroom so fast that the door bounced off the opposite wall and nearly shut behind him. Uncaring, the pale boy dove at the collection of gems on his desk, his hands quickly snatching at the strands of precious metal. In the blink of an eye, he had the Sennen Ring resting over his neck on a thick thread of silver. "Bakura?" he tried to reach the other as the Ring settled over his heart.

The sense of extra overwhelmed him once more, integrating all his senses with a hyperawareness, but the spirit remained silent. He could feel the ancient within him—like a warm, dark shadow that enveloped his very being—but there was something wrong about it, something different. It was almost as if Bakura were tattered around the edges, fading in and out of reality while he tried to stabilize himself.

"Don't do this to me," Ryou pleaded, his hand pressing the Ring to his chest. "I tried so hard to get you back—I became a criminal for you." He fell to his knees. "You said I was a treasure to you, that you would never let me go, never leave me," he bowed his head low, defeat beginning to weigh him down. "If you break that promise, you'll be no better than my father." He shook his head and sighed. "I don't even know how many years I wasted chasing after him, hoping that one day he would just open up his eyes and see me standing there. I don't think I could bear it if I lost the one person who really did see me. You might throw me into fits on a regular basis, and I know you're bad for me, but when I think about you never speaking to me again… the world seems crueler somehow."

The weight of the future and the past pressed in on Ryou, smothering the boy until a single thought occurred to him: he had to fight. As a child, he'd done whatever he could to gain his father's attention, but his choices had been limited; now he was a teenager with many more options at his disposal, and he wouldn't let Bakura go until he'd exhausted every last one. He had to see the spirit, had to talk to him; the desire burned through his blood until there was no other thought in his mind. Forcefully, he unleashed the strength of his will on the Ring, marveling as it readily responded to him. For a moment, he felt his mind disconnect from his body, but the sensation died as soon as he found himself standing in the hallway between his soul and Bakura's.

The hallway was predictably different—the walls had been scratched and carved, as though a great beast had gone on a rampage. Foreboding gripped Ryou, but urgency made him move on. Through the first door was the same room he remembered—an ancient marble hall, lovingly decorated with the wonders of an age long dead—but it, too, had been caught in the storm. The oil basins were cracked and broken, sending their oils and fires across the smooth floor to creep along in an ever-growing blaze. A few of the massive pillars that supported the great ceiling had tumbled down, revealing patchy holes to the unseen world beyond. He turned away from these disturbing details, only looking at them long enough to ascertain that Bakura wasn't trapped among the wreckage.

Where could the spirit be? The hall seemed to continue on forever, and Ryou had seen precious little of it in the past. Desperately, ignoring the heat of the spreading fires, his eyes sought out the filmy curtain that had once lead him into a room of treasures. It didn't take long to find, though he was dismayed to discover that the curtain had been ripped to shreds. The world beyond remained the same, however. From wall to wall, the room was stuffed with the finest things an ancient Egyptian could have laid his hands on. And, for the most part, the horde seemed untouched—a few tables and chairs had been overturned, but nothing more.

Bakura was sprawled over a mountain of coins, seemingly unconscious. His red coat had been forgone, leaving him only with a wrap of cloth around his waist, and he was sweating, breathing heavy. Under most circumstances Ryou would have pondered how a spirit could sweat and why he would have to breathe, but something more disturbing caught his attention. At erratic intervals, Bakura flickered in and out of sight, in and out of being, and it terrified the pale boy. He'd seen it happen before, of course, when the spirit had appeared to him in real life—but this place was a little slice of reality all its own, and Bakura had always had solid form here.

He raced to the spirit's side, falling to his knees until he could shift the older boy's head onto his lap. Ryou was disoriented, and unsure what to do, other than make Bakura as comfortable as he could—which would be hard since he still didn't know what was wrong. Aside from his sickly and flickering appearance, the spirit had no wounds, no visible maladies.

"You need to tell me what to do," Ryou pleaded. "How can I fix this if I don't even know what happened?"

With a wince, Bakura's eyes snapped open. His gaze was glassy and unfocused, but his hand found Ryou's cheek unerringly. He disappeared from sight several times as his fingers danced over the pale boy's skin. "I don't know what's wrong," he admitted on a laugh, his voice low and husky.

Ryou swallowed roughly. There had always been a hint of insanity lurking around the ancient's eyes, but his unseeing gaze now spoke of nothing but madness. Had the Other Yugi tried to destroy him, or was Bakura merely being affected by the prolonged resonance between the Sennen Items?

