One afternoon, Ryou went to the museum to work on the diorama as usual, and to his surprise, his father and Ms. Chono were standing in front of the stone slabs. His first reaction upon seeing them was to turn around and leave, but it was too late; Ms. Chono had already caught sight of him. "Ryou!" she cooed his name as if calling a stray kitten.
"Oh hey Ryou," Mr. Bakura said, noticing his son for the first time. "Good to see you."
Ryou quickly put on a mask of friendliness. "Good afternoon Ms. Chono, Dad," he said politely.
"Darling, how are you? I rarely ever get a chance to see you," said Ms. Chono, which was a lie. They saw each other every day at school.
"I was just telling Ms. Chono about the Millennium Items. Come join us," said Mr. Bakura.
Ryou reluctantly walked closer and stood next to his father in front of the stone slabs.
"Isn't it fascinating? I never knew there was more than one of these weird magical gold thingies. I thought Yugi's pendant was the only one," said Ms. Chono.
"It's called the Puzzle," Mr. Bakura corrected.
"Yes, yes. That's right. How silly of me," Ms. Chono slapped her forehead exaggeratedly, and a piece of her face make-up fell off and shattered on the floor like porcelain. Hurriedly she grabbed her face powder and got to work covering up the exposed area. Mr. Bakura was too busy staring at one of the stone slabs to notice.
"I wish I knew the meaning behind this scene depicted here," Mr. Bakura rambled mostly to himself. "What kind of ancient ritual are they performing? What does it have to do with the Millennium Items? And more importantly, why do these people look like...like..."
"Mutou Yugi and Kaiba Seto?" Ms. Chono finished, and judging by her bored tone, she was not really interested in this conversation.
"That's right!" Mr. Bakura said, snapping his fingers.
"You could just ask them yourself," said Ms. Chono dully.
"I've tried, but they're both celebrities. Mr. Kaiba is in America and Mr. Mutou is always being followed by his fans. I can't get close to either one of them," Mr. Bakura said.
"Well, that's easy! I could just give Yugi detention or something and have him visit my office after school, and then you can come in and talk to him," said Ms. Chono.
Mr. Bakura's eyes lit up in excitement. "Brilliant! I knew I could count on you!"
As Mr. Bakura and Ms. Chono leaned in to kiss one another, Ryou shielded his eyes.
"I have to go to another meeting right now, but we'll see each other again tonight. Meet you at the same place as usual?" Mr. Bakura said.
"Of course, honey! Don't work to hard now," Ms. Chono cooed.
They quickly kissed one more time, and then Mr. Bakura was gone, leaving Ryou alone with his least favorite teacher.
"Now then," Ms. Chono's voice grew ten times darker with Ryou's father out of the picture. "Come here you little brat!" She reached out and tried to grab Ryou, and he jumped out of the way just in time, heart rapidly beating.
"What do you want from me, Ms. Chono?" Ryou asked, tense yet still polite.
Cracks appeared on Ms. Chono's face like fractured glass. "Your father told me about you! You have one of those magic millennium things," she screeched.
Ryou could feel the Millennium Ring growing warmer against his chest. Any second now, the Spirit was going to take over. Don't come out! I want to handle this on my own! Ryou shouted into the mind-link, and the Ring stopped reacting.
"Give it to me," Ms. Chono growled, taking a menacing step towards Ryou. Her make-up was peeling away rapidly.
"Wait! Don't come any closer! You don't know how dangerous the Millennium Items can be. You could get seriously hurt!" Ryou pleaded.
But Ms. Chono wasn't listening. She continued to stalk closer to Ryou, and Ryou backed away until he hit the wall behind him.
Don't come out, don't come out, Ryou thought over and over in his head. Aloud he said, "Stay back! STAY BACK!"
With a flash of light, the Millennium Ring materialized itself through Ryou's shirt and out into plain view, and Ms. Chono was suddenly pulled up into the air by an invisible force and thrown across the room, crashing into the opposite wall.
