ONE TEQUILA, TWO TEQUILA, THREE TEQUILA, FLOOR.
Disclaimer: I am not Kazuki Takahashi. I not own YGO.
A/N: I admit that I am not old enough to consume large amounts of alcohol legally, therefore tolerate with the limited information about the alcoholic cocktails mentioned in this chapter. All 'tastes' are purely imaginary and under no circumstances have I actually consumed any. This warning is to avoid strange 'looks', similar to those given by Yuugi to Honda or Bakura in the previous chapter.
Also, after reading my chapters and combing over for errors, I have found an inconsistency to whether the Millennium Item's inhabitants can take a physical form or not. Shall we assume they can whenever they want to? Of course, being spirits, they have their limitations and can't do it forever. So, that concludes that the spirits CAN take physical forms, just not permanently.
Skip intro.
The introduction to this is not important. There was nothing to say apart from I was sitting in my Soul Room until I was so rudely disturbed. But what is important would be that I have an intruder in my apartment. So sue me, I am a thief; I have extremely sharp senses that I honed over the ages. Of course, these could be a distraction at times. Hearing the clumsy intruder from my Soul Room, and that is saying a lot since my hikari's Soul Room is as noisy as a crèche classroom when the teacher announces 'Story time!' Not that I have had any contact with children of these ages. One, me with children? Two, my hikari doesn't let me for the above reason. Back to the clumsy intruder, an intruder which, judging by the creak of the floorboards, slightly taller than 4 feet. Since when did fairies decide to move in?
Note to self: Must burn those books whose ideas have taken liking to the shambles of my mind and then exorcise myself some time soon.
4 feet? Since when do primary school children feel the need to break into an apartment. Another reason why kids and I do not go. Serious rivalry there. Rivalry, you say? Why the hell do you think 'childproof' is an oxymoron?
Stop. Pause. Rewind. Just over 4 feet? That wouldn't happen to be 4 feet 2 inches, would it?
"Bakura?"
"Pharaoh, since when have you adopted this cute pastime of breaking into apartments?"
"No need to be defensive."
No need? I had just found a barely over 4 foot, 'adolescent' who bore a crown of tri-coloured hair, who wears a tight mesh and spandex muscle shirt, tight leathers…okaaay, sharp turn to the left and let's not take that turn on memory lane…Pharaoh roaming in my apartment.
"Come to laugh over my loss to Malik?" Do not get me wrong. That statement, which only has that question mark there solely for grammatical purposes, was a threat. Look down, somewhere in the hand area and see that silvery glint? That. Is. A. Knife. Not sure whether it's as sharp as I'd like it to be, but it will do.
"Since you lost to Malik…"
"You decided to come here and remind me again? Nice of you." I gruffly reply.
"Actually, no. Figured you had only lost to him because of the alcohol questions. Guess you need a memory update on alcohol."
"What's in it for you?"
"What makes you think that I have something to gain?"
"Answer the question."
"No. I have nothing to gain, but you do."
"What's that? I get to see you drunk and wasted?"
"…Perhaps. I am going to teach you the joys of modern alcohol."
"Why would you want to do that?"
"Are you backing away from a challenge? Scared to think what alcohol can do now?"
"Ryou! I'm going out!" I hollered across the corridor separating the living room and study. Just so, I don't have my hikari pestering me as I learn what the hell this century has to offer on liquid joy.
"Now?" yells the boy. "Be careful!"
Shut it, pharaoh. I can see smirking from here.
"He still tells YOU to be careful? Shouldn't he be opening a window and announcing to the world that he's letting you out and for THEM to be careful?"
"Enough lip, save the macho repartee for the bar.
"Bakura. This is what you call a lime daiquiri. It's rum and lime juice." He drawls, as if he had found teaching witless kids to be a favoured pastime. L-I-M-E D-A-I-Q-U-I-R-I. You don't say.
"I may be lacking in the alcohol department, but I'm not stupid."
"Of course not. You proved that point so well when you lost to Malik."
"Shut it, pharaoh. Or I'll seal that orifice for you…permanently."
"Still bitter. A drink would help, wouldn't it, Tomb Robber?"
"And damn if it didn't," I muttered before grabbing a delicate-looking cocktail glass almost overflowing from the ominous looking greenish liquid, "One lime daiquiri." I agreed, throwing my head back to fully knock back the substance down my throat.
Ra! People nowadays drink this stuff? Looks like people these days were getting to be as masochistic as I am. That so-called lime daiquiri was so Ra-damned volatile that you could remove carpet stains with that stuff. Took me two soda waters to put the hell writhing inside of my stomach out and wipe that pain-induced grin off my face. Looks like the old personality of masochism came back and visited once more.
