Heya, new chappie. I'll reply to your reviews in the next chapter. Thanks for reading and for the amazingly kind reviews. I'm surprised by the amount of support I've received from this story.
Anyways, I don't own YuGiOh or the characters. :3

Enjoy~

(Bakura's POV)

I ran into the museum, feeling completely breathless after sprinting there from Ryou and Melvin's. I stopped for a few seconds to catch my breath and then looked around. Ugh. Work. This will be fun... I spotted a tanned woman with gold beads on two strands of her long black hair. That must be Ishizu... I noticed my eyes linger for a few seconds on the gold beads. It seems the Ishtar's really love their gold. She was, as I had expected, extremely beautiful. I walked up to her slowly. She immediately noticed me as I did so. Her piercing gaze- which was now on me- seemed to look deep into my mind.

"Hello, Bakura, you look a lot like Ryou... except at the same time, you don't," she said. I blinked, unsure how to reply to her comment. I quickly put on a fake smile and greeted her in my most polite voice.

"So, what does Marik do around here?" I asked.

"He sometimes gives tours, sometimes does inventory. How are you with people? Marik descriptions of you have always made out that you aren't great with people? But, since meeting you, I don't really agree with how he's described you... well, I agree with how he describes your hair; it is extremely fluffy."

Fluffy...? Bloody hell, Marik. I held in an irritated groan and replied, "I'm not that great with people, I'll admit."

"I see. You must be like Ryou then, he seemed pretty shy around people too."

Yeah, I'm shy... "Yeah... Would it be okay if I did inventory? Please?" I put on a shy voice, trying to sound like Ryou.

"Sure. I'll help," she said smiling.

She's trying to be nice to me because I'm Marik's friend. Ugh, I need to keep up with this bloody shy, polite act even longer. "Okay, thank you."

(Marik's POV)

Ryou and I both sat on his sofa under a blanket, staring tiredly at the TV screen. I glanced at Ryou. He looks awful... I wonder how he's feeling. I'm not feeling as bad as I was earlier. Alcohol and Ryou don't really go together.

"Ryou, maybe you should go to bed or something..." I suggested quietly.

"Who are you? My mum?" He replied irritably.

"Uh, sorry..." I mumbled. His face softened immediately as if he'd only just realised what he'd said. It's unusual for Ryou to talk to anyone like that... if it was Bakura or Melvin it would be completely understandable, but I've never heard Ryou talk back to anyone in such a bitter and harsh tone.

"Oh, Marik, I'm so sorry." He looked like he was about to cry. Oh frig... No, please don't.

"No, it's fine. Don't worry about it..."

"I'm never drinking again..."

"You've said."

"I know..."

"How are you feeling? Do you feel any better than earlier?"

"Like crap... I don't know. A little better, I suppose. What about you?"

"I feel pretty much better. Do you want me to get you anything?"

"Can you get me a glass of water, please?"

"Sure," I said softly as I got up and headed towards the kitchen.

(Ryou's POV)

I watched as my boyfriend's brother exited the room.

Marik's so kind. I can't believe him and Bakura have gotten so close, it's unreal. Well, I suppose they match in a way. They're really similar, but at the same time, they're different. I wonder if Marik's spoken to Bakura about his past... Melvin opened up to me easily about it but he's a lot different to Marik. Unlike Melvin, Marik's friendly to everyone but Marik seems to be more closed up about everything at the same time. I wonder if Marik blames himself for stuff that happened in their past... I know Melvin blames himself for a lot of the stuff that happened to his siblings... Has Bakura spoken to Marik about our past? I doubt it... I haven't even told Melvin properly and Bakura doesn't like speaking about it... I hope he hasn't... if Marik tries to talk to Melvin about it, Melvin will find out that I haven't told him everything. I just don't want to talk about it. I never want to talk about it... This is making my head hurt even more...

