Calai'di–I'm sorry I have to do this, but I need to explain some things before we go on.
First of all, like I said at the very end of the last chapter, the other spirit possessing Ryou is Zoku Necrophadisu, or Zork as he's more commonly known (but I can't call him that without laughing so I'm sticking with Zoku). The yamis, hikaris, and Malik don't know this. Harry, Ron, and Hermione do. So, no it isn't Yami Malik that's possessing Ryou, it's Zoku, and they don't know it.
Oh, and yes, it is the locket that enables him to possess Ryou.
And finally, THANK YOU FOR ALL THOSE LOVELY REVIEWS!!! I find such inspiration by reading them! May Thoth bless all of your writing!
Chapter 16: Trials of Possession
"You know, I expect we'll be good friends with Madame Pomfrey by Christmas," Yugi commented, his head in his hands. He was sitting next to 'Ryou', who was strapped to one of the beds again, after dragging the boy to the hospital wing. Malik was sitting nearby in a similar position.
"Maybe we should go to class," he suggested. The boy on the bed began struggling violently again.
"Yes, yes, we should go to class!" the boy exclaimed. "Good idea, Malik. Let me go, and we can all go to class together!"
Malik shook his head and grinned. "Naw, we'll just stay here and watch over you, spirit. We don't really need to go to class at the moment."
"I told you, I'm Ryou! Ryou Bakura!" the boy yelled. "Why won't you listen to me?!"
"All right, what's the last card Bakura played in his duel with my yami during the Battle City tournament?" Malik asked smartly. The white-haired boy screwed up his face, but instead of an answer he just wailed loudly.
"Malik! Ryou wouldn't know that!" Yugi exclaimed. He placed a hand over the crying boy's mouth, but drew it back quickly as he got bitten. "Ouch! He bit me!"
"Well then, it definitely isn't my hikari," said a harsh voice from by the door. They all looked up the Bakura leaning against the wall in his usual 'after Battle City' clothes. Yugi jumped to his feet in surprise and almost instantly gave over control to Yami.
"Bakura, what do you think you're doing?" he asked calmly.
"I think I'm leaning against a wall watching you try to bring some sense to someone who had none in the first place," Bakura answered slyly. He pushed himself from the wall and walked over to the bed where his hikari was trapped; he stared down with contempt at the boy. "What are you doing here, in MY hikari?"
"What are you talking about, Bakura?" the boy asked forlornly. "I am your hikari. Surely you'll believe me."
Bakura stared disgustedly down at the teen. "This is a pathetic way of freeing yourself. Do you really think I'll believe YOU are Ryou?"
"But, Bakura..." the boy cried. "I...I love you. You won't let mean old Malik and Yami hurt me will you?"
"Thief, don't fall for it," Yami warned.
"Please, Bakura...please let me go..." The boy stared up at him wide-eyed and pleading; the yami's concentration began to slip. "Please, Bakura...don't you love me anymore? Please let me go..."
"Pharaoh, what if this is Ryou?" Bakura suggested, taking a step towards the bed; Yami brought his hand down on the thief's shoulder to stop him.
"Bakura, that isn't Ryou, I'm sure of it."
"Why don't you ask him something only you and Ryou would know?" Malik said. Bakura stared down at the boy on the bed, thinking; he knew what he wanted to ask, but he also just wanted to free his hikari right now.
"What...what was your card in my reading?" he asked, fighting the urge to free the boy right then.
"The...Knight of Swords?" the boy guessed. The thief stood back, no longer compelled to free his hikari's body. The boy realized what had happened and began pleading again. "No, Bakura, please...you won't leave me like this, will you? You won't let them trick you! Please let me go!"
"Shut up. You are not Ryou. Why don't you free yourself and leave his body?" Bakura growled, turning his back on the pleading boy. Instantly, the cries stopped and were replaced by a crueler voice that sounded like two people at once, one of which was Ryou, and the other was the voice of the shadow creature in the dream.
"You three will pay for this, I swear to you! I'll kill you all!" he exclaimed, struggling to break free of the straps holding him to the bed.
Bakura didn't look back at him, but answered in disgust, "And so you now show your true colors."
"Who are you?" Yami asked, his tone very similar to his associate's.
"Wouldn't you like to know, Pharaoh." The boy began laughing harshly, and he stared at Yami with crimson-coated brown eyes. "You thought you could lock me away forever, but you thought wrong. And now we are once again in the same position, same status, and same disability." He glared at each of them in turn, his eyes lingering on Bakura's back longer than on the others. "As for who I am, you will find this out later. But now you will mark my words, for this betrayal, you will all die by my hands! And, Thief King, it will be your precious hikari that stills your beating heart. You will die!!!"
The boy fell limp to the bed, eyes closed, his breathing rasping and uneven.
"Is he always like this when this happens?" asked Bakura, trying to keep his voice even and calm, though he was failing rather miserably.
