Borath: Cheers for reviewing guys! Wow, this partnership thingy is
working out pretty damn good, dontchya think? My turn to do the bulk next
so wish me luck. ;p
Pachelbel: We have most of it done now, actually. Review, and you'll get to see it!
Spawn: Chapter Three
Bakura spent three days getting drunk. Every time he sobered, he'd check to see if he was "alone" in his body again. Every time he discovered he wasn't, he'd grab a fresh liquor bottle and start all over again. He didn't sleep due to the fact that a bottle of Black Labeled Vodka was enough to knock even a yami out, so no time was wasted in his attempt to kill what was now happily leaching off of him.
By the fifth day (after spending the previous 24 hours nursing the worst hangover he'd ever experienced, which was saying a *lot*. The Ring filtered a lot of things so it was something of a challenge to get a hangover, and he'd drunk things similar to camel piss in the past without getting this kind of headache) he hated to admit it, but he was actually tired of drinking. This stupid condition of his was already changing him for the worse. He'd have to stop fighting, too, if he didn't nip this thing before it got large, heavy, and worse of all; noticeable.
He'd kept his mouth shut though; he'd done that right. Ryou was clueless, figuring him to just be having an 'episode' that would pass in a few days. He had dared not comment on the quantities of alcohol that Bakura had downed over the last few days, amounts that would be potentially lethal for a mortal.
So a week passed with Bakura suffering in silence, and his 'condition' only worsened. He was now violently ill at night, a happy little turn of events that he had yet to get bored of cursing. The first time it had happened he deluded himself into thinking that it was just the mass quantities of alcohol that he was drowning himself in. The second and third times though it sunk in properly. Remembering back to Yami's pregnancy spells, he had nearly killed himself outright when he realized that this could go on for up to three months.
But most disturbingly, a thought that had occurred to him in more than one of his drunken episodes had not been forgotten, and would not leave him alone even when he tried valiantly to drown it as well with shots. That was; if he really *was* pregnant (which he frenziedly hoped he wasn't despite all the evidence), that would make Malik, or Rishid, or *both*, the father, or fathers. Urgh. Just the thought of it gave him a headache.
*~*~*
Ryou yawned as he made his way down the hall to the kitchen, thinking hazily how good a glass of water would taste, especially right now, as the house felt very similar to a sauna. His pajamas and bed sheets felt confining in the suffocating heat, to the point that Ryou was half tempted to strip down and wear nothing but a towel.
Bakura had finally come home from spending a week at some bar, stinking of... well, Ryou didn't want to think of what he'd passed out in. It seemed to be a different stench every night but he subtly ignored it. His yami was quite temperamental lately, but that wasn't unusual, although it could be worrisome at times. He was suspicious of Bakura's interest in hostility lately though. By that he meant his complete lack of it. His yami seemed completely obsessed with getting as drunk as possible with as many concoctions as possible. Ryou feared that this was going to lead to a veritable explosion that he likely wouldn't be able to walk after.
The reason for this spell of behaviour also eluded him. Had he and Malik had a bigger fight than usual? Or was there something bigger at work here. It was tempting to ask, but also suicidal so he kept his mouth shut.
Ryou stopped mid-step outside the bathroom, the sounds of retching from inside catching his attention. He knew instantly that it was Bakura; his father would be out of the country for at least the next two months, and the dark spirit's mind was practically screaming obscenities through their bond, weak as it was. That weakness was a bit worrying though; nothing about Bakura was weak due to his old-instinct that to be weak was to be on death row.
The teen supposed Bakura was drunk yet again, but it would have to be incredibly strong alcohol if *Bakura* couldn't keep it down. Morbid curiosity guided Ryou's hands, and before he knew what he was doing, he'd opened the bathroom door.
"Yami?" He asked softly. A groan was the only answer. "Are you drunk again?"
"I wish...." Bakura muttered pathetically before his stomach continued its all-out rebellion.
"Are you sick?" Ryou's voice now held a note of concern. Yamis weren't supposed to get sick, were they? He'd never seen Bakura ill before.
Bakura reached up and flushed the toilet. "I guess I am. I felt all right this *morning*."
Ryou timidly stepped closer and pressed his palm against his yami's forehead. "You don't have a fever. You feel sort of cold." A pause as realization dawned. He'd thought the heating system was on the fritz. Apparently it was Bakura's fault that he couldn't sleep. "Did you turn up the heat?"
