A/N:

Remember, schools in Japan met for half days on Saturdays, especially before the new millennium.

Chapter 27: Weekend From Hell

The next day, Saturday, dawned as hellishly as Bakura could have figured. He had wiled hours away in his room as he heard the sounds of Ryou headed to bed—likely without eating, but also without purging, so Bakura couldn't quite bring it in himself to care much. The looming knowledge that someone knew about his cutting made him want to do it even more. What could possibly come of it at this point? With a sigh and a quickly retrieved blade, Bakura sliced two small, barely bleeding cuts in the meat of his upper arm. He tended to not like cutting on his upper arms. The 'feel' wasn't there, and it seemed he had to cut deeper to feel the same satisfaction. With that thought, Bakura cut slightly deeper wounds into his shoulder.

He shrugged on a black long sleeve tee underneath his open uniform. A move that screamed rebellious in the strict Japanese culture, but frankly, he just didn't want to worry about potential blood stains to clean up later. He could also blame the art classes for his clothing choices, he supposed. Minami was still having the students work on self portraits to hang on Cultural Day, which, Bakura calculated, was about week and a half away, to Bakura's worsening dislike of anything he attempted for a self portrait.

Yes, today, along with his not-neutral conversation with the idiot Pharaoh or his angry outburst at Ryou to contend with, today was looking to be a stellar school day. His only consolation was today was a half day, then he could hole himself in his room in peace.

Ryou, one of his smaller feats of the day, approached him with a plate of okonomiyaki, pan-fried cabbage and carrot pancake, and not the breakfast Bakura was expecting of the day or of Ryou. Not long ago, at one of the many hangouts with the Moutos and their myriad of friends, Joey had brought take-out okonomiyaki. Ryou had outright refused.

Ryou had stumbled through a thirty second awkward explanation that it could be a trigger food to him that day, to which Joey had apologized to Bakura's confusion. Bakura had watched the quick conversation that transpired with confusion. He knew Joey was one of Ryou's friends, but he always seemed at the core with Ryou's eating disorder—a connection Bakura couldn't figure out.

But today was a week later, and Ryou, who should be angry with him after last night was serving up one of his blatantly stated fear foods and one of Bakura's favorite junk foods in modern Japan.

"Why?" the single syllable inquiry slipped out before Bakura's brain processed he should apologize, and by the time he drummed up enough courage, the moment eclipsed, and any apology soured in Bakura's gut, as Ryou simply explained his therapist's intent for Ryou to share a fear food with someone he trusted.

Bakura did, in fact, choke on the shredded fish flakes on top of the mayo and teriyaki sauce dressing each pancake. Well bully if he didn't feel like an asshole with Ryou's sweet temperance.

"Too many?" Ryou asked, face scrunching in concern at the potential of too much fish flakes. Again with the saccharine domesticated individual Ryou was by nature. The bastard in Bakura smirked as he remembered just why taking advantage of Ryou had been so easy; the human in him, cringed.

"It's good," the closest to an apology Bakura could handle over breakfast, well, without returning to a blade. "I like it."

Ryou smiled. He took a bite, and all seemed forgiven in apartment 801.

Homeroom ended and another cruel art class began. Cruel: an apt descriptor if only not an expletive. Bakura was fast beginning to dread the class with Minami constantly asking the students about their progress on their self portraits. Or maybe it was because she felt the need to check on his personal progress, which was deplorable.

"Draw yourself. It can be abstract to photo realistic—it's all up to you," Minami had said brightly long before Yami had figured out his secret, or rather before he stupidly had reacted so badly his cutting had been exposed.

Bakura barely repressed a sneer of self loathing. All he wanted to do was take the darkest colored pencil on his desk and scribble out the nonsense of his facial structure he had begun to sketch. It made no sense why he couldn't just draw himself. Was it his modern appearance? No, not exactly.