"I need more help than that," Ryou replied. "Tell me what happened—what are you fighting?"

"I don't know," the spirit repeated, lowering his hand. "The Ring has always been my anchor, but suddenly it feels like I can't hang onto it anymore."

The pale boy shivered. "What happens if you let go?" he asked, already fearing he knew the answer.

Bakura's eyes finally focused on him, and the insanity that glittered in their blue depths was frightening—what must it have been like to live in this place for thousands of years while everything he knew grew old and was forgotten? "I will die a true death," he answered, his voice filled with painful certainty.

"No," Ryou shook his head. "I lost you for a day—just one short day—and I didn't know what to do with myself. I can't lose you forever; I refuse!"

Bakura laughed. "You sound more like me by the minute," he purred.

"Maybe," Ryou conceded. "But that only means you have to stick around to see how I turn out, right?"

The tanned boy shook his head. "If my ties to this anchor are cut, I'll disappear, and there's nothing either of us can do about that, my little landlord."

"Landlord?" Ryou echoed, his mind racing. "Can you anchor you soul to something else—even if it's only until you can figure out how to fix the Ring?" he asked in a rush.

"It's possible," Bakura nodded. "But I don't have the energy; as it is, I'm barely holding on to the Ring."

"Can you stand?" the pale boy asked, already moving to support the other's weight.

Glassy eyes regarded him for a moment. "Why?" he asked, but moved to stand anyway.

"I'm your landlord, right? You've been using the Ring to possess me," Ryou explained, slowly navigating the two of them through the blazing hall. "But now the Ring is rejecting you, so why not move your soul into me?"

"Even if I had the energy to make the transfer," Bakura replied, "it would be different than when I resided in the Sennen Item—you'll find it overwhelming."

"You're a bad habit," the pale boy explained, "but I'm already addicted. I said that I refused to lose you, and I meant it. If you don't have the strength to make this transfer, then I'll make it happen by myself."

After a lot of stumbling, they finally made it out of the burning room and back into the hallway. Ryou had never been through the second door, had never seen the room that was meant to reflect his own soul. It was a large space that looked depressingly similar to his apartment, but the walls were shadowy and amorphous, as though to suggest that things could lay beyond those boundaries. He quickly shook off his curiosity though; he didn't have time to look around. With as much speed as possible, he laid Bakura out on the couch, then paused. He knew what he wanted to do, he just wasn't sure how to do it. But he had already bent the Ring's power to his will once this night, so he could do it again.

Nervously, Ryou searched inward until he found the warm pulse of the Ring's power. From one place to the another, he commanded the Ring. I want what you have—give it to me. For many minutes it seemed as though nothing were happening, but slowly he began to feel something from his real body—he felt the five cones of the Ring press against him until they were buried into his flesh. The pain seemed minor in this place that existed on a spiritual level, a dim echo of sensation from his physical shell.

Suddenly, Bakura moaned, his dark face caught in a grimace. Ryou was about to ask him what was wrong, but he already knew. A heat was building up in the Ring, flooding through the cones and into Ryou's body. The world spun and his senses reeled as Bakura's soul languidly drained into him. A rush of foreign sounds blared through him, as well as a thousand thoughts, feelings, and a mess of jumbled images—the spirit's memories, perhaps? Ryou felt like he was being stretched thin, stuffed to overflowing with something bigger and darker than he could have ever imagined.

Slowly, ever so slowly, the sensations died away, until the pale boy was left with nothing but the feel of five long trails of blood running down his chest. Eventually, even that faded away, and with it went Ryou's consciousness.
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We're two of a kind, you and I, a smooth voice trickled through the darkness.

Ryou frowned, his mind grasping onto the words, even as his body demanded that he sleep more. He wanted to sleep—he was so very tired, and there was a comfortable warmness enveloping him—but the voice wouldn't leave him alone.

You're more powerful than you imagine, it continued, but you're lucky I was there to stop you. If you had gone on any longer, you would have been the one living within the Sennen Ring.

The Sennen Ring? Ryou's eyes snapped open, his sleep thoroughly abandoned as he remembered what had happened. But the world remained dark as his gaze desperately searched for something to focus on. "Why can't I see?" he whispered.

Long finger's worked through the pale boy's hair, massaging his scalp. The blindness will pass, Bakura answered. You nearly worked yourself to death this night—you're body is in shock. Ryou tried to sit up, but arms from below suddenly held him down. "You lost enough blood to have earned some rest," Bakura whispered in his ear, sending shivers up the boy's spine.

