Disclaimer: If I owned Yu-Gi-Oh! there'd be an amazing live action movie with really hot actors, but as it is...

"Why oh Why
Did it take you so long to want something more?

And then you ask yourself, is this where you belong?
Is it right, or is it wrong?
Does it matter what's right, In The Heat Of The Night?"

~In the Heat of the Night, Pat Benatar

Chapter 16

Alistair wasn't sure how he felt about hanging out with Yugi and his friends. Because Yugi had inadvertently made it clear how he felt about the redhead, he was certain the spiky-haired duelist had shared those thoughts with his friends. It didn't help that they arrived before Ryou got back from class.

After letting them in, the five of them sat in Alistair and Ryou's living room in uncomfortable silence. After a few very long minutes, Joey couldn't stand the tension anymore and decided to voice everyone's thoughts.

"Can I just point out how weird this is?"

"Joey!" Téa hissed.

"I'm just sayin' that I think we're all thinking about how that last time we saw this guy he was working for some weird Atlantian ghost who was trying to take over the world by stealin' people's souls. But Dartz has been gone for over a year; so what's this punk still doing hangin' around?" He looked accusatorially at Alistair.

"I live here," Alistair replied neutrally, trying to keep his anger in check. Seto had told him about Joey Wheeler and his tendency to speak before he thought about what he was saying.

"Yeah, but why do you live here?" Shoving a hand in Joey's face, Tristan said:

"What Joey's trying to say is: how do you and Bakura know each other?"

"And I think what you're really trying to say is: because Ryou and I know each other and because we both have less than perfect pasts, unlike the four of you apparently, we must be up to something.

Let me make this perfectly clear: the Spirit of the Ring is gone, so do Ryou, the one that's supposedly your friend, a favor by not acting like he's going to send you to the Shadow Realm every time you see him. It's an insult to compare him to the creature that possessed him."

"Look pal," Joey started. "Bakura's been our friend a lot longer than you've even known him, so don't act like you have a right to call us the bad guys." Alistair was beginning to see why Seto disliked this group so much; they were hypocrites, claiming to be such good friends when really they didn't care about Ryou at all.

"All I'm saying is that if you really consider yourselves his friends, you have a hell of a way of showing it." Yugi, Téa, Tristan, and Joey exchanged guilty looks.

"Sorry I'm late." Ryou breezed into the living room, having heard none of the comments that had been made. "Let me just drop my stuff in the bedroom and then I can introduce you all properly. I hope you haven't been waiting long." In the twenty or so seconds that the Brit was gone, the five in the living room tried to avoid catching each other's eye.

"Right," Ryou said, sitting beside Alistair on the floor with Sewell cradled in his arms. "I suppose you've all already introduced yourselves but, Alistair, these are my friends, and guys, this is my roommate Alistair. And this," he held up Sewell, who looked over her shoulder at him reproachfully, "is Sewell." Grateful for an excuse to move past the awkwardness, Téa cooed and reached out to rub the calico's head.

"She's so cute!"

"She's Alistair's. He found her outside a restaurant."

They spent the next few minutes playing with the cat until Joey made the mistake of rubbing her fur the wrong way. She hissed and swatted at him with her paw before streaking off towards the bedroom, but before her untimely exit, the cat had successfully broken the tension.

Though they didn't say so, Alistair's defense of Ryou had simultaneously assuaged their suspicions about the redhead, and guilted them into realizing how absurd their worries about Ryou had been. Yugi in particular felt chagrined when he recognized how unfounded his qualms about Alistair had been. He'd forgiven Raphael on the grounds that Raphael had been controlled by the Orichalcos, yet he hadn't paid Alistair the same courtesy even though he'd claimed to have.

The carton of beer that Joey and Tristan had provided was quickly emptied which served to loosen Joey's already quick tongue.

"Hey Alistair," he said, turning to the redhead. "Rich Boy never gave me a straight answer: did you two duel on top of his plane?" Alistair's features immediately became drawn.

"Yeah, we did."

"What happened up there anyway? Why'd the plane crash?"

"Because of the Seal of Orichalcos." It was plain to everyone that Alistair didn't want to talk about it, but Joey had never been one to take a hint.

"He was really vague on the details about that. Did you almost beat him or something?"

"Not exactly."

"Hey Téa, what are your plans for when you get to New York?" Ryou asked in an effort to diffuse the situation. "Will you still have a bit of break left, or will your classes start up right away?"