"Not always," Yugi answered as he took control. "Only when Yami comes out. This thing seems to really hate him. But Ryou should be okay now."
Bakura sank to the floor, his face in his hands. "Why did this have to happen to him?!"
"Bakura, maybe we should tell Professor Dumbledore about you and Yami now," Yugi suggested, placing a hand on the yami's trembling shoulder.
"Yes."
"What?!"
"I said 'yes'," Bakura answered. He glanced up at Yugi with annoyance. "I agree with you, Dumbledore should know." He burrowed his face in his hands again, emitting audible sobs. "What did he ever do to deserve this?!"
"Uh...yami?"
Bakura stopped and looked up at the bed; Ryou was staring down at him, freed from his prison courtesy of Malik, tears welling in his own eyes.
"Yami, are you okay?" he asked, crawling off the bed. Malik and Yugi glanced at each other and quickly moved to another section of the room where they could look out the door. Ryou crawled to Bakura's side and stared anxiously up at him. "What's wrong?"
"That damn thing in your head, that's what," the yami answered. He jumped slightly as Ryou placed warm hands on his own.
"Bakura, please don't be scared for me," he pleaded. "I'm scared enough for both of us. I need you to be strong for me so I don't completely lose it."
"Ryou...I..." The thief gazed down at his feet, and he suddenly smirked. "I can't believe I was acting so weak," he said in his usual tone of voice. Ryou laughed and got to his feet, pulling his yami up with him.
"You know, I bet Transfiguration is over by now. We need to get our homework and find out what they did in class," Ryou said, dragging Bakura towards Yugi and Malik.
"One more thing. I don't think you know this, but Yugi and I decided we're going to tell Dumbledore about Pharaoh and me."
"Fine. Come on, yami...oh, what now?"
Bakura had frozen in place, eyes wide open with fright, staring through the door out into the hall. Yugi and Malik were frozen in similar poses, and they were all staring at the same thing. A pale face with bleach-blonde hair had been looking in at them, a face accompanied by Slytherin robes and an obnoxious attitude.
"Malfoy."
Yugi, Ryou, and Malik stood nervously in front of the stone gargoyle that led to Dumbledore's office, unsure of what they should do. The headmaster didn't know they were coming, or that they had a problem at all, and Ryou and Yugi, at least, didn't like to interrupt someone if the person didn't know they were coming.
"You may come up," said Dumbledore's voice from out of nowhere. They glanced at each other nervously, Ryou gave the password, and they headed up to Dumbledore's office.
"Come in," Dumbledore said as soon as they reached the door. They entered and stood nervously just inside the door, looking around for the unseen headmaster.
"I see that even I cannot prohibit your use of your Millennium Items," said the old man as he descended from an upper level. He stared straight at Ryou as he sat behind his desk. "However–"
"Uh, Professor, " Yugi interrupted, stepping forward slightly, "before you going on, there's something we need to tell you that might help to explain that." Dumbledore nodded slightly to indicate he would listen. "Well, you see," Yugi went on, "when Ryou and I got our Millennium Items, something else came with them. I'm not sure how to explain–"
"We're possessed, Professor," Ryou interjected, "by two ancient Egyptian spirits that were trapped in our Items."
"Is this why you have been missing classes, Mr. Bakura?" Dumbledore asked.
"No, not exactly. Can we explain this first, please?"
The headmaster nodded again and watched them patiently.
"Three thousand years ago, the Millennium Items were made with the intent of protecting Egypt and the Pharaoh," Ryou said, unaware that his hand was fiddling nervously with the Ring. "Then, the lest owners of our Items got sealed within them. You see, the reason Yugi and I were destined for you particular Items is that we're the reincarnations of the previous owners, the ones who's spirits are locked inside."
"And these spirits sometimes possess you?" Dumbledore said, more of a statement than a question.
"Yeah, but it's almost always willing," Yugi answered.
"May I speak to these spirits?"
"Well, personally, I feel that Ryou's been possessed enough for one day," answered a caustic voice. Bakura stepped out of the shadows behind Malik to stand beside his hikari; he stared reproachfully at Yugi and demanded, "Let's go, Pharaoh, unlike you, I haven't got all day."
Instantly, Yami appeared next to his own hikari, glaring just as disdainfully at the thief. "I don't know what else you could be doing right now."
"And I suppose you were actually busy?"
"As a matter of fact–"
"Excuse me!" Dumbledore exclaimed, silencing the two yamis. "Now, I would like to know who you two are."
"I am the spirit of the Ring, Ryou's yami," Bakura said, bowing slightly, "also called Yami Bakura, or Dark Bakura, Thief, Tomb Robber, and, more commonly, just Bakura."
"And I'm Yami Yugi, Dark Yugi, Pharaoh, King of Games, but usually just Yami. Oh, and thief-boy forgot one, isn't that right, Soul Stealer?"
