I read The Agony and the Ecstasy about Michaelangelo and then read more on the Egyptian gods. This is the result.
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Ryou blinked his eyes open, then shut them tightly against the harsh sunlight streaming through his window. Quickly, he gave his body a mental rundown and was grateful to discover no injury. Then he turned his attention to last night's events.
Let's see. He had been walking home from an emergency trip to the art store for more paints because he had realized half way through painting that he had run out of several colors. He had actually made it to the residential area, almost back to the apartment, when he heard a low laugh and felt that tell-tale tug on his soul which signaled Bakura's possession. And that was it.
Ryou rolled out of bed. Gods, he could only wonder what the dark spirit had done last night. If he was lucky, it was only minor theft or pick pocketing. At worst, he could be casing someplace, like a jewelry store or an art gallery. Or he could have pulled off such a heist.
Terror overtook him as he scrambled to his desk, powering up his personal laptop. What if Bakura had done even worse? The locks on Yugi's windows weren't that good. Anxiety mounted as Ryou brought up the news page. Oh thank gods. Relief flooded through him. No headlines. No murders, no thefts. Bakura had spared him again.
Of course, this did not guarantee that Bakura hadn't done something Ryou would regret later. But unless Bakura saw fit to inform his host of the events of his nighttime prowls, and he rarely did, Ryou would remain in the dark. So he'd just have to hope that whatever it was wouldn't come back to haunt him.
Ryou changed out of last night's clothes (all black, not a good sign, but nothing in the pockets, a good sign) and proceeded to make breakfast for one, to the background noise of Bakura's silence (a good or bad sign, depending). He had been doing that a lot lately, staying oddly silent after a night out. Ryou glanced at the clock tiredly as he put the dirty dishes in the sink; 10:23.
He would never make it to work in time. He froze in a moment of indecision. Go in anyways and beg forgiveness? Call in sick?
Ryou dashed to his room to find his uniform. Why had he not remembered work until right then? The alarm hadn't been set, obviously, but that was no excuse, was it? Argh, where was his shoes?! He rooted through his closet, to no avail. At least Bakura wasn't laughing like he normally did. His laughter made it very hard to concentrate. Ryou threw himself to the floor and swept his arm under the bed. Shoes? No? Maybe-
Ryou's hand landed on a relatively large, deathly cold object. Ryou jerked back and peered under the bed, but couldn't see anything through the shadows. Or rather, the Shadows. He swallowed nervously. Why was there a small pocket of Shadows lingering under his bed? More importantly, why had he not suffered excruciating, soul-wrenching pain when he touched them?
Cautiously, he reached out a hand and touched them again. Chills swept through him and the hair on the nape of his neck stood up, but other than that he was fine. Odd. His hand fell on the large object and
he grabbed it, quickly pulling it out of the cold. It was heavy and as he brought it into the light he felt his jaw drop. Oh my gods.
It was a statue of Isis, kneeling with spread wings, just under a foot tall. She was beautiful. Each feather on her wings was a tiny sliver of stone, malachite for the green, lapis lazuli for the blue. The dark wood base had tiny lotus blossoms set in white topaz. The solar disk was a perfect lens of carnelian, held in place with gilded horns. In fact, almost her entire body was covered in a thin sheet of gold. But what truly stunned was the face. The soft, caring eyes, the kind yet determined smile, the faint hint of sadness. She seemed to radiate both a quiet strength and a mother's unconditional love.
Ryou's hands shook slightly as he beheld the masterpiece. Where had Bakura gotten it? A theft of this magnitude would have made the front page, but there had been no word. A cover-up? Someone wanted it recovered quietly, without media fuss? The statue must be worth a small fortune. It was a perfectly preserved piece of Egyptian art, from no earlier than the late Second Intermediate Period at most.
But wait. Recovering from the shock, Ryou took a closer look at the statue. The hands were palm up, and this style of statue typically depicted Isis with her hands palm down. And the face wasn't usual either. It was too… human, too expressive. Normally the gods, like the pharaohs, were represented by the same basic template. As beautiful as she was, this Isis was too unique. A beautiful fake then, Ryou decided.
He put the statue down and paused. Were there more? Ryou reached back under the bed with a mixture of hope and dread. Sure enough, he found something else.
It was a statue of a hawk carved in limestone, incredibly detailed although not bejeweled. An inscription of the first line of the Hymn to Ra was inscribed around the base, and the double crown reinforced Ra's image. Again, not quite the exact style of Egypt, so obviously not legitimate. But still amazing.
Ryou found a statuette of Bast, a regal cat of black basalt, complete with a gilded jeweled collar and gold earring; another gilded basalt statuette of Anubis, grave and protecting, likewise too expressive. His alarm grew as he slowly surrounded himself with miniature statues of cats, hounds, Horus, Set, and other gods, stone and wooden, each seeming to be a beautiful, expressive counterfeit.
And then he found a chisel. Ryou stared at the tool in disbelief. No… There's no way. He dug around under the bed, pulling out an old wooden hammer and other stone and wood carving tools, plus the tubes of paint that he thought he had run out of.
Dumbfounded, Ryou gazed at the artworks in astonishment. Had… Bakura made all these? It didn't seem possible. But Yugi had told him that, according to Yami, Bakura had grown up in a former tomb building village, so it made some sense. Ryou reverently picked up the Isis statue again. The sheer love that went into these. A unexpected tear slid down his cheek. He had always thought that Bakura was a, not godless person, but he was a tomb robber for gods' sake! Ryou had always figured that Bakura just didn't care. But these statues; their simple making was an act of love and devotion.
A small gasp escaped him at the realization: Bakura had been stealing supplies. He hadn't been stealing because he felt like it, just for kicks. The jewelry Ryou would find in his pockets, the gems and the 24kt gold necklaces, they were raw materials. Ryou could only guess where the stone and wood came from, but it was Bakura he was talking about.
If you breathe a word to anyone, you will find yourself wishing you were dead.
Ryou flinched, a slight smile twitching to life. That was the Bakura he recognized.
What a beautiful secret of the gods.
--
What, it makes sense to me. Bakura grew up in an ex-tomb building village; his parents would have probably taught him how to read, plus things like carving. Besides, Bakura made all those lead figures for his Monster World game. Obviously he must have learned. And then the expressive touches are a result of Bakura's time in the present; it influenced his style some what.