On Little Cat Feet, a yu-gi-oh fanfic

Disclaimer: Meow mew mrow meow-meow (translation: these characters are not mine).

A/N: This fic started life as the fifth and final chapter of Five Ways Amane Bakura Didn't Leave Her Brother. As such, what is now the fifth chapter of that fic fits as a sort of conclusion/sequel to this one – this is pre-canon and that's post-canon, though both deal with the relationship between Ryou Bakura and his canonical little sister, Amane. It doesn't really matter which order you read the two fics in, and it's not necessary to read one in order to understand the other, but I can't say I'd be upset if you decided to check out Five Ways. Feedback appreciated!

On Little Cat Feet

'I believe cats to be spirits come to earth.'-- Jules Verne

When Amane and her mother died, things happened on a level that nobody could see unless they were also somehow intimate with death. Those who had gone through near-death experiences, those who had been clinically dead and then brought back, mediums, psychics and others more attuned to the world beyond the living – they might have caught a glimmer of the fireworks that followed the squeal of tyres and the horrific crunch of a Nissan Micra wrapping itself around a tree. Still, even they would have had to squint very hard to see what happened next.

Maybe it would just have been a blur of colour to them; something like an afterimage of staring at the sun, even though it was night. Maybe they would have sensed the two orbs of light some other way, as they rose from the broken bodies in the driver and passenger seats. Perhaps they would have heard the crackle of energy, or felt the sudden wash of warmth as the first shot into the sky like a falling star in reverse.

The second orb rose at a much slower rate, and not in a straight line like the first. It had none of the first orb's certainty, either. Instead it wavered from side to side, as though fighting the compulsion to follow, or caught up in the kind of indecision that makes your head hurt if you think about it for too long.

Finally, with a decisive burst of iridescence, the second orb took off – not into the sky, but along the wet road that the car had just travelled along. It passed by a farmhouse where lights had snapped on at the sound of the crash, and a man in pyjamas, Wellingtons and a cagoule was jogging down his drive to see what had happened. It skimmed through hedgerows, flying in between the police car and ambulance screaming towards the crash site from the opposite direction, not slowing or deviating from its course.

When it reached a cluster of houses on the edge of town, however, it finally began to slow. It approached one of them cautiously, almost tiredly. Its light had dimmed with its madcap journey, its size reduced since it first appeared, as though it had burned up part of itself as fuel, or the distance between it and its mortal shell had weakened it. Whatever the reason, when it passed through the wall of the house it floated languidly up the stairs, meandering when it reached the upper landing and finally coming to a halt on the floor outside one of the bedroom doors. It rolled against the door, but bounced off and rolled back again, letting out a burst of disappointed sparks.

A low hissing signalled the arrival of this house's pet, a cat with a belly made bulbous by unborn kittens. Unlike humans, the cat could see the orb, in the way many animals are able to see things invisible to their 'more evolved' masters. The cat hissed and bared her teeth and claws at this intruder, but when the orb let out another sad burst of sparks she stopped, licked her paws as if she had nothing better to do, and then cautiously sniffed it.

"Mrow?"

The orb was shrinking. A thin, keening noise cut through the air, making all the fur along the cat's spine stand on end. She hissed again, but this time it wasn't a threatening noise so much as a frightened one. She swung her hindquarters around, tail stiff, but didn't bolt as she clearly wanted to. Instead, she stretched out her neck and gingerly, delicately picked up the ball of light between her teeth, ignoring the laws of physics and good sense the way all felines are apt to do. She carried it into the airing cupboard where she'd made her nest and curled up, nestling it like one of the kittens she would suckle once they were born. The orb glowed ever more dimly, but flared a little as the cat tried to lick it the way she always had before when it was mortal and sad.

By the time the phone rang and the occupants of the two bedrooms rose fuzzily to find out they'd been struck by tragedy, the orb had faded so much it was easy for it to sink the last of itself into the cat, who purred at the warmth and went to sleep, not noticing or caring about the newly sparkling fur on her convulsively rippling belly.

Ryou and Amane had been waiting months for Prissy to have her kittens. They'd read everything they could about cat pregnancy, saved up their pocket money to buy things the books recommended she'd need, and watched eagerly as she grew bigger and bigger. When she started sleeping in strange places, like under the kitchen sink and behind the toilet in the upstairs bathroom, Amane insisted they keep a diary so they'd know where to check when she finally disappeared to give birth.

When Prissy finally did, however, Ryou couldn't bring himself to be as ecstatic as he'd thought he would be. He didn't notice she hadn't come down for breakfast, or check the diary to see where she could be. He actually found her by accident, nurturing several tousled bundles in the airing cupboard across from his bedroom. He just stared at them until the backs of his eyes started to prickle.

Amane would never get to see Prissy's first litter, because Amane was dead.

But Ryou wasn't heartless, even freshly submerged in his pit of grief. When he'd come off his crying jag he made sure Prissy was comfortable before phoning the vet to update him on he progress. Then he sat with his back against the banister, the airing cupboard door open in front of him, and just watched.

Prissy opened her eyes and stared indolently at him, but she didn't try to carry her kittens away or drive him off. She'd always been more Amane's cat than his, since Amane was the one who had brought home the straggly, half-dead stray three years ago, and then cried until Mum and Dad said she could keep it. Still, Prissy let him stay. It was quite a compliment that she didn't consider him a threat. Usually she just tolerated Ryou, since all her love was reserved for Amane.

Had been for Amane.

It still felt too shocking to even think. Putting it into words was … weird. His mother and little sister were dead.

Dead.

Ryou knew his father was downstairs staring at the cup of coffee he'd made hours ago and never touched. Ryou would have to go down soon and fix them some lunch, or they'd both forget to eat. Food seemed unimportant compared to the catastrophe that had rocked their lives. How could you think about sandwich fillings when two of your most important people were stretched out on tables in the town mortuary?

Nevertheless, the way of the world is not to wait for the shocked or the grieving. Life went on, and his stomach rumbled eventually, forcing him to abandon his vigil and go downstairs to his father's dull eyes.

"I'll be back in a bit," he promised.

Prissy stared at him, completely unperturbed whether he stayed or not. She didn't know yet that her beloved owner was dead. Would she ever realise, or would she just wonder why the smallest and tallest of her four humans weren't around anymore? Could animals mourn?

Ryou felt like a fool, but he said it anyway. "I'm sorry, Prissy."

The cat yawned. When she finally closed her jaws, Ryou had already disappeared past the line of the landing.

Ryou should have noticed earlier, he realised afterwards. He should have seen what was happening, but he'd been too involved in his own emotions to notice his father was going into a meltdown of epic proportions.

Dr. Bakura had removed every scrap of his wife from their bedroom first, but since Ryou never went in there he couldn't possibly have known. Next it was the study, where each adult had their own desk. Dr. Bakura would sit at his, perusing his research and sending emails to colleagues in universities all over the world, while his wife sat at the other, tapping out her romance novels in companionable silence for hours. It was a routine they'd spent a long time developing, and one that had sustained them for almost twenty years.

Without her familiar figure sitting straight-backed in her chair, Dr. Bakura set about making the study his and his alone, as if by exorcising her he could pretend his grief didn't exist. He stored her computer in the attic and covered her desk with relics discovered on digs, essays sent to him by contemporaries, and neatly written notes detailing what his schedule said he was to do next.

He'd always lived his life by a schedule, even when nobody else constructed one for him. By contrast, his wife lived hers by haphazardly placed post-it notes, which could contain such nonsensical messages as 'Placatory bubble bath too cheesy?' 'Must remember gay friend is a cliché' and 'Revise chapter five and pick up Amane from karate lesson before 6pm'. Dr. Bakura was so dedicated to his work he often forgot petty things like eating or sleeping, but she was the vim to his vigour. She kept things interesting and pulled him out of himself when he got too serious from thinking about long-dead people and places.

But now she was gone, and apparently she and Amane were two dead people Dr. Bakura didn't want to think about.

What finally alerted Ryou, however, wasn't this careful deletion of his mother from his father's sanctuaries. It was after the funerals, when he wanted to look at photographs of Amane's last birthday, a fancy dress party when they'd dressed Prissy up in a bib and cone hat and given her a bowl of birthday cake. She'd been sick all over the carpet, of course, and sat licking her paws on top of the freezer while they cleaned it up. Mom had snapped Ryou and Amane in their identical skeleton outfits, crouched with the antibacterial spray and cat-vomit-stained tissues in their hands, but great big smiles still on their faces. Amane's hair had come loose from its ponytail and the two of them looked so alike, despite the difference in age and gender, that the only real way to tell them apart was their eyes. Ryou had taken after their mother, with soft brown eyes like melted chocolate. Amane, on the other hand, had their father's startling green. It was Ryou's favourite picture of them together, but when he went to the photo album cabinet in the sitting room he found it empty.

"Dad?"

It took three calls to get his attention. "What?" Dr. Bakura asked gruffly.

"Where are all the photos?"

"Tossed them."

Thinking he meant he'd just put them somewhere else, Ryou asked, "Where did you put them?"

"With all the other rubbish."

"You did what?"

"Needed the space."

"For what? The cabinet's empty."

"Stuff."

"But all our family photos were in there – your wedding, when we were babies, award ceremonies, that time I went to Scout camp. There were loads of Mom and Amane in there!"

"Mmm."

"Where did you put them? You didn't really throw them out, did you?"

"Mm-hmm."

"When? When did you do this?"

"Last week."

"But the bin-men have been since then!"

"So?"

Ryou gaped at his father and felt, suddenly, like he was looking at a stranger. He'd heard stories of men who went to seed after losing their wives or children. Instead, Dr. Bakura had become ultra-uptight. He was wearing a tie. Despite his scheduled life, he never wore ties unless he was going to give a lecture at some prestigious convention or redbrick university. Not only that, his tie had a clip in the middle to stop it flapping about. The edge of a plastic protector peeked out of his jacket pocket, the creases in his trousers were sharp enough to cut your finger, and even though he was wearing shoes in the house (something Mum would never have allowed), they were cleaned, buffed and polished to within an inch of their patent leather lives. There was probably more grime on Ryou's slippers and jeans than on the entirety of his father's body. He was wearing hair gel, for pity's sake. His hair usually looked like his children's – wild and shaggy, like a narcoleptic lemur had fallen asleep while humping his head.

How did I not notice all these changes? some part of Ryou wondered, but it was drowned out by the much louder part, which was shouting, He threw away all the pictures of Mum and Amane. They'll all have been incinerated now, or be in some landfill with rats and cockroaches running all over them. He threw them away without telling me! How could he do that?

The answer wasn't a very palatable one, as Ryou learned in the following weeks.

His father became more uptight and distant. Apparently, if he couldn't have the missing members of his family, Dr. Bakura preferred not to remember they'd existed at all. It was his coping mechanism against the enormity of his grief, and though Ryou felt sick every time he thought about it, he could understand it. Sometimes he felt like his own insides had been liquidised with pain, and were just slopping about inside him like acid, ready to burn any time he thought about his mother or sister and how they'd died.

The police said the impact would have killed them both outright, long before the petrol tank caught alight, but it had been wet that night – enough that it was a miracle the tank had ignited at all, and there was plenty of time for either of them to regain consciousness before the explosion. Most of Ryou's nightmares these days involving clawing at a seatbelt or a car door handle while flames licked at his clothes.

"Some days I think Dad wants to forget about me, too," he confessed to Prissy one day, when she'd escaped her kittens to gobble down a bowl of cat food. "I think I look too much like both of them. He gets this funny expression that he never used to before … it happened. It's the only time he looks at me for more than five seconds, but I hate the way he just stares, like he's trying to figure out who the heck I am and what I'm doing in his house." He sighed. "What do you care though, huh? As long as there's food in your bowl and a hot radiator to sleep next to, you're all set."

Prissy flicked her tail irritably and rubbed her head against his knuckles, before disappearing upstairs to deal with her brood.

Ryou hoarded things. After he found out what his father was up to, he scoured the house for remnants of Mum and Amane and stored them in his bedroom.

