DISCLAIMER: This is a work of fanfiction produced for entertainment purposes only. Yu-Gi-Oh! and all related characters are the creations of Kazuki Takahashi.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: Yes, I know it's an odd title. I'll explain it at the end of the story, rather than here, so it doesn't spoil anything ^_^
Chapter 25: Four Kinds of Trouble
Ryou moved quietly around the kitchen, making himself a grilled cheese sandwich for his dinner and being very careful not to make any sudden movements that would wake the chibi sleeping with his little head against Ryou's chest. The whole time, Ryou tried to keep his eyes from straying to the kitchen table and the old book lying open there. Although he knew that he'd have to look in it eventually, he really wasn't looking forward to it and was trying to put it off for as long as possible.
Once his dinner was ready, he hesitated. Ryou's heart was torn between looking at the book and ignoring it… at least while he ate his dinner. His grumbling stomach made the decision an easy one. He'd surely end up forgetting all about eating if he tried to study the book over dinner and he really needed to eat something before he made himself ill. Knowing that he'd end up looking at the book anyway if he stayed in the kitchen, Ryou took his sandwich and sleeping chibi-yami into the livingroom. His thoughts kept straying to the book. Desperate to find something to distract him, even for only a little while, Ryou turned on the TV.
He ate his dinner calmly through two news stories before a photo of Bandit Keith appearing on the screen caught his attention. Ryou listened with growing interest to the newsreader.
"Duelists around the world were stunned today when the Official Duel Monsters League announced the suspension of one of Duel Monsters' top rated players from all official tournaments, competitions and championships. The League has cited several charges of cheating and unfair play against Bandit Keith; the current American Duel Monsters Champion. Bandit Keith was not available for comment."
Ryou blinked and then smiled slightly. "Well, it's about time someone caught him at his underhanded tricks. Joey will be very pleased about this."
His friend had faced Bandit Keith during the Duelist Kingdom competition. Despite Keith's cheating, Joey had managed to defeat him in the end. Keith had also come up against Yugi at one point, although he'd been under Marik's mind control at the time. He'd cheated in that duel too. Bakura had seen it. He'd been watching the duel with great interest as he tried to work out who was manipulating Keith, and which Millennium Item was being used to do it. The mind control had left Keith in a pretty bad way. None of them had heard much about him since then.
On the TV, the newsreader was still talking. "This suspension will be incredible luck for one young duelist though. Bandit Keith had already gained entry into the upcoming Tokyo Duel Monsters Tournament. With his suspension coming into effect immediately, this means that his position in the Tournament will now go to the next in line. In this case, that's a talented young man who's been taking the dueling world by storm over the past few weeks. Yes folks, although it's bad news for Bandit Keith, this suspension will give Evien Sanders entry into the prestigious Tokyo event!"
"My, that is lucky." Ryou glanced up from his sandwich in time to see the photo that had flashed onto the screen. He froze, his startled eyes locked on the image.
The young man pictured wasn't anything out of the ordinary. He had shoulder-length blonde hair and grey eyes and the kind of face that you could look at and forget within a few minutes. Even his black jeans, tee shirt and jacket were nothing unusual. The most striking thing about him was his smile. An icy chill ran down Ryou's spine as he looked at it. He knew immediately that this duelist was cruel, calculating, devious and deceptive. It was all there in the evil twist of his thin lips.
The image switched to the subject of the next story and Ryou blinked at the sudden interruption. He was more than a little disturbed at how intense his reaction had been to a single photograph. Ryou wasn't sure if it was paranoia or premonition, but he had the strongest feeling that the duelist in the photo was going to be trouble.
After that unpleasant incident, Ryou really wasn't in the mood to look at the spellbook, so he took his time over finishing his sandwich. All too soon though, he was done. He stared at the plate for a moment, trying to talk himself into moving, so was very relieved when Bakura-chibi stirred. It gave him an excuse not to study the spellbook.
Ryou smiled down at his chibi-yami as the child blinked sleepily, but his smile faded to a concerned frown when the little boy suddenly squirmed and his wide eyes filled with distress. "Bakura? Is something wrong?"
The chibi whimpered unhappily and squirmed again, clearly very uncomfortable. Worried, Ryou tried to calm him down with a gentle hug and back rub, but the child simply ignored his efforts. "Maybe you're hungry again… How often do chibis need to eat?"