Bakura nodded. "I don't know why. Just keep waking up... thought maybe some heat would knock me out." He sighed, resting his back against the tub, his legs bent and forearms resting on them. Not looking at Ryou, he asked: "What time is it?"
"Around 2:30."
Bakura gave a "hmm" of acknowledgement before pushing himself up, stumbling weakly into the kitchen. He had to keep a hand against the wall to maintain his balance, something that Ryou found very disconcerting and Bakura found very irritating. However, at the moment he felt too tired and wretched to care. He also felt the tiniest most miniscule spark of admiration for Yami in that he put up with this through two pregnancies. Stupid Pharaoh.
Ryou followed, waiting until Bakura was seated at the table before speaking. "Maybe we should call-"
"A doctor?" Bakura scoffed, putting his head into his hands and scrubbing his fingers through his hair.
"Yami Yugi," Ryou finished ignoring the interruption. Standing on the opposite side of the table to where Bakura sat, he shrugged slightly. "He's had illness and the like before, maybe he has some advice."
Bakura shook his head, regretting it immediately when the room tipped warningly at the movement. "If he's awake at this hour, I don't want to know about it. Besides, it'll be a ski-day in Hell before he'll ever help me. Not that I *need* help, by the way. The Ring will fix me up sooner or later." He neglected to add 'I hope' onto the end of that sentence.
Ryou frowned. "Okay. But... if it doesn't, you should talk to Malik. Unless you have a problem with *his*... er..." his mouth froze momentarily under the glare he was receiving, and he forced out, "... advice."
Bakura sneered, sitting up a little as his new-found hatred of the Egyptian granted him strength. It was his bloody fault this was happening to him. Him and his crackpot spells and potions. "Yeah, he'd *love* this."
He quickly decided not to tell Ryou this was the *third* night he'd lost his dinner to nausea. If he worried the hikari any further, then Yami *and* Malik and who-knows-how-many-more people would be called over to hum and haw and scoff at his problem. Now wouldn't that be wonderful?
Besides, what would he tell them? "Gee, guys, I don't know what's wrong, but I have a paranoid suspicion that Malik's get-Yami-pregnant spell might have-" Bakura stopped that thought in its tracks.
But.. No! It had to be impossible! *He* hadn't been dunked in the Fountain. Ra, he hadn't even slept with anyone lately. And hopefully Malik had been smart enough not to leave the spell so vague it could affect *anyone * who ate Rishid's potion. Bakura prayed that was the case.
"Where are you going, yami?"
Bakura's hand turned the doorknob and he yanked the door open. "To get some...beer." He'd been about to say 'Pepto-Bismol' but then Ryou would wonder what happened to the last bottle. Bakura wanted this pregnancy shit either confirmed or dispelled entirely now so he could either laugh it off as a moment of insanity or start planning what the Hell he was going to do about it. Alcohol wasn't working so if he really was pregnant he'd have to start getting creative and serious.
*~*~*
Bakura walked slowly along the sidewalk. The local thugs knew better by now than to try to touch him or Ryou; even though he didn't come by this area often, he was a somewhat revered- well, *feared* presence. This was the first time that Bakura had reflected on that as unfortunate. He really wanted a bullet or knife to come along and find its way into his stomach right about now. But he wasn't that lucky. The best he could hope for was a scrap that would help get rid of some of his frustration and, dare he say it? Looming depression.
Smothering a self-pitying sigh, he went into a local supermarket and, after swiping every brand of home pregnancy test they carried, he went into the men's bathroom and began to try them out.
This took three hours and many bottles of water, and *still* they all came up positive. He double and triple checked the signs on the boxes, and was further disappointed. Throwing the last one to condemn him to his fate at the wall for good measure, he kicked the mess of test-sticks under the sinks and stalked out of the shop.
Angrily, he decided to take to the streets again and try to figure out what he was going to do. It was now an ironclad fact. He was pregnant. And the conventional ways of getting rid of it weren't going to work. He couldn't very well walk into a doctor's surgery and demand an abortion. Beside, he wasn't quite 'equipped' for that particular procedure. Despite his valiant efforts, drinking hadn't gotten rid of it and if anything had only made his nausea worse, and he sure as Hell didn't know any spells that would help. He was also on his own with this, unless there was absolutely nothing he could do about it and had to admit to needing help. That could very well be close to birth with his stubbornness.
