Hooray! My very first review! Thank you so much Ravensta692003 it's good to be back! And I hope a few of your questions are answered soon!!!

Now onto the next chapter.

My first attempt at a Yu-gi-oh angst fic so be nice.

Disclaimer: I own it all! The characters! The show idea! Everything! -police chases me- Okay! Cool it people! It was just a joke! Sheesh!!!

" " Speaking

' ' Thinking

:::::::::::: Scene change

CHAPTER 2: Annoying Blonds and Red Undies

It was eleven in the morning when Bakura woke up. He washed up, relieved himself and headed downstairs, leaving Ryou still asleep in bed.

Bakura made himself comfortable on the couch as he surfed through the channels, clad in only his favourite fire-red silk boxers. There was a knock at the door sometime later. The silver-haired yami groaned loudly and sank lower into his seat on the couch. He was so comfortable there and did not want to get up. However, the knocking only became increasingly louder, as the person behind the door grew more persistent. The dark-eyed yami soon realized that the only way the knocking would cease was if he answered the wretched door. Bakura groggily walked over and answered it.

"Hey there, Bakura!" Yugi smiled cheerfully. Bakura stared blankly at the happy violet-eyed boy for a moment, before slamming the door in his face. He made to walk back to the couch, when someone began to pound furiously at the door.

"BAKURA YOU'D BETTA OPEN UP IN D'ERE OR I SWEAR I'LL KNOCK DIS DOOR DOWN!" came a loud, obnoxious voice from behind the door.

'Damn that blond idiot!' the yami thought to himself. 'Note to self...kill Joey any chance you get.' Bakura opened the door enough so that he could stick his head out. He was about to give Joey a few choice words for practically beating his door in. Unfortunately, he never got the chance as the blond shoved the door completely opened, revealing an Egyptian tomb raider in nothing but bright red boxers.

"Bakura!" Yami gasped in amusement. "So this is what you do when no one's watching, strut around at home in your underwear, eh?"

"Who would have guessed you looked so good in red?" Joey teased.

Bakura's face turned from fair to scarlet in three seconds flat. "Why the hell are you all here!" the silver-haired yami demanded, glaring from one teen to the next.

"We came here to see Ryou," the honey brown-eyed teen piped up, staring past Bakura and into his house. "Where is he anyway?" the outspoken Joey enquired, pushing past Bakura and making his way inside, the others following closely behind.

"He's still asleep blondie so come back later or something," Bakura growled, feeling the vein in his temple begin to throb, as he grew more annoyed.

"Naw! We can wait until he wakes up," Joey said, seating himself in Bakura's spot on the couch. "Aaaaaa" he sighed contently. "Still warm," he said reaching for the remote which the yami got a hold of first.

"Yonks!" Yami said swiping the remote from the other. Bakura glared at him. "Oh come now Baku, is this really how you treat your house guests? Be nice," he said, taking a seat between Honda and Anzu on the couch.

"Technically you're not my house guests. Technically I didn't even invite you over. So I don't have to be nice," Bakura informed Yami. "I'll go wake up Ryou now," he said heading for the stairs. "The sooner he's up, the sooner I have the authority to kick you clowns out..."

Bakura was about to open the hikari's bedroom door and wake him, but froze when he heard mumbling coming from the room. The curious yami leaned his head against the door hoping he could hear more clearly.

"It's so hard to keep living like this ... in constant fear," Ryou muttered to himself as he sat on the edge of an unmade bed, clad in nothing but a white t-shirt and silver boxers. 'I never wanted it this way...Marik! If it were up to me you'd still be alive, and we'd still be together only...only you'd treat me differently...better.'

Bakura could scarcely make out what the boy said. However he did manage to catch the name 'Marik' and gasped when he did. Marik happened to be Ryou's former boyfriend. Their seemingly impenetrable relationship had lasted eight long months. Unfortunately, Marik died a few months ago, he had been murdered.