Ryou carried his chibi-yami into the kitchen… and froze in the doorway, blinking in surprise at the large package sitting on the kitchen table. It definitely hadn't been there earlier. He sighed in relief. "I guess this will tell me what's wrong with you. It looks like the spell has conjured up something to help with whatever the problem is!"
He took a closer look at the package, noting with amusement the picture of a clearly uncomfortable D Human gingerly holding what looked like one of the cherubs from the Chorus of Sanctuary. Beside that was the product name.
"Shadow Realm Diapers…" Ryou turned very pale. "Oh dear…"
For a moment he simply stood there, staring at the package as though it was something incredibly dangerous, like a Blue Eyes Ultimate Dragon or Malik when he'd had too much sugar. Then the chibi squirmed and whimpered in his arms and Ryou snapped out of his stunned daze. He gently hugged the distressed child. "It's all right Bakura. Don't worry, I'll look after you." He faced the package; his face set in a determined frown. "It's only a diaper. I've faced worse on the dueling field. How hard can this be?"
Ryou approached the situation with his usual methodical care. First, he gathered the things he needed, then he laid them out on the kitchen table. The towel went down first, with the powder and diapers within easy reach. Then Ryou lifted his unhappy chibi-yami onto the towel and started to unbutton his sleepsuit. "I wonder why they don't make these so you can change a diaper without having to take it off completely?"
Bakura-chibi didn't seem to like having his sleepsuit taken off. He looked up at Ryou with such big, sad eyes that the boy had to restrain himself from pausing to cuddle him in reassurance. "I promise you'll be dressed again before you know it. I just have to get this thing off you…" Ryou trailed off, blinking at the diaper.
"Now how do I…? Oh, I see, it has clips. So I just unsnap these and… it's still in place. Oh dear… There must be something else that I need to… Is that Velcro? Yes. So if I undo that… it's still in place. Um… oh there's a safety pin! I'll undo that and… I don't believe this." Ryou frowned down at the diaper, which was still in place. "This is getting ridiculous. Now what? It's undone along both sides… Ah, I see, there's a tie at the top!" Ryou beamed at his chibi-yami in triumph as the diaper finally came undone. "There! Now what comes next…?"
Ryou had a vague memory of a baby-changing scene from a movie that he'd once seen. He was pretty sure that the baby had been powdered before the new diaper was put on. Turning away from Bakura-chibi for a moment, Ryou reached for the powder. When he turned back, he blinked. "Bakura! Get back here! I haven't finished yet!"
The little chibi had apparently decided that he'd been lying still for long enough and had decided to do something about it. Unable to crawl, he'd done the next best thing and rolled himself into the middle of the table. Lying on his back again, the little chibi wriggled slightly and looked over at Ryou with what was definitely a chibi version of Bakura's smug smile.
Ryou sighed. "If there had been any doubt in my mind that you're my yami, this would definitely have settled the matter." He studied the situation for a moment. Even if he leaned over, he'd barely be able to reach and he might end up hurting Bakura-chibi if he tried to pull him back. On the other hand though, it was a cold night and the chibi was lying naked on a cold table. He was already starting to shiver. There was only one thing to do…
Turning around, Ryou hoisted himself up onto the table, then turned and edged close enough so he could lift his chibi-yami up safely. Holding the small child against his chest, Ryou slid off the table again. He was smiling slightly. Bakura-chibi had snuggled against him as soon as he had picked him up. There had been no hesitation in the small child at all. That made Ryou very happy.
"All right. Let's try this again, shall we?" Ryou put the chibi down on the towel again and eyed him sternly. "And this time… no rolling away!" Just to be sure, Ryou kept one hand on the child's chest as he retrieved the powder.
The chibi lay quietly, his wide eyes watching Ryou curiously as the boy shook the powder container over him. The powder refused to come out so Ryou opened the top a little wider and tried again. The resulting cloud made both boys cough.
"Oh dear…" Ryou scooped his chibi-yami up and carried him out of the cloud, leaving a trail of powder behind. He gently rubbed the coughing child's back until Bakura-chibi could catch his breath. "Well… at least some of the powder got on you too. Now for the new diaper… I think the powder's settled enough now."
