Woot! Finally back in school, alright: here's part three, also a re-run for most ppl. I'll try to get part four up tomorrow and then post new stuff either Thursday or Friday.

Disclaimer: Freai doesn't own Ryou Bakura, Arthur Bakura, or the spirit of the Ring.

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"When your only friends are hotel rooms"

(Part 3)

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Chocolate-brown eyes stared off into nothingness, void of any warmth or emotion. The tacky wallpaper was dimmed by the late-afternoon grey that filtered through the window, so it didn't affect his numb state. The hotel room was bitterly cold, and his body protested but he couldn't move. His thoughts had surrounded him, wrapped so tightly it was impossible for him to physically do anything.

His father had been in the headmaster's office. Ryou hadn't seen his father in over a year, but there he was; even the spirit that haunted him couldn't have prepared him for that. He had been caught between hugging his father, crying, laughing, or turning around and running from the room. But all he ended up doing was staring at his father in disbelief with his jaw slack and mouth slightly open. "Hello son," his father barely looked at him, and when he did he had this look in his eyes that just radiated sadness. For a moment Ryou thought that it was something that he had done to make his father upset, but after a while of just standing there until the Headmaster asked him to sit down in the chair between his father and the counselor, he knew his father wasn't mad at him. He was ashamed at himself.

Ryou couldn't talk any more, he was too focused on the fact that his dad was in town and he hadn't known it. Had he come to surprise him, or… had he been avoiding him? He could feel his heart breaking as his father spoke with the headmaster and the councilor, and he wasn't paying attention. But he soon noticed that his chest was hurting more than an emotional pain should. A voice whispered harshly in his ear, "Pay attention. Stop acting like a child!" A sharp pain on his ear snapped him out of his stupor and he looked up just as the headmaster turned to him for his input. "We are all really confused Ryou, would you care to explain to us what has been happening with you the last few months."

"Make something up!" Ryou blinked at the headmaster in pseudo-confusion. "What do you mean, sir?" The old man described how though his grades have not suffered, that he had been extremely anti-social, mischievous almost, and that both teachers and students were complaining. "Well…" his mind raced as he tried not to think about his father, who had finally turned his gaze to him, "I'm afraid that I've been a little… jumpy lately. As you know my last school I had some… unfortunate events happen." He blushed deeply to add to his lie. "I'm afraid that some of my… roommates had been picking on me as well, and I just couldn't seem to settle down. I've been feeling a little better as of late. But… I'm sorry to say, sir, that I don't feel very comfortable here any more." That had been too easy, he could never lie this well, the thing in his head smiled cruelly before retreating back to wherever it disappeared to. "You're welcome."

His headmaster sighed. "I was afraid of that," he stood up from behind his desk and handed Ryou's father a stack of brochures. "Because of Ryou's brilliant grades and statistics he is wanted just about everywhere, these are some schools that have said that they would love to have him. I did the liberty of not telling them about past events."

"Thank you," his father said gravely, and shuffled through the brochures. The rest of the meeting Ryou tried to participate, but by the time it ended he was exhausted and could only think of being able to talk to his father alone. They had decided on a private secondary school inside of London, which also had optional individual housing. The councilor had suggested Ryou do that and meet new people outside of the living quarters, and then room with them the next year. Possibly even the next trimester or two. Just to prevent his unlucky chances of unpleasant roommates.

Ryou was reluctant to let his father leave, but he had to get back to London. He said he was staying for the next month, and that he would see him at the end of the term when he came home. Ryou thought his heart had stopped. Home. Oh how much he would love to go home, and the first real smile in months crossed his face. It was bright and wide and contagious for his father gave a smile as well only smaller. He got to hug his father for the first time in a year, and said goodbye.