As he turned out of the exit he ran straight into Seto Kaiba, who dropped a large bag of groceries at the impact. Bakura cursed his unusual clumsiness as he stopped to face the other. A thief shouldn't have been careless enough to bump into somebody. Kaiba's expression, as he turned and saw the thief, went from anger to the standard icy recognition he gave most people.
"You're out late in a bad part of town," Bakura mused after a few moments of silence. His hands moving into his pockets in a sign of outright refusal to help pick up the scattered items from the bag, he smiled thinly at the taller teen.
Kaiba rolled his eyes as he picked up his bags. "This store is the only one in town that carries the things on Yami's list. And since you're the worst of the things that crawl around this part of Domino, I'm not all that worried."
Bakura stiffened in irritation before shoving Kaiba off the curb. Yet again, the bags hit the pavement, but this time the thin plastic burst. Eggs splattered, baby food bottles either shattered or rolled away through the gutter. Milk made a thin white veil over the sidewalk and blacktop before making a gurgling fall down the storm drain.
Bakura noted this coolly, a smirk on his face. Then his eyes fell on a box near his feet. "Trojan: Now with spermicide. Trusted for 83 years!" the packaging proudly announced.
"Condoms," the tomb robber stated dryly, a frown already forming on his features. Even they couldn't have preventing his 'condition' though. A layer of latex didn't exactly stop magic, no matter how weak it was. And if there was one thing that Malik was good at it was spells.
Kaiba nodded marginally, a hand coming up to his face knowing that he couldn't rescue most of the contents of that bag, and he wasn't in the mood to duke it out with Bakura. "We're taking steps to ensure that we don't have to go through mid-night feedings again for a long time."
"I thought the Pharaoh lost that ability when the Puzzle was fixed?" Bakura asked in confusion. Perhaps some other unfortunate accident had befallen the Pharaoh that had either made him female again or gotten him knocked up. That way he could feel safe in the knowledge that he wasn't the only one suffering. That would certainly cheer him up a bit.
"Yami says so, and so does Tetsuo apparently, but we want to be on the safe side. Pregnancy is a huge strain anyway and with Yami it was dangerous because he's a guy. He doesn't want to be put through that sort of thing again," he replied honestly, his gaze remaining steely.
Bakura realized that he might be able to get some much-needed information this way without alerting anyone of his little problem. Walking around Kaiba and then back into the shop, he was pleased to note that Kaiba followed him to buy the ruined items again. "But the Nyannichuan spell made it easier for him. Are you saying that it could have been worse than it was?"
He felt a twinge of guilt as the latter of those words twigged a memory. It had been his fault that one of the twins had been killed, no matter how inadvertently. When he'd been stranded in Egypt with Yami he could see how devastating an impact that loss had been. It was a thought though; he hadn't tried throwing himself at the ground yet. But the spell that had caused this probably wouldn't be broken that easily.
"A lot worse," Kaiba said as picked up a new packet of formula, dumping it into the basket he'd picked up at the door. He honestly had no idea why he was answering the Tomb Robber's questions, but if it was going to keep Bakura quiet and let him get his shopping done in peace then he'd carry on. "Yami's body wasn't designed to carry a baby let alone take the strain it caused. He got a lot of help from Tetsuo apparently. He worked some charms or something to keep things running smoothly. Without that I doubt that Kiseki would have survived."
Bakura nodded slightly, pausing in his steps as a new thought occurred to him. What if the spell was permanent like the Nyannichuan? What if this was going to happen over and over? Glancing around himself in mild panic, Bakura found that he had conveniently stopped walking in the chemist section. Grabbing a small purple box from the closest shelf, figuring that he might as well get used to this protecting shit now, he increased his pace to catch up to Kaiba.
The brunette glanced at his newly acquired package curiously. "Why are *you* bothering with those? It's not like either you or Malik can get pregnant."
Fortunately, Kaiba turned his attention to the shelves before he could see Bakura pale slightly. Sensing that if he hung around here too long Kaiba would discover his secret, Bakura stuffed the box into his pocket and made a beeline for the door, breaking into a mild jog when the alarms started ringing. No one chased after him though; people knew better than to mess with him.