It should have been easy. All Ryou had to do was do the same things that he'd done to get the previous diaper off, only in reverse order. It would have been easy… except…
"Ouch!" Ryou winced as Bakura-chibi kicked his arm for the third time. The chibi was obviously happy and looking more lively than he had since Ryou had found him in the duck pond. He was lying on his back, wriggling, kicking his little legs and waving his little arms. Unfortunately, his movements were causing Ryou considerable trouble with doing up the new diaper.
Every time Ryou tried to do up one of the pins, Bakura-chibi would move and the pin would end up jabbing into Ryou's finger. When Ryou tried to do up the Velcro tabs, the chibi's legs kept kicking him in the arm, and the child's squirming made it very difficult to get the tabs properly aligned so they worked right. When he tried to do up the top ties, it was Bakura-chibi's arms that kept getting in the way. As for the snaps, Ryou would no sooner get one done than the chibi's wriggling would undo it again! By the time he finally finished, Ryou was hot and flustered. "Whoever makes these things really needs to include some instructions… and something to distract a chibi with."
Getting his chibi-yami back into his sleepsuit was just as difficult. The child kept squirming so much that Ryou could barely get his little legs into the pajamas, let alone the rest of the little wriggling chibi. Still, as he finished with the last button, Ryou had to admit to himself that he really didn't mind. A wriggling chibi was a happy chibi, and that was exactly what Ryou wanted.
"Oh, so you think all that was funny, do you?" He chuckled as Bakura-chibi kicked his little feet happily. "From your perspective perhaps, but I just hope I don't have to go through all that every single time!" Picking up his chibi-yami, he cradled him against his chest with one arm as he started clearing up the mess. The little child immediately snuggled happily into him, making Ryou smile.
By the time Ryou had cleared up, Bakura-chibi was sound asleep and Ryou had run out of excuses. It was time for him to look at the Book of Secret Arts and find out exactly what his yami had done to himself… this time. He sighed as he settled down at the table, his chibi-yami snuggling into his chest even as he slept. Ryou began to read.
The boy was frowning by the time he'd finished reading through the spell and its description. After a moment's thought, he started to read through the spell again, this time going over each part as carefully as if he was looking for a needle in a haystack. But even after going through it a second time, Ryou was still very confused.
There didn't seem to be anything in the spell to explain why his yami was now a chibi-yami!
For a moment, Ryou considered the possibility that Bakura had cast a different spell, but he knew in his heart that it was the right one. Not only had the book been open at the page, but Bakura's last words to him, before he'd locked Ryou in his soulroom, had hinted at what the spell would do. No, this was definitely the right spell. But it had apparently had a very wrong effect on Bakura!
The spell was titled 'To Gain the Greatest Treasures in the World'. That alone was enough to convince Ryou that it was the spell that his angry yami had been intending to cast. It seemed like a fairly simple spell, although the title was actually a little misleading. The Shadow Magic didn't automatically give the spellcaster the world's greatest treasures. It merely read his heart to determine his three strongest desires, then it manipulated whatever it needed to in order for those dreams to come true. Once they did, the spell restored everything to normal, except that the spellcaster kept whatever he had gained. So what the spell actually did depended entirely on what the spellcaster desired.
That worried Ryou. He knew his yami and he knew that Bakura had been in a very bad mood when he'd cast the spell. Of all the possible things that could have been in his heart at the time, most of them were too chaotic to even think about! But… the form that the spell had taken seemed to imply that Bakura's heart had been focused on something else. Something that Ryou couldn't even guess at. He looked down at his sleeping chibi-yami in confusion. "Bakura… what could you possibly have wanted so badly that you could only gain as a chibi?"
Ryou looked over the spell one last time. There was something troubling him about it, but he couldn't quite work out what it was. He sighed heavily and closed the book, after marking his place just in case he needed to find the spell again in a hurry. "I'll have another look at it tomorrow. Right now…" He interrupted himself by yawning. "Bedtime."
As Ryou stood up though, Bakura-chibi stirred. He began an all-too-familiar squirming and whimpering routine. Ryou groaned. "Oh no… not again… Well this time, I'm changing you in the bathroom where you can't roll out of reach!"
While Ryou was changing his chibi-yami, on the other side of town another light was also trying to change his yami. His yami's mind, anyway.
