And now presenting… a double chapter! Have fun!
It's time for sunny storytime, children! In our last happy tale, Bakura was mauled by the evil cat warrior, Maybelline! Then our brave side character Ryou fed placated said warrior-beast by feeding it! Now our protagonist battles unconsciousness while being attended to, and he suffers from his mind being… IN THE HAZE! Dun dun dun. IMPORTANT THINGS REVEAL THEMSELVES TO THE LIVING IN THIS CHAPTER! We start out with Bakura barely conscious.
… … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … … Whoo-ee… That's a lot of ellipses… ellipses… eclipses… something is tipses! That's not a word… Is someone getting the best, the best, the best, the best of you? Wait, the best of who…? …I'M THE BEST AT EVERYTHING!
My pain HURTS… I mean my brain… I mean MY… my…
My, what is that delightful smell?
"Did you just say the word delightful?" Ryou peers at me. "And how are you writing in your little spiral notebook while you're unconscious?"
"Oranges Ryou… oranges…" I'm not sure I know what I'm saying… I'm seeing Ryou through slit eyes… if I sit up then what'll happen?
GAAAAAAAOOOOOW! BAD THINGS WILL HAPPEN! I realized how much my back hurts. This is worse than the time Mako brought me home to meet his folks, and the band went marching home! …Wait, did that ever happen? I don't think so…
…My legs look like SHREDS of their former selves! They… they… they were MUTILATED BY THAT CAT! That's it! That cat is going on my blacklist!
…I need to write down my blacklist. As soon as I take a nap so I can hide in the unconscious abyss from my pain. (That sounds kind of emo….)
Well, I really don't jump around when I go to shows. (I don't go to a lot of shows, actually…) So I could be eeeeeeemo…
:Later:
Ok! So while Ryou is changing the bandages on my legs, I'm going to write down my blacklist.
1. Pharaoh (duh)
2. Yugi (he called me an idiot earlier!)
3. Maybelline (the cat)
4. Pharaoh's leg hairs (together I think they make a person of their own)
5. Malik and Marik (they took my moose)
6. Guy down the street (he owes me money)
7. That lady that screams at traffic (I still have to pay her back for beating me in our last shouting match… NO ONE outscreams Bakura!)
So-o-o-o-o. Apparently what happened after I passed out (in a manly fashion) in the Ishtar home went a little something like this, according to Ryou:
I billowed to the ground like a sakura blossom plucked prematurely from its tree, my attacker hissing and spitting in derision. Then Ryou leapt to my aid, ready to defend my honor and armed with only his gi and a katana made out of hardened cat food. He swung the "kibble katana" at the beast's head, rendering it as unconscious as a (insert something ninja/samurai/shogun/feudal era-related here). Then, after the battle was won, Ryou dragged me ceremoniously to our refuge, our ancestral home at 12 Maple Syrup Street.
…Why was their (oops, typo) a sword made out of cat food? Does Ryou even OWN a gi? Isn't that a martial arts training outfit? I never see him work out, and he's not interested in martial arts.
"I wasn't really wearing a martial arts training outfit," the Ryous say. Yes, I'm seeing double now. Actually, more than double. There are five of them, and they all have pineapples for heads. I now have five pineapple headed hosts. Man, it's hard to focus on stuff. And Malik's here too… and a poster of the Grim Reaper, and… wait, a poster of the Grim Reaper?
O.O I'm not home! I'm in Malik's room! Moonlight filters into my abysmal soul releasing realization upon my tortured self! I must be emo! HELP!
…I'm passing out again…
:Later:
I realized something while sleeping. Being how I am—a genius—I know. I know the circumference of a cell phone. The circumference of a cell phone is 2 times its radius, times pi. I'm not sure what the radius of a cell phone is, and pi isn't as tasty as when it has an e, but that doesn't matter. What does matter is that I'm in Malik's room.
Apparently, instead of dragging me home, Ryou merely carried me (in pansy fashion, 'cuz he's a pansy, pansy, PANSY) all of ten feet to Malik's room.
"Actually, I got Odion to do it."
Well, that's great. And STOP READING OVER MY SHOULDER, RYOU.