*~*~*
Review..... Now.
Pachelbel: We have most of it done now, actually. Review, and you'll get to see it!
Spawn: Chapter Three
Bakura spent three days getting drunk. Every time he sobered, he'd check to see if he was "alone" in his body again. Every time he discovered he wasn't, he'd grab a fresh liquor bottle and start all over again. He didn't sleep due to the fact that a bottle of Black Labeled Vodka was enough to knock even a yami out, so no time was wasted in his attempt to kill what was now happily leaching off of him.
By the fifth day (after spending the previous 24 hours nursing the worst hangover he'd ever experienced, which was saying a *lot*. The Ring filtered a lot of things so it was something of a challenge to get a hangover, and he'd drunk things similar to camel piss in the past without getting this kind of headache) he hated to admit it, but he was actually tired of drinking. This stupid condition of his was already changing him for the worse. He'd have to stop fighting, too, if he didn't nip this thing before it got large, heavy, and worse of all; noticeable.
He'd kept his mouth shut though; he'd done that right. Ryou was clueless, figuring him to just be having an 'episode' that would pass in a few days. He had dared not comment on the quantities of alcohol that Bakura had downed over the last few days, amounts that would be potentially lethal for a mortal.
So a week passed with Bakura suffering in silence, and his 'condition' only worsened. He was now violently ill at night, a happy little turn of events that he had yet to get bored of cursing. The first time it had happened he deluded himself into thinking that it was just the mass quantities of alcohol that he was drowning himself in. The second and third times though it sunk in properly. Remembering back to Yami's pregnancy spells, he had nearly killed himself outright when he realized that this could go on for up to three months.
But most disturbingly, a thought that had occurred to him in more than one of his drunken episodes had not been forgotten, and would not leave him alone even when he tried valiantly to drown it as well with shots. That was; if he really *was* pregnant (which he frenziedly hoped he wasn't despite all the evidence), that would make Malik, or Rishid, or *both*, the father, or fathers. Urgh. Just the thought of it gave him a headache.
*~*~*
Ryou yawned as he made his way down the hall to the kitchen, thinking hazily how good a glass of water would taste, especially right now, as the house felt very similar to a sauna. His pajamas and bed sheets felt confining in the suffocating heat, to the point that Ryou was half tempted to strip down and wear nothing but a towel.
Bakura had finally come home from spending a week at some bar, stinking of... well, Ryou didn't want to think of what he'd passed out in. It seemed to be a different stench every night but he subtly ignored it. His yami was quite temperamental lately, but that wasn't unusual, although it could be worrisome at times. He was suspicious of Bakura's interest in hostility lately though. By that he meant his complete lack of it. His yami seemed completely obsessed with getting as drunk as possible with as many concoctions as possible. Ryou feared that this was going to lead to a veritable explosion that he likely wouldn't be able to walk after.
The reason for this spell of behaviour also eluded him. Had he and Malik had a bigger fight than usual? Or was there something bigger at work here. It was tempting to ask, but also suicidal so he kept his mouth shut.
Ryou stopped mid-step outside the bathroom, the sounds of retching from inside catching his attention. He knew instantly that it was Bakura; his father would be out of the country for at least the next two months, and the dark spirit's mind was practically screaming obscenities through their bond, weak as it was. That weakness was a bit worrying though; nothing about Bakura was weak due to his old-instinct that to be weak was to be on death row.
The teen supposed Bakura was drunk yet again, but it would have to be incredibly strong alcohol if *Bakura* couldn't keep it down. Morbid curiosity guided Ryou's hands, and before he knew what he was doing, he'd opened the bathroom door.
"Yami?" He asked softly. A groan was the only answer. "Are you drunk again?"
"I wish...." Bakura muttered pathetically before his stomach continued its all-out rebellion.
"Are you sick?" Ryou's voice now held a note of concern. Yamis weren't supposed to get sick, were they? He'd never seen Bakura ill before.
Bakura reached up and flushed the toilet. "I guess I am. I felt all right this *morning*."
Ryou timidly stepped closer and pressed his palm against his yami's forehead. "You don't have a fever. You feel sort of cold." A pause as realization dawned. He'd thought the heating system was on the fritz. Apparently it was Bakura's fault that he couldn't sleep. "Did you turn up the heat?"