Right before he had punched the mirror in Ryou and his bathroom, he had felt exactly like this, like a spiraling black pit of ugly. And it wasn't based on his looks like Ryou and his eating disorder—so the psychology lesson had attempted to elucidate the students. Just like Minami appeared to elucidate some sort of artistic charisma from him. Again.

"I see you're taking the photo realism route based on your sketch," Minami stated from just behind Bakura's desk. Fuck! That woman had the ability to pop up from seemingly nowhere. Bakura swore he saw Tristan jump once or twice, conveniently in the direction of Miho, but jump nonetheless.

Bakura absently redrew the contour of his head. He shrugged.

"What are you going to use to shade yourself?"

Maybe he wouldn't bother, Bakura thought sourly. Leave himself as blank as he felt half the time. Times where he stared listlessly at the ceiling paint swirls, or simply sat, staring out at noting, doing nothing. A shrug wouldn't suffice this time, so he muttered the first thing that came to mind: the colored pencils he had grabbed at random at the beginning of class.

Luckily he was forgotten momentarily as Yami asked loudly if he could be excused to the nurses' office. Minami nodded, and Bakura watched the Pharaoh abruptly depart the room. Well, that was certainly strange. Yami had been quite well the day before during the conversation he would rather never repeat in the park.

"I'm not feeling so well, either," Bakura said, dropping the box of colored pencils he had been holding as a shading decision. Minami simply gestured, but her eyes conveyed a sort of knowledge she could only have pieced together based on coincidence.

Yami sat on an empty cot in the nurse's office. Upon seeing Bakura, he hastily wiped his eyes, and turned away from Bakura. Bakura stilled. Was he? Could he?

"Are you…crying?" Not quite a shot in the dark, as Yami's eyes continued to leak tears, even after his attempt to hide his emotional state.

Yami plainly spoke, an opposition to the tremor in his voice. "I'm allowed to be upset, Bakura."

Bakura flinched against the sensation of guilt creeping into his stomach. He scratched at the back of his neck, wishing he could walk away from whatever this was becoming. "Um, why? That is, are you okay…?"

A chuckle from Yami. He swiped at the tears, which, thankfully, seemed to be halting. "I'll be okay. I'm just worried about you."

"You don't need to be," Bakura folded his arms as he sat roughly on an adjoining cot in the thankfully empty nurses' office. The thin cot's legs screeched against linoleum. Yami glanced up with a scrunched up expression.

"You don't think!? Bakura, your cutt—"

"I'm fine!" Bakura nearly shouted.

Yami gave Bakura another one of those weird expressions, where his eyes lightened as if another round of tears wasn't far behind. "Your arms say something else," Yami said, sarcasm dampening the odd expression into something more baleful.

Bakura crossed his arms, turning away from Yami. "Well, you don't need to cry over it."

Yami plunged his index fingers into the corners of his eyes as moisture collected once again. "Don't I? Maybe somebody should? In fact, you should!"

"I don't cry." Deadpan.

"Ever?" Silence descended upon the two.

Yami tried and failed to grab Bakura's hands. He caught Bakura's gaze with his own. "Not even when your village…?"

Bakura's hand automatically went to his pocket, where the card protector, san card, but replete blades, lay. Anger narrowed his eyes to near slits. "Some of us, Pharaoh, can control ourselves."

"You were a child!" Then, voice still thick with his crying jag mixed with ire as Yami realized just what Bakura had said, retorted, "I see your control is doing you wonders!"

Bakura whirled around, back facing Yami. "Stay the fuck out of my business!" He stomped off, wondering why he had bothered following Yami in the first place.

That afternoon, Bakura cast an eye out of the crack in his door, down the hallway, watching Ryou in his room holding a quiet conversation on his mobile. He strained to hear the words Ryou said, but he got the general drift that it was not going to end well. He flinched at the sound of the sharp crack of a fist connecting with a wall.

Creeping out of his bedroom to observe, he saw Ryou punching numbers in his phone, shaking his opposite hand. Bakura saw the slightly red knuckles on Ryou's hand, and felt a momentary connection, which dissipated as he recalled how rarely Ryou resorted to self inflicted violence.