He started in Amane's room, since his father hadn't reached there yet. Sensing that if he was too obvious about it his own room would be exorcised of their memories as well, Ryou was careful about what he took, how much, and when. In this way he rescued all Amane's karate and swimming certificates, a scrapbook she'd been keeping about kitten development, all the pink ribbons he'd given her for birthdays and Christmas (which she'd protested about but kept anyway), and a selection of stuffed toys she'd had since she chewed on them in her crib. He also took every single photo he could dig up – quite a few, since Amane often spent her pocket money on disposable cameras. She'd wanted to be a photographer when she grew up – assuming her preferred careers of costumed superhero or professional karate champion didn't work out.

Ryou skipped two different days of school to complete his task. The first day he spent in Amane's room. The second he patrolled the house, seeing if there was anything his father had missed. Perhaps if he'd been a more confrontational boy he would have challenged his father outright about his behaviour, instead of skulking around like a thief in his own home, but that had never been Ryou's way. He was gentle and soft-spoken; a natural born peacemaker who disliked raised voices and arguments. Of the two siblings, Amane had always been the stirrer, wading into situations she knew little about with her fists and feet flying. Just as their parents had balanced each other in their study, Amane and Ryou had balanced each other in school. Whatever disturbance one of them created, the other could usually be counted on to sort it out in his or her inimitable fashion.

Ryou never caused disturbances anymore. Girls still fought over him, as they had since the onset of their hormones came up against his delicate good looks and total lack of awareness that he resembled something from a boy-band. They just weren't as obvious as they had been before his tragedy became the talk of the school. These days his classmates mostly whispered behind his back, or when they thought he wasn't looking. They generally fell into two categories: those who wanted to mother him and those who saw him as a curiosity.

Boys had never really liked him at all, since he didn't play sports, wasn't into comic books, video games or music, and his very presence made it more difficult for them to score with the female population of Clayton Secondary. Yet even they were curious after they read in the newspaper about the accident. Being that close to someone who'd suffered such an enormous loss was a novelty. Those who approached to give their condolences had a nosy glint in their eyes, as if doing it just to see how he'd respond so they could report it back to their friends.

Ryou had no friends. There were people he'd hung out with before the accident, but his corrosive grief left them ill at ease, and they drifted away. Soon he found himself alone at break and lunchtimes, relegated to the library or the shadow of the science block, where nobody went because it smelled of urine and vomit from the drunks who climbed over the fence every Friday and Saturday night.

He'd always had Amane to talk to before. Really, it was strange how well they'd gotten along considering their status as older and younger siblings was supposed to make the teenage years a battlefield of screaming fights and slamming doors. Yet it had never been that way between the two of them. The only thing that ever happened to their doors were notes one periodically slipped under them when the other was in the doghouse and had been sent to bed without supper.

Ryou had rescued those letters from Amane's room, too. He remembered sending each one. He kept them in a shoebox with the letters she'd sent to him. His handwriting had barely changed over the years, but hers went from spidery to … less spidery. He reread them all, both his and hers, starting with the earliest, when she was just learning to read and write and spelled everything phonetically.

He was careful not to get any tears on the ink when he started to cry. Sometimes Prissy would jump into his lap, which made him feel better. There was something about a warm, purring bundle of fur that calmed the nerves and eased even the keenest heartache.

A lot of the notes dealt with The Game – a variant of a role-playing game they'd kept going for years, albeit sporadically. Long ago, their mother had purchased a Monster World rulebook when researching a novel set in a fantasy world. It hadn't contained anything useful for her purposes, but even as a child Amane had loved all the gruesome pictures of monsters. She made Ryou read all their stats to her, though she couldn't understand most of the complicated gaming vocabulary. Ryou, however, had become fascinated. He'd tried explaining it to her, but Amane couldn't maintain interest long enough on something so cerebral. She much preferred running off to play make-believe with props that could do actual damage, and would stand in the garden lopping off daffodil heads with a wooden sword while Ryou told her about orcs, rangers, wizards and trolls. As time went on he started creating plots that she would act out, adding her own ideas and dragging him into it whenever she could.

Thus 'The Game' had been created – a simplified RPG conducted through notes and doodles, the plot of which was now documented entirely in the shoebox on top of Ryou's closet. They'd just been at the point where Amane's wandering warrioress, having defeated the evil sorcerer, was about to rescue Ryou's healer-mage from the dungeon he'd been thrown into. The irony wasn't lost on Ryou. Neither were the parallels with his current real life situation.

"Please come and save me," he murmured, feeling stupid even as he said the words. "Come back and save me from all this, Amane."

But she would never perform any last-minute daring recues again, either real or imaginary.

The three kittens had opened their eyes at two weeks. Ryou remembered reading that long-haired cats took longer to open their eyes than short-haired, and that at first all kittens' eyes were opaque blue. He also remembered that even though their eyes were open, at first they'd still be blind because they had no pupils. It sounded like something from a sci-fi novel, but truth really was stranger than fiction sometimes.

He set up a roadblock of sorts at the top of the stairs to stop them falling, and watched as they gambolled about, squeaking and hissing at each other. They had a spindly-limbed, trembly way of moving that fascinated him, though they couldn't really walk yet. Mostly they half-crawled, half-dragged their round little bodies around the nesting box he'd provided. He and Prissy lay side by side, observing until one of them had to mediate some crisis or other – usually a kitten getting so tangled up in the blanket it couldn't free itself. Prissy didn't seem to mind Ryou interfering, which made him feel strangely proud for some reason.

At three weeks, two of them had formed pupils and were beginning to get their proper eye colour. Like Prissy, their irises were a rich gold, their pelts pale grey with black stripes on the crowns of their heads.

However the third kitten, the only female of the trio, didn't lose her blue eyes until half a week after her brothers. When she did they weren't gold, but a startling shade of green. Coupled with her silvery fur, so pale it was almost white, and the fact all the kittens bore their mother's long hair and tendency to look unkempt even after they'd been groomed, it was no wonder Ryou was taken aback by her appearance.

He picked up the mismatching kitten and raised her to eye level. She stared groggily back, blinking and sniffing as she tried to get used to all these strange new sensations. Ryou couldn't even begin to image what it was like to see the world for the first time. The little queen tried to raise herself up on her front paws, bracing them against his palm, but her head was still disproportionately large for her body and she hadn't the strength to raise it. She flopped back down and mewed piteously.

Prissy, in a moment of violent motherliness, demanded Ryou return her kitten to the nesting box by sinking her claws into his leg. Ryou yelped and, after complying, pulled up his jeans to reveal two half-moons of red dots on either side of his calf.

"I wasn't going to hurt her," he sulked.

Prissy flicked her tail dismissively at him and lay down to suckle her babies. Ryou knew when he'd been dismissed.

He was startled when he turned around to find his father staring at him from the middle of the staircase.

"Amane really loved that cat, didn't she?" he said in a monotone, not even lifting his voice at the end to show it was a question.

Remembering how so many things of Amane's had been removed from the house, sudden fear washed through Ryou. His moved so that his body blocked the open airing cupboard, putting himself between Prissy's family and his own father.

"Yes. She did. So do I." There was a definite and unprecedented edge to his voice for someone who didn't like confrontations.

Dr. Bakura blinked behind his glasses. "I'm not going to take them to be put down, Ryou."

"I …" Ryou hesitated. Was he that transparent? Why had his father jumped straight to that conclusion? "How was work today?" he asked instead, losing his nerve.

His father gazed at him for a moment with that probing expression, then turned and descended the stairs without answering the question. "I'd like fish for dinner tonight. And some of those grilled vegetables you made last week. They were nice."

It was always Ryou who did the cooking now. Before, it'd always been Mum, and neither Ryou nor his father ever entertained the idea that Dr. Bakura should step into her role. There was probably more in that than they cared to examine.

Ryou could help releasing a sigh of relief. He looked down at the nesting box, surprised to find the little female kitten staring back at him, having been rolled onto her back so Prissy could wash her stomach. Her green eyes seemed to lock onto Ryou's face – but that was impossible, since she could probably only see three inches in front of her nose, and even then only in vague splotches of colour.

Still, Ryou pushed the door ajar with a strange feeling in his gut that he couldn't put a name to.

There were many things in life that could be considered cute. Baby booties, the pink stationary relatives from Japan had always sent Amane, puppies and fawns just learning to walk.

None of them, however, could eclipse Prissy's kittens. They were made up of two thirds flesh and blood, and one third pure, unrefined cuteness.

Ryou never tired of watching them as they grew. He took great delight in the pricking of their ears, which had started out so close to their skulls they looked like that had no ears at all. He marvelled at the way they explored their world, which didn't stretch beyond one half of the upstairs landing, and the way they could make every inch of space count in their games.

After their eyes opened and they began to see, hear and smell clearly, making connections between all three of their senses, their sense of adventure began to emerge. He loved how at nearly a month old they wobble-walked out of the nesting box on their own, no longer dragging themselves along by their forepaws or being carried by their scruffs, but often falling over for no apparent reason. He could watch them for hours, losing himself in their clumsiness and the way they never let anything keep them from trying again.

Amane would have loved them. Ryou felt closer to her, watching the kittens, but that wasn't the only reason he did it.

It was the reason he brought out her scrapbook, though.

The book was remarkably thorough, considering how Amane's teachers always wrote on her school reports that she needed to put more effort into her written work. From it, he learned that if Prissy didn't do it, it would be up to him to introduce the kittens to the litter-tray, and that he wasn't supposed to buy clumping cat litter until they were at least four months old in case they swallowed it and it expanded in their stomachs.

When they were five weeks old he dutifully carried them downstairs and placed them in Prissy's tray. The two males cowered in the corner. By contrast, the little female cavorted about like she was having the time of her life, batting at her brothers with tiny blunt paws and flicking up litter like a kid building sandcastles at the beach.

Ryou always waited until his father was out before bringing them downstairs. He hadn't quite let go of the feeling that his father saw the kittens as the last remaining reminder of Mum and Amane, and that he wanted nothing more than to consign them to the dustbin like the pressed flowers from Mum's wedding bouquet and the macaroni art Amane made on her first day at playgroup. Dr. Bakura was not a cruel man, or at least he hadn't been before his became a widower, and since then any cruelty he did commit was less malicious than it was just a by-product of his silent, bitter grief. He'd become an austere man, with a blank gaze that hid his thoughts so completely Ryou had to stare hard to recognise the father who used to laugh and twirl him around as a toddler.

Ryou didn't hate him. He got the feeling other boys his age, put into the same situation, would have turned their hormonal, grieving hearts black with hatred against a man who had prevented them from mourning their own mother by exorcising her memory from the house. Ryou tried to talk about her with him, and when that failed he tried to talk about Amane, but each time it was the same story. His father turned that horrible blank gaze on him and Ryou's words died in his throat. Dr. Bakura didn't insist, didn't lay down the law or set out an ultimatum that Ryou had to live by. He just stopped talking about them and somehow Ryou did them same – at least to him.

It was too weird talking about it at school. Over a month down the line and his classmates had forgotten his tragedy in favour of another. Polly Morrison's grandmother had died of cancer and Polly had spent the woman's last days at her hospital bedside. Polly was a popular girl with a fondness for the spotlight, so she enjoyed the attention and milked it for all it was worth – pushing her lapping bereavement over the brim of propriety with the force of her own personality as a riptide. People were much more interested in listening to her talk about the horrendous beep of a flat-lining heart monitor than watching Ryou hunch over his desk with his shoulders by his ears.

Prissy made a good listener. Maybe it was a sign of madness or something, but she was there and she didn't judge him, no matter what he said, so he told his inner thoughts to a cat instead of going to other family members or a grief counsellor.

"I must be doolalley," Ryou said. "Or at least going that way."

Sometimes the tone of his voice caused her to get up and rub her head under his chin, wetting his throat with her nose and purring enough that his whole head seemed to vibrate. She meowed indignantly when he tried to sweep her up into a hug, however, so he fell to hugging her kittens when he needed something to cling onto, or just to hold to remind himself he was alive. They didn't mind. They snuffled him curiously, though the little female usually tried to climb inside his jumper, or forced her head up his elasticised sleeve and got it stuck. The sight of her back legs fruitlessly pedalling the air never failed to make him laugh, and he always felt better afterwards.