Marik came back in, holding two glasses of water. He handed one to me, smiling kindly and took a sip from the other one. He settled back down next to me on the tiny sofa and we continued to sit in silence.

(Bakura's POV)

"Thanks for taking Marik's shift today, Bakura; I honestly did want him to come in today because I know you both have that house to pay for. He's taken so many shifts here in the past just so he can pay for that place and he refuses to let me pay for him but I still have to get the boss to take some money out of my pay check and add it to Marik's just so he can keep up with the rent," Ishizu said as she continued to place the numerous artefacts that she'd been counting into a box.

"It's fine... I owed it to him really... Marik ends up paying my share of the rent more often than not and I honestly feel really bad about it... Do you think I could take shifts here more often?" I asked, counting pencils to go into the gift shop. Ishizu looked up at me with a smile. That's the same smile Marik gives when he's happy. She's buying it. I'm going to get a job! Finally!

"Of course you can! I'm so glad you asked. Marik's often complained in the past about you not paying your share, this will make him happier!"

"He seems to complain about me a lot," I joked.

"Yes, I suppose he has complained about you repeatedly and I truly can't see why, you're a lovely person, but he doesn't complain about you as much anymore. I'm very happy; it shows he's making friends. Thank you for befriending him, it's great of you. I know that when we first came to Domino, he was really sceptical about the whole idea of being in a new place but now he's finally settled in and I'm so proud of him. I feel Domino has improved us all in a way. I feel we can finally put our past behind us and move on with our lives... I never thought Melvin and Marik would move on as well as they have but Ryou has saved Melvin and I finally think Marik is letting it go too... Oh... I've said too much... You probably don't understand..." She trailed off awkwardly. Clearly surprised that she'd started rambling about the past, she turned her all-seeing gaze away from me and stared at the artefacts that she'd just boxed.

We sat in silence for what felt like hours but was really just a few minutes.

"I know, Ishizu... Marik told me about it," I said quietly. I felt her eyes return to my face.

"You know? Marik told someone? The full story?" She said with a surprised and scared tone, I noticed her eyes had widened in the way that Marik's often did. I nodded. Her expression saddened. "You understand why I had to move them away from Egypt, right? Marik and Melvin would have gone mad in that tomb. After all we had seen in there... I couldn't keep them there... Melvin was forever screaming at everything. He'd scream at Rishid and me if we tried to speak to him, he'd scream at his shadow, he'd scream at his hands, he'd scream at the walls and Marik wouldn't speak to anyone except for himself... He'd hide in his room but I could hear him, whispering words of hatred and blame but he directed them all at himself. I couldn't take it. I couldn't get either of them out of the tomb for ages and when I did, they'd run back and scream at me for taking them out, telling me they weren't allowed to leave because father would punish Rishid and then punish all of us. I had to hide all of the knives because I often saw Melvin try to stab himself in the way he stabbed father... So I hatched a plan to get them out... To save them...

"I made Rishid get a job so he could save us up some money, while I stayed at home and tried to keep my two younger brothers sane. The thought that I could save them was the only thing that kept me from running away on my own. I had always hated the tomb because it always made me feel as if I was locked up but I hated it even more after everything that had happened. I was forever reminded of all the things that had happened. Every time I walked past the room where I had hid the Millennium items from my brothers, I ended up crying.

"Soon, Rishid had saved up enough money for me to make a phone call to Mr. Maximillion Pegasus. I assume you've heard of him?"

"Wealthy business man that invented duel monsters?" I asked and received a nod.

"Anyway, I called Mr. Pegasus to offer him the Millennium items that my family had been guarding because I had read in a magazine, on the day Marik, Melvin and I had snuck out of the tomb that he was in search of the Millennium items. Over the phone Mr. Pegasus told me that he was already in possession of the Millennium eye and I told him that my family were in possession of the other Millennium items. When I asked him how he had ended up with the Millennium eye, he would not tell me and he also refused to tell me what he needed the items for, but at the time I did not care, I just wanted to save my family.