"Yes, I got your message, father," he said into the phone, pacing as he spoke and wringing his hands through his long hair. "I know, I should've called later, but—"

Ryou turned abruptly, and Bakura ducked behind the cover of a solid wall, before peering out of the corner of his eye at Ryou's distressed expression. "I know your work is very important. I know," he paused, turned, and paced towards the far wall.

"I do appreciate the phone. Sorry, I'm just disappointed I won't get to see you," Ryou said in an odd pitch after a long moment.

"No, there isn't anything in particular I want for Christmas." He sat down on his bed, reaching over into the bedside tape drawer for a hair band.

"You too, mmm-hmm. Goodbye." He flipped the phone shut. In one motion, he reached around with his hands and pulled his hair into a ponytail. Bakura returned to his own room, realizing Ryou did not plan to move from his bed for awhile.

When Bakura sat across from Ryou at the table for dinner, he found Ryou toying with his food, picking bits up with his chopsticks and dropping them back to the plate, not actually consuming more than a couple bites of vegetable.

"You gonna eat any of that?" Bakura asked menacingly as he stabbed the thinner of the chopstick into a chunk of meat crudely. Ryou dropped his chopsticks, jerking his head up to meet Bakura's twisted features.

He returned the glare, grabbing his dishes almost filled with uneaten leftovers, and left the table. "No, I'm not hungry," he said, unconcerned about Bakura's reaction to the overt lie. He scraped his dishes into the garbage can, and set them in the sink, just as the home phone rang.

He picked up the phone as Bakura listened in, picking at his food, appetite diminished. "Kaiba wants us to meet him?"

He grabbed a notepad from the counter and wrote down the information shared with him. "He wants to see us in his office? Tomorrow?" Bakura speared a piece of roasted pumpkin, using the other chopstick to wedge it down, back on his plate. He grimaced at the prospect of seeing Kaiba. He cracked his fingers at the thought.

"Okay, we'll plan to meet him tomorrow," he said and hung up the phone. The anger that clouded his face had been wiped away by the time Ryou relayed Yugi's message.

Yami, Yugi, Ryou, and Bakura, plus Marik as a new addition, stood across from Seto Kaiba, similar to their very first meeting back in late March: Bakura in his trademark long sleeved top and ugly disposition, Ryou reflecting the living dead in his sleep deprived state, Yami's eyes flickering nervously, gaze falling on each member of the makeshift group, with Yugi only expressing mild concern at the mention of a meeting. Marik, similar to Yami, snuck looks at Bakura, his former paradigm shattering as he visualized the multitude of scars and cuts under his sleeves.

"Why did you want to see us?" Yugi asked with a large smile, making him appear younger than his current age.

Seto Kaiba shifted the paperwork on his desk as a reminder of the real reason he asked the five individuals he and Mokuba had helped to his office, quickly fabricating a pseudo excuse, a curtain in which to cloak his machinations. He waved a hand at the obviously distressed group of teenagers, an indication to take the proffered seating.

Bakura stood near the door, face impassive, but eyes darting for the freedom promised just past his closed door. Seto hid a smirk around his coffee mug as he drank deeply from the cup as he noticed the former thief king scratch at the skin hidden by his sleeves. The pieces were falling into place.

"With next week's career planning meetings and upcoming graduation, I wondered what the game plan was?" he asked diplomatically.

"Graduation?" Marik queried, squinting his eyes out the window, down at the barren November landscape visible in the urban sprawl. "Isn't that not for another four months?" He mentally assessed the Japanese school year.

"Yes," Kaiba growled impatiently. "But entrance exams are coming up in the next two months. How do you plan to pay for university? What career field do you think you'll be working?" He glanced especially at Yami, Bakura, and Marik.

Bakura scratched intently at one of the fresher cuts on his arm, dragging his fingernail across the expanse of the cut as Kaiba quick fired questions that likely would be brought up during the infamous career planning with Kobayashi next week. He was unable to articulate any future life goals. Hell, going through the motions proved hard enough.

