A/N : I'm too lazy to put long author notes, an old fic I decided to finish. :D
Shadows on the Walls
When Ryou was six years old, Bakura first time offered to tell him a story.
Maybe I should tell more about those two.
Ryou was a happy little boy, just like almost every other boy, just turned six. Ryou wasn't like every other kid. He was special. He was thin and he had long white hair and soft brown eyes, which made him look a little girlish. Ryou was a kind kid. He was that kind of a kid who was often bullied... and pitied.
Other kids didn't like him. Ryou talked to himself, or so it seemed. In reality Ryou talked to his shadow. Ryou's shadow wasn't normal one. Ryou's shadow was different. His name was Bakura.
Bakura, who looked exactly like Ryou expect older, was Ryou's shadow, invisible and nonexistent to everyone else. Bakura followed Ryou everywhere he went, silent and supporting.
It rained that day. Rained so hard, you couldn't play outside, you didn't even want to go there.
Ryou was bored. And when Ryou was bored so was Bakura.
Right now they were playing chess and Bakura was losing. He hated losing. He always lost. Bakura sighed, Ryou was a smart kid. That, or he sucked at chess. Probably both.
"How about we quit and call it a draw?" Bakura suggested.
"Okay," Ryou shrugged. "What do we do next?"
Bakura thought about it. Then after a minute of silence and hard thinking he got a brilliant idea.
"What if..." Bakura said. "I tell you a story?"
Ryou looked skeptical.
"You can tell stories?" He asked.
"Don't give me that look, kid. I can tell stories. This story is about Thief King, who lived in Egypt thousands of years ago..."
And so Bakura began telling a story. When he talked, shadows on the walls around them started moving. They danced and moved, forming people, places, everything that Bakura told. The shadows were telling the story.
When the story was over shadows on the walls stopped moving and slowly drifted away. Ryou stared in amazement.
"Wow," he breathed." That was a really good story. Maybe you could tell me more later?"
"Sure kid anytime you want:"
"Thanks, Bakura."
"My pleasure, kid."
"So what were those things on the walls. They moved and they danced."
"They were shadows of real people, kind of memories," Bakura told tilting his head.
" Do I have a shadow like that? Shadow on the wall? A memory?"
Bakura laughed.
"I'm your 'shadow on the wall' kid, will always be."
When Ryou was eight his parents died in a car accident. Ryou was all alone. He cried three night in a row, too afraid to sleep, too afraid to open his mouth, because he feared what he might say. Only shadows were his companions. Only shadows were there for him, in an empty and silent house.
Shadows, including Bakura, told him stories, trying to cheer him up. Stories about Thief King. Shadows danced on the walls, pleading to the little boy, smile, don't cry anymore.
Ryou didn't smile, and he couldn't stop the tears rolling down his cheeks. He just stared at the shadows, and listened to the story.
Bakura told a story after another, and shadows danced tirelessly.
After finishing another story Bakura leaned his head against the wall. He was tired. It wasn't easy to try to cheer up a boy, who just lost his whole family. When the telling stopped shadows on the walls froze.
"Bakura," Ryou whispered.
"What, kid?" Bakura mumbled.
"Did Thief King loose anyone precious to him?"
"Yes," Bakura answered, slowly, sadly. " He lost many precious people."
"Can you tell me?"
Bakura sighed and told Ryou the story about the massacre of Kul Elna.
Ryou didn't cry anymore.
When Ryou was ten, they had a blackout in his school in middle of the day.
Everyone else started screaming, when light suddenly went down. In darkness, people started panicking. The teacher tried to calm the students down, but it was useless. Some of the kids were running around, some of them started crying helplessly, some of them were to scared to do anything, they just stared, shaking, silent tears rolling down their cheeks. The fear in the air was almost touchable.
Ryou just sat in his chair staring into darkness. He was calm. He didn't feel the fear. He had no urge to get up and run. He didn't feel like screaming, or crying.
Behind him Bakura wrapped his arms around Ryou's neck, and buried his head to boy's hair. Bakura let out a small chuckle, unaffected by the other children.
In darkness, in the embrace of his shadow, Ryou realized, he was never afraid of dark.
When Ryou was twelve, he realized something. Something very important.
It was one of those times when Bakura was telling a story. And shadows on the walls, memories of the people in Bakura's stories moved and danced.
Ryou was like always listening very closely. The combination of Bakura's words and the imagery shadows showed him was amazing. Then it hit him. The Thief King wasn't one of the shadows. He never was. He never had been.
When Ryou was fourteen he got his first kiss.