"My deal with Pegasus was that he would take my family to Japan so we could start over but I also requested that he put the items into this museum, which he owns, and to give me a job at the museum so I could fulfil my family's duty and continue to guard them because I did not feel it was right for me to just hand them over to a stranger and then not know of their whereabouts. I didn't tell him the details of why I wanted to move and why it would be difficult to get my brothers to leave but he didn't pester me about it, just like I didn't pester him about what he wanted the items for. Pegasus agreed quickly to this deal, which told me he was really desperate for the items. Unfortunately, I still don't know why he wanted them but I am exceedingly glad he kept to his word. They are currently hidden inside this museum, out of view of the public. Don't tell Marik, I don't need him reminded of his past while he's at work. I'm worried the mere sight of them could drive him mad.

"Anyway, the plan worked successfully. Pegasus himself came over to Egypt in this amazing plane. He got two of his muscular body guards to sedate Marik and Melvin and when we were in our new home, the house that I still live in, which Pegasus had agreed to pay the mortgage for, they finally awoke. I informed them that we were no longer in Egypt and that we'd be living here. It was a month or two before either of them spoke to me and Rishid and during that month they only came down for food and then returned to their rooms. It took even longer to get them to go to Domino High. When we finally did convince them that school was important, we realised that they didn't speak enough Japanese yet for them to actually go. Marik learnt the language faster than Melvin but refused to go to school without him so Rishid ended up teaching Marik from home. Soon they both enrolled into school, which we thought would help them get over it, but at night Marik would wake everyone up by his shouting and screaming because of his nightmares and Melvin was flipping out, he would trash his room, break things around the house, steal from shops and beat people up if they tried to have a conversation with him," she stopped there as if she was unsure what to say. Her eyes lingered on my face, undoubtedly trying to figure out what I was thinking about the whole thing. Ishizu's expressions and her way of doing things were like Marik's so it was easy for me to understand why she did something and what she was thinking.

"That's how Ryou and I met Melvin and Marik," I said, for once being the person who was trying to keep a conversation going. It was unusual for me; normally I enjoyed the silences between conversations because they gave me time to think or meant that I no longer had to listen to whatever the person was saying, which I never usually did anyway, but, this conversation was intriguing me. I was probably only interested because I was interested in Marik but there was something fascinating about Ishizu, she was easy for me to talk to and I was sure she made conversation easy for anyone. Maybe it was the fact she spoke about things which were of interest to me, Marik and Melvin's past were something that I had always been interested in, ever since I met them.

"What do you mean?" She asked and then I realised why she was easy to talk to. She cared about what I was saying. In the past, people have never been interested in me, I've always been brushed aside, or forced to listen to something more important than what I have to say. She's like Marik and Ryou and Melvin, she listens. She's motherly and sisterly and kind, something I've dearly missed over the past few years. Mother... Amane...

"It must have been a few weeks after Melvin and Marik had joined school," I began, "Ryou and I had both heard rumours about one of the new kids, Melvin Ishtar. They said he was a bully, a horrible, horrible bully who would beat up anyone who tried to talk to him. You've met Ryou, so you know he's a great person and he's kind and friendly... and unfortunately for Ryou, he thinks that everyone can change. I do agree, some people can change but Ryou wants to help them change all the time and he doesn't understand that people can hurt other people. Because I knew this, I immediately told Ryou to stay away from Melvin. Ryou normally listens to what I say, so I didn't expect him to go up to Melvin and try to talk to him. One lunch time, I was wandering around in search of Ryou because he and I usually eat together when I overheard two girls speaking.

"One of them had said, "I hear that one of the Touzoku twins is trying to befriend that scary Egyptian boy..."

"The other one replied, "Which Touzoku?"

""The cuter one, Ryou is it?"

""Really? Awww, but he's adorable! I don't want him to get hurt. It would have been fine if it was the scary Touzoku... He would be able to take on... umm... Melvin?"