"Therapy is a fuzzy kitten," he murmured when he opened his eyes to find he'd left his bedroom door open, and that all three had climbed up his duvet and onto his bed while he slept.

The two males nestled against the small of his back, enjoying his body heat the way they usually enjoyed their mother's. The little female had clambered up to his pillow and sat so close to his face that breathing in her fur had caused him to choke and wake up. Instead of panicking at his sudden movement the way the other two did, she stared at Ryou with her curious green eyes, and then settled down for a nap, leaving her brothers to run back to Prissy alone.

"You're rather fearless, aren't you?" Ryou said sleepily, closing his eyes again. It was one of the first times he did so and didn't immediately think of flames and being trapped – not even briefly.

When he reawakened it was to see Prissy leaving through the door, the scruff of her third kitten clamped firmly between her jaws, though the little queen cried at being carried away.

Six weeks after the accident, Ryou came home to find his father had returned early. He was standing in front of the open airing cupboard, staring at the box of kittens. All three still nestled close to their mother as though feeding, though they were beginning to take solid food and Prissy had taken to butting them away from her teats.

Dr. Bakura looked up when Ryou thundered up the stairs. "You'll break something if you're not careful," he said mildly.

Ryou panted, eyes flicking to count the cats. Still four. That was good. He abruptly felt silly for worrying. What had he expected his father to do – toss them out of the window before he got off the school bus?

Dr. Bakura followed his gaze and frowned. "I wouldn't have hurt them, Ryou."

"I … I never …" Ryou stammered. Truth be told, he had no idea what he could say next. He was a terrible liar. When put under pressure words burst out of him like a water balloon punctured repeatedly by a needle. He looked up at his father, throat bobbing but nothing coming out because if he started saying something right now, he knew it would be something he didn't actually want to say.

"You don't have a very high opinion of me anymore, do you?"

Ryou swallowed, but kept silent.

Dr. Bakura nodded to himself, as though Ryou had just confirmed some unpleasant fact. "Excuse me," he said without warmth.

Ryou moved aside and his father went downstairs. Once the man had gone, he dropped to his knees and extended a hand to Prissy, who licked it. The little female kitten also bounced to her paws and rasped her tiny pink tongue across his palm. Then she fastened her teeth on the tip of his thumb without breaking the skin. She was trying to get him to play with her when her brothers were too sleepy. Ryou smiled and picked her up, and she promptly tried to go up his sleeve like always.

It was strange, but in six weeks these four cats had done more to help Ryou deal with his loss than anybody else. He found joy in them, and caring for them helped him to block out more painful thoughts and feelings until he was ready to deal with them. Filling his head with information about specialised kitten food, socialising skills and weaning was better than filling it with thoughts about how his mother and sister had died, how his father had changed and whether or not he should be doing more to make him change back. Maybe it was a little selfish, but Prissy, her kittens and their little world had become a major part of his world as well. Ryou was happy to immerse himself in it until he could think about all that had happened without feeling like he'd been stabbed through the heart with a chunk of ice.

"Hands aren't for biting," he said, pulling the little queen back. She fastened onto his thumb again "Hands are for petting, stroking, and picking you up with. Other things are for biting."

Suddenly remembering, he put her down and drew out a drinking straw he's snaffled from the canteen. He drew it across the floor and watched with satisfaction as she chased, pounced and tried to catch it. She mewed, waggling her bottom in the air and attempting to hold down the elusive thing with her forepaws, but he kept pulling it away. Eventually he allowed her to 'capture' the straw, and watched as she proudly carried her prize away to chew on. Amane's scrapbook had said the crunchy plastic would be good for teething, and would aid in training the kittens to know the difference between biteable things and non-biteable.

The pang in his chest came again, but, as though melted a little by the warmth of a furry body, this time the ice wasn't so cold.

"We're moving?" Ryou gaped. "When?"

"At half term. You can start the next half in Domino."

"But … Japan?" He still couldn't quite believe it. Surely he'd heard wrong.

He hadn't. "It makes sense."

To you. Dr. Bakura was from Japan, after all. However, even though Ryou had visited and was as perfectly bilingual as a boy raised in England was ever likely to be, the idea of moving there permanently shocked him to his core. It frightened him, too. His whole life was in England. His school, his home, his mother's relatives – Mum and Amane's graves were here in Clayton!

"We can't." In an unprecedented move, Ryou stood up to his father. "I don't want to go. You can't make me."

"The decision has already been made," his father said calmly, pushing aside Ryou's opinion as easily as he would a stack of disorderly papers in his study. "There are too many old ghosts, and it's not as though you have much tying you down here. You haven't brought home any friends in months, and it's been years since you went to anybody's house."

"But Mum and Amane -"

"Are dead. They're not here anymore, Ryou."

"But their graves -"

"Aren't them. A headstone isn't a person. This conversation is over. I'll be in my study. Call me when dinner's ready."

Ryou stared at his retreating back, the bluntness of the words like a brick his father had smacked into the side of his head. Dead. They're not here anymore, Ryou. A headstone isn't a person.

"I know it isn't," he muttered. "But it's … all I've got left."

For a second he actually considered chasing after his father, banging open the study door and demanding that the conversation continue, but the click of the lock deflated his unfamiliar rage far too easily. Ryou slumped, tears blurring his eyes no matter how he tried to blink them away, and then stumbled upstairs with a hand over his mouth as if he was going to be sick.

The worst thing about grief was the unexpectedness of it. It was a lurking foe that camped out in your body, waiting for the right moment to strike. You knew it was there, like the dull throb of a stubbed toe or a stomach-ache, but these were just shadows of the real thing. When grief struck properly it was like a shark attack – swift and devastating. You could be walking along the street, perfectly normal, and then suddenly something caught your attention. It didn't have to be something significant, or even something you'd anticipate could make you gasp and your eyes fill with tears – a particular brand of chocolate that had gone on sale, which would make you think of the person who loved that brand. Your impulse was the buy them some, until your brain caught up with itself. Or you could be sitting at home, watching TV or reading or just staring into space, and an image would pop into your head that left you shaking with sobs like an epileptic having a fit.

For Ryou, it was the evening after his father dropped the bombshell about moving to Japan. The television was on, but it was only background noise and a blue flickery glow, since he hadn't switched on the room lights. Ryou was staring at a spot just above the screen, when suddenly he gave a sharp intake of breath and gripped the sides of the armchair so tightly that his fingers squeaked against the polished wood underneath the plush fabric. His eyes widened. For a few seconds he actually thought he was going to choke on his own spit because he couldn't make his throat move to swallow it.

Somehow he got up, turned off the TV, walked upstairs and flopped face first onto his bed. He lay there for a long while, not saying or doing anything, until something brushed his hand and he looked up to see a pair of tiny green eyes half an inch from his own. On impulse he pulled the kitten into a hug. She struggled a little, but when he slowly began to judder she stopped and lay very still in his arms.

"We were really young," he murmured. "Amane and I. I was … was teaching her to skip stones. Mum and Dad had taken us to a beach somewhere in Wales, and it was all full of rocks and bits of broken shell. Mum showed us both how to listen for the ocean in a conch shell, and Dad took pictures with the big expensive camera he always took with him on archaeological digs. We were all together and …" He scrunched his eyes shut. "For a second, downstairs, I felt really happy, just like I did that day. And then I remembered."

"Mrow."

"I can't believe I'm talking to a cat and it kind of answered."

"Mrow!"

"Hey – ouch!" Ryou rolled onto his back and held the kitten above him. "Your claws are sharp."

"Mrow?" She wiggled a little. A thin stream of urine arced onto his shirt.

"Oh no!" Ryou leapt to his feet. He was gentler than any other boy his age, but even he had his limits. "Yeuuuuch!"

The little queen made a sound of relief and then meowed happily as she was swung around. She thought it was all part of some elaborate game. She kicked her little paws and let out pleased noises.

Ryou paused in hurtling around looking for a paper towel. He stared at the kitten. The kitten stared back. For a six week old, it was a disturbingly intelligent look.

"I suppose I should think about naming you little fellahs soon."

The kitten mewed.

"Sorry, little fellahs and lady."

"Mrow."

"We have to take them with us."

"Don't be ridiculous."

"We have to -"

"Ryou, they're cats."

"So?"

"They're young. They can go to be rehomed. I'm sure homes are just crying out for kittens, and as for the mother …" Dr. Bakura stopped.

Ryou held the little queen close. He'd taken to carrying her around, since she wanted to be picked all the time anyway. Several times she'd clambered up onto his shoulder and surveyed the world from a new perspective, but her grip wasn't yet perfect when he was in motion unless he kept a hand pressed on her back, which made her wiggle and dig in her claws. When descending stairs he cradled her in his arms instead, and he hadn't put her back before meeting his father in the kitchen. Now he half turned away, as if to shield her.

"There's only a fifty-fifty chance they'd be able to rehome Prissy. It was only luck that we took her in when she was a stray. You know that. And then what? What happens to her if she can't be rehomed through proper channels, or she fails those behaviour tests they do before they put them up for adoption?"

They called it 'humane euthanasia', but unless an animal was really sick or dangerous, Ryou couldn't see it as anything but murder. Prissy was neither of those things. She was just too old and set in her ways to take kindly to being shunted around the way a rehoming centre would do before deciding whether or not it was worth trying to find her new owners. Not many places or people would accept some of her behaviour. Ryou knew he took it mainly because she was Amane's cat.

Dr. Bakura sighed. "Ryou, you cannot expect to take four cats with you to Domino."

"Why not? It's not like I'll have any friends over there."

"You're being uncommonly petty."

"Because if you're going to make me leave behind my life in England I don't want to just lose the entire thing. They may just be cats to you, Dad, but to me they're …" Ryou stumbled. He dropped his eyes. Suddenly the words felt like clumpy cat litter in his throat.

"They're what?" Dr. Bakura asked, managing to sound both flat and dangerous at the same time.

"They're family."

"Ridiculous."

"Have you even thought about me once this whole time?" Ryou forced himself to raise his gaze and meet his father's squarely. There was more at stake this time than there had ever been before. What had started out as a conversation about the silliness of getting attached to kittens they were just going to leave behind had turned into something much more. He couldn't afford to be his usual accommodating self this time; not if he wanted his father to understand … anything. "Have you ever wondered how I'm feeling?"

"I understood that you were mourning your sister and mother. Apparently you were too busy replacing them with pets." His father turned angrily away, as though Ryou had just insulted him.

"And you're pretending they never existed."

"It isn't for you to question what I do -"

"It is if it's ruining my life!"

"Don't be melodramatic."

"I'm not!"

"Really? You sound exactly like a melodramatic teenager to me. I'm just trying to do what's best for you."

"No, you're trying to do what's best for you. I don't see much of what I want featuring anywhere. I don't want to go to Japan."

"We've been over this."

"We never finished."

"I have." Without another word, Dr. Bakura shrugged on his coat from the stand and plunked his hat on his head. He yanked open the front door and strode through without a backwards glance.

Ryou's whole body seemed to twitch with the stress of acting against his own nature. The little queen squealed as his arms tightened convulsively around her. Almost immediately, Prissy came skidding into the porch and fastened herself onto Ryou's lower left leg in a display of exactly why she'd fail a rehoming behaviour test.

Ryou yelped and released the kitten, but rather than run away or go to her mother, she tried to climb back up his other leg. She mewled pitifully until he picked her up and placed her on his shoulder. There she stretched out, front and back paws dangling either side, and happily nuzzled his neck. He could feel her tiny purr reverberating through him.

Prissy performed the feline equivalent of an eye roll – she sat down and began washing herself. Then she lifted her tail and stalked away, her motherly duties completed and a patch of warm sunlight on a windowsill calling her name.

"Well, nothing got resolved again," Ryou murmured. "But at least I've said more of my piece this time. I won't let him take you guys away." He chucked under the little queen's chin. "I'm quite fond of you, even if I do have to remove awful things from your litter tray. Speaking of which, where are your brothers?"

A crash from the living room heralded the answer that they'd been trying to climb the drapes again, and this time managed to pull them down entirely.