While Téa outlined her plans for her first few weeks in New York, Ryou casually rested his head on Alistair's shoulder. Alistair tensed, having been trained by Seto to avoid affection in public like the plague, but quickly remembered that he and Ryou had no such rule and relaxed, even going so far as to put an arm around the Brit. The gesture had the desired effect and Yugi, Joey, Téa, and Tristan all realized at the same moment that Alistair wasn't merely a platonic roommate.

"Is anyone else still hungry?" Ryou asked the room at large, removing his head from Alistair's shoulder. There was a general murmur of assent. He turned to the redhead. "Could you put a pack of popcorn in the microwave? The box is in the cabinet above the stove."

"Sure." Alistair got up and began rummaging through the smaller of the kitchen's two main cabinets. "I don't see it."

"Hang on." Ryou got to his feet and joined Alistair at the kitchenette. "You know, it might be in the cabinet over the refrigerator now that I'm thinking about it. I'm sorry."

"It's ok." Alistair found himself leaning in to kiss the Brit, not caring that they had an audience.

Once the popcorn started to pop in the microwave, the two sat down again, this time with Ryou leaning against Alistair's chest.

Téa and Yugi politely avoided staring by turning their attention towards each other, having finally gotten together several months prior after Téa bit the bullet and asked the Duel Monsters champion out on a date.

Tristan, whose girlfriend Serenity wasn't there to distract him, and Joey, whose on again off again girlfriend Mai was currently overseas competing in an all-female Duel Monsters tournament, couldn't stop themselves from goggling at the couple.

Pretending he didn't notice, Ryou asked Tristan if he was excited that school was starting again soon.

The longer that Ryou leaned up against him, the more annoyed Alistair became by the others' presence, which they must have eventually noticed because they left en masse shortly before midnight.

"What did you think?" Ryou asked after waving goodbye as Yugi's small blue car and Tristan and Joey's black truck pulled away from the curb. Alistair shrugged.

"They're ok."

"What do you mean?"

"I don't know. I guess it was just that they told a lot of anecdotes that involved people I don't know, so that was kind of boring, and Téa getting emotional about leaving for New York was awkward after she started crying. The whole experience was mediocre for me. If we would have actually been doing something it would have been better. But just sitting around and talking isn't really my thing."

"I'm sorry you were bored, and also that Joey kept asking you about Kaiba. It was nothing personal; he just really enjoys hearing stories that make Kaiba look bad."

"I noticed that. Why?"

"They have a bit of a history, mostly one involving Kaiba calling him a mutt or a deadbeat or a loser."

"Oh." That sounded slightly more antagonistic and juvenile than Alistair would have expected from Seto who, though not always pleasant, tended to maintain at least a certain degree of maturity, outside, of course, of any duel he played without Mokuba's safety on the line; there all bets were off.

Ryou wrapped his arms around Alistair's neck and leaned in to kiss him. Alistair was surprised by the Brit's eagerness, but not so much so that he didn't reciprocate, though he was still coming to terms with the idea of taking the lead.

Soon the two fell into bed together.

Alistair was rather at a loss as to what to do in this situation since all the experience he had involved the other person acting as the 'top', and he also wasn't sure what would be acceptable. Should he wait for Ryou to tell him what he wanted or just try something and see what he said? Alistair's inner debate was halted by Ryou tentatively reaching up the back of his thin tank top as they kissed.

Just as before, when Alistair took off Ryou's shirt the Brit seemed to grow uncomfortable.

"I'm sorry," he apologized. "It's just that I've never done this…But I want to," he added quickly.

"I told you before: just tell me if I do something you don't like." Ryou nodded, his tense expression revealing just how nervous he was. Alistair reached out and stroked his cheek. "If it makes you feel better I've never done this either." Ryou's amber eyes widened in surprise.

"You mean you and Kaiba never…?"

"We did, but never like this."

"What do you mean?" Suddenly feeling rather hot around the collar himself, Alistair said:

"I mean, I was always…" As he struggled to find the words, Ryou realized what he was trying to say.

"Oh. I guess that makes sense." He giggled. "Sorry. I hadn't thought about it, but now that you mention it I can't help but picture it and," he continued to giggle, "and then I remembered something Joey said once about Kaiba being really uptight and needing a good shag and it's just funny. I'm sorry," he added when he saw that Alistair looked slightly put out, his smile fading. "That wasn't very thoughtful of me." Alistair shook his head, though he had been upset by how flippantly Ryou had joked about his and Seto's sex life. He didn't find anything particularly funny when he thought back on all the times he and Seto had had sex. But he and Seto weren't together anymore. Not that that decision was one he would have chosen. If only Seto hadn't jumped to conclusions…

His sudden flash of annoyance towards the brunette spurred him to redouble his efforts to make his and Ryou's relationship a success.