Bakura nodded. "I don't know why. Just keep waking up... thought maybe some heat would knock me out." He sighed, resting his back against the tub, his legs bent and forearms resting on them. Not looking at Ryou, he asked: "What time is it?"
"Around 2:30."
Bakura gave a "hmm" of acknowledgement before pushing himself up, stumbling weakly into the kitchen. He had to keep a hand against the wall to maintain his balance, something that Ryou found very disconcerting and Bakura found very irritating. However, at the moment he felt too tired and wretched to care. He also felt the tiniest most miniscule spark of admiration for Yami in that he put up with this through two pregnancies. Stupid Pharaoh.
Ryou followed, waiting until Bakura was seated at the table before speaking. "Maybe we should call-"
"A doctor?" Bakura scoffed, putting his head into his hands and scrubbing his fingers through his hair.
"Yami Yugi," Ryou finished ignoring the interruption. Standing on the opposite side of the table to where Bakura sat, he shrugged slightly. "He's had illness and the like before, maybe he has some advice."
Bakura shook his head, regretting it immediately when the room tipped warningly at the movement. "If he's awake at this hour, I don't want to know about it. Besides, it'll be a ski-day in Hell before he'll ever help me. Not that I *need* help, by the way. The Ring will fix me up sooner or later." He neglected to add 'I hope' onto the end of that sentence.
Ryou frowned. "Okay. But... if it doesn't, you should talk to Malik. Unless you have a problem with *his*... er..." his mouth froze momentarily under the glare he was receiving, and he forced out, "... advice."
Bakura sneered, sitting up a little as his new-found hatred of the Egyptian granted him strength. It was his bloody fault this was happening to him. Him and his crackpot spells and potions. "Yeah, he'd *love* this."
He quickly decided not to tell Ryou this was the *third* night he'd lost his dinner to nausea. If he worried the hikari any further, then Yami *and* Malik and who-knows-how-many-more people would be called over to hum and haw and scoff at his problem. Now wouldn't that be wonderful?
Besides, what would he tell them? "Gee, guys, I don't know what's wrong, but I have a paranoid suspicion that Malik's get-Yami-pregnant spell might have-" Bakura stopped that thought in its tracks.
But.. No! It had to be impossible! *He* hadn't been dunked in the Fountain. Ra, he hadn't even slept with anyone lately. And hopefully Malik had been smart enough not to leave the spell so vague it could affect *anyone * who ate Rishid's potion. Bakura prayed that was the case.
"Where are you going, yami?"
Bakura's hand turned the doorknob and he yanked the door open. "To get some...beer." He'd been about to say 'Pepto-Bismol' but then Ryou would wonder what happened to the last bottle. Bakura wanted this pregnancy shit either confirmed or dispelled entirely now so he could either laugh it off as a moment of insanity or start planning what the Hell he was going to do about it. Alcohol wasn't working so if he really was pregnant he'd have to start getting creative and serious.
*~*~*
Bakura walked slowly along the sidewalk. The local thugs knew better by now than to try to touch him or Ryou; even though he didn't come by this area often, he was a somewhat revered- well, *feared* presence. This was the first time that Bakura had reflected on that as unfortunate. He really wanted a bullet or knife to come along and find its way into his stomach right about now. But he wasn't that lucky. The best he could hope for was a scrap that would help get rid of some of his frustration and, dare he say it? Looming depression.
Smothering a self-pitying sigh, he went into a local supermarket and, after swiping every brand of home pregnancy test they carried, he went into the men's bathroom and began to try them out.
This took three hours and many bottles of water, and *still* they all came up positive. He double and triple checked the signs on the boxes, and was further disappointed. Throwing the last one to condemn him to his fate at the wall for good measure, he kicked the mess of test-sticks under the sinks and stalked out of the shop.
Angrily, he decided to take to the streets again and try to figure out what he was going to do. It was now an ironclad fact. He was pregnant. And the conventional ways of getting rid of it weren't going to work. He couldn't very well walk into a doctor's surgery and demand an abortion. Beside, he wasn't quite 'equipped' for that particular procedure. Despite his valiant efforts, drinking hadn't gotten rid of it and if anything had only made his nausea worse, and he sure as Hell didn't know any spells that would help. He was also on his own with this, unless there was absolutely nothing he could do about it and had to admit to needing help. That could very well be close to birth with his stubbornness.