It was then that Ryou realized the comfortable warmth he was laying on was Bakura. But it couldn't be, his mind argued; the spirit's form in the real world was merely a mass of static and pressure. This felt like a living, breathing person. "How?" he asked, blindly trailing his fingers over the spirit's face, mapping out with touch what he could not see.

"This must have been what the resonance between the Items caused," Bakura replied, tightening his hold on the smaller boy.

Ryou laid his head down on the ancient's chest; he was tired of straining his useless eyes, and the dull ache around his sternum was beginning to flare up into genuine pain. "So you have your own body now?" he asked quietly. Why did that revelation make his soul sing and feel empty all at once?

"No," the spirit shook his head, "I can only hold this form for a little while." His fingers began to trail up the other's back, stroking him like a favored pet or a lover.

"Do you think," Ryou swallowed, trying to ignore the touches, "you would have been given back your body completely if I hadn't forced you out of the Ring?"

The tanned boy shook his head again. "My body is long dead," he replied, "and reincarnated into you. If it were at all possible for me to live again, I think it would take the power of all seven Sennen Items to do it." His hands clutched the boy close again. "We had no way to know what was happening, so I'm grateful that you took action. Besides," his voice dropped lecherously, "I like it in you; it's tight and cozy."

Ryou laughed weakly—he knew he should be offended or appalled by the other's words, but he simply didn't have the energy. "You've certainly made a fast recovery."

Bakura hummed an agreement. "It's more than we'll be able to say for you, however." His hands traveled lazily to the pale boy's chest. "What, exactly, were you thinking of when you forced my transfer?"

It was then that the younger boy realized he had a swath of thick bandages circling his torso. He'd been in his soul room when the Ring had impaled him, so he had only dimly felt the pain then, but now it burned through him with a vengeance, making him wonder how deeply he'd been wounded. "I don't know," he finally answered. "I panicked—the only thought in my head was that I didn't want to you taken away again."

"Admirable sentiments," the spirit agreed, "but there were other ways you could have done it—ways that didn't involve maiming yourself."

"Wait," Ryou frowned, narrowing his useless eyes at the other, "I just saved your unlife, and you're angry with me because I was injured in the process?"

Bakura snorted. "If you want me to seem completely illogical—yes."

"Well, there's gratitude for you," Ryou quipped sarcastically, putting his head back down.

"Oh, I am grateful, little one," the spirit purred. "But how am I to express it? Words fall pitifully short, I can't think of anything grand enough to get for you, and you're in no condition to receive any physical affirmation of that gratitude. Under the circumstances, I have done what I can: I've bound your wounds, and I intend to harass you every minute until you've made a full recovery."

The pale boy yawned, his exhaustion catching up to him once more. "I don't understand why you're so worked up over this," he murmured sleepily. "You're the one that almost died."

Bakura's strong hands cupped the smaller boy's head, drawing the unseeing gaze to meet his own. "Because you almost went with me, Ryou," he said grimly, his fingers tracing the contours of the boy's face. "Two or three more inches of tissue, and the Ring would have pieced your heart," he sighed, sounding more serious than Ryou had ever heard him. "And as if that weren't enough, you worked so hard at the soul transfer that you nearly reversed it completely; you almost tied your own soul to the Sennen Ring." He growled then, a wicked sound that vibrated his chest and rumbled through the boy lying atop him. "I'm angry for good reason."

Ryou yawned again. "You've got no ground to stand on," he whispered, sleep pulling at him.

"I take care of my treasures," the spirit whispered darkly, "so I get understandably upset when they're damaged. After all, reparations can lead to some unfortunate side effects."

Ryou felt his curiosity pique, even as dread filled him at those words. Questions bubbled up to his lips, but exhaustion finally won the battle—he passed out long before a single sound could leave his throat.
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A/N: I'm not usually one to write much in the way of maiming or bloodshed, but the original manga was fairly violent, when you look at it. The scene where Ryou gets impaled by the Sennen Ring actually happened in the manga (I believe it's in chapter fifty, the same chapter where he makes his first appearance) and it was really powerful, in my opinion, so I wanted to find a way to work it into my own story.

And, once again, Bakura turns suggestive. This man will seriously not stop with the innuendo.

Please review!

Disclaimer: I do not own YGO or any of the music by Muse.