That was a message to Ryou, Jim Bob, not you. I'd erase it but… I only have a pen. :) But it's a new pen! I stole it from Malik. Woot!
Meanwhile, in the 3rd person…
"…" Strings checked his watch. Bakura STILL wasn't out yet. Where was he? Strings sighed inaudibly, then began to see how well he could doodle on his face, since his arms were almost full of his conversations with Bakura. (Remember, Strings has been writing down everything he's wanted to "say.")
Back in the mind of our favorite protagonist (if one can really call him that…)
I feel like I'm in a haze… like when Mako kidnapped me and dragged me to his undersea castle. …Wait, was it a castle underseas?
…I'm pretty sure the answer is "yes."
Didn't it go something like this, Jim Bob?
"Under the sea!" Mako sang. "Under the sea!" All of the dead fish on those plaques he had started la la la-ing. "Life is much better, down where it's wetter, WHY DO YOU GET ALL THE LOVE IN THE WORLD!?"
Why did the music change? Did my subconscious forget the words to the song?
"Malik! Turn that down! Can't you tell Bakura has a headache? And for goodness' sakes, Nine Inch Nails?" Ryou scolds Malik. Then he adds, in a hushed voice he doesn't think I can hear, "…At least play Eminem."
"NO!" I scream. "NOT EMINEMMSS!"
Ryou takes a step back. "…I don't understand this part of the fic," he says, turning to Malik. "What is that a reference to, that S on the end of Eminem?"
"Well," Malik explains, "there was this joke on the internet or something, where this guy pretended to call up Eminem, and pissed him off. 'Eminem' would reply with bits from… I think it was just from one song, but anyway, the guy called Eminem 'Eminems,' and some people thought it was funny." Malik looks around as if somebody is listening.
"Oh, so that explains that reference," Ryou said, nodding appreciatively. "Now everyone can understand that—uhm, joke." He's looking at me. "Uhm… everyone… in this room, that is." He kneels down. "So, uhm… we should probably change his bandages again."
"He can hear you, you know."
"Well, let's just pretend he's unconscious," Ryou says sarcastically. "It'll be fun."
"I can hear you, you know," I say, glaring, "and I don't even remember why I came over here."
"Ah-ah-ah! Unconscious people don't talk!" Ryou says, shaking his finger. I glare and chomp the air near him.
"The mime you were hanging out with told me that you came here to try to figure out how to rescue Ryou from the Shadow Realm," Malik says.
"There's a mime outside?" Ryou asks. "Really?"
Oh. I'd forgotten how much he likes mimes. Cool. Now he won't do the whole 'Aw-Bakura-I-didn't-know-you-cared' routine.
"And Bakura?"
"Yeah?"
Ryou FLUTTERS his EYELASHES. "I didn't know you cared," he says in his most feminine voice, making Malik laugh. I hope Malik is laughing at Ryou, instead of with… holy Ra he's laughing at ME! Dang it!
"What are these on my legs? WHY AM I WEARING BARNEY STICKERS!?"
"Those aren't stickers, they're band-aids," Ryou points out. …Wait a minute, I don't remember thinking that in quotation marks! "You're talking out loud again."
"The mime says you've been doing that ever since you arrived at the museum," Malik says.
"How would he know? He didn't come in with m— Wait a second. He TALKED to YOU!?!?"
Stupid mime!!
Later!
Ryou is helping me walk out of the Ishtars' place. Yeah, he's helping me. Yeah, I'm admitting it. Heck, I'll even admit that I need help; my legs are covered with fine red lines. Actually, scratch that; those scratches aren't lines, they're gauges. …Wait, I spelled that wrong. It's gouges, isn't it? Ah… the dramatic effect is gone.
This sucks. My legs hurt like hell and I can barely put any of my weight on them without my whole body cringing. I wish this were Ryou's body instead of mine.
…Oh. Wait. :)
"Ryou?" I begin innocently enough.
"Yeah?"
"When I sent you to the Shadow Realm, I was using your body, and you were just a voice in my head. So now, even though you have your own body, I'm still in your original one."