"Still there, Tomb Robber? Surely that one drink hasn't lost you on me?"
"Next?"
"Very well," he purrs, "This is a tequila, with lemon of course."
"All citrus is it? Surely you don't have anything in mind?"
"And what would that be?"
"Wouldn't you like to know?"
"Perhaps. Drink will you, perhaps that will loosen your tongue and tell me what you have in mind."
"Indeed I will, suits both our plans doesn't it, Pharaoh?"
…With hindsight, I rather skull down whatever is inside those bottles marked with a crossbones symbol on than this. I'm not sure what I am supposed to taste besides pain. I had to wave off two people who wanted to give me the Heimlich manoeuvre. Yami had to have 3 beers after he saw the look on my face.
"Shut it, Pharaoh."
"Or you'll shove something into a certain someone's oral cavity?"
"Only if you insist with your constant reminders."
"Would you like me to keep reminding you?"
"Your daiquiri, Pharaoh?" I dared.
"Not too dizzy are you Pharaoh?"
"Not. At. All. Your turn."
"One of these things." I saluted the Pharaoh before I best whatever flaming poison is in this salt-rimmed glass. Grabbing what I thought was my soda water off the table, I chugged that down as to set my throat on fire. Or so it looked. You try drinking what was burning mere seconds before sliding your throat, then grabbing what you thought was water and sculling approximately 50 millilitres of that before realising you were doing something parallel to dousing vinegar on a bee sting. That deed is not going to appear on anyone's 'to do' lists any time soon. One, it isn't the best of ideas. Two, strike that, it was plain stupid.
Several people clapped, others were stunned at the fact that I wasn't crying for water whilst half dead on the ground. Instead, my friend sadism pays a special visit and what my adoring, whilst gaping, audience sees is a spiky white haired youth laughing in such a manner as, in my host's words, 'to put the super villain in any block buster movie to shame'.
"Your move, Yami."
"Bakura…how are you feeling?"
"Feeling like you're about to pass out after your next drink."
My next drink. The next step to being practically, literally, technically and figuratively dead. I felt something sliding across my tongue, but was unable to taste it. Yami knows the routine by now. He pounded me on the back; now my backbone is in the front part of my chest. I would bet the Millennium Ring that he did NOT do that to help me. Some guy wearing an anti-shirt consisting of only sleeves and red leathers was standing behind me with fresh refills; plus, that 4 foot 2 inch Pharaoh is starting to look hot, just like this nuclear waste I'm drinking.
"Next up," the Pharaoh continues to purr as he strokes the compact bottle of the next blow to my mind, "is the new Baileys Glide. Taste the lightness." If I hadn't known that line was from the advertisement flashing at the train station, I would say that the light-headedness was showing up on my face, that, or Yami somehow knows I am going to hit that back lights of my head any time in the near future. But, since my friend masochism had also paid a special and inopportune visit, I take the damn creamy coloured bottle and force it down my throat. At this time, I realise that people have a point when they say that I am insane. I am insane. Even I say so. The fact I can get half a sentence done is amazing, because, in all logicality, I shouldn't be able to think in a vaguely straight line and should be stone cold on the ground if I were alive. My ears are ringing, and I can no longer focus my eyes. You could put a grenade behind me, pull the pin, and I wouldn't hear a damn thing. I've lost the sight in one eye, and the world sounds like it is made of rushing water. The barmaid seemed offended when I told her that her alcoholic concoction had given me brain damage. Yami saved my throat by pouring beer directly into it from the pitcher. My shirt is drenched and my hair is as wet as my shirt from sweat, I also smell like alcohol. At least when Ryou drags me out he'll know what knocked me out. I've decided to stop breathing; it's too painful. Screw it; I'm not getting any oxygen anyway. If I need air, I'll just suck it in through the 4-inch hole in my stomach. Half choked and technically dead, I still cannot believe my less-than-half-logical-self believes that there is still no way I am going to lose to Yami at a drinking game, as darkness eats at my eyesight like a malignant virus and as my body slumps in an 'signing off' position for tonight.
I cannot believe Yuugi's yami dragged Bakura to the local club for 'a couple of drinks'. Sure, Bakura freely going to that particular nightclub get himself smashed is completely within my view of him, and probably is expected in his reputation to be the impulsive nutcase as he is, but YAMI? The fondly nicknamed 'King of Duel' dressed up in hardcore punk gear consisting of a tight muscle shirt, human sized dog-collar and 'Ra-how-can-he-breathe' leathers, had decadently lured MY yami to a night of alcohol. In a nightclub that I'd never be caught in, dead or alive… though Bakura would like to fix the 'dead or alive' business if I had actually uttered this lecture aloud.
