Chapter 2
"Nothing fixes a thing so intensely in the memory as the wish to forget it." -Michel de Montaigne
Ryou lay wide-eyed and still in his bed. The clothes of yesterday wrinkled on his form, twisted and lightly dampened by perspiration. Delicately he flopped his head to one side, then downwards looking about his room. Light perfumed through the thin window treatments, lightly coloring the mostly wooden furnishings. He glanced at the clock, half past seven. Ryou hummed in thought. Was it really worth rushing about for a class he'd likely be late to? The clock did no pause for thought. Grudgingly he curled out of bed.
Nausea smacked him back as a nasty wave of vertigo assaulted his senses. Is this what a hangover feel like? Today was not going to be a good one, he was certain of that.
Feeling drained and burnt out – he couldn't remember actually falling asleep, let alone when- there was only one source available to him. Praise the gods for hot showers he thought, peeling off the dirty mess of wrinkled clothing. His hands combed through his knotted birds nest, trailing down the locks and smoothing across his chest with languid abandonment.
A cold tremor cracked through his being. Ryou clutched about his chest, desperately he looked down.
There was nothing. The ring...it was gone?
Ryou flung himself into the bathroom, seeking a second opinion. Wide coffee-brown eyes gawked back, mimicking his movements as he palmed the smooth, slick skin on his bare chest. Pins and needles dance across his hand. A sharp, throbbing pain pricked within his head. How...how... Ryou tilted his neck from side to side. A small tug pulled on his chest. Ryou cupped the sink bowl for support. Taking a strong breath he released it all at once. The weight tugged again. Like a Coke bottle removed from a pant pocket, he could still feel the weight of it, whether or not it was truly there. Ryou turned his body from one side to the other, looking more intently now. There so subtle Ryou nearly missed it. A tinny glint flickered where the light brushed his chest. Was...was it still there? Ryou touched again. That same icy sensation dusted his skin.
Ryou stared a moment longer, waiting. A bright flash of light, the flair of heat when his body was over thrown.. a bloody monsoon for all he cared, anything! Nothing happened.
And nothing would happen as Ryou, after several long moments of precise staring, found himself being worked over by the hot shower. Frequently between drying and dressing he would revisit the mirror, and in the oddity that he was first struck by, nothing further presented itself.
There was no stirring upstairs either. Had the spirit left him? None sense, where would he go? The spirit had no mobility without the usage of his body. The headache was evening, settling into a long throb which was no less painful. Something fringed on the edge of his memory, a hazy confrontation of words...blonde, ebony and red... Yuugi? Yami? He wasn't sure at the moment. He'd spoken to him, about Bakura he believed. Had Yami banished Bakura to the shadow realm? It could explain his hazy memories from the other day...maybe longer, it was difficult to decipher.
The scale tipped back and forth, unable to find a balanced understanding. The pain in his head let nothing pass, he'd have to settle down before tackling the questions again. If only the task was so easily achieved. Normality, that was the key.
Five past eight, classes had begun.
Roughly shoveling his belongings into a shoulder bag, Ryou stumbled down the stairs in a dizzying daze; an untoasted bagel and he was out the door. Ryou stared with depleting strength down the twisting walkway towards the campus. God help him if he had to walk, he'd take the grime coated bus with pleasure.
Ryou picked at the bagel with his nails, shaving more onto the street floor then would be eaten. Stepping lightly, he flashed his school pass and scanned quickly for a seat. The pickings where poor; an old woman in a parka- in this heat, an obvious crazy; three whining children pecking and probing a neglectful mother; a gossip nest of teenage girls in the back and a few stray loners. Ryou peered curiously at one loner, dressed in a lightly stained jumper. Jounouchi? Smiling, he nodded and took the seat across.
"Morning", he offered. The other nodded with some strain, his hands fidgeting in wild gesture against the window pane, deliberately avoiding Ryou. Jounouchi was not gifted in patience or restrain, this game of keeping cool was fruitless.
"Hey, you better watch your back. You mess with my buddy Yuug', your messing with me." His shoulders rolled, broadening his form with hard-chested dominance. Bewildered, Ryou stared in confusion. The man went on, his tongue dancing away with him in a show of alpha power. "You must be real messed in the head there, Yuug' told me all. Loaded amped and queer just looking for a fight? You try that shit again and I'll be laying a smack down on your face. Get it?"
The world lurched forward. Students trickled out, one on shaky legs. Ryou stared lost after the departing bus, steeled blue eyes holding his focus. …...wait a minute What? His mind was wheeling at full speed. A brawl, between the two of them? Yesterday...yesterday? He knew nothing of yesterday. But by Jounouchi's account something horrible had gone down.
Wind combed and tangled his hair, whipping stray locks across his face. His headache was on the attack as well, snapping and pricking in the same unpredictable manner. For a moment Ryou was swept up in the loss of decided action. Really, where is the manual on what to do when your charged with a crack-rage brawl and a spirit is on the loose? Dig yourself deeper it seems, as Ryou briskly made his way across campus. In truth he had nothing to go by for Yuugi's current class- if he even had class at the moment- and less insight what to do once he found the guy.
Students channeled him on either side, bumping and diverting his path. He pursued faster. He needed to see Yuugi, the desperation was suffocating.
Quickly, quickly his mind demanded of him
Jounouchi's verbal attack seemed to notch with his earlier theory. A confrontation of the spirits vicariously through the two boys.
Quickly, his mind persisted. Don't let it get away.
Get away? Ryou shook his head, his mind was getting ahead of him. What was he just thinking? Yes, that's right him and Yuugi where fighting... No, No, No not Him and Yuugi..
Quickly, don't let it go..
Hold on to what I don't understand! Yuugi and...whom?
He couldn't breath, the channel was narrowing. His body slacked, but the mind did not.
