Disclaimer: I will never own Yu-gi-oh
Ryou stands up slowly wondering where he is. He isn't scared here though. The room gives off an aura that it is designed specifically for him. More perfect than anything he can imitate at home although he has tried.
"You're in your soul room Landlord."
Ryou turns to see someone who, if they didn't have as narrow eyes and wild hair, could pass for his doppelganger standing next to the only door within the room. The voice seems familiar and realization dawns on the teen.
"You." He whispers to the body belonging to the voice he has been hearing lately.
"I." The voice smirks arrogantly and enters the room approaching the boy. "I do have a name though, Landlord."
"I-I don't care." Ryou states strongly. "I don't want anything to do with you."
"That really doesn't matter." The doppelganger strolls around Ryou's soul room, which makes the boy uncomfortable. This man seems to have dominance over everything he touches and the way his hands slide over various objects is like he is tainting them.
"I want you out of my body." Ryou eyes trail the moving man who stops at a desk.
The voice lets out a cold laugh that causes Ryou to shiver. He has never heard anything as dark as that laugh and he can't think of adequate words to describe it.
"That isn't happening. I've waited millenniums for a vessel, boy, and you don't have the power to cast me out." The smile on his face is almost as cold as his laugh although it is more calculated. "But I do pay rent. The souls of your friends don't seem to satisfy you though. There has to be something that you want, Landlord."
No, Ryou thinks to himself tearing his eyes away from the body. I don't want anything from him.
However, while he is thinking this his eyes land on a picture frame next to the voice's hand. The teen doesn't know if it was intentional but inside the frame is a picture of him and Amane. It is a memory of a happier time. Despite his subconscious screaming at Ryou to not, the boy walks towards the frame, ignoring the man beside it and picks it up.
"Can you?" Ryou asks quietly slowly looking up into crimson eyes.
"I can." The doppelganger widens his smile. "But something like that is more valuable than a simple rent payment. We'd have to make a deal."
"I shouldn't." Ryou looks back down at the image of his sister smiling at him.
"Then I can't." The man touches the photo causing Amane to slowly disappear causing a panic to build up in Ryou before the image quickly changes back to normal. "Calm down. It was only an illusion but do realize that I can manipulate this place. I can cause your mind more torment then that small panic attack there. Taking this deal would be for your best interest. I'll leave your soul room alone."
"And the rest of the deal?" Ryou asks once again looking back up.
The man leans into him to whisper in his ear, which Ryou doesn't like. The body is cold and the whisper is like a freezing wind nipping in his ear. It is unnatural for someone to lack this much temperature and when the man straightens up, Ryou knows he should say no and try and leave. This is not a man he should trust but the slow ache in his heart when he looks down at the picture causes the teen to softly whisper the word deal.
"Good. Now sleep, Landlord." The voice says and although Ryou doesn't feel tired, he shuts his eyes and lets himself be brought to the ground.
When Ryou opens his eyes, he is back in his original room. It doesn't have the same warmth as his old room, which causes the teen to think that it was a dream. The dead can't come back to life and spirits, if the voice was one, shouldn't be that cold.
"You're too naïve, Landlord." An ethereal form of the voice stands next to him. "Then again, most humans are. Dismissing the real as a delusion or a dream is easy but pathetic at the same time. Though you did pick up on one thing. I am a spirit so you can stop calling me voice now."
"What do you propose I call you then?"
"My name." The spirit sneers. "Bakura."
"Where is my sister?" Ryou asks ignoring the spirit's answer. He isn't about to call the being that. "If you didn't revive her, the deal is off."
The spirit lets off another cold laugh and inside this room, it echoes off the walls causing it to me even more chilling than before.
"Like I said, Landlord, I don't need the deal. It makes things easier for me but either way, things will swing in my favour." The spirit pauses for a moment and walks towards the closed door. "But I did revive your precious sister."
The door that he is standing by opens itself revealing a girl with white hair looking at the ground and as she slowly raises her head, Ryou can't help himself when he starts to quickly walk towards her. He finally reaches her and pulls her into a strong embrace. She is almost as cold as the spirit but Ryou pushes that thought aside. Amane was back.