"Huh?" Ryou looks weary, for some reason. ...Am I really that fat? I mean I know I'm kinda jus' putting all my weight on him, but come on! "Oh… yeah. I suppose you're right, Bakura. So technically that's my body that got scratched up." He glances downward, where his favorite pair of jeans have been transmogrified into tattered capris. (I actually suspect they are girl pants, but they're comfy, so I don't mind when he wears them.)
"…Well." Ryou eyes my left knee, which is still bleeding a little. "Do you want to, you know, stay in control of my body for a little while longer?"
"Uh, nooo?" I say bluntly in my Valley Girl voice. (Can you BE blunt and talk like a Valley Girl at the same time? Um, I don't knooow?)
"Dang."
Jim Bob, I may throw Ryou back into control of his own body at any moment, so I'm sorry if I cut off abruptly. I'm grasping the Millennium Ring, ready to do just so in a minute, when Ryou DROPS me onto the hard pavement!
"A mime!" he shouts. Just shouts. Then he says it again, excited. "A mime!"
Oh boy.
Strings looks up, his eyes bright and frozen like a deer in a headlight—er, not IN a headlight, but in the light FROM the headlight, you know. And like a mime caught in the spotlight, (not IN it, but you know) he freezes. And doesn't move. Like a… mime. And Ryou eats it up.
Confused, Jim Bob? Maybe it would help if I explained, just for you, Jim Bob, my trusty notebook. In the past (Author's note: Meaning in Yu-Gi-Oh manga #12) Ryou saw Strings before. And he acted like Strings was one of those royal guard people in London… And you know what Ryou said?
"Boo!" Ryou leaps at Strings and raises his arms in a semi-Frankenstein-ish fashion. Then he sort of freezes that way and looks at Strings questioningly.
Strings doesn't even blink. T.T Not this again with the not moving!
"Look, Bakura! It's a funny man. Should I play with him?" Ryou quips.
o.O "A Luigi's Mansion quote?" I ask.
"Why not?" Ryou says, turning to smile. I see a countdown on his lips. "5… 3… BOO!" he screams as he twists around to see the response he's earned from Strings. And yes, he does look like an idiot. That's the thing about Ryou; sometimes he draws attention to himself. Usually, he's a well-mannered, quiet, inconspicuous, shy, awkward nincompoop of a teenager. IDEAL for body-snatching. Think of Yugi. Why else do you think the Pharaoh dotes on him? Because Yugi is all those things I just listed. And those things make up the perfect host. And if you accept this as a rule, then the whole thing with Malik and his other half fighting on the Battle City blimp makes sense—Malik is not well-mannered, shy, OR quiet, although he can blend in pretty well with a crowd if he wants to, (which is pretty amazing, given his fashion choices,) so he CAN be inconspicuous. But mostly he's not. So, he's not a good vessel. And that's why there was conflict between him and his other half. Pay attention, Jim Bob, this is all very true.
I am not pulling this off the top of my head or out of my (very bad)butt or from any other body part you pull things from. Under these guidelines, Ryou's basically a good host, except that under certain conditions, he gets excited about something. His eyes light up and the corners of his mouth are pulled up as if by a string, and he acts goofy, and therefore he isn't inconspicuous or awkward or shy, and is therefore temporarily a terrible host… AND an idiot. This happens with Yugi, too, but the idiocy of his friends absorbs his own and negates the effect.
So, under certain conditions, Ryou is a dummy. One of these conditions is when he is in the presence of a mime.
"Boo!" Ryou tries again. This time he twirls around and touches his nose, grinning shyly. And he thinks this will help him get Strings to move… how? O.oV (That 'V' is a sweat drop, Jim Bob. Just so you know!)
"Boo! Boo! Boo! Nyeeah! Meow!" Suddenly in a booming voice: "Ryoma, become Seigaku's pillar of support!" Then in a normal voice (if you can call it normal) "Nyaaaaa! Boo! Boo! Hiss!"
…Siiiigh…
One time in London, he was in front of the… London Guard people? Is that what they're called? The people with the big hats that don't move. Anyway, to get them to move, he pretended he was about to take a gun out of his jacket while screaming "I've got a gun!!!" The guard kicked him in the balls (ooh, PG-13!) and twisted Ryou's arms behind his back, and all my baka no host could think to say was "You moved!!! HA!" …Yes, he is an idiot.
