Disclaimer: Yu-Gi-Oh! belongs to Kazuki Takahashi.
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#19: The Sun

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"--not going to spend time on her case anymore."

Ryou paused outside the doorway to his classroom. Someone had left the door open for once, and Jounouchi's desk was only a row away from it.

"But they never found the criminal!" Anzu protested.

"I know that," Jounouchi said. "But they say they don't have time for one unknown murder in a city like Domino. And it's not like her family is leaning heavily on them to keep looking, so. . . ." He let out his breath in a hiss. "They weren't doing such a fuckin' grand job of it, anyway. They let one of the suspects off with half an hour's conversation."

"Jounouchi-kun. . . ."

"I know, I know, Yuugi. Fine. It wasn't him. But who? Who has light colored-hair and a reason to kill Mai?"

Jounouchi's voice still choked a little when he said Mai's name, but Ryou no longer felt as guilty upon hearing it as he had before.

(This is growing irritating,) Bakura muttered. (If he needs a killer that badly. . . . )

Ryou was going to ask Bakura to finish his sentence, but then Jounouchi spoke again. "I tried to find some clues . . . something, but. . . ." He snorted. "Officer Minekura told me I probably screwed up their chances to find the guy by investigating on my own, the bastard. . . ."

"He'll be caught," Yuugi said with certainty. "Whoever did it. He'll be caught."

"I really--"

"No, Yuugi's right," Anzu said, cutting Jounouchi off. "He'll be caught. It's just . . . it's just not right for him not to be. His actions will catch up to him."

Ryou spotted another of his classmates walking down the hall, so he stepped into the room before he could be seen eavesdropping.

"Hello, everyone!" he said cheerfully.

"Oh, hey, Bakura-kun!" Yuugi replied, a little startled. Ryou ignored the jump and gave the three of them a smile, making sure to keep his lips closed as he did. He started putting his books for their first class into his desk.

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Ryou's canine teeth had slowly chipped and grown and reshaped themselves into the fangs that Honda had once mentioned to him a few months ago. When he'd noticed this, he'd felt that they were too obvious, so he began smiling with his mouth shut. He couldn't help people who spotted them by talking, though, which made it something of a useless effort.

Ryou had also developed a habit of absently running his tongue over the new points. No one noticed but Honda.

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The school day dragged.

The tightly-knit group of friends had been fraying at the edges lately, though no one cared to admit it. It had begun with Jounouchi attacking Ryou, and the animosity and inherent side-choosing that had come with that; and then Jounouchi spent less time with them and more time trying to find Mai's killer. And that was added to by the fact that Honda had been drifting away from everyone save Jounouchi and spending more time with Ryou -- when he wasn't avoiding the other teenager as much as possible. Otogi had his store to concern himself with, Kaiba was busy with his new theme parks, and though Yuugi and Anzu did their best to keep everyone together and talking to each other, even they were starting to give up. Things had simply changed after Mai's death. It wasn't reversible.

So Ryou was quite glad when the final class was over and he could go home.

He made his way back alone, and hung his coat over the armchair before setting his schoolcase on the kitchen table. Then he changed out of his uniform into normal clothes, and then Bakura took over.

When he returned control to Ryou, it was nearly midnight, and the spirit had once again forgotten to take off his shoes before stepping inside. Ryou went back and toed off his sneakers, checked for blood under his nails, and settled down at the table to finish his homework before starting on his finals' study guides.

He didn't bother to ask the spirit what he'd done. Ryou could tell that Bakura was in one of those moods where he wouldn't deign to explain himself to his landlord.

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This pattern continued for two more nights. (Ryou had tried in vain to convince Bakura to take off his shoes. Bakura had told him that after becoming a vampire, any space Ryou occupied could never be sacred, so it didn't matter whether he brought shoes that had touched the profane outside world inside or not. Ryou was still working on a reply to that.)

On the morning of the third day, Ryou went to school and learned that Mai's killer had been found.

He was Umezu Junji: a duelist, college-age, with very pale blond hair that could easily be mistaken for white after sunset and from a distance. He had gone to the police station and confessed to the murder, and told them that he had first seen Mai during the Battle City tournament and that she had turned down his challenge, saying he wasn't in her league. It had wounded his pride.

When the detective questioning him asked why he had killed her, Junji couldn't seem to think of a better reason than that.

Kaiba verified that Junji was one of the invited duelists to his tournament, and two days later -- after Ryou had once again wound up missing the better portion of the previous night -- the police managed to find an eyewitness of Mai scorning him. Between that and the confession, the case was considered closed.

Jounouchi had thanked Kaiba for helping. The other teenager had replied that Battle City had brought him enough bad PR, and he wasn't going to allow the press another chance to speculate.

"Thank you anyway," Jounouchi had said.

Kaiba had paused for a moment, before snorting and returning to his book. That was as close to a 'You're welcome' that anyone other than Mokuba or Yuugi would ever get out of him, so Jounouchi dropped the subject.

The Umezu family had protested that their second-oldest son would never do something like this, but since Junji continued to plead guilty, there was nothing to be done.

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How did you do that? Ryou asked soon afterward, as he was watching the news report on Junji's sentencing. His chemistry textbook sat on his lap.

(There are some things, landlord, that you do not need to know.)

A few moments later, one of the announcers reported that Junji had been sentenced to three years at hard labor. Ryou winced. The unfortunate guy. . . .

(If no criminal had been discovered, Jounouchi would have worried her death like a dog with a bone,) Bakura said. (Would you rather take his place in jail?)

No.

(Then be quiet about it already. You aggravate me.)

Bakura was irrationally irritable, so Ryou assumed that the dreams had been really bad that day and dropped the subject.

He watched the television for another minute and a half, but when the news moved from Junji to a different story, he shut it off and returned to working on his stoichiometric questions.