He removed his hand from his sleeve, feeling the burn of two icy blue eyes staring at him. Kaiba stroked the papers on his desk, calculating.

"You have a point," Yami said, taking in the message Kaiba was trying to present. "We do have to start making decisions."

The meeting continued in that manner, the teenagers tossing out potential ideas and opinions regarding further education. Bakura flexed his fingers, itching to pluck a razor blade from his pocket, if only for the comfort it would bring.

Kaiba held up the stack of papers, medical records of one Bakura Mouto, effectively silencing the last tendrils of chatter. "One more thing," he said as he gently tapped the top most sheet. "I had my secretary fax me these." He held up the paper so everyone in the room could see the printed name. He grabbed the paper from the back, flipping it over to reveal an email from Dr. Satou. "He requested a follow up appointment, so I looked into what specifically he treated you for."

He stared directly at Bakura with his sharp eyes. Bakura stood ram rod still, hardly daring to breathe lest his words confirmed Kaiba's suspicions. "He treated you for an infection?" he asked, then faced Ryou. "You implied it was for a fever."

Ryou's eyes crinkled as he tried to process the information on little sleep. "I thought it was a fever."

Marik jumped up. He grabbed the email from Kaiba, who gave him a nasty sneer, but allowed the paper to be snatched from his hands, and skimmed the body of the email message. "Thanks for your concern, but we aren't interested," he said flatly.

At Marik' tone and instant dismissal, Bakura's blood ran cold. He could hazard a guess what was typed in that email. Marik's indifference to the information told him that someone—he fixed Yami with a poisonous glare—had informed him.

The last thing he saw before he bolted from Kaiba's office was the identical glances of confusion on Ryou's and Yugi's faces.

Yami followed, dashing madly after Bakura. As he caught up with Bakura near a public toilet intended for employees of Kaiba Corporation, his mind spit images of the third weekend in July when he had watched over an ill Bakura. The doctor had not mentioned an infection, but the medical record proved he had, in fact, given Bakura a prescription for one.

He prevented Bakura from locking himself in a stall, remembering Marik's encounter with Bakura in the school toilets, by sticking his foot in the bottom of the doorway. Bakura let out a low scream, already holding onto the card protector. In his fisted hand, Yami saw the reflective metal blades.

"You had an infected cut," Yami stated.

Bakura held a blade in his fingers, the card protector jammed into his pocket. "Yes," he said dully.

"Can't you see this is a problem?" Yami fell silent as Bakura shoved up his sleeve with the back of his wrist, once more exposing the mutilated flesh. Yami said nothing as Bakura looked down at his arm, inspecting. He followed Bakura's gaze, letting out a gasp when he spotted the two raised scars. His face twisted with disgust. "Bakura," he breathed.

"I don't have a problem," Bakura lifted his eyes to Yami's.

Yami smirked. "Prove it, then."

Bakura clenched his teeth, cognizant of the unspoken promise to inform Ryou or Kaiba if he did not. He ripped the fabric of his shirt down to cover his arm, and returned the blade to the card protector.

Yami's eyes flashed. He held out a hand. "I think I should take those," he said, puffing his chest out, self importantly.

Bakura didn't bother responding as he put the protector and the blades back into his pocket.

A/N:

I never thought I would write a Saturday, but I did for the plot. I just only mentioned homeroom and art.

Okonomiyaki: referred to as Japanese pizza for reasons unknown to me. It's more like a cabbage and carrot pancake. Hokkaido and Osaka have different versions, but Ryou's homemade version is likely similar to one I made recently: cabbage and carrot pancake, with teriyaki sauce, mayo, and bonito (fish) flakes. It was amazing, if I do say so.

Ryou phones his father in the early afternoon, which is early morning in Egypt. I used 1pm Tokyo time to 6am Cairo time. As an archeologist, it's probably not too early, but maybe Ryou's father likes to sleep late.