/Bakura? Do you want a glass of water?/ I send through our link, 'speaking' in the quietest tone I could manage.
No, I am fine.
/I'm making some fruit salad for you in the kitchen, if you want some./
"Why so nice, all of a sudden?" My yami says in his usual touchy tone as he crosses his arms, leaning in the doorway as he does so.
"Aren't I allowed to care for the little tomb robber who had gotten smashed 19 hours… 20 minutes ago?" I continued, humouring myself as I go. Bakura seizes a knife and starts slicing an orange up, before grabbing the entire stockpile of knives that Father had so unwittingly brought home.
"Baku, bring the knives back?" A newly discovered habit of mine, mocking the tomb robber like that. Quite endearing to see him wrinkling his nose and try to pay no attention to my comment.
"Don't. Call. Me. Baku." He says through gritted teeth, waving those knives around like a toy rattle. Kawaii. Yes, you may think I'm asking for it for the constant gibes and such, but it is amusing. I don't recommend such jeering and jostling towards the famed Tomb Robber for the public though, my insured safety has something to do with the fact that he possesses my body, and if anything happens to that, well, he too can say sayonara.
"Or else what, Baku-chan?"
Smiling sweetly, I watched my darker half go into one of his 'dangerous moods'. I could give a frame-by-frame commentary that would involve certain bits of information that would make the Tomb Robber's blood boil, such as the fact that he does an 'almost pout' and childishly scowled down at me but that could undo my life insurance.
"Here, eat your fruit salad." I hand him a bowl of diced orange, pineapple, strawberry, grape and passionfruit pulp.
"I'm not eating that." He points out, because he is a stubborn yami who had gotten smashed, and who needs his lighter counterpart to keep him in check.
"Yes you are. It will get you back to normal, just eat it." I try to say in an exasperated tone.
"Back to normal? And what," he pauses for effect and menacingly slides up to me, showcasing the most delectable expression a smashed Tomb Robber can make before continuing, "do you mean by that? Are you saying that I, like others in the mortal population, need to be cosseted and taken care of because I have a hangover?"
Just as I was about to nod, I am thankful I considered nodding, having stalled time. Time, which saved my neck from being skewered by an airborne, cheesed-off yami-propelled, kitchen fruit knife.
Thud.
1 kitchen knife thrown in my general direction, barely missing my head by approximately 20 centimetres. Whatever possessed my father to buy that stash of knives from Egypt in the first place? Sure, I am hardly able to throw knives so carelessly like that, but Bakura? I wouldn't trust him with a steel-nib pen.
"I…" my Yami states in steely tones.
Thud. Thud.
2 and 3 kitchen fish filleting and chicken-skinning knives respectively hurled also in my general direction, barely missing my shoulder by a hand span. My yami's knife or shadow-magicked physical body or/and both is really starting to scare me now. It's like seeing a child playing with darts and getting closer with every turn and then actually hitting bulls-eye in their 3RD go. Just what are parents thinking, if at all, when buying playthings for their children? Do they actually want to unconsciously train them to weaponry? Scary thought there.
"…do…not…"
THUD.
No, Ryou, don't move…even though your yami looks like he's in the mood to use those knives for purposes other than dicing vegetables and slicing meat, stay where you are. Do not alarm the armed tomb robber.
"…have a HANGOVER!" he yells angrily, as he haphazardly throws random knives at my already punctured door.
"Yami! Stop that! Now, give me those knives!" I yell. Fun is fun, but when fun starts involving the fact that people could be killed or starts gets out of hand, like my yami does now, enough is enough. Forcefully grabbing my yami's wrist and pulling his free hand away from the knives, he half-heartedly struggles from my feeble grip.
"I have knives and I'm not afraid to use them!"
"Bakura! Give me those knives, sit down and eat your lunch!" I yell, making up for my miserable attempt at a scowl.
"I have knives and I will dice you up if I need to, so put that bowl down. Slowly. None of your watery eye tricks either!"
"You would hurt me, Bakura, because you are such a…nice, caring, sympathetic, considerate yami." Smiling sweetly before I draw out the guns for the final showdown of 'skills that come with the hikari package', I actually never do. However, I do widen my eyes, but never get round to producing the shiny stop-any-yami-in-their-murderous-tracks teary-eyed looks. Why? If I were able to, I wouldn't have had to see stars and wouldn't have been locked out of the apartment. Stupid Bakura.
/Yami…let me back in…/ I protest through our link. /It's boring out here on the balcony…/
Yes, instead of the heated corridor of the apartments, he has considered something and has locked me out of the indoors part of the building and sealed me out on the 3-storey high place. The 3-storey place prone to cool winds that made it so inhospitable that only a measly Aloe Vera plant and a couple of fuse-wire supported disease-resistant tomatoes lived in their green plastic pots, otherwise known as my balcony.