"Oh for goodness sake," Ryou grumbled, but he was smiling as he uncovered the two male kittens and the little female chattered her own disapproval down on them from above.

'Though your cat may look nearly full-grown by the time he or she is one year old, cats are actually still considered kittens until they are two years old. It takes two years for a cat to complete development in both mind and body. During its first two years of life, your kitten will go through several developmental stages, but the most important developments occur within the first twelve weeks of life.'

Ryou lifting his eyes from the page to see the little queen demonstrating the proper use of a scratching post to her brothers. Beyond them Prissy rolled on her back in sleep. She had never used the post in all the time they'd owned it, instead preferring to sharpen her claws on trees, furniture and legs. The male kittens pounced on the post, and Ryou couldn't help smiling when their sister batting them back like she really was trying to teach them what to do. It was a silly, fanciful notion, but it made the corners of his mouth twitch.

The photocopied page of H. Voegel's book Cats and Caring for Them that Amane had stuck into her scrapbook was crumpled, and had obviously been smoothed out before being stuck down. She'd used sellotape and got half of it all twisted, obviously had a tantrum and screwed up the uncooperative paper, then retrieved it once she'd calmed down. She'd always had a hot temper, flaring up rapidly and cooling off just as fast. Ryou's more placid nature had always been a perfect foil for her.

The kittens were eight weeks old now, and had undergone their first set of shots, their first deworming at the vet, and their first bath. Ryou had opted to try the bath when he knew his father was at some awards evening up at Oxford University and wouldn't be home until the next day. He'd been trying to keep the kittens' profile low lately. Plus, that gave him enough time to clean up the heinous mess that resulted. Who knew water could get into so many places without actually just sticking a hose through the window and flooding the bathroom?

Ryou turned over onto his back, moving his head from side to side to make a better indentation in his pillow, and raised the book above his head to continue reading. Something small fluttered out onto his cheek. Closing the book on the finger of one hand, he picked this up with the other and saw it was a folded up piece of notepaper. Opening it revealed more lines of Amane's spidery writing, which looked like nothing so much as the trail an actual spider might have left if it was big enough and had been dumped in ink first.

Good Name for Cats

NOT FLUFFY!

White – Cottonball, Diamond, Frosty, Krystal, Marshmallow, Milky, Talcum (as in Talcum Powder).

Black – Abracadabra, Darth Vader, Ninja, Nightmare, Tar Baby (must tell Prissy to try hard for a black litter, as they have cooler names).

This would be so much easier if we knew what their dad looks like!

Something landed on Ryou's stomach. He looked down at the little female kitten. He knew now that it was unusual for her to have developed green irises as quickly as she had, especially ones as penetrating as the eyes now staring back at him. She stalked her way up his chest and curled into a ball under his chin, forcing him to tip his head back so he didn't inhale her fur and choke. It also helped him swallow the knot of emotion that had lodged in his throat when he read Amane's note. He could just imagine her writing that.

He remembered how she'd staked out the front garden, trying to figure out which of the cats passing by was the father of Prissy's litter. Ryou had his suspicions about the Tompkins' tomcat, Bruno, since he was the only one in the area with green eyes, but he was a tabby and little … um …

He still hadn't thought up good enough names for the kittens. He mentally tagged them 'little queen', 'big brother' and 'little brother', since one of the two males was slighter than the other. He'd tried a couple of names, but nothing seemed to fit. He supposed it would come in time, as their personalities emerged and his inspiration could fix on something more fitting than 'Fluffy'.

NOT FLUFFY!

"Well you definitely won't be Fluffy." Ryou stroked the little queen. "Except in the ways that count, of course. I could stroke you all day."

Under his hand, the kitten began to purr.

When the kittens were ten weeks old, Ryou felt like his life was no longer a hotbed of burning thorns he was trying to walk through with bare feet. The little queen was his constant companion, much to her mother's chagrin. Prissy often bullied her daughter out from under Ryou's feet, and would sit on the floor or counter eyeballing them both disapprovingly when Ryou picked up the kitten and put her on his shoulder. He found tremendous comfort in her presence there, though he knew his father disapproved. He started wearing pale clothes so her hair didn't show so much, and thick jumpers even though it wasn't cold so that her claws had something to grip onto. In return, she watched life from his point of view and kept up a mewling commentary that stopped only when she was purring into his ear and flicking the back of his neck with her tail. Ryou reckoned he probably could have walked to school with her up there and she would have sat through every class, perfectly happy until it was time to go home again.

Then, as the kittens were entering their eleventh week of life, everything changed.

Ryou didn't mind dogs. In fact, he quite liked their honest affection. But there was one dog even he could find no redeeming features of, and that was Crazy Carl.

Mrs. Murphy's rottweiler was psychotic. There was no other word for it. He regularly strained at his choke chain trying to bite anything that moved, and looked at the world through wicked eyes that never seemed to blink until you'd passed his garden. Carl had killed squirrels before. Ryou had seen their broken little bodies on his way to school before Mrs. Murphy had chance to move them and put sand on the bloodstained grass. She was elderly, and Carl was her only companion. Since he was never savage with her, she flatly refused to believe he was a danger.

"My poor poopsy," she'd say, taking his jowl between her thumb and forefinger and wiggling it as one might a chubby baby. "My little snookums."

When the kitten started going outside, Ryou worried they'd stray into Carl's garden. There was a wall along one side, and he watched from the front door as all three, on various occasions, navigated it without falling in. Usually they avoided it because of the smell of dog, and eventually he trusted them enough not to watch their every move like an overprotective parent.

That is, until the day Mrs. Murphy's grandson came over. Ryou was in the living room, poring over trigonometry homework, when suddenly a popping noise began outside, followed by ear-splitting squealing. Ryou recognised Carl's frenzied barks and was at the door in an instant, having also recognised the sound of a cat in pain. He tore across the road and leaned over the gate, horrified at what he saw. Until the day he died, he knew, it would be emblazoned on his brain like graffiti.

Mrs. Murphy's grandson had an air rifle, good aim from hours on his X-Box, and no sense of compassion. He thought it was fun to take pot shots at whatever he liked, especially when he was bored at his doddery old grandmother's house. The cats that kept using her wall as a thoroughfare proved a nice distraction. What did he care about repercussions? He was going back to London at the end of the weekend, and it wasn't like there was a shortage of mangy moggies in the world.

The smaller of the two male kittens had died outright. The second had been wounded and fallen into the garden, where Carl had chased him into the corner. Injured, the kitten hadn't been able to get away, though the claw-marks on Carl's face told their own story. The two brothers never went anywhere alone, perhaps as a throwback of their sister's bond with Ryou, and their mother's disinterest when she had something better to do. They died as they had lived – within three feet of each other.

Ryou was devastated. It felt like Mum and Amane all over again, only this time he was right there and he still hadn't been able to do anything.

Filled with crazy rage enough to equal Carl's own, Ryou vaulted the gate, picked up a hollow plastic garden gnome and smacked the dog with it. Carl continued to shake his head, splots of blood flying from the pitiful body in his jaws. Ryou hit him again, and again, channelling all his desperate frustration and anger and grief into swinging that stupid plastic gnome. He thought he heard Mrs. Murphy's grandson shouting at him, and Carl yelping, but he didn't stop until someone pulled him off. He looked down to see red of a different shade on the stupid gnome's stupid pointy red hat.

"Ryou!" Dr. Bakura snapped. "Pull yourself together!"

"He killed them!" Was that Ryou's voice? Was that really his own voice sounding so high and strangled? "He killed them, Dad!"

"I know." Dr. Bakura continued to hold him back. His hands gripped Ryou's elbows from behind like a prison warden putting handcuffs on an inmate.

"My little poopsy!" Mrs. Murphy screeched, hobbling out of the house on her stick. "What have you done to my darling?"

"Your dog killed my cats!" Ryou cried. His face was wet with tears. They were already dripping down his neck and into his collar.

Mrs. Murphy shook her head. "He wouldn't do that. He's not like that. You've never liked him. You horrible, horrible boy -"

"He's savage! He's a killer! He's -"

"Ryou," Dr. Bakura said firmly, calmly, completely at odds with Ryou's emotional outburst.

Ryou blinked. He realised that Mrs. Murphy was trembling, shaking her head in denial, but that her eyes were fixed on the two little bodies – one still, as if sleeping, and the other nothing more than a tatty bundle smeared with blood and drool. She knew. She knew that her dog had done this, just as she knew her grandson had started it. She just didn't want to believe it. They and her daughter were, after all, all she had left in the world, and Carl was her only companion most days of the year.

They 'humanely euthanised' animals that killed the way Carl had.

Ryou froze. Then he tugged his arms free of his father's hands. Dr. Bakura let go.

"I'll take care of things here," he murmured, sounding almost like he used to when he was a real father, not just a hollow facsimile. "You get on home."

"I … I want to take them back with me."

A hint of steel crept back into his voice. "Ryou, that dog may be rabid."

When he got through the door, Ryou immediately called for Prissy and the little female kitten. He found them both under the coffee table, shaking after the terrible noises outside. The little queen crept out when Ryou approached, but Prissy shrank away from his scent. Ryou froze again, realising he was covered in smears of mud and fresh blood. Animals could smell death, couldn't they? He backed away, but the little queen followed him, wrinkling her nose at the unfamiliar smells mixed with the more familiar scent of her brothers, and that of Ryou himself. She mewled and tipped her head to one side in confusion.

All at once Ryou fell to his knees on the living room carpet and wept as though his heart would break – the way he'd wept the night of the accident. Brutal sobs constricted his chest and shredded his throat, making it feel like he was just a container for something much bigger than himself. He couldn't breathe. He couldn't think. All he could do was imagine the two male kittens he'd never even named, and feel the leaden frustration that once again something precious had been ripped from him by forces he couldn't control.

The little queen clawed her way onto his lap and up his front until she was in her usual spot on his shoulder. There she licked his ear and mewled as though trying to comfort him, until Dr. Bakura returned and ushered his son upstairs to take a bath and wash himself clean.

Ryou was barely able to see where he was going, much less clean himself up. So it was that his father, who'd grown so distant and cold, dampened a flannel and gently held his teenage son's face still to wipe it free of dried tears and blood.

"You can bring the cats."

Ryou looked up at the silhouette in his doorway. "What?"

"You can bring those sodding cats to Domino," Dr. Bakura said, indulging in some uncharacteristic language. Then he turned and left, as if the oppressive atmosphere bothered him too much to stay within five feet of Ryou's bedroom.

Ryou looked back down at the photographs he'd taken of the kittens when they were still half-blind and flat-eared. He'd been looking for some to stick into Amane's scrapbook, continuing her work, and become caught up in just flicking through the catalogue of the kittens' lives. Carefully, he swiped the backs of several with glue and stuck them down on one of the spare pages, then wrote underneath them in his neat handwriting.

'Tweedledee and Tweedledum'

Perhaps not the best names in the world, but their playful inseparableness made it appropriate. He wrote as much in the scrapbook, as though writing to Amane to explain his choice and why he hadn't chosen any of her ideas. Writing in the scrapbook made him feel even closer to his sister, as if somehow he might open it one day to find a spidery reply. Plus, putting the males' names down in writing made it official, and meant he could keep up the theme with the little queen. She was currently in his lap, sleeping soundly, having barely left his side since he wandered out of the bathroom yesterday afternoon.

Ryou looked down at her. "Welcome to the rabbit hole, Alice."

Prissy disappeared.

It had always been a risk. She'd found them as a stray, after all, and while it had been convenient she had stayed. Both Ryou and Amane had just assumed this was because she'd chosen them as her permanent home. Now, however, following the deaths of both Amane and her kittens, Prissy chose to disprove them and move on.

Ryou sometimes wondered whether she'd tried to convince her last remaining kitten to go with her. If she had, Alice had refused. He awoke the morning of Prissy's desertion to find Alice on his pillow, sending kitten breath up his nose and absorbing the warmth of his breath in return. She slitted her eyes at him, licked the tip of his nose almost absently, and then settled down for the rest of her nap – though when a noise sounded outside his door she leapt up and hissed, as though trying to protect him with her tiny claws and teeth.

"Ryou?" his father said.