Ryou stares deeply into Strings' glossy eyes. "….ALASHAZAM!"
Strings rolls his eyes. Tired of staying frozen for this git, he lets loose and pulls out a ciggy. (That's a cigarette, not a signature.) Slowly, he draws it to his lips, then blows out a puff of smoke. Remember, Jim Bob: if you smoke, you'll look like a mime. And that's bad.
Ryou, after informing me that he might be magic because saying "alashazam" made this mime move, decides that saying "alashazam" makes ALL mimes moves, so he isn't magic because he can't be magic because he says "I've never been able to do magic before, except for make magically DELICIOUS scrambled eggs!" So now he thinks Alashazam makes mimes move. (Alliteration, ooooh!) I need to use this information to humiliate him…
"Hey," Ryou says, realizing the obvious and the bizarre. "You've got weasels on your face."
Strings blinks.
"I mean," Ryou says innocently, blushing, "you've got writing on your face."
This is true. Strings' are limbs already littered with what he's limned on them since yesterday. ('Limned' is a sweet word for 'described!' Woot! No, wait, I think that deserves two zeroes in the woot: W00t! I'm cool and descriptive, Jim Bobbio!) There are sentences snaking down his arms, and there are even a few words written sloppily on his cheeks, as well as a decorative drawing of a lion while I runny nose I doodled on his forehead last night. (He has no idea. It's hilarious.)
You should understand, J-Bob, that outside of Little Mimetown a mime like Strings looks rather ridiculous, and when you add in the fact that he's got writing all over his face, he looks like a complete dork. He he he…
H-HA HA HA! Hah… that's hysterical. Excuse me, Jim Bob, I need to wipe away a tear.
NO I'M NOT CRYING! Stupid ugly notebook. That's right, I called you the u-word! And you are! You've got moles drawn in sharpie on your back! I should know! I drew them! I… dang, talking to a notebook makes me feel like I'm on Aqua Teen Hunger Force… … … … Man, I hope I'm not Shake. …Actually, I guess the way I've been acting lately, I've kind of been like Shake… Have I? Oh. Well, I'm sorry, Jim Bob. Here, I'll hug you. Awww, you feel better now:) Good.
"What are you two staring at??!" I snap. Ryou and Strings are gaping at me. I mean, really gaping at me! Their maws are touching the ground. Geez!
"You a—You APOLOGIZED to a notebook!" Ryou stammers, as Strings holds up a sign in true Genma Saotome fashion with the words You called me a dork! splashed as angrily as they can be across it. I must've been "writing aloud" again.
"Hey, uh…" I think I might be blushing. Just a little. Barely. Not really. Ryou's still gaping, and Strings looks ticked. And I don't like the way he's brandishing that picket sign. "…Where did you get that sign?" I ask, attempting to change the subject. Strings points to the external wall of the museum, where four more signs are leaning against the brick. They all say You called me a dork! on them. That's weird. I didn't think there was a market for those kind of signs. What is this, Ranma ½? "Oh," I say.
Thunder rumbles. A droplet falls. You get wet. A fly flies into Ryou's mouth. He swallows it without realizing it. Eesh. This paragraph is random.
"Hey," Ryou says, and then he stares into space for exactly ten seconds, before realizing "it's raining."
"Naw, really," I say. Idiot. "Why don't you—"
TTFN Jim Bob!
…Ok, so nothing important really happened in this chapter. So SUE ME! Or review me. Preferably the latter. Know what I've got? A stick of gum. And it's not even mine; my mom gave it to me. So that's how much I own. Ha. Oh, and I don't own Yu-Gi-Oh, so you can't sue me for that either. I also don't own Nine Inch Nails, they're song "All the Love in the World," the Emo song, Eminem (Slim Shady would be kind of weird to keep as a pet, huh? He'd probably bite), the Little Mermaid, or any Barney band-aids. And for the second part of the fic, I don't own Luigi's Mansion, the quote "You've got weasels on your face" (which is from Weird Al's Albuquerque), the phrase "Ryoma, become Seigaku's pillar of support!" (which is from Prince of Tennis), Aqua Teen Hunger Force and Master Shake, Ranma ½ and/or Genma Saotome.