Ryou had been certain that by laughing he'd ruined the mood, but Alistair quickly proved that theory wrong by firmly pressing his lips against the Brit's before delving his tongue into his mouth.

"Hang on," Ryou said slightly breathlessly as Alistair started to slide his loose pajama pants down his hips. He reached over to the nightstand positioned next to the bed. The room was dark so he was forced to feel around blindly. "Here." He could feel the heat rising in his face as he pressed the condom into Alistair's hand. It was the redhead's turn to be surprised.

Given that he and Seto had had months of build up before having sex for the first time, he was taken aback to discover that perhaps not everyone waited that long. Then again, he'd hooked up with Darren after knowing him for all of fifteen minutes, but they hadn't gone all the way.

"Are you sure you want to?" he asked. Ryou nodded, though he looked slightly nervous. He'd never thought he'd be the kind of person to give himself up so easily, but the situation felt right. Alistair was someone he liked and trusted and also someone he was attracted to which, collectively, seemed like the right combination of traits to warrant a yes.

Consent established, Alistair set the condom (which given that it had a packet of lube attached to the back was probably from Twist) aside and began kissing along Ryou's neck and chest, slowly working his way down the Brit's pale torso.

As Alistair went down on him, Ryou let out an inadvertent moan and closed his eyes.

"Ok," Alistair said softly a few minutes later, one hand still jerking the Brit off. "Get on your stomach and try to relax."

"Easier said than done," Ryou mumbled, taking a deep breath, his heart pounding in his chest. But he dutifully rolled over after Alistair let go of him.

Though not as nervous as his counterpart, Alistair was nonetheless apprehensive. He didn't want to hurt Ryou, but he also knew that there was no way he could avoid it. To try and help the Brit relax, he massaged the tense muscles in his back until he felt them begin to loosen up. He paused briefly to open the packet of lube and squeezed a generous amount onto his fingers, the substance unexpectedly cool and sticky to the touch.

Just as when Seto slid his fingers into him, Ryou gripped the sheets and bit his lip in an attempt to deter the sounds that nonetheless began to spill from his mouth. Once he was sure that he had done all he could, Alistair said:

"This is going to hurt, but try to stay relaxed and then it should start to feel good, ok?" Ryou decided not to mention, at least not yet, that this wasn't the first time his body had been put in this position, merely the first time he was personally getting to experience it, and said that he understood.

This time when he bit his lip it was to distract himself from the pain that Alistair was inflicting on him.

Alistair tried to alleviate the Brit's obvious discomfort by tilting his hips up slightly, which seemed to work; he felt Ryou's body beginning to relax again.

Even as he was using the other man's body for his own pleasure, he couldn't help but feel protective of him, making every effort to please him, implementing techniques that Seto had used on him that he'd found particularly pleasurable, including flipping Ryou onto his back.

Alistair leaned down and captured the Brit's lips in a kiss as he continued to thrust into him. It was a very different sensation than he was used to, and a lot more work, but he enjoyed it.

Ryou continued to verbally indicate that the redhead was doing a good job, especially when Alistair lay practically flat across his chest so that his uneven breathing sounded in his ear.

"Ooh, Alistair. Mmm…"

After they both climaxed, Alistair pulled Ryou into his arms.

"How was that?" he asked, running a hand gently through the Brit's feathery white locks.

"That was really nice," Ryou murmured, suddenly sleepy, more comfortably nestling against Alistair's chest, his head resting in the hollow of the redhead's neck.

"I'm sorry if I hurt you."

"Just at first, but I knew that that would be painful. I may never have done this before, but as we both know I didn't always get a choice when it came to what happened to my body." Alistair's eyebrows contracted in concern.

"I'm sorry." Ryou shrugged.

"I can't do anything about it now. I'm just glad that that part of my life is behind me for good." He leaned up to give Alistair a kiss.

They lay in comfortable silence for a few minutes. "Can I ask you something personal?" Ryou asked tentatively, not entirely sure he wanted to know the answer. Alistair could tell just by the tone of the Brit's voice that the question would be about Seto, but as little as he wanted to talk about the brunette, he supposed that it was only natural that Ryou would want to ask about him.