"Hmmm … I'm up, I'm up."

"Post for you. I've left it on the coffee table downstairs. I'm going out for a newspaper." He left without bidding him good morning. Ryou heard the front door shut.

He lay in bed, thinking about the strange way his father had been reacting to him lately. They were still very distant, but since the incident with Crazy Carl it seemed that Dr. Bakura was trying, in a ham-fisted and reluctant sort of way, to reach out to his son. He talked about things that didn't need talking about, though most of the time he still couldn't meet Ryou's eyes. Ryou would have found the post on his own, since they always left it in the same place. There had been no need for his father to knock on his door and tell him, except … except maybe to make some kind of human connection

Maybe.

Or perhaps he just felt guilty about his behaviour since the funerals.

When Dr. Bakura came home, Ryou was in the shower trying to get the tangles out of his hair, but there was a plate of bacon, eggs and baked beans warming on the grill, and a note saying where to find it.

Alice hated the cat carrier. She cried all the way to the airport, and only stopped when she switched to screaming as they took her away to the pressurised luggage compartment. They were flying with an airline that allowed pets only if they passed all the correct requirements for weight, health and check-in fees. Ryou had elected to pay Alice's fee himself, as well as the money towards her Pet Passport. Not that he expected his father to change his mind about bringing her over that, but it never hurt to be careful.

He was so anxious to be reunited with her when they got to Domino that he barely registered everybody was speaking Japanese. The smell of cinnamon buns was thick in the air. No matter where you went in the world, all airports reeked of cinnamon buns and sweat. Dr. Bakura frowned disapprovingly at his son's behaviour, but said nothing. Instead he got them a taxi and they travelled to what was to be their new home in relative silence.

"You'll be starting school as soon as possible," Dr. Bakura said suddenly.

Ryou blinked at him as if surfacing from a trance. He'd been watching the buildings and streets as they passed, mentally comparing what he saw with what they'd left. Some things were the same, but some were like stepping into another world. "I will?"

"Of course. There's no point wasting any time when you're at such a critical stage of your education."

"But where will I go?"

Ryou saw a pair of teenagers at the side of the road, waiting to cross. They were wearing boy and girl versions of the same uniform – blue trousers and a blazer, buttoned to the neck, for the boy, and a blue skirt with a pink blazer and a huge bow-kerchief-thing for the girl. Unlike in England, they hadn't tried to customise their uniforms. The girl's skirt was still regulation knee length and the boy's shoes had been shined. They laughed at some private joke. A spike of envy went through Ryou.

"Domino Prep," his father said shortly. "I've already arranged it with the headmistress. You start on Monday."

It was Saturday. Ryou sank low in his seat. So much for a chance to get acclimatised.

In her carrier, Alice wailed. She hated being trapped with no way out.

You and me both, Ryou thought.

The boy and girl on the street weren't from Domino Prep, it turned out. Ryou's school uniform was still trousers and a buttoned blazer, but it was all brown, save for the starched white collar poking out and digging into his neck. Coupled with his pale skin and white hair, it made him look like a giant cigarette standing on its end.

His mother would have told him he looked smart. Amane would have told him he looked like a cigarette. His father just grunted and went on eating his breakfast.

The apartment they'd rented was already furnished, reducing the small space even further. It was rather cramped for the two of them, in fact, but Ryou had his own room and most of his things fit into it. If the soles of his feet pressed against the wall while his head was flush against the headboard, it still wasn't for him to complain. His father's room had come with a double bed.

Alice leaped onto his shoulder. She had already adopted a post on the armoire – all the better for landing on him with a reasonable degree of accuracy. Ryou pried her off.

"Not today, Alice. I have to go to school."

She mewled. She hadn't been allowed out since they arrived. Ryou was terrified of her wandering off, being run down by a car, meeting the Japanese equivalent of Crazy Carl, or finding some other trouble while he wasn't around to rescue her. She stared accusingly, as if rebuking him for going out without her.

"Believe me, I'd much rather stay at home with you."

"Ryou," his father barked from the kitchen table. "We'll be late." As a gesture of goodwill – though to whom, Ryou wasn't entirely sure – Dr. Bakura was driving him to school. After today Ryou would get the bus. "Get a move on."

"Coming." Ryou removed Alice, stroked her from nose to tail-tip the way she liked, and left. "See you this evening. I'll give you a full run down of what goes on."

Alice's mewl was unequivocal: You'd better.

Ryou couldn't believe it. "You're leaving?" he followed his father around the room. "But we've only been here a month!"

"The opportunity came up and I took it. It's a very good one. In a few years I may have been considered too old to be eligible."

"But … Cairo?" Ryou changed direction to avoid being trampled. "For how long?"

"Three months."

"I'm expected to live on my own for three months? Isn't that illegal?"

"I don't see why. You're a responsible boy, and I'd allocate you an allowance to be dispensed at regular intervals. You've been taking care of the housework and housekeeping for a while, yes? It stands to reason you can cope as well alone as you do with me around. It's hardly as if you depend on me for your welfare, save for providing a roof over your head, which wouldn't be an issue."

"I'm not sure the authorities will see it that way," Ryou muttered. He bit his lip. "I don't … do you have to go?"

"Don't be childish, Ryou. You're not an infant, and I can't afford to pass up an opportunity like this one. They don't come around every day. Not when you're my age and on my salary."

Ryou bent his head and stopped walking as his father bustled out of the room with a bulging folder under his arm. "So Domino is just a dumping ground, is it?" he muttered under his breath. "I suppose I should've seen that one coming. I can't believe I actually thought …" He shook his head. "So stupid. So stupid."

Alice was curled up on Ryou's chest, nose covered by her tail. He could feel her breathing in and out, her tiny heartbeat pitter-pattering in counterpoint to his own. It was too hot and stuffy for bedclothes, so every time she twitched her little claws clicked against one button of his pyjama top. The digital clock read 3:14.

I wonder if it's this hot in Cairo, Ryou thought. I wonder if Dad is –

One green eye opened. Alice yawned. She got up, stretched, padded up onto his pillow and sprawled across his face. She left his mouth and nose uncovered so he could breathe. Her meaning was unmistakable.

"All right, all right, I'll go to sleep."

His only reply was a drowsy purr.

"Hey, you're the new guy, aren't you? From England?"

Ryou blinked. "Um …"

The girl in front of him smiled. It crinkled her nose winsomely. When she giggled her shoulder-length hair swayed like a field of corn. She was pretty. There was no denying it; which further begged the question of why she was talking to him.

Ryou sat ramrod at his desk. "Yes," he said after a while, when he realised she wasn't asking a rhetorical question. "I am. New, I mean."

"Cool." She leaned her elbows on his desk. She'd had to twist around in her seat to face him, which bunched her blazer under her chest and made it stand out more. She didn't appear to have noticed, but Ryou certainly had. He kept his eyes riveted to her face. "I'm Kirei."

"Ryou Bakura."

She shook her head. "You're not in England anymore. Family name comes first." She patted just below her collarbone. "I'm Kinpatsu Kirei."

"Oh. Of course." Ryou could feel the blush creeping up his neck. "Bakura Ryou."

She nodded. Her smile was entirely unmocking. "That's some accent you're got there. Still, you speak Japanese really well for a Westerner."

"My dad's Japanese. My mum was English."

Kirei's eyes widened and her mouth opened in a surprised moue. The intake of breath was miniscule but audible. She'd obviously noted the use of past tense. There were already rumours flinging themselves around school about why he apparently lived alone and had only one family member's contact details on his records.

He could have explained, but really, he was just too tired out by the whole situation. Bringing up his strained home-life was a step further than he wanted to go, especially in a brand new school where he had anything but brand new problems. Ryou ducked his head. "I have to get to lunch -"

"No, sorry, don't go!" She caught his sleeve. "I was just … never mind. I was being rude. Listen, would you like to eat lunch with me today? Then I can show you around; introduce you to people and stuff. Give you the grand tour." She smiled again.

Ryou's legs suddenly felt like cooked linguine. "Um," he said, "all right. That would be … nice."

Two boys were whispering to each other by the door.

"Didn't take long for Preying Mantis Kinpatsu to get at the new kid."

"Poor guy doesn't stand a chance."

"Think we should warn him?"

"Nah, let him enjoy himself while he can. It shouldn't take long for him to hear about her rep."

"I dunno. He keeps himself to himself. Maybe we should tell him before he makes a fool of himself. If someone had told me I wouldn't have …"

Kirei's expression flickered a little. She started talking about where you could find the nurse's office and the guidance counsellor, pulling Ryou from the room behind her so he missed the rest of the two boys' conversation.

The package was bulky and oddly shaped. Ryou unpacked it warily, as though it might explode or bite him. What slid out didn't have teeth or a timer. In fact, it wasn't anything he could have predicted.

"What on earth does he expect me to do with this?" He held up the unwieldy and, frankly, hideous necklace his father had sent. It looked incredibly old, the metal tarnished and dusty with what appeared to be red sand. Some kind of antique, perhaps? How had it got through customs? Probably not an actual antique, but still something pretty old. Was this a mistake?

He extracted the note and frowned at that as well.

Ryou,

Greetings from the Two Lands. Not sure if you'll get that reference. If not, engage your brain for once and look it up. University is thinking of extending my tenure here. Great opportunity. Been on several digs so far and in the middle of a fresh one. Department here very excited. Dr. Bauer from Harvard also here for a while. Been a long time since have seen her, but seems to be going well. Will be working closely in future, according to provisional curriculum plans. Am sure it will be all for the good. Dr. Bauer very intelligent woman with several accolades in field. Very keen to investigate this new site – possible links to a previously unknown pharaoh, which could make both our names. Don't burn down apartment building or get into any trouble at school in the immediate future, as will be on location and so incommunicado for a while, and will not be able to sort it out for you.

He hadn't signed it, but Ryou recognised his father's handwriting and typical brevity. He turned the note over, looking for an explanation for the necklace, but found none. He wasn't really one for wearing jewellery anyway, but hulking great things like this were certainly not his bag. What could his father have been thinking? The necklace reminded Ryou of the gang of Goths who used to hang around the statue in the town centre back home. They hadn't been especially scary – mostly harmless and a bit sad that their appearance didn't frighten people the way it used to in the days before chavs and news stories of poisoner grannies and knife-wielding toddlers. Even so, Ryou had crossed the street rather than go past them if he could help it.

Home. Try as he might, this place still wasn't it. His father mentioning Dr. Bauer made Ryou feel even more homesick for England. Dr. Bauer was one of his father's contemporaries. Ryou had met her once when the whole family went with Dr. Bakura to some prestigious international convention of lecturers and their families at Oxford University. As Ryou recalled, Dr. Amelia Bauer had gone alone and left alone. She was an attractive woman in a distracted, scholarly way that was nothing whatsoever like Ryou's mother. He remembered them talking together by the buffet table, like the before and after in an art installation called 'the university experience'. In his letter (if the brief note could be termed such) Dr. Bakura had made no note of any attraction, but for some reason alarm still spiked in Ryou at the thought of his father taking up with any other woman.

The fate of all those family photographs prickled in Ryou's brain. To dislodge these unwelcome thoughts he started to clear away the discarded packaging, only to pause when a second note fell out. This one was crumpled, as if shoved in as an afterthought. Dr. Bakura's handwriting was spidery, as though he'd been drunk or unable to hold the pen properly while writing it.

This necklace is a gift. It is special. It will bring you good luck. Wear it for me. Local tradition says it will bring you luck, and guide your path straight and true to whatever you seek. From me to you, Ryou. A gift from father to son, given with love. Never take it off.

Ryou stared. The words sounded so unlike his father. And besides, a gift, for him? On birthdays and at Christmas it had always been his mother who took care of any gifts. If she hadn't, Ryou and Amane would probably have ended up with fresh air and a blank look of confusion that presents were expected.

Could it be that Dr. Bakura regretted leaving Ryou behind after all? Could it be he was sorry for dragging his son across the world to Japan, where he didn't want to go, and then leaving him there alone? Could this be an act of actual emotion? Or was that just wishful thinking?