Three weeks passed, and he made the highest marks in his class on his finals. He couldn't WAIT to leave the school, so much so he couldn't sit still the entire train ride back to London. He had been so happy, that had to be the best day of his life. He arrived at the National History Museum in London, found his father who showed him all of the new contributions he had given to the Museum with great fervor. This was the one thing that he and his father had in common, and Ryou questioned if he could ever go on another dig with him. He frowned a little and said that he was currently excavating in South America, and that he thought it was too dangerous. But when he went back to Egypt or Italy he would be sure to pluck him out of school, "I've missed my best assistant" he said through a smile, messing up his son's now croppy white hair. They had gone home, and Ryou was as happy as he could ever be.

His father left four days after that. He had to return to South America to finish up his dig site, and the people he had left there had said that they were having trouble with thieves. Before he left, though, he had to ask his father one thing. His father was washing the dinner dishes when Ryou brought the golden necklace in from his bedroom. "Dad?" He asked hesitantly.

"Hmm?" He had been zoning out again, either thinking about work or about… Ryou's mother again. Ryou hoped it was work, because he always felt awful when he interrupted his father's memories of his late wife. But he turned around with a curious look in his eyes, "what is it?"

Shifting his feet a little, and biting his lip in nervousness, he held up the circular object. It was a ring, big enough that it took up a majority of his chest when he wore it, but not enough that he couldn't hide it. It had a triangular pyramid in the center with the eye of Horus engraved on it. And five long pointed thin-cone-shapes hung from the bottom half in even intervals. It as obviously Egyptian, and made of pure gold, but it looked really old… and that's what worried Ryou. "Could you tell me about this?"

A spark lit up his father's eyes, "Oh! So you got it! Do you like it?"

"Yes, I love it Dad," Ryou said half-truthfully.

"Well this is quite a story; sit down, sit down, I'll tell you all about it!" He put his half cleaned dish down and sat with his twelve-year-old son at the little kitchen table. "Well I was in a bazaar in Cairo, that one just a few blocks from the Cairo Museum – oh, you probably don't remember. Anyway, I was just passing through it and this necklace caught my eye." He picked it up, running his rough callused fingers over the smooth metal. "And it reminded me of you, so I thought immediately that I had to buy it for you. But this is pure gold, I'm sure of it, and it appears so old. The shop keeper told me that it was extremely old, dating back to Ancient times. I even dated it myself, this is over 3000 years old!" Ryou's eyes widened, also becoming captivated by the object his father had yet to put back on the table. "He told me it was somehow connected to this game, but I must have gotten confused in translation. He said it was connected to that game you and your friends use to play, Duel Monsters I believe it was called." Ryou tore his gaze away from the item and gave his father a quizzical look. Who just smiled back at him apologetically. "I think he was just trying to get me to buy it, that was another strange thing… he seemed REALLY eager to get rid of it and INSITED that I buy it. I was going to get it anyway, but I took advantage and got it for a much MUCH lower price than he was going to sell it to me for." The wink his father gave him made Ryou burst into giggles.

"Oh yes, you were always good with the merchants-"

"HEY! That old lady was stronger than she looked!" His father protested, becoming flustered at the memory as his son laughed at him. After he had calmed a bit he handed the item back to Ryou, "This is a priceless item Ryou, so always take care of it." Ryou stared at the necklace and took it from his father, running his own fingers over it.

"Did he have a name for it?"

His father's eyes lit up again, "that's the other part of the story!" He leaned in closer to his son, who knew that this was going to be the highlight of his father's tale. "The man believed that this was one of the Millennium Items, the Ring to be precise. You remember the story don't you?"

Of course he remembered, it was an old tale he had heard from the other archaeologists when he went on digs with his father. About a nameless pharaoh and magical items. After that… Ryou was even more afraid of the spirit that haunted him than before. He hadn't told his father about the thing in his head. But the fear was one of the reasons that he sat in the hotel room all alone staring at the wall. The other was because of a girl named Alice, and a boy named Charles, as well as other classmates of his: Eric, James, Courtney, Richard, and Brittany. They were the reasons that he was sitting in this hotel room, hiding in this hotel room, and why he might never be able to see his father again.

TBC

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PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE REVIEW!!!! Is it really that bad?