His neighbors were moving, and their daughter, a 13-year-old girl, confessed her love to Ryou. Ryou just blushed, and mumbled something incomprehensible, something between no and yes.
Girl had smiled and planted a soft and quick kiss on Ryou's lips. Then blushing madly she ran away.
Ryou just stood there, not quite realizing what was happening and just had happened.
Bakura standing beside him, found it hard to breath. He clutched his stomach and laughed.
Ryou never saw the girl again.
When Ryou was fifteen, he and Bakura had their first real fight.
Sure they had fought before, but it had never been this serious.
The subject of the fight really wasn't so important. Bakura had said something about one of Ryou's friends that Ryou didn't like.
Later when Bakura tried to make peace Ryou just screamed at him, told him that he lied, and told him that he hated him.
Bakura just stood there, facing the storm, not saying a word. But he was hurt. It could be seen in his face.
In the end Bakura was right. Ryou's friend wasn't so friendly as the boy had first thought. But it took two weeks. Finally...
Ryou apologized.
Bakura apologized.
Everything was good again between a boy and his shadow.
It was September. It was Ryou's 16th birthday.
There's shouldn't be anything wrong with, well, anything. Ryou turned sixteen... so? If anything that should be a happy event. And it was for most of the day. Ryou got some presents from few friends he had managed to get and keep during the years. Bakura had remained unusually quiet the whole day, he seemed distracted, he didn't look directly at anyone, and kept on muttering under his breath. Ryou, even though he was happy, couldn't help but get worried.
When they finally got home, after a long school day, Ryou just threw his bag to the floor and turned to face Bakura.
"What's wrong?" he asked.
Bakura stared at the floor, then at the wall, then at the ceiling, avoiding Ryou's gaze. Finally he sighed and said:
"I have only one more story to tell. Will you hear it?"
Ryou frowned.
"But..."
Bakura looked Ryou to the eyes and asked again:
"Will you hear it?"
Ryou nodded and sat down on the floor. Bakura closed his eyes for a while, as if he tried to remember every bit and aspect of the story he was planning to tell.
And shadows started dancing once again. Bakura told the story. Usually his stories were light in their mood, they hardly ever stuck in the fact that stealing was wrong. The stories simply assumed it wasn't. But this time, like the time when Bakura had told about Kul Elna, the story was darker, with a sad undertone in it.
This story was about how Thief King was betrayed and captured, and then sentenced to death. After death Thief King's heart was weighted against the Shu Feather, the feather of truth, from the hair of goddess Ma'at. The person whose heart weighted more than the feather, had done many sins and evil deeds during his life, and his heart was fed to a horrible beast, and the spirit would wander alone forever. Everyone whose heart weighted less than the feather was free to go to the afterlife. To everyone's surprise Thief King's heart was light, like child's and free of every sin. Gods, of course, started suspecting that something wasn't quite right. I mean, Thief king, who hadn't committed a sin in his life? Soon gods found out that before his death Thief King had used a spell and switched hearts with his future reincarnation. There was no way to cancel the spell so gods send Thief King to protect the boy with his heart until the boy turned 16, after that the boy could carry the heart on his own. But when he was child the Thief King should help and support him.. Thief King accepted though he knew that...
"...he couldn't rest, before the deal was fulfilled," Bakura finished.
Ryou just stared as the shadows slowly disappeared. They were in silence for a while. Then finally Ryou turned his brown eyes to face Bakura and slowly, as the realization came, spoke:
"You are the Thief King, aren't you? You switched my heart with yours. The gods weighted my heart, and your heart is here, isn't it?" Ryou tapped his chest with his hand, where his, Bakura's heart was.
Bakura just nodded.
"Now what?" Ryou asked.
Bakura tilted his head.
"Now my part of the deal is fulfilled. Now I die."
"Just like that?"
Bakura nodded again.
"I will miss you..." Ryou smiled. "...Thief King."
Bakura walked to Ryou.
"I will still watch over you," he said, before planting a soft kiss on boy's forehead and muttering few words in Arabic. "And if I can't, I'm sure the Gods will."
Bakura placed his hand on Ryou's chest, where his heart was, and to his own chest, where there was nothing. Then smiling one last time, the Thief King disappeared.
Ryou just stared, still not believing that he was gone. Bakura was gone. His shadow, his friend for 16 years was gone. The tears started rolling down his cheeks.
The shadows on the wall whispered, reminding him:
'Remember kid, wherever you are, wherever you go, no matter how alone you may feel, your shadow always walks beside you.'
Ryou smiled.
Thief King was finally one of them. Just a shadow on the wall. His shadow.