Ryou examined the necklace more closely. It couldn't be that old, otherwise his father would never have been allowed to send it to him. Still, it looked old. Old and ugly. But, as a gift, the thought was what counted, right? His father had no real experience with picking gifts for a teenaged son, especially one like Ryou, so in his mind this was probably entirely appropriate.

Local tradition says it will bring you luck, and guide your path straight and true to whatever you seek.

Was that Dr. Bakura's way of trying to create common ground between them? Could he be trying to offer a piece of his world to Ryou, so they shared more than just chromosomes and bittersweet memories of dead people?

A gift from father to son, given with love.

A hard lump formed in Ryou's throat.

The door creaked. Sudden hissing caught his attention. Just as he was turning to look, however, Alice landed on his arm. She had no sooner entered the room than she'd launched herself through the air and knocked the necklace from his grasp. Now she stood over it on the floor, baring her little fangs.

"Alice!" Ryou said sternly, surprised. "No! Bad kitty!"

She hissed again. He could almost imagine her saying something cutting: I'm not a dog, you twit. The behaviour was unwarranted, but Alice was often unpredictable in her likes and dislikes. She seemed to be going through some kind of feline puberty. When he tried to pick up the necklace she unsheathed her claws and batted his hand away. Ryou considered leaving it until she grew bored and wandered away, as she was bound to. It would be easier than allowing her to draw blood.

From me to you, Ryou.

Wear it for me.

His resolve hardened. Just as he'd been surprised by her reaction, Alice herself was surprised by Ryou's when he pulled his sleeves over his hands to protect them, picked her up and dumped her outside the room, shutting the door behind him. She yowled in protest, but he ignored her as he slipped the necklace over his head and arranged it on his chest, trying and failing to make it look less kitschy.

"I'll have to get a plainer shirt or something if I want to look less like an extra in a bondage video," he murmured.

Alice just wailed balefully from the other side of the door.

"Oh, wow, you make figurines?" Kirei made to pick one up, but paused with her hand still hovering above it. "Can I touch them?"

Ryou shrugged. "They're nothing special. I have a lot of spare time."

"They are special." She examined a tiny statuette with wings and a wand. "It looks like a fairy. How cute!"

"Um, it is a fairy." Ryou's cheeks felt hot again. He wasn't sure whether he was embarrassed at the compliment, or that he was seeing his possessions through her eyes. Good grief, what kind of boy made fairy dolls in his free time?

He seemed to blush a lot around Kirei, and could very rarely say why. He couldn't work it out. She inspired such strange reactions over which he had no control. None of the girls at Clayton Secondary had made him feel so wobbly inside. He was struck by verbal diarrhoea whenever Kirei came within five feet of him, and half the time his cheeks felt like they needed a blood transfusion just to keep up with the blushing.

Today's visit was a prime example of him doing bizarre things when she was around. He'd never wanted to invite anyone back to the apartment before. Truth be told, he was a little ashamed of it – not because he lived in it alone, which was weird enough. No, mainly it was because it was so poky it always looked messy, even when he tidied, and the carpet had an unfortunate tendency to look grubby no matter how much he shampooed and vacuumed. Yet when Kirei asked if she could come over to watch a movie he'd instantly said yes.

Now he stood, hands behind his back, not knowing what to say as she cooed over his RPG figurines like they were something out of the Hello Kitty factory. He wasn't stupid. He knew about kissing and sex and all that other stuff. More than once he'd looked for a quiet corner to eat lunch at Clayton Secondary, only to find it already occupied. He'd just never really considered any of it in the context of himself. Ryou had no concept of how he appeared to others on a purely physical level. He was too busy wondering how much of a freak his behaviour and private tragedies made him seem.

"You made all these yourself?" Kirei gestured at his collection.

"Like I said, I have a lot of spare time."

The figurines had started out as just the ones from The Game, but had extended to ones he'd never used. He'd never been able to create Amane's warrioress. He'd tried numerous times, but been unable to get it looking the way he wanted no matter how much he tweaked. The fairy in Kirei's hand was one such failed attempt he'd rejigged when it became clear that, yet again, his sister's character would elude him.

"They're brilliant." Kirei put down the fairy and picked up a little blonde naiad. "What's this one?"

"A naiad. They're water spirits."

"Sort of like kappa?"

"Not really. Naiads are from Ancient Greek legends. They're guardians of springs, fountains, lagoons and things, and they're supposed to take on the form of beautiful young women when they emerge onto dry land."

"How cute!" Kirei exclaimed again. She held it up to her face. "We share the same hair. Do we look alike? What do you think, Ryou – could I pass as a naiad? Or would I have to get into a bikini first?" She laughed.

A lot of things were 'cute' to Kirei. She'd used the word on Ryou when she tried to take his hand at the bus stop and his face turned the colour of raw hamburger. Ryou had learned pretty quickly that Kirei had something of a reputation. There were things written about her in the boys' toilets that made 'Preying Mantis Kinpatsu' sound like a compliment. The fact that she'd turned her attentions on him was equal parts complimentary and terrifying. He couldn't decide if she wanted a fresh start or fresh meat.

He wondered for the umpteenth whether he should have bitten off his tongue instead of inviting her over. He didn't want anything from her except friendship, and apparently that wasn't something Kirei excelled at. He didn't want to reject her and have her accuse him of leading her on, especially if she'd befriended him because he didn't know anything about her reputation. Ryou knew all about fresh starts. He'd thought she was just being nice at first, welcoming him to the school because he was new, but as the days passed …

She was looking at him in that strange way again. Her eyes were blue, but seemed to change shade depending on her mood. When she first said hello they'd been bright and innocent, like a cloudless sky. When people talked about her in her earshot they seemed almost navy with something caught between anger and sadness, as if she hated what they said but couldn't deny it. When she looked at Ryou that way, however, her eyes were more like the dark blue of sapphires sparkling in poor light. It was rather disturbing, actually.

His throat seemed to close up as she turned towards him. Uh-oh… He backed up a step, and then wondered whether he really was a freak of nature. Any other boy would have welcomed what Kirei was obviously offering – not a fresh start for herself apparently – but Ryou's first thought was of flight and how to remedy the situation without either of them being humiliated.

A furry grenade detonated under Kirei's feet. She yelped, matching Alice's screech in perfect pitch and volume. Both cat and girl sprang backwards, Alice spitting and blinking in the manner of someone woken unexpectedly from a very good dream.

Ryou took the opportunity to snatch up his copy of the Monster World rulebook his mother had given him so long ago. He didn't need it for its information anymore, but kept it close to assuage a very different need.

"Would you like to play a game?" Was his voice usually that high-pitched? He cleared his throat to bring it down to a level less likely to summon dogs. "I mean … I could teach you? Teach you how to play an RPG, that is. You could be the naiad." With any luck, something so geeky would drive her off while letting her maintain her dignity.

But Kirei just smoothed her hair out of her face, spared an irritated look for Alice, and beamed at him. "All right."

She sat very close on the sofa as he went through the basics. Even when he shifted sideways to lean across the coffee table and point things out on the board, she did too. She ended up squashing him against the armrest, her hip disconcertingly soft against his thigh.

"Do you understand?" he squeaked.

"Mmm-hmm. Oh!" Kirei blinked and looked down. Alice, apparently having decided the human with the clumsy big feet could provide penance with her lap, stared up at her before putting her nose under her paws for a nap.

"Don't worry," Ryou said with pathetic gratefulness. "It means she likes you."

Alice opened one eye in a moment of perfect feline scorn: That old chestnut? Really? Oh, and by the way, you owe me the expensive cat food for this, you big scaredy-human. None of that dried rubbish.

As far as Ryou and his troubled hormones were concerned, she could have fresh salmon and caviar for life, as long as she stayed right where she was for the entire evening.

He leaned forward to arrange the game pieces, vaguely aware of metal knocking against his chest. He'd started wearing the necklace from his father under his shirt, since it looked so ridiculous but he couldn't bring himself not to wear such a rare and special gift.

Ryou sighed and shook his head. His voice stayed unenthusiastic but polite. "Game start."

"I heard she collapsed in his living room."

"Some kind of seizure. The doctors don't know what it could be."

"She's still in the hospital, isn't she?"

"It's quite sad, actually. Apart from the headteacher and her family, not one person sent her flowers or a card."

"You're surprised? All the girls hated her, none of the boys would admit to being with her, and they couldn't exactly send a card without admitting something."

"He sent a card though, didn't he?"

"Well duh. It was his living room. Like he could deny anything after they found her there? She was even wearing that really short skirt. You know, the one from Miata's party, when Kinpatsu was found in the cloakroom with Miata's boyfriend?"

Ryou tried hard not to listen to the conversations. Gossip swirled around him like water down a fast-flowing stream, his thoughts a stubborn and unmoving rock in the middle of them. He didn't actually remember much of what happened, which was understandable according to the doctors who'd seen him afterwards. He was probably blocking, they said. People who panicked during traumatic experiences sometimes did that. It would come back in time. All he could really recall was playing Kinsei at the RPG and then her crumpling on the couch, blue eyes blank and head tipped back like she was dead. Nobody blamed him. There was nothing to blame him for.It had been some kind of stroke, the paramedics had said. Apparently it wasn't only middle-aged and old people who could have them.

Somehow that didn't make Ryou feel any better.

He hadn't sat on the couch since it happened. He sat at the kitchen table instead, pretending to do homework but mostly staring at the grain of the wood and wishing he could rewind the past year and start over. Or not even the whole year. Just the part that had started with a phone-call from the Clayton police one rainy night.

Alice often hopped up on the table and rubbed herself under his chin, pushing her face into his to break him from his terrible loop of thoughts. He was grateful every time she did.

"You're something good about this last year, at least," he murmured, scratching behind her ears the way she liked best.

She mewed, not purring even though that usually did the trick. Her green eyes were rooted on his face, as if trying to communicate something she wasn't able put into words. The look was far too intelligent for a cat, but Ryou was sunk too far into his own feelings to realise that. Even if he had, he wouldn't have cared. He just needed comfort right now, and that was one thing Alice excelled at.

"Seems I'm bad luck wherever I go," he said into the fur of her neck as he hugged her close. "People never stick around very long with me, even if something bad doesn't happen to them first."

Alice didn't fight the embrace the way most cats would – indeed, the way her mother always had. Instead, she licked Ryou's ear and made crooning noises deep in her throat. They thrummed through him, making his molars vibrate and the roots of his hair tingle. It wasn't an unpleasant sensation.

"Don't you ever disappear on me, okay?"

"Mrow." Alice nuzzled him, as if to say: Don't worry. I won't.

"Hey, UK!"

Ryou debated the merits of pretending he hadn't heard. As nicknames went, 'UK' wasn't the worst he'd ever had – or at least it hadn't been until he realised it was actually a pun on 'uke'.

He'd read enough manga over the years to be familiar with the term, and overheard enough conversations since it emerged he hadn't slept with Kirei to realise that his long hair, soft voice and painful politeness made him a stereotype incarnate. It never occurred to his classmates, apparently, that maybe he was choosy, or that girls just scared the hell out of him because he turned into a tongue-tied idiot around them. No, if he looked the way he did, and the juiciest apple in school had dangled close to his mouth and he still hadn't bitten it, to their minds he had to be gay.

It made him a double curiosity, and removed some of the rules previously binding their mouths shut. It wasn't okay to pester the new kid, the grieving guy, or someone rumoured to have such a skewed home-life it made soap operas look reasonable. It was okay to pester the homo.

"I know you can hear me, UK."

Ryou sighed. "Yes?"

"We want a word with you."

Six words destined to provoke the heavy feeling of dread akin to swallowing liquid metal.

Ryou turned. A group of four upperclassmen were behind him. Leaves and sand from the building site on the other side of the street blew over them all. It got into Ryou's eyes, making him blink, but didn't appear to bother the other boys. Against the horizon the massive diggers and bulldozers waited like sleeping monsters. The sense of aloneness heightened with the empty driving compartments and locked gates.

"About what?" Ryou asked warily. This smelled about as promising as week-old rice pudding. He was already calculating the location of the nearest shop he could duck into.

He realised in the same instant that there weren't any he could reach before any one of the four long-legged boys caught up to him.