"Oh yeah, I did forget that…"
The headmaster cleared his throat loudly to silence the spirits and went on, "May I ask why you call yourselves 'dark'?"
"You don't want to know," the thief answered, inducing a hard jab in the stomach from Ryou.
"We're dark compared to our hosts," Yami said, glaring as Bakura, "and when we first emerged I guess we were even a bit evil. Tomb Robber, here, stayed like that for a lot longer than I did. But we're okay now–"
"–Unless someone threatens Ryou and me," Yugi finished.
"Our existence depends on our hikaris," Bakura continued, smirking slightly at Yami. "If Ryou died, I'd be stuck in the Ring again, which I'd like to avoid at all costs, so I'll do whatever's necessary to protect him. Pharaoh's the same way about Yugi. But otherwise I guess we're okay."
"Unless someone really annoys you, right Bakura?" Ryou said slyly. The yami glared at him but didn't say anything in his defense.
"Am I correct in assuming that 'Pharaoh' and 'Tomb Robber' refer to what you were in your past lives?" Dumbledore asked.
"Yes, I was Pharaoh and he was, and still is, a thief," Yami answered; Bakura looked indignant.
"I was the best thief, thank you very much, and I still am the best thief. You just don't remember that, oh great Yugiou."
"Well, it's apparent you two don't like each other," the headmaster commented. "Now, I have a couple of questions for you...ah...Bakura. Professor Snape has recently accused you assuming, of course, that it was you and not Ryou, of buying weapons in Knockturn Alley. Is this true?"
Bakura glanced at his hikari before answering proudly, "Yes, that's true, and I don't regret it. I got two katagana, two daggers, and a very useful knife."
"You...you got all that?" Ryou asked incredulously, ire creeping into his voice.
"And are any of these at Hogwarts?" Dumbledore inquired.
"You'll know if I lie, won't you?" Bakura asked nervously. The old man nodded once, and Bakura sighed, "All of them, but only because I couldn't send them back home. I'm not telling you where they're hidden, though; there are people here who I don't want to know."
"Very well, I'm sure that has something to do with what else you wanted to tell me. Second question: have either of you been using your Items' powers?"
"You already know that," Bakura remarked.
"But I want to hear it from you."
"Bakura has," Yami tattled.
"With good reason!"
"Not that first time."
"I was lost! And so were you, don't forget."
"SILENCE!" Dumbledore commanded; that shut them up. "Why have you been using your Item?"
"The first time, I didn't know how to get back to the dormitories; I also didn't think you'd be able to detect it. But the second time, Yugi was in trouble and I didn't know where he was. You can ask him for the details."
"Those are both understandable reasons, and I expect you to use the same reasoning should you use them again. Now, I would like to know why you have been missing so many classes, Ryou."
Ryou shifted uncomfortably and revealed the locket. "Well, we think I've been possessed again, and by Malik's darker half this time."
"What?!" exclaimed Malik, speaking for the first time. "We never agreed to tell him that!"
"Mr. Ishtal! Calm down!" the headmaster ordered. "I believe I am unfamiliar with your story. Is there a spirit in you Item as well?"
"No, thankfully no, because that priest was an arrogant, traitorous, son-of-a-bitch, and Kaiba's irritating enough as it is. No, my dark side is actually part of me. Ever heard of Multiple Personality Disorder?"
Dumbledore finally looked like all of this was getting to him; he sat back in his seat and looked rather faint.
"I'm sorry if this is too much for you, Professor," Ryou said apologetically. "It's a lot, I know, but I don't know who else to turn to. Shadi and Bakura are at a dead end, I don't know how much Isis would be able to help me, and Yami doesn't have any memories of his past life. You're the last person I can think of to help me." The lighter white-haired boy dropped to the floor in despair. "I don't know what to do. It really scares me."
He buried his head in his hands and tried to retreat to his soul room only to find Bakura guarding the door.
{{You're not going to get help by running away, hikari.}} Bakura scolded silently.
{I know. But I can sense that he can't help me. I don't know what to do!}
{{You can start by looking by your feet and opening your senses.}}
Ryou opened his eyes and saw that Fawkes was sitting by his feet; a beautiful song reached his ears, touching his very soul, calming his fears and mind. He reached out his hand and slowly pet the bird's golden plumage, oblivious to everything else in the room.
Dumbledore slowly stood up. "I am afraid I do not know how to help you."
The words rang through Ryou's head like an old bell, over and over; his heart sank even lower in hopelessness.
"But," the old man went on, "I will help you look for the answers you seek. Perhaps, we shall find a way to stop these other possessions, as I'm assuming you want Bakura to stay with you?"
"Yes." Ryou answered. He stood up and smiled at his yami, who surprisingly returned it in earnest. "Thank you very much, Professor. I knew it was a good idea to come to you about this."