/Yami?/
Fine. Don't answer; see if I care. See if I mind being stuck out here, wearing a flimsy T-shirt and half-freezing to death. Not that it was cold, not in this type of season in Tokyo, but wind-chill was nothing to be sneezed at here. Well, at least I have the plants as company. Yes, the plants. There was nothing else worth looking at apart from the half-blown off paint off the rail, a spiky Aloe Vera plant, that had been used so many times that I should put it in some new potting mix so it grows again and green plastic pots. Of course, the pots themselves weren't interesting as they were your average pot, no; those were the pots in which those resolutely slow-growing tomatoes grew in. The tomatoes also had fuse wire that I had decided the tomatoes needed in order to stand straight. Looking back and remembering how many times I had to buy tomatoes from the supermarket to cook, I could just throw that plant in the bin and be better off, stupid unyielding plant it is.
Even with the fuse wire… fuse wire? That's right! Fuse wire! Why didn't I think of it before? Unwinding the flexible, yet strong, wire from the shrivelled stem of the wretched plant, I proceeded to thread it through the keyhole. Bakura's not the only one who is 'resourceful'. Meep, whenever I catch myself thinking or saying such things, which is never good. It means either I am more like that tomb robber than originally thought OR I am acquiring Bakura-like tendencies by osmosis.
/Guess who's back?/
"What are you doing back in here?"
"I live here?"
"Very funny. Now, how did you get back in? I thought I locked the door."
"…Ano… I-I- picked the lock?"
"With what?" It may be just me, but the tomb robber looks more intrigued than murderous… but I may be wrong. You never know. One moment, moderately sane and relatively harmless, the next, threatening to blow half the apartment up.
"Fuse wire, Bakura. What else?"
"The fuse wire you said 'went missing'?"
"It didn't go missing, it just went to supporting the tomato plants."
"Tomatoes don't need support, they row on their own accord. You planned for this eventuality, Ryou."
"Gomen."
"Never mind with the apology, I… am going to eat that fruit salad now."
Strangely, he picks the bowl up, walks to the table and eats his lunch civilly. I have no idea whatsoever to what happened just then, so don't ask. I don't know, it isn't normal. It's not something you would find in a textbook, so please don't ask because I honestly do not know. I know I am repeating myself… but I really don't know.
Whilst I feed myself as I am well capable to do so, because unlike you pathetic mortals, I do not get 'smashed'. Picking at a seedless grape, I am, if I am to follow the trend of most of my kind and am somewhat inarticulate, I am amazed. But since I am a great, strategic and cunning King of Thieves, I have a vocabulary ranging from honorific to the deplorable ways to refer to all those who surround me. I will have to say that the boy planning for this eventuality is astounding, it is the most intelligent and sensible thing he has done, so I was stuck with the boy for a not-so-random reason after all.
My hikari can smirk, threaten, laugh as to inspire fear and an urge for the receiver to make a break for it, coordinate when cleaning, yield unexpected force when angered, and pick locks? Hn, I knew there was a reason why he and I got along so well…
A/N: Translation and partially-discussion time!
Gomen: translated before. You should remember that it is the humblest, commonly used around friends, way of apologising.
Kawaii: Please tell me you have at least heard of this one? Means 'cute'.
Baku: Ah, the fond but dangerous name of our favourite Tomb Robber. Just a name so cute and 'glompable' that it is almost unbefitting of Bakura.
Ano: sort of like 'um'… You use it as a space filler, time stall-er etc etc etc
'anti shirt': term taken from listening to commentary from 'School Of Rock'. I thought the singer looked like something from a fanfiction when I first saw it, so hence, it wormed into my FF.
Fuse wire: it is great for supporting your tomatoes, and I speak from experience. They even keep them up after they're long dead and wilted…sadly, this is also from experience. Nothing seems to grow in my garden… apart from spring onions, chilli and what I believe to be some bok-choy (got to be some freak species from that genetic engineering place to live in my 'garden')
Fruit salad (orange, passionfruit, strawberry, pineapple and grape): hey, it works. I like this combination, so therefore my characters will too.
Dear almost-non-existent adoring audience: please bear with me, seeing as I do have an odd way of writing FF. I start with a random chapter and write everything-ish up before writing stuff in the middle to make it make sense… so that's why sometimes a chapter takes 3x as much time as it is supposed to. Also, like most writers in , I have HOMEWORK, ASSIGNMENTS, and TUTORING and other crap that are mostly education related. sigh I have no life…
To outside world, we'd like to hear from you in our homework-enclosed world, please review and send condolences. (A virtual cookie or virtual stick of pocky would be good too?)