Don't be ridiculous. You're just assuming they're up to something. This could all be very innocent.

Ha! Doubtful. Something about the speaking boy's tone didn't exactly inspire confidence. Neither did the way all their smiles curled their mouths but left their eyes hard, or the way the one on the far left kept punching his fist into the palm of his other hand.

Ryou took a step backwards.

Almost as one, the four boys advanced.

Oh bugger.

Alice was pacing when the door opened. She leapt at the door, and then pulled up short. Her senses, much more perceptive than a human's, picked up the scent of blood before she saw Ryou. Her mouth was full, but she mewled in alarm around it.

"Nothing to worry about," Ryou slurred, one eye swelling to roughly the size and shape of an overripe plum. "Just a dispute about who, exactly, is allowed to attend Domino Prep. Apparently I don't meet several of the necessary requirements, and no matter how much I tried to assure everyone I do, they don't believe me." He loosed a bitter laugh that sounded more like water gurgling down a plughole.

Alice followed him into the kitchen, still mewling and leaping at his ankles.

"Not now, Alice."

If she'd been Prissy she would have sunk her claws into his leg. Instead she just leapt onto the table and watched as he cleaned himself off at the sink. The towel usually reserved for drying dishes turned pink and damp. Ryou stared at it for a moment with his good eye, before dropping it into the sink where it soaked up grease from last night's washing up and his own blood. He locked his elbows and pressed his hands against the edge of the counter, leaning his full weight on his arms and breathing in a distressing way – halfway between in pain, in tears, and instability.

He prepared another tea-towel, wrapping it around come ice cubes from the freezer and pressing it against his black eye. Then came over to the table, where he sat down and leaned his head against his folded arms, pinning the cold compress between them. He didn't pass out, but he didn't look up either. Alice pawed at his hair. For once, he ignored her.

Eventually she had to go use the litter box, but instead of taking her mouthful with her, she placed it in front of him. Ryou raised his head and found himself staring into the painted eyes of the blonde naiad figurine. He blinked at it, confused.

"Why on earth did you bring me this?" he wondered, even though Alice was no longer there, and couldn't have explained even if she had been.

The naiad figurine was just another reminder of how quickly he'd managed to screw things up at Domino Prep, and how little control he seemed to have over his own life anymore. Kirei still hadn't regained consciousness. Her parents practically lived at the hospital now. It was brainless, but there were still whispers going around that perhaps he'd done something that had left her in her coma. What, exactly, was never specified, but people talked more than they listened to themselves. Ryou had been there when she collapsed. Ryou was the new kid. Ryou was the outsider.

Again.

It was Clayton Secondary all over again, only worse.

"Perhaps I infected Kirei with my 'gay germs'," Ryou muttered bitterly. He put the figurine down and went back to staring at his own arms in close-up.

When she came back in, Alice gazed sadly at him. She started to groom his hair and left ear with her rough pink tongue, but Ryou didn't raise his head again until the ice-cubes had melted and soaked his sleeve.

"Mrow?" Alice sniffed delicately at a sheet of paper and looked at Ryou, her tail lashing. "Mraaa."

He had the shoebox out again. Reading his old correspondences with Amane brought him comfort. He wondered what she would have said about things as they stood now. Probably she would have rolled up her sleeves and gone after anyone who'd hurt him, her own safety be damned. He smiled at the thought, even though being defended by your little sister was beyond pathetic. With Amane around nobody would have called him names unless they wanted a faceful of fist, and as for beating him up and threatening to deliver worse if he told anyone how he'd gotten his injuries …

He winced when he reached to pull out another letter. The tendons in his left hand weren't working properly. The doctor had looked at him askance when he said he'd fumbled a catch in baseball during PE, since he was more used to playing cricket and often ran the wrong way when the ball came at him. The injury would heal, but for now movement was limited. It prohibited his usual method of distraction, since he couldn't make any Monster World models if he was just going to mess up the fine details: hence the shoebox.

Ryou wished he could talk to his mother or sister. Especially Amane. Not even for advice or conversation, but just so he could unload his thoughts and feelings. Alice was great when she was around, but Amane had understood. She'd known him like he'd known her: inside and out, almost like a twin despite their different ages. The raw pang of her absence had not gone away. Ryou knew now that it never would.

Struck by a sudden idea, he pulled out a notepad and a pen. He was right-handed, wasn't he? And maybe …

Well, he already talked to a cat on a regular basis and constantly made RPG figurines he never used. Couldn't get much sadder than that, right?

Alice climbed onto his shoulder as he began to write, as if reading his words.

Dear Amane …

"You want to transfer schools?" Dr. Bakura said in confusion. He'd barely been back five minutes and already looked at his son with disapproval. "Why?"

"I don't fit in at this one."

"That's nonsense, and certainly no reason for moving schools again."

Ryou's jaw set. A muscle jumped in his cheek. His mind was full of newspaper stories about four bodies wearing the brown uniform of Domino Prep, found on a building site locked from the outside. Details had differed depending on where you read about it – the tabloids described them as hooligans who'd broken in to do battle with a rival gang, while the broadsheets went for the innocent schoolboy-prank-gone-wrong angle – but all mentioned the expressions of terror on their faces, and the strange coma of the surviving one even though he'd sustained only minor injuries.

Ryou knew he hadn't been out that night. He'd fallen asleep at his desk. He knew that. He'd woken up there in the early hours of the morning, slumped across his latest letter with a mind fogged by sleep.

How, then, to explain the sand on his shoes when he went to put them on for school the next morning?

He pleaded with his father. Domino Prep was bad news for him. He was too embarrassed to say about the gay-bashing, or everyone's refusal to accept he wasn't responsible for Kirei because that would have meant accepting he wasn't really gay, and that their unforgivable treatment of him had been wrong whether he was or not. High school wasn't a place where mistakes were admitted lightly, if at all. He had to stick to saying he 'just didn't fit in' and pointing out his falling grades as proof that he'd be better off somewhere else. The fact he had to catch three buses to get to school helped.

"I could go somewhere closer. It might be less prestigious, but Domino High isn't far, and their exam results are still better than Clayton Secondary's ever were." Ryou appealed to his father's academic nature, hoping that would work.

In the end, however, it was more distractedness than logic or pleading that made Dr. Bakura give in.

"All right, all right, if you really must. I'll telephone in the morning to investigate Domino High, but I'm making no promises in case they don't have any places available." Dr. Bakura had his mobile phone out, but if he wasn't going to call the school right now, Ryou wondered what for.

"Are you expecting a call?"

"Yes, as a matter of fact. Dr. Bauer said she might get in contact."

Ryou's insides froze. "About work?" he asked weakly.

"Hm? Oh, yes. Well, what else would it be about?" his father snapped, perhaps a trifle more defensively than necessary. He stalked out of the room, clearly wanting to be away from Ryou, even though he hadn't seen his only son in months.

"I thought so," Ryou said in such a small voice even he could barely hear it.

He raised a hand to his chest, feeling the contours of the necklace. His father's gift to him. As requested, he'd only ever taken it off to sleep, and even then he was sometimes so tired when he went to bed that he forgot, since he woke up wearing it. Dr. Bakura hadn't so much as mentioned it when Ryou came to the airport wearing it on the outside of his top for a change, which had left Ryou even more deflated than the lack of hello or the stony silence in the taxi.

It's not a big deal, he thought.

But it was. It felt like a betrayal, even though rationally it was anything but. The problem was that emotions aren't rational, and the moment Ryou owned up to the hurt it engulfed him. Likewise the fear. His father had found it a little too easy to forget about Ryou while in Egypt, and a little too eager to get away from him now he was back.

"Some days I think Dad wants to forget about me, too."

The confession he'd made to Prissy in her nesting box floated to Ryou out of the past.

I'm part of his old life; the one he wants to forget. The one that hurts too much to hold onto.

Could there be any truth to such a traitorous thought? Dr. Bakura had cleared out memories of his wife and daughter from their house with ease. True, those had been the actions of a newly grieving man. Ryou knew grief could make you irrational, but his father still been able to wipe them away like a stubborn coffee ring, and without apparent regret. And he had set Ryou up with a place to live while he was away, as if keeping Ryou hidden safely out of the way while he went about … doing what? Making a new life for himself? Flaunting himself as a single man about town? Erasing his old roles as husband and father so he could reinvent himself into someone new?

Ryou shook his head. He wouldn't let himself believe that.

But as he went to sleep that night, listening through the wall to Dr. Bakura moving around, the thoughts just kept coming back and refused to go away. For once Ryou could almost hate his father. He shivered and turned over, pulling the pillow over his head.

Ryou opened his eyes and stared around his darkened bedroom groggily. "Bwuh? What's …" He stared into the gloom. "Alice?"

She wasn't visible, but he could hear her.

"Are you … growling?"

Her pitch lowered, becoming a snarl. Suddenly a commotion went up in the corner. Thinking he'd left the cat-flap unlocked and some vicious stray had got in, Ryou leapt out of bed and rushed to switch on the light. He wouldn't remember until morning that the cat flap had been left behind in Yorkshire, since they now lived on the fourth floor of an apartment building.

"Alice!"

She was bleeding and panting, but there was no opponent anywhere. Ryou scooped her up and examined her front paws, which were lacerated as if she'd been walking on broken glass. For some reason Alice continued to growl low in her throat, eyes fixed on something glinting on the floor. Ryou went to pick it up, but she bit his hand to stop him. Shocked, he dropped her, and his still half-asleep brain couldn't decide what to do when doing so caused her to yowl in pain.

Cautiously, he held out his hands. Alice hobbled into them, rubbing her head against his palm the same way she always did. She didn't bite or scratch, though she did snuggle rather more than usual, as if she were a child seeking comfort after a nightmare. She left little bloody paw prints on his pyjama top when he picked her up.

"Let's get you cleaned up," Ryou murmured, wondering what on earth was going on. There was no other cat in his room anywhere, nor even a racoon, like you sometimes heard slipped into people's homes while they slept. Yet Alice had definitely been fighting something. Could cats have nightmares? Had she been fighting an enemy in her mind and ended up injuring herself in reality? It seemed the most likely explanation, though it had never happened before.

Ryou shushed her and carried her out. Alice glared at something over his shoulder with an intensity strong enough to melt metal, but when Ryou looked there was still nothing there.

"Hullo. Now how did this get here?" Ryou got down on his hands and knees to drag out his father's necklace, which had somehow become wedged under his chest of drawers. The space was narrow. He practically had to lift the whole chest to get it out. "I could've – ngh – sworn I left this on the dresser the night Dad got back from Cairo. Ngh-gah!"

The necklace popped loose. Sweating slightly, Ryou picked it up. He'd been looking for it for weeks with no luck. His father was leaving today for a trip to Harvard, where Dr. Bauer's department had invited him as the keynote speaker at some conference or other. He hadn't mentioned the fact Ryou wasn't wearing the necklace, and the hurt had been so much at first that Ryou hadn't wanted to wear it, and so hadn't looked especially hard when he couldn't find it.

The grime under the chest of drawers was terrible. The necklace was covered in dust, and a few of its spikes were stained with odd brownish marks. There was also an old piece of some food other that had gone gooey and stuck to the eye motif. When Ryou tugged it off it trailed a thread and felt like he was holding cold snot.

"Disgusting!" he exclaimed. "I really ought to clean under there. I could be harbouring the next dreadful pandemic that'll threaten the safety of the world."

"Ryou!" his father called. "Where did you put my passport?"

"You left it on the kitchen counter."

"It isn't there. You've moved it somewhere and I'm going to miss my flight."

Ryou blew out a sigh. He tossed the necklace onto his bed (try as he might he'd never been able to sleep on a futon) and went to see what he could do, resolving to clean both his room and the necklace later, after his father had left.

"What do you think?" Ryou turned around to look at himself from behind. "Do I look better in blue or brown?"

Amane meowed a running commentary that was probably all to do with the cream puff she'd snaffled than because she actually had something to say. She'd stolen it from his plate, but he couldn't bring himself to be mad, even though it was the last one. It had been a bit stale anyway. Any excuse to buy more cream puffs couldn't be bad, in his opinion, and Alice was actually pretty funny. Who knew cats could get a sugar high?