"This was when I joined their conversation and said "Thanks, girls, but do you know whereabouts the cute one of the Touzokus and the scary Egyptian are? Because listening into your conversation, as flattered as I am at the fact you think I could take on that Melvin person, is no longer helpful.""

I felt Ishizu's eyes pour into me as she picked up on the fact that I was only pretending to be nice, shy and polite earlier. She didn't say anything and let me continue with my story.

"Uh, the girls informed me that they were in the canteen so I went there. The first thing I noticed was that everyone in the canteen was looking towards one specific table and on that table sat my little brother and your brother. I could already see that Ryou's plan wasn't really working; Ryou was chatting animatedly to Melvin while Melvin was sitting stiffly, glaring at Ryou with his hands clenched into tight fists. I walked up to them quietly.

""And then the Harold pooped on the carpet so Bakura made me get rid of him. Bakura doesn't like animals..." Ryou was talking about his old hedgehog, Harold. I noticed one of Melvin's fists rising and being pulled back. Ryou's eyebrows drew together in worry and he closed his eyes. Melvin's face fierce and you could tell Ryou's attempt at having a conversation with him had really pissed him off. I caught Melvin's fist just before it hit Ryou's face. Melvin pulled his fist back and he turned to me in anger. Ryou opened his eyes in surprise and saw me there and then watched in horror as Melvin stood up and looked ready to murder me. I smirked at him.

""Quite the punch you got there, perhaps you should join the wrestling club. This little guy here," I said gesturing to Ryou, "is not your punching bag."

""Maybe you're my punching bag then," Melvin replied simply.

""Oh no, I'm so scared of the big bad Egyptian," I remember saying. It wasn't a great comeback, but in the state Melvin was in, whatever I said was likely to put him over the edge. Melvin aimed a punch at my face and I dodged easily. He swore. We ended up having a massive fight and we both ended up in the nurse's office sitting across from each other in anger. Ryou had gone with us to the nurse, not because he was injured, but because he was worried about both of us. He held an ice-pack to my head and constantly kept asking whether we were both okay and kept coming out with random phrases like "violence never solved anything." It was irritating me but it seemed to be irritating your brother even more so I cheerfully let him continue. Sooner or later Marik walked in asking what had happened and Ryou explained it in a way that made neither me nor Melvin look like the person in the wrong. I recall Marik asking whether he and Melvin were twins and Marik saying "no" and that Melvin was a year above us. Marik was in Ryou's and my Maths class.

"Marik looked at me and said, "at least someone fought back this time."

"Melvin laughed and nodded. After that, Melvin and I became good friends and he started hanging round with Ryou and I at lunch times..."

I ended the story there. 'At least someone fought back this time.' Those were the first words Marik said that were directed solely at me. I smiled fondly at the memory. That was the last time he spoke to just me until we ended up becoming roommates. Ishizu smiled at me.

"You know, you didn't have to put on a fake personality when speaking to me, I would have approved of you and Marik either way," she said.

"How did... how did you know?" I asked in surprise.

"The way you smile when you say his name, how you took the job this morning, the fact that you ran here, the fact you put on a fake personality to impress me, your breathing became audible after I pretended to sound uncomfortable with calling Ryou 'Melvin's boyfriend' as if you wanted to keep something from me, how interested you are with Marik and his past and how intently you listened every time I said his name. Also, Marik's always been obvious about his feelings for you, even if he didn't realise them himself. He never actually seems upset with you when he complains about you and he says a lot of good things about you too."

She picks up on a lot of little things... She's like a detective or something. She knows everything, when you're lying, what you're feeling. It's scary.

"You picked up on that?" I said awkwardly

"Yes," she replied with a laugh.

"You're very observant," I mumbled.

"Only when I want to be, I assumed Marik and you would've gotten together about now. When did it happen?"

"Last night."