"If only there was a way to end all this pain," Ryou muttered. Suddenly he was struck with in idea. Reaching into his drawer he pulled out a switchblade. He timidly rubbed his fingers over the smooth plastic handle. 'This isn't new to me, so why I'm I shaking so badly?' he questioned himself. 'I've cut myself before. This time will be exactly the same as all those other times, only difference is this time we'll hurt a little more..." he tried to reassure himself, before lowering it down on his arm. The cool metal of the knife touched his awaiting skin, and his mind dared him to pressed it harder,

until he could feel it pierce deep into his skin. Ryou took a shaky breath, gently running the blade over his wrist. He knew he was stalling. He was having second thoughts.

'Pull yourself together,' Ryou commanded himself. 'This will be the last thing I ever do in this world, so I might as well do it with as much dignity as possible. I'm not going to be a wimp about this, ' he decided mentally, finally finding his nerves. 'Bakura,' he whispered. 'Yami, Yugi, Honda, Joey, Anzu I'll miss you all and I just want you to know that none of this is your fault. Don't cry for me I wanted my life to end this way...after all...I deserve it..." and with that he drew a quick breath and...

"WHAT THE FUCK RYOU!!!" Bakura cried angrily tearing into the room, hair flying. "WHAR DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING?!" he demanded standing over the smaller boy, who currently sat on the bed. "WHAT'S MY SWITCHBLADE

DOING IN YOUR ROOM! I'VE BEEN LOOKING FOR IT EVERYWHERE!" he yelled snatching it away despite the protest he received.

Ryou finally rose from the bed, shaky slightly. "What-are-you-doing-in-my-room?" he whispered heatedly, his tone uncharacteristically dark.

"Checking up on you," the yami responded, refusing to feel threatened by this individual whom he use to admire.

"Why?" the smaller teen enquired. "I'm not a baby."

"You were going to kill yourself," Bakura spoke softly. "You were telling us this was goodbye. You were preparing yourself for death...and-"

Ryou gasped just then. "How do you know all of this!" he demanded.

"I was listening to you...from...behind the door," the yami confessed.

"But...that's...impossible. I didn't physically say any of that stuff. In fact I wasn't speaking at all."

They stared at each other in silence for a moment; Bakura's face was etched with a look of guilt, Ryou's sheer anger.

"You were reading my thoughts again!" Ryou accused him. "You promised me you wouldn't do that anymore! We talked about this! You said that if I ever had a problem you'd wait for me to come to you about it, instead of prying into my inner most thoughts! You promised!"

"I'm sorry for invading your privacy," Bakura muttered, knowing those were the words his hikari wanted to hear. "But it's a damn good thing I did," he added abruptly. "You tried to slit your wrist!"

"You don't know that," Ryou grumbled, turning sharply on his heel heading for the door, Bakura dashed in front of him.

"Oh really," he scoffed. "If you weren't planning on using my knife to commit suicide than exactly what were you gonna do with it? Slice fruit?"

"What I do with myself has nothing to do with you," Ryou said darkly, his head bowed so that his eyes weren't visible under his silver hair. "It's none of your concern."

"None of my concern! None of my-" he cut himself off. "Ryou of course this is my concern! You're my hikari. I'm your yami our souls are connected to eachother. Therefore, it's my job to look after you, protect you."

Ryou did not look convinced, judging by his frown. "You can quit pretending it's my well-being you're fretting for," Ryou told the other with a sideways glare. "We both know the only person you're worried about is yourself."

"W-what? –"

"You're just afraid that if I kill myself you'll disappear as well, like what happened to Malik."

"Ryou that's not it at all...and Malik hasn't disappeared."

"Then why is it that no one has ever seen or heard from him since the night M-, the night of his yami's death?"

'Wow. Did Marik frighten him so much that he can't even bare to speak his name anymore?' Bakura mused to himself.

"Well answer me dammit!" Ryou yelled, tearing him out of his musings. "If Malik's not dead then where is he?"

"...I-I...I don't know," he confessed slowly, not sure how else to respond.