For a moment, Ryou was paralyzed with shock. Did he do that? He hadn't known he was capable of it. "M-Ms. Chono. Are you alright? Oh gosh, I'm so sorry." Once he snapped out of his confusion, he ran to his teacher and tried to help her up.
Ms. Chono shrank away from him, curling up into a ball and covering her face. "Leave me alone. Don't look at me!" she choked out, starting to cry. "I-I'm h-h-hideous!"
"Don't say that. You're beautiful!" Ryou said.
Ms. Chono turned around and glared at Ryou with tear-streaked eyes. By now, every single piece of make-up had already fallen away, revealing her crinkled and disfigured face.
Ryou flinched but composed himself. "It's not that bad…" he coughed.
"I don't need your pity," Ms. Chono grumbled. "This is all Yugi's f-fault. He did this to me."
"Yugi made your skin look like that?" Ryou said disbelievingly. He knew that Ms. Chono had something against Yugi, but his friends had never told him the reason why.
"No, you dolt! I was born looking like this. Yugi cursed me so I couldn't cover it up with make-up."
"Oh…" Ryou didn't know what to do at first, but then an idea came to him. "I can help!" he said brightly, grabbing the Millennium Ring with both hands.
"You want to help me?" Ms. Chono said incredulously.
"Sure, why not? Here, let me just…" Ryou closed his eyes and concentrated.
A few moments passed and nothing happened. Ms. Chono began to grow impatient. "Well? Aren't you going to do anything?" she said.
"Please be quiet for just a little while. I've never attempted this before," Ryou admitted, keeping his eyes closed. He took deep breaths, making himself relax. He could feel the shadow energy in the air, and all he had to do was make it bend to his will. The Millennium Ring glowed in his hands.
Once it was all finished, Ryou opened his eyes. "Did it work?" he wondered.
Ms. Chono took out her make-up and began applying it. She rubbed her face with primer, put on a full coat of foundation, and then added applications of concealer, highlighter, contour, and a little bit of blush. Afterwards, she got to work on her eyes, which took a surprising number of steps to complete.
Ryou had no idea that there were so many steps to applying make-up. No wonder his fangirls complained about it all the time. He sat leaning against a wall and started playing games on his phone as he waited for Ms. Chono to finish.
The process of putting on a full set of make-up took a total of twenty minutes. When she was done, Ms. Chono looked in her compact mirror and grinned in satisfaction. "Welp, considering that nothing's peeled off yet, it seems that the curse is broken."
"That's good to hear!" Ryou said, putting his phone away.
Ms. Chono smiled a real, sincere smile. "Thank you Ryou. It's been a long time since anyone's been nice to me after seeing my natural face."
"Your welcome," Ryou said with a touch of sadness.
Ms. Chono gathered up all of her make-up supplies into her bag and stood up, smoothing out her clothes.
Ryou stood up as well, tucking the Millennium Ring back underneath his shirt. "Do you think you could do me a favor and stop dating my father? I've never been truly comfortable with it."
"You don't think I'd make a good step-mother?" Ms. Chono teased, making Ryou shudder. Then she laughed and said, "I'm just kidding, hon. Calm down. All right, I'll leave your father alone. He may be handsome but I'm getting sick of his boring rants about Ancient Egypt."
"Thanks!" Ryou beamed. "I have to go work on my diorama, but I'll see you at school tomorrow?"
"Yes, see you later Ryou," Ms. Chono said with genuine gladness.
No penalty game for Ms. Chono, sorry. I was originally going to have her betray Ryou again and then have Bakura kill her off, but the repercussions would have been too great and it'd screw up the entire storyline. So I got rid of her the easiest way I knew how; by converting her to good. It's cheesy but effective, so now I can move on to other random story ideas.
btw, I want to say thank you to those of you who have left reviews! If you haven't written a review yet and would like to, please do so! I'll accept anything including criticism as long as they aren't flames.