"Marik was drunk; I hope you didn't take advantage of him..."

"Of course not."

"Good," she said as she finished putting the last thing away, "well, we're done. Good work. Ask Marik for my number when you get home, that way you can organize another shift here whenever you want."

"I will. Um, Ishizu, about Marik..."

"What is it?"

"You know you said about how he used to scream at night..."

"Yes?"

"He still does it. Almost every night."

"Oh... He hasn't spoken to me about them..?" She looked hurt and upset.

"Don't worry, I don't think he wants to talk about them. I just thought you should know."

"Thanks for telling me."

I nodded.

"Here." She gave me a pay slip, "we pay anyone who just takes shifts every now and then their pay when they're done."

"Thanks, bye," I mumbled as I exited.

"Bye, Bakura."

I walked slowly home and I saw Marik parking his motorbike as I got to the door.

"Hey," we said simultaneously and then we laughed half-heartedly. He looked less tired than he did this morning and he grinned at me.

"So, how was work?" He asked as we walked inside.

"Oh, it was fine. Ishizu picked up on my polite act and she also worked out about us quite quickly."

"She has a habit of noticing stuff." I nodded in agreement.

"It's creepy," I said, he nodded. "So, how was your day?"

"It was alright, Ryou was irritable, just like you usually are, Fluffy," Marik said, pinching one of my cheeks.

"Ugh. Don't do that... And don't call me that!"

"See, irritable. Anyway, honey, what do you want for dinner?"

"I don't mind, sweetie, what is there?"

"Steak or a vegetarian meal, baby."

"I'll have to go for steak then, snookums."

"I knew you'd say that, pumpkin."

"Oh, darling, you know me too well."

"I know I do, angel."

"You're so perfect, princess."

"Back at you, pudding."

We both cracked up with laughter and then stopped laughing. We glanced at each other, and then began laughing again. I stopped laughing first and gave Marik my most serious face.

"Now go cook dinner, wife," I deadpanned. He grinned at me.

"Oh, anything for you, sexy," he said as he walked towards the kitchen.

The rest of the evening went by. We ate, joked, teased each other, kissed a few times, watched some TV and then Marik went to bed first, informing me that he was going to take a shift at the museum in the morning. I went to my bed soon after, completely tired out.

(Ryou's POV)

Ah, I finally feel better. It's been a long day. I heard the door open and close and then Melvin shouted, "I'm home, Ryou!"

"Welcome home, I'm in the living room," I called from the sofa. He walked in and smiled at me.

"How you feeling? Any better?" He asked.

"Yeah, loads better now. Just a little tired. I don't think I react well to alcohol."

"I'm just glad you're feeling better. Sorry for pressurizing you into having the alcohol. Ishizu texted me that she found out Bakura and Marik were together."

"Really? How? Marik was with me all day and I don't think Bakura would have told her..."

"She worked it out; you know she has that weird way of noticing things."

"Oh right! You told me about that before."

"Do you need me to get you anything?"

"A glass of milk, please."

"Oh... milk..."

"You forgot to buy it..?" I felt my eye twitch.

"Um... maybe," Melvin sounded surprisingly nervous.

"MELVIN! I ASK YOU TO DO A SIMPLE THING AND YOU DON'T EVEN GET IT!" I shouted, eyes welling up.

"You're not going to cry, are you?"

"Maybe..."

"No, Ryou, don't!"

"I wanted you to buy milk," I said with tears rolling down my face.

"I'm sorry. I'll go and buy you some..." Melvin practically ran out of the house.

"Heh... Works every time."

Whew. This is a long chapter for me. :P I hope you all enjoyed. Don't forget to review.

What does Rishid think of both of his brother's being gay? What did Pegasus need the Millennium items for? When will the next bit of puppyshipping occur? What happened in the white haired twins' past that they don't want to talk about? FIND OUT SOOOOOOOOOOOON (maybe). :P

-Dani