"Exactly-"

"But I know he's not dead, Ryou!" his yami interrupted, a tinge of pain escaping his voice, never had he wanted to believe Malik dead. "I can feel it. He's alive...somewhere," his voice trailed off as he began to think about his old friend. "Hey!" he called as Ryou turned to leave the room.

"Yeah, what is it?" Ryou enquired nonchalantly.

"You've really changed," he said quietly. "You never used to be this way."

"People are allowed to change," Ryou shrugged indifferently.

"Yes, but for the better," Bakura sighed. "You've become a cold-hearted bastard, and that's my job," he added, trying to lighten the mood to no avail.

"As I'm sure the whole point of you coming up to my room this morning wasn't primarily to spy on me, then may I ask what your original reason was?" Ryou enquired rather briskly.

"You're friends are downstairs. They want to talk to you," Bakura explained. "I didn't invite them over or anything," he felt the need to add. "They just sort of invited themselves..."

Despite all that had just happened, Ryou couldn't help the smile that pulled at his lips when he heard this. His friends were downstairs waiting for him, after rejecting their many offers to hang out. After ignoring their phone calls in the midst of his depression, they were still downstairs waiting for him, sticking by him, and that touched something deep within the silver-haired boy.

"They're downstairs..." Bakura repeated once more to the zoned out teen.

"Then tell them I'll be there."

Bakura nodded and exited the room. Once he was gone Ryou washed up and prepared to meet his friends for the first time in a long time.

After informing Ryou's guests of his answer, Bakura walked into the kitchen and grabbed a can of coke off the table for breakfast. A few moments later happy cheers could be heard coming from the living room. Curious the yami poked his head out from the kitchen to see what all the commotion was about.

It was Ryou. He was coming down the stairs dressed in a pair of jeans and a black t-shirt. Some of his more eager friends dashed up the staircase to meet him half way, and commenced hugging the life out of him or bombarding him with difficult questions. In the end it was little Yugi who took the slightly overwhelmed hikari by the hand and lead him to the couch.

"How have you been, dude? We haven't seen you in like...forever!" Honda began.

"Yeah it's almost like you've been avoiding us or something," Joey added.

"Guys," Yugi scolded them. He turned to the other hikari. "What they meant to say was that we haven't heard from you in a while and we were worried about you...that's why we came to visit."

"Well, thank you for coming I really appreciate it," the silver-haired hikari told them with a small smile. "I haven't purposely been avoiding you guys, you know, I just needed sometime alone...to think," his voice trailed off.

"Then I guess you've managed to do a whole lotta thinking these past few months, eh Ryou?" Joey teased, before being nudged hard in the side by Anzu.

"We understand," Anzu told him. "Losing someone close to you is always hard," she said referring to the death of his koi. "You take all the time you need." The others nodded at this.

"Thank you," Ryou smiled appreciatively. "I will."

Just then a loud grumbling sound filled the room and immediately all head turned to Joey.

"Sorry," he smiled sheepishly, holding his stomach. "I guess I'm kinda hungry."

"Wait a sec," Yugi began, jumping up. "I have a great idea! Why don't we bring Ryou out for lunch."

"That's an excellent idea," Yami approved.

"And the fresh air would do him some good," Anzu added.

"Oh, I really don't think so," Ryou declined hurriedly. "I ...still have a lot of cleaning to do."

"Don't be silly," Joey laughed, playfully slapping him on the back. "Bakura can do dat for you," he suggested, just as the yami strolled into the room.

"Excuse me?" the yami sneered, his dark eyes narrowing to mere slits.

Joey swallowed hard, well aware that he was probably playing on one of the short-tempered yami's last nerves.

"C'mon, it's not like you can go out in those," the blond tried to justify himself, eyeing Bakura's underclothing with a slight smirk. "So you might as well stay 'ere. Right?"

"Hn, you'd like that wouldn't you," was Bakura's simple retort. "If Ryou goes then I go."

"Well...I tried," Joey shrugged with a sigh.

TBC

Don't worry people contrary to popular belief, this story does in fact have a plot. So pleaz stick around to find out jus wat it is. Suggestions and comments r always welcomed.

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