"No, Yami, I really don't think I should call Ryou tonight. It's far too late and chances are, it would only upset him. I'm sure it would upset Bakura. I'll talk to Ryou tomorrow at school, I promise! Besides, I'm sure that they're both fine. They'll have talked it all out by now." Yugi smiled up at his worried yami reassuringly, but the spirit's answering smile was very slight.
"I wish I had your confidence, Yugi. Bakura was furious this afternoon. I have not seen him that enraged for a very long time. What he did to you…" Yami's fists clenched and he stood up from where he'd been perched on the corner of Yugi's desk and began pacing back and forth across the room with quick, angry strides.
Yugi jumped up and moved to block his yami's path, forcing the spirit to stop. "Yami! I'm okay! Really! We've been over this already. Bakura didn't hurt me! He just sealed me and he wouldn't have done it if he hadn't been angry. You heard Joey and Tristan when they were here earlier. It's no wonder he was upset. Even you admitted that your comments hadn't been fair, and that they'd only made a bad situation even worse."
Yami sighed and closed his eyes. "Yes… but even so… it does not lessen my concern for Ryou. You know Bakura. You know what he is capable of."
"Was. What Bakura was capable of. He's changed, Yami. Oh, I know he's still basically the same, but his goals have changed. He's not after the Millennium Items now and as for power… He's seen what it can do, and the cost that people pay for it. He's paid that cost too, and I really don't think he wants to ever pay it again. Now, he's just trying to sort himself out. He's been after the Items for so long, he's forgotten what it's like to just… live. He's still adjusting to everything that's happened and he's still getting used to his new life with Ryou. Everything's changed now."
"I know. But he is still a yami and he still has access to a great deal of power. Even if he did not do it deliberately, even if he did not truly mean to do it, he could still…" Yami trailed off, not wishing to paint too graphic a picture for his innocent light. As always though, Yugi knew exactly what he meant. The boy smiled slightly.
"Ryou told me he knows that Bakura wouldn't hurt him. I don't know if I would believe Bakura if he said that, but I believe Ryou. He trusts Bakura. We need to accept that. Even if we can't trust Bakura too, we can at least trust Ryou's judgment. He wouldn't stay with Bakura if he thought he was in danger."
Yami thought about that for a moment before finally nodding. The motion seemed to be the signal for his tension to ease and he released a deep sigh as he dropped down onto the bed. "Very well, Yugi. Talk with Ryou tomorrow. And perhaps…" He sighed again. "I owe him an apology. I should not have jumped to conclusions as I did."
Yugi smiled. "I'll ask Ryou if he thinks it would help. If Bakura's already gotten over it…"
"True, it might be better just to forget it all happened." Yami was silent for a moment before he added, "But if he has hurt Ryou… in any way…"
Yugi nodded. "Then you won't be the only one to take action. I'll be right behind you."
Yami smiled at his determined light. "We'll decide tomorrow, as soon as we've talked to Ryou."
It was getting late, but Ryou couldn't sleep. His chibi-yami was curled up beside him, sleeping soundly and making the cutest little snoring sound every now and then. Ryou couldn't take his eyes off the child. He was extremely worried. As he'd been getting ready for bed he'd suddenly realised what it was about the spell that had been bothering him.
He'd been wondering what to do about school the following day, if his yami was still a chibi. He didn't really have a choice. There was no way he could leave the child alone, and taking him to school was out of the question too. Luckily, he stayed home from school so rarely that the school would believe him if he said that he was ill. But… it would only work for a day or two. After that, he'd need to find a baby-sitter. Then it had hit him.
With all the other spells he and Bakura had used so far, they had been for a specific amount of time or until a specific condition had been met. But with this one… there was nothing to indicate how long the spell would last! Ryou had raced to the book and looked up the spell. He'd read it through twice before one passage had struck him. It didn't give a specific timeframe, but there was a condition. The spell would last until Bakura-chibi gained what he had wished for.
Without knowing what his yami had desired most at the time he had cast the spell, there was nothing Ryou could do except wait, look after his chibi-yami and hope that the spell worked and his yami's wishes came true, so he would change back. That could happen at any time. It could be that night, or the following day, or sometime next week…
Or Bakura might remain a chibi… forever…
TITLE EXPLANATION: Four Kinds of Trouble
Trouble 1: Evien Sanders
Trouble 2: Diaper Duty
Trouble 3: The Spell (and it's possible consequences)
Trouble 4: Yugi and Yami (How will they react if Ryou isn't at school the next day?)