He was trapped. He was always trapped when the other took over. He would bang on the door of his soul room, of his own mind, screaming, but if the other heard him, he paid no attention.
The two boys were complete opposites for sure, but it went beyond simply sharing a mind with one so unlike himself. It was like sharing a mind with the person he feared the most. The thief was cunning and ruthless. Ryo was filled with anxiety every time the other took over. What would he do to him this time?
When the thief took over, he would always harm his host's body in some way. Pissing off thugs who would proceed to beat the boy up, self harm, thievery. The young Brit was terrified that he would wind up dead or imprisoned for something that the spirit of the ring did. It was not an ungrounded fear. Both had nearly happened on several occasions.
So here he sat, like so many other times, curled up on the floor of his soul room, near to tears but not allowing any drops to escape from his eyes.
It would be alright; it always was in the end. If he fell asleep here, the other would silently slip back into his own soul room, and though Ryo may wake up in an alley or the street, he could find his way home and continue slumber in the security of his own bed.
He was just scared for the day that he wouldn't wake up at all.
A/N Would you believe that this started out as a story about Malik? By the middle of the fourth sentence, Bakura popped into my head and it just continued from there. Despite its shortness, this actually took me a couple days to write, simply due to lack of inspiration. Thinking about this makes me wonder what Ryo's soul room looks like because I had absolutely nothing to picture in my head when I was writing about him laying on the floor. Literally, what was in my head was Ryo curled up on the ground of an empty, gray room. I think that's what my next one-shot will be about.