As he turned out of the exit he ran straight into Seto Kaiba, who dropped a large bag of groceries at the impact. Bakura cursed his unusual clumsiness as he stopped to face the other. A thief shouldn't have been careless enough to bump into somebody. Kaiba's expression, as he turned and saw the thief, went from anger to the standard icy recognition he gave most people.
"You're out late in a bad part of town," Bakura mused after a few moments of silence. His hands moving into his pockets in a sign of outright refusal to help pick up the scattered items from the bag, he smiled thinly at the taller teen.
Kaiba rolled his eyes as he picked up his bags. "This store is the only one in town that carries the things on Yami's list. And since you're the worst of the things that crawl around this part of Domino, I'm not all that worried."
Bakura stiffened in irritation before shoving Kaiba off the curb. Yet again, the bags hit the pavement, but this time the thin plastic burst. Eggs splattered, baby food bottles either shattered or rolled away through the gutter. Milk made a thin white veil over the sidewalk and blacktop before making a gurgling fall down the storm drain.
Bakura noted this coolly, a smirk on his face. Then his eyes fell on a box near his feet. "Trojan: Now with spermicide. Trusted for 83 years!" the packaging proudly announced.
"Condoms," the tomb robber stated dryly, a frown already forming on his features. Even they couldn't have preventing his 'condition' though. A layer of latex didn't exactly stop magic, no matter how weak it was. And if there was one thing that Malik was good at it was spells.
Kaiba nodded marginally, a hand coming up to his face knowing that he couldn't rescue most of the contents of that bag, and he wasn't in the mood to duke it out with Bakura. "We're taking steps to ensure that we don't have to go through mid-night feedings again for a long time."
"I thought the Pharaoh lost that ability when the Puzzle was fixed?" Bakura asked in confusion. Perhaps some other unfortunate accident had befallen the Pharaoh that had either made him female again or gotten him knocked up. That way he could feel safe in the knowledge that he wasn't the only one suffering. That would certainly cheer him up a bit.
"Yami says so, and so does Tetsuo apparently, but we want to be on the safe side. Pregnancy is a huge strain anyway and with Yami it was dangerous because he's a guy. He doesn't want to be put through that sort of thing again," he replied honestly, his gaze remaining steely.
Bakura realized that he might be able to get some much-needed information this way without alerting anyone of his little problem. Walking around Kaiba and then back into the shop, he was pleased to note that Kaiba followed him to buy the ruined items again. "But the Nyannichuan spell made it easier for him. Are you saying that it could have been worse than it was?"
He felt a twinge of guilt as the latter of those words twigged a memory. It had been his fault that one of the twins had been killed, no matter how inadvertently. When he'd been stranded in Egypt with Yami he could see how devastating an impact that loss had been. It was a thought though; he hadn't tried throwing himself at the ground yet. But the spell that had caused this probably wouldn't be broken that easily.
"A lot worse," Kaiba said as picked up a new packet of formula, dumping it into the basket he'd picked up at the door. He honestly had no idea why he was answering the Tomb Robber's questions, but if it was going to keep Bakura quiet and let him get his shopping done in peace then he'd carry on. "Yami's body wasn't designed to carry a baby let alone take the strain it caused. He got a lot of help from Tetsuo apparently. He worked some charms or something to keep things running smoothly. Without that I doubt that Kiseki would have survived."
Bakura nodded slightly, pausing in his steps as a new thought occurred to him. What if the spell was permanent like the Nyannichuan? What if this was going to happen over and over? Glancing around himself in mild panic, Bakura found that he had conveniently stopped walking in the chemist section. Grabbing a small purple box from the closest shelf, figuring that he might as well get used to this protecting shit now, he increased his pace to catch up to Kaiba.
The brunette glanced at his newly acquired package curiously. "Why are *you* bothering with those? It's not like either you or Malik can get pregnant."
Fortunately, Kaiba turned his attention to the shelves before he could see Bakura pale slightly. Sensing that if he hung around here too long Kaiba would discover his secret, Bakura stuffed the box into his pocket and made a beeline for the door, breaking into a mild jog when the alarms started ringing. No one chased after him though; people knew better than to mess with him.
*~*~*
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