She twined in and out of his ankles.

"Ack, no! You're getting white hairs all over my new uniform!"

Unrepentant, Alice sat down to wash her shoulder. She flicked up her tail, gave a disparaging sniff, and stalked out of the room to hunt down more snacks with all her predator wiles.

Ryou found her later, smelling of garbage and with a sticky box that used to contain doughnuts stuck to her head. He nearly laughed himself sick, and afterwards didn't feel half so bad about starting a new school in the morning.

The first day at Domino High wasn't so bad. Ryou would even go so far as to say it went well. His classmates didn't seem like pitchfork-wielding yokels, repressive traditionalists or anti-everything-ers like he'd feared. He didn't get called mutant freak once, and not one person commented on him being effeminate. There were so many effeminate boys there already, he saw at lunch, that one more didn't have much impact, for which he was grateful. Even the thugs he'd spotted lounging behind the PE block were less threatening than the bullies at Domino Prep, although he didn't fool himself that they were any less dangerous when a kid with even weirder hair than his own came staggering around the corner minus his lunch money. The work wasn't anything Ryou couldn't handle, the kid assigned to show him around seemed bored by the task and didn't ask any probing questions of him or his life, and he went home with the bubble of dread well and truly popped.

At least, until Alice didn't come to greet him even when he called. He found her groaning on his bed, the sour smell of vomit in the air. Her chest rose and fell so rapidly he could feel a fresh bubble of dread growing even before he checked her over. She didn't fight him, just moaned softly and coughed. He saw in an instant what was wrong.

"You've been picking through the rubbish again, you silly thing."

He wondered if he should try to hook the string out of her mouth, but it was caught under her tongue with both ends trailing down her throat. She obviously couldn't get it out herself and had exhausted herself trying. Ryou vaguely remembered reading that you shouldn't ever try to remove foreign objects yourself, in case you caused further damage.

"C'mon, missy," he said with false joviality, as though Alice was a small child in need of reassurance while you rushed them to hospital. "Time for a visit to the vet. And no complaining about travelling in your carrier."

Alice closed her eyes and concentrated on breathing.

Ryou's first day at Domino High turned out to be his only one that week. He spent the rest at the apartment, nursing Alice after he was allowed to bring her home again. The emergency operation to remove the string she'd swallowed had shocked and terrified him. The string hadn't just slipped down her oesophagus, but had wrapped around something inside and very nearly killed her. The panic that blossomed in Ryou when the vet said this was intense.

"Cats often eat things they're not supposed to," reassured the nurse, a kindly woman with the womanly curves of someone genetically designed for comforting hugs. Ryou had let her put an arm around his shoulders as he stared at nothing and worked at blocking the panic threatening to make him run around the waiting room gibbering. "My old tom loves tinsel, even though it's one of the worst things he could swallow. Each Christmas we have to fence off the tree to keep him safe from himself. But he's nearly twelve now, with four operations like this one under his belt, and it hasn't slowed him down at all." When Ryou hadn't answered she'd squeezed his shoulders. "Cheer up, love. She'll be fine. You'll see."

"I can't lose her," he'd murmured. "I just can't."

"I know what you mean. When you really love pets they're like your children."

But it wasn't like that. Alice wasn't a dependant – or not just a dependant, anyway. Ryou wasn't only the two-legger she tolerated because he provided food and shelter, the way most cats viewed their owners. Likewise, Alice wasn't just Ryou's pet. She was … what? His friend? His family? Yes, and more. He loved her. He needed her. It was difficult to characterise how much she meant to him without sounding like a character in a schmaltzy Hallmark movie or someone into bestiality.

Very few people knew what it was like to wake up each morning and remind yourself that the ground beneath you was still solid, but that was exactly how Ryou felt each time he checked Alice's basket and found her still there.

She didn't sleep on his bed, since he was frightened of rolling over and jarring her stitches. She wore a plastic cone around her neck so she wouldn't lick them, but she didn't seem to have the energy for even that. She just slept, sometimes dragging herself to her bowls or litter tray, but never further. It was distressing to see, and reminded Ryou just how close the fragile stability of his life had come to dissolving. Alice was his one constant. He would defend that to the last.

Eventually, of course, she recovered, but Ryou was more cautious than before. He went back to school, but kept himself to himself and rushed home afterwards to make sure she was all right. He worried about her, the way he had just after her brothers were killed, and imagined all sorts of things happening while he wasn't around to prevent them. He didn't join any clubs or societies. He didn't make friends. He just worked hard at keeping his head down and not standing out. He didn't want to stand out. He lived frugally – the operation hadn't been cheap, but he'd paid for it without hesitation – and kept his expectations low.

He knew now that he shouldn't aim high or expect much. That way it wouldn't hurt so much when it all fell apart. Why set yourself up when that only meant the place you fell from would be higher and incur more broken bones? A depressing way of looking at things, he knew, but true. Truer than he'd known before fate systematically removed everything, everywhere and everyone he'd ever cared about.

Hope and the expectation you deserved more weren't reassurance so much as part of an elaborate trap that life kept trying to tempt him into, but Ryou wouldn't be fooled again. He'd fallen for that trick too many times already, and his battered heart couldn't withstand another hit. The events of the past year had taught him about loss; how close it was, and how quickly things could change. He'd learned how tragedy was always there, an inch and a breath away from grabbing your ankles and yanking you under the water to drown.

Had it really only been a year since the car accident? Everything had changed then. His mother and sister were dead; his father had become a stranger; his friends at school in England had proven fair-weather; he'd had to move from the place where he grew up, leaving behind everything that was familiar – including the language and culture – and come to this sodding country, where he was barely given a chance at a fresh start before fate once again threw up on his shoes. Now, not only did he sometimes suspect he was going crazy, sleepwalking and doing God knew what else at night, he'd nearly lost Alice as well? Well, no more. No. More.

Ryou's experiences had made him pragmatic. Surviving wasn't about reaching for the stars and holding on to your dreams. It wasn't about bettering yourself. It wasn't even about making connections with others and standing on their shoulders to reach new heights. That was a path down Easy Street to the cross-section of Disappointment Avenue and Heartache Boulevard. No, Ryou had learned that life was about building meaning out of chaos: grab hold of what you love, hang on tight, don't expect anything and don't let go. To do otherwise was to invite disaster with a gold-edged invitation.

"You look much better without the cone."

"Mrow."

"Although maybe you could have worked it a bit more. Turned it into a fashion statement. All the kitties on our block would have wanted one, too."

"Mrow!"

Ryou smiled. It felt good. Alice sat on his desk, cleaning her whiskers with one paw. She was so big now, so unlike the little kitten he'd watched gambol about on the landing in their old house. She still had the same pale fur, though, and her green eyes had only become more intense as she got older. She had a stare that could scrap the barnacles off the hull of an oil tanker, but also melt him like a chocolate teapot. He scratched behind her ear, taking satisfaction in her purr, before going back to what he was writing.

Dear Amane,

Dad sent a postcard today. Seems he and Dr. Bauer are getting along famously, although he doesn't call her Dr. Baer anymore. I don't feel comfortable calling her Amelia though, so I'll stick with her title. You'd probably call her Dr. Devious or something. Dr .Dad-Snatcher perhaps? Or something worse. You were always more imaginative than me when it came to insults and nicknames.

Alice is doing well. You'd hardly know how ill she was anymore. I caught her shredding the rubbish bag again. She loves sugar even though it's so bad for her – just like you! I tried to get her to try those little cat-treats from the pet shop, but she was having none of it. Remember how you always scraped out the syrup from the container whenever Mum got us those pecan twists from the supermarket? You'd pick off the nuts and put them all on my slice because you hated them. You can't get pecan twists here in Japan, and nothing is really as sweet as back home – Japanese people aren't as sweet-toothed as us unhealthy Brits, it seems. Still, I'm making do with cream puffs and melonpan. I think you'd like them. Alice certainly does and she

He stopped as a paw suddenly landed on the page. He looked up, intending to shoo Alice off the paper, but stopped. She was staring at him, but not in a way that meant she wanted to play, be petted, eat, or go out. It was a strange look, and one which he couldn't understand.

"Funny little thing," he murmured, setting down his pen and gathering her into his arms.

She burrowed against him, making a strange high-pitched noise. "Reeeeee."

"What an odd sound. You haven't swallowed anything bad again, have you?" He lifted her so her face was on eye-level, but Alice had learned her lesson about what was edible and what wasn't. She patted his cheek with one paw, claws carefully sheathed.

"Reeee …" Her tail lashed in concentration. "… Reeeee …"

"Curiouser and curiouser." Ryou smiled. It felt good. "Perfect for you, eh, Alice?" Then he sighed. Writing the letter had, as always, made his sister rise in his mind. It hurt, but he could cope. Hold tight to what mattered, right? "Amane would have loved you, Alice, I'm sure of it."

"Reeeeeeooooow!"

Ryou got to his feet. "I'll finish this letter later. All this talk of food has made me hungry. I fancy something sweet and pastry-like. What do you say?" He set Alice on his shoulder in her usual perch. "Care to join me?"

Alice nuzzled his neck, knowing he'd never understand. "Mrow."

"Right. Onwards to sugary things!"

As he switched off the light, Ryou failed to spot the glint of metal peeking out from under his pillow. He hadn't left the necklace there. He would put it away afterwards, but it would find its way back somehow, and he'd dismiss it as him just being absentminded again. He was doing that more and more, after all – finding himself in places he didn't remember going, looking for things only to discover he must have moved them, or moving around this Monster World figurines and then forgetting about it so the new arrangements were a surprise when he next looked. He never thought much of it all. Everyone got absent-minded sometimes, right?

But as he closed the door behind him, Ryou's passenger looked back and stared directly at the necklace. She narrowed her green eyes, lashed her tail, and skinned her lips back over her teeth.

The metal glinted back challengingly.

The door clicked shut, but both of them knew this wasn't over. Not by a long shot.

Fin.

'Having a sister is like having a best friend you can't get rid of. You know whatever you do, they'll still be there.' -- Amy Li

Side-flings, Homages and Downright Rip-offs

There was one dog even he could find no redeeming features of, and that was Crazy Carl.

-- Crazy Carl the Rottweiler is based on Krazy Karl the Doberman, an adult dog my mother owned for three weeks as a teenager, before his intense aggressiveness, plus his habit of biting her ankles and wrists as she tried to feed him, ensured his career as the psychotic defender of a junkyard rather than a family pet.

No matter where you went in the world, all airports reeked of cinnamon buns and sweat.

-- Side-fling to an episode of 8 Simple Rules.

"I'm Kinpatsu Kirei."

-- Roughly (and we're talking sandpaper rough) translates to 'pretty blonde hair'.

Greetings from the Two Lands.

-- In Ancient Egyptian texts, there is no name given to Egypt. References are made to The Two Lands, which Western academic circles generally think refer to Upper and Lower Egypt, although there isn't a single Ancient Egyptian reference to confirm this idea, or even to define such a frontier between Upper and Lower Egypt. The true meaning of the Two Lands is lost to time, but speculating about it as still fun. (www. egypt-tehuti. org/articles/two-lands. html)

None of the girls at Clayton Secondary had made him feel so wobbly inside.

-- For the purposes of fanon, instead of London (which seems to be the generic home for so many English characters) I gave Ryou's family a home in Clayton, South Yorkshire (en. wikipedia. org/wiki/Clayton, (underscore) West (underscore) Yorkshire). I don't live there, so I've taken a few liberties with things like the school. Any and all inaccuracies are my fault, though I've tried to avoid them as far as I can.

"Sort of like kappa?"

-- Kappa are a type of legendary water sprite found in Japanese folklore (wapedia. mobi/simple/Kappa (underscore) (folklore)).

Oh bugger.

-- I'd be lying if I said LittleKuriboh's Abridged Series didn't influence this line.

"Hullo. Now how did this get here?"

-- 'Hello' is a greeting that was invented for use over the very first telephone line (which was chosen over its rival 'ahoy-hoy', though apparently nobody told Mr. Burns that on The Simpsons). 'Hullo' is an exclamation of surprise that, as far as I know, is rarely used outside Britain.