"Thank you!" He speaks to the spirit for the first time with gratitude and happiness.
"Have fun with your sister, Landlord." The spirit smiles before vanishing and returning to his place within the Ring.
There was only one word that could describe how Ryou felt right now. Happy. And not the fake happy that all humans put on but the rare genuine happiness that few ever touch. His sister, the most important being in his life, was back. The spirit and thus the deal with him ceased to matter.
"Amane," Ryou begins to lead the girl out of his room. "There is so much stuff I want to tell you."
"I had a great day, Amane." Ryou says walking back into his room after hours of absence.
"Me too, brother." She smiles at him and Ryou feels the ecstasy he has been experiencing all day grow. It has been way too long since he saw her smile or heard her call him brother. The privilege of those things had been snatched prematurely along with the girl's life. Ryou realizes this and pulls her once again into an embrace.
"Don't leave me again." Ryou whispers into her hair.
Amane doesn't respond but the teen keeps his hold on her. Although he spent the whole day with her, he still feels that she may slip through his fingers once again and wants to keep a firm hold on her. After a few moments though, Ryou notices that his sister's body is now limp against his.
He holds her out at arm's length before dropping the body. It is no longer his sister but instead a decaying corpse. There are no brown eyes in the sockets anymore and her pale skin is now a shade of black waxy against her skeletal form. Because her body is between the stages of decomposition, parts of the corpse that used to be flesh no longer exist.
Ryou can't scream or cry so instead he takes a step back and ends up falling lightly on to his bed, staring at the corpse. The teen is in shock. He keeps looking at the corpse with no real thoughts running through his mind until he sees ethereal feet beside it causing him to look up. Ryou meets a smug and triumphant look with his own dead eyes, still not thinking.
The spirit laughs again, and Ryou would swear that if sound could harm that 1000 blades would be piercing his skin, before stepping over the decomposed body and standing tall in front of his host.
"You are too naïve, Landlord." The spirit echoes his earlier words with a slight smile on his lips. "Don't you even read those books on your shelf?"
The doppelganger gestures his arm towards a bookcase full of different books dealing with occult matters. Ryou's eyes flick quickly to it before focusing once again on the corpse through the not quite solid of the Ring inhabitant.
"There is no way to permanently raise the dead. Consider yourself lucky, Landlord. Most bodies turn back to the way their corpse was found after a few moments. You got a whole day. But the interesting thing is, you made a deal to completely attach your soul to this." The spirit taps on the Millennium Ring that the teen is wearing around his neck before continuing.
"The result would have been the same without the deal but this speeds up the process. Because of the nature of the deal, your soul, the essence of who you are, is attached to the Ring. Do you know what that means, Landlord?" The spirit looks to the boy who doesn't take his eyes off his sister's corpse. "If the Ring is ever not within your possession, you will most likely go mad. You will always retrieve this item. You will always be returning to me voluntarily, Landlord."
At these words, Ryou looks up to the spirit defeated. He has read the books on his shelf, though he had conveniently forgot the part about necromancy, he did remember what they all said about what he had done with the spirit. There was no way out. In other words…
"In other words," The spirit whispers with each word dripping with satisfaction. "You belong to me."
The spirit vanishes back to the Ring, leaving a now quietly crying Ryou and the decaying corpse of his sister behind.
A/N: Sorry that is has taken me so long to get something up. I injured myself and then I've been writing other things and I've come to the realization that I hate writing card games. How did the show writer's do it? I think that piece is going have some strategic jumping around.
Anyway, I loved writing this. I really enjoyed writing Bakura in this style. This whole thing was inspired by when I was going through the shipping list and came across dealshipping. Obviously this isn't that but it did start out as that until it started to freak me out because necromancy, necrophilia (well not quite since there wasn't going be sex), and incest all in one is just too much but I didn't want to discard this piece and it wouldn't leave my mind either so there we go. We get this.
As a small side note, I use the term doppelganger in its lose definition of a ghostly double. Technically, Bakura isn't one since he isn't a manifestation of Ryou's mind.
So hope you enjoyed!