HERE'S YOUR CHAPTER!
OMG RUN RYOU RUN! (oh wait...he's hiding...that's right...)

I don't think I'm having as much fun with this story* as I am with others I'm writing (such as Triangular Hallway), or even as much fun as I had writing the previous two stories in this trilogy. But you guys really are having fun and loving it and that's all that matters for me. Besides, there's still thiefshipping in this, so everyone is still happy!

I do not own Yu-Gi-Oh!, YGOTAS, Hetalia, the fanfiction site, Bakura's hair (I wish!), the British language, Slenderman (the game or the abridged version), or any of the character/trademarks in those.

R&R

ENJOY~!

"Ryou you know you are not getting out of this!" Bakura shouted. He looked around for his hikari, but only spotted Melvin. "Hm..." he mumbled. "I was so sure that he was in here... Oh well." He turned to the door to leave, but did a double take and whipped back around, his eyes locking on Melvin, widening as they did. "How..." Bakura said, taking a step forward.

"...the bloody hell..." Another step.

"...did you..." Another step.

"...get in..." One more step.

"...our apartment?!" With those two words, he took the final step, and was at the foot of Ryou's bed.

"None of your business, Florence," Melvin said. He leaned backwards a tiny bit more. "And unfortunately, your hikari isn't in this castle. Try somewhere else."

Bakura slammed his hands onto Ryou's bed. "Don't call me Florence!" His face grew furious and serious. "And listen here, Melvin, tell me where you've hidden my former host. If I find out that you've done something to him, I will torture you ten times worse than I will him for hiding from me. And you won't even get to go to the Shadow Realm while I'm doing it. Understand?"

"Perhaps," Melvin said casually, his face showing that he didn't take the threat seriously.

"Where. Is. Ryou?!" Melvin felt Ryou flinch, most likely at Bakura's volume.

"Again, none of your business."

"It is, too!"

"What do you want him for anyway?"

"He and I have some unfinished..." Bakura lifted his hands off of Ryou's bed and cracked his knuckles. Loudly. "...business. I'm here to finish it. What exactly I'm going to do to him is none of your business. Where is he?"

"He's not here."

"Liar."

"If he was here, don't you think you would have found him by now?" Melvin could feel Ryou start to tremble. The hikari pressed into him more.

"I have. I'm waiting for him to tell me the truth so I don't have to destroy you!"

"What?!"

"I know that Ryou is hiding behind you! You think I can't sense him? I've been in his body for over ten years! I can sense him. Ryou! Come on out now!"

Ryou cringed. "Okay okay okay I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry just please don't kill me, Spirit, please!" Ryou let go of his hair so it puffed up a bit and was visible from behind Melvin.

Bakura smirked. "I knew it." He folded his arms and had a triumphant look on his face.

Ryou crawled out from behind Melvin's large figure and looked at Bakura with sad and pleading eyes. "I'm sorry, Bakura," he said sadly and pleadingly.

Melvin suddenly grabbed Ryou and wrapped his arms around the slightly trembling light. "Back off, Florence," Melvin said coldly. He let Ryou sit in the center of his crossed legs. Ryou leaned into Melvin.

Bakura's eyes widened. He had, at first, assumed that Melvin had been hiding Ryou for his own purposes. However, he hadn't suspected that Ryou had been hiding behind Melvin for protection... "Ryou..." he breathed. He pointed at Melvin. "You're actually...okay with this tosser being in your room?"

Ryou hesitated, then nodded thrice. Melvin smiled on the inside.

"Well... Whatever," Bakura said dismissively. "It doesn't matter. He can't protect you forever. If you leave now, I'll do it in your soul room so you won't have physical scars."

"Leave the boy alone, Bakura," Melvin said. "What the hell did he do to you?"

"Not what he did, what he has to do. We made a deal long ago. I would stop treating him like total crap and stop punishing everyone around him if we do weekly torture sessions. He's due for one today, and he knows it."

Ryou cringed, and it was very noticeable by both yamis. He regretted the decision to make the deal, but wouldn't ever take it back. It was better to take the fallout for Bakura's evil and bloodthirsty nature than to have Bakura hurt others and then have them hate him more so than they already did. He couldn't help it. It was in his cultu—I mean nature!

"He's right..." Ryou said in a small voice. he was about to say something else, but Melvin interrupted.

"So?" he asked. "Doesn't mean I have to le you go with him."

"Actually, it does," Bakura said. "He's my hikari and you have no right to tell me what I can and cannot do with or to him! I never bothered you with what you did to Marik, even though it bothered me. Now you do the same."

"Since when do either of us play fairly or by the rules, Florence?"

"Since never, but that's beside the point!"

Mevlin smirked smugly at him. "You don't have the guts or heart to force me to give him up." Bakura glared at him. "You don't dare try anything against me. Ever since Battle City, you've been scared of me. Ryou has been as well, but that's beside the point. The point is that I can take you on. Just try me, Florence."

Bakura frowned deeply. Ryou noticed a hint of uncertainty and maybe even slight fear in the spirit's eyes. Normally, he would have been surprised to see such a thing in Bakura's eyes. But this was Melvin he was dealing with. Fear seemed like an appropriate response.

"Don't underestimate me," Bakura finally said, looking confident again. "I can take you on. And if you don't give Ryou up now, I'll be forced to. I've changed since then. And so have you."

"Then come over here, Florence and do som—" Melvin cut himself off and zoned out with a neutral look on his face.

Bakura didn't like being ignored (which was one of the things he and Marik did not have in common). "Hey! What? Hello?"

Melvin continued ignoring him.

Ryou noticed his silence. "Uh... Melvin? Are you..."

"Remember how you sensed that Florence had woken up?" Melvin asked Ryou, staring straight ahead.

"Not Florence," Bakura muttered under his breath.

Ryou nodded silently.

"Well, the same with Marik and I."

"So..." Ryou said, "he's awake?"

"More like..." Melvin zoned back in and looked behind Bakura. "...at the door."

There was a knock on Ryou's open bedroom door.

*But that's only because of the lack of thiefshipping in this and current and recent chapters (^_^)

According to spellcheck, both here and on my ipod, I don't know how to spell the word "apartment" correctly. No matter how many times any spell checker corrects me, I never learn. Probably never will. I'll become one of those people who dies old, STILL saying and spelling a certain word wrong. And then I'll come back and haunt people, writing that word over and over in its incorrect spelling for all eternity! XD
Wait...what? This AN just got WAY too off topic.

Um...
oh yeah! Deathshippping...

WHAT?! DEATHSHIPPING IS TWO-SIDED NOW!? SINCE WHEN?!
Tee hee hee.

Guess what? I've joined both parts of the main plot together, and now all I have to do is write the second part of the plot. Don't worry, that part is MANY chapters away, so I have time.

Be prepared for a short thiefshipping break in a few chapters, because I- I mean WE- really need one.

See you next chapter!

BYEEEEEEEEEEEE~!