"Sure."

"How…how long were you and Kaiba together before you did this?" Alistair realized as soon as the question was raised that the answer wasn't simple given that there had been five months in which he'd been gone in the middle, but then again he supposed that he and Seto hadn't been together as such before he'd left, so perhaps a more accurate number would be the amount of time after he'd gotten back.

"About a month."

"Oh." It was not the answer Ryou had been hoping for, and Alistair quickly elaborated.

"But it was complicated. We didn't even like each other at first; we actually hated each other, or at least I hated him. We argued a lot for months, and we even got into a fist fight once, but then something changed and we just sort of…" He trailed off. He wasn't comfortable being so cheesy as to say that he and Seto had fallen in love with each other, though in essence that was what had happened. Ryou got the idea.

"That's intense," he said finally, a hint of jealousy in his voice. "This must be horribly boring for you by comparison." Alistair sat up, forcing Ryou to as well, and cupped the Brit's face in his hands.

"That's not true. You have no idea how nice it is to be able to be with someone who you don't argue with every other day, who lives a normal life, who you don't have to break down a wall to be with. I did care about him, and there is a lot of history between me and him, but I would never compare the two of you so that doesn't matter. I'm with you now." Ryou looked into Alistair's silver eyes and chose to believe him.

"It's really nice to hear you say that."

A lawnmower starting up just outside the bedroom window jarred Alistair awake. He blearily looked around for some indication as to what time it was. The sunlight streaming through the window was weak indicating that it was still early. He had no memory of falling asleep the previous night, but obviously they both had.

Ryou had rolled over at some point and was lying face down against a pillow, only half under the covers, his silvery hair in tangles.

Trying not to wake him, Alistair eased out of the bed, intending to walk over to the bathroom after checking the time. He squinted as he tried to read the display on the digital clock sitting on top of Ryou's bookshelf and took several steps towards it. Before he was quite able to read it, he tripped over his own crumpled pants and banged his knee hard against the bed frame. He swore involuntarily and loudly, rubbing the spot. The noise caused Ryou to stir. He yawned and sat up.

"What's going on?" he asked groggily, rubbing his eyes. Even though he now had a throbbing pain in his right knee, Alistair couldn't help but notice how attractive Ryou looked barely covered in the thin white sheet and with tendrils of his thick hair sticking out every which way.

"Nothing, I just tripped and hit my knee," Alistair admitted ruefully, realizing how stupid he must look standing naked in the middle of Ryou's bedroom, bent over and holding his leg. Ryou giggled sleepily before yawning again.

"What time is it?"

"Uh." Finally able to see the numbers on the clock, Alistair answered. "Eight-seventeen."

"I suppose I might as well get up." Ryou suddenly recognized his own nakedness and became rather shy. Pulling the sheet more securely around himself he hunted around for his pajama bottoms and pulled them on before getting out of the bed. He stretched languorously.

"How do you feel?" Alistair asked. He remembered all too well how sore he'd been after he and Seto had had sex for the first time.

"Alright. You weren't lying about it hurting though. Whenever the spirit did that I just sort of tried to block it out, so I never had to actually feel it before. But I feel fine now."

"Good."

"I was going to take a quick shower; do you need the bathroom first?"

"Yeah, just give me a couple of minutes. Oh, and do you want me to make breakfast? I think we still have a few eggs." Ryou's expression became stern.

"You are not to touch anything in that kitchen that can't be cooked in the microwave or smothered in milk, not after you burned my pan."

"I'm still sorry about that." Ryou smiled.

"Oh, don't worry; I'll eventually come up with some way for you to pay me back."

"I have no doubt."

After finishing in the bathroom and getting dressed, Alistair walked out to the living room where Sewell was waiting for him. She immediately demanded food and he obliged her, scooping a small portion of dry cat food into a ceramic bowl for her. She purred as she gobbled down the kibble.

Finally Ryou emerged from the bathroom wearing a loose-fitting white and blue striped shirt over blue jeans.

"Do any of your shirts fit?" Alistair asked with a grin. Ryou looked down at his chest.

"You don't think this fits?"

"None of your shirts do."

"There's a difference between being too loose and just not fitting like a second skin. You fall more on that end of the scale. I don't think I've ever seen you wear anything that would actually let you breathe." It was Alistair's turn to appraise his own clothes. He was wearing a tight black tank top and his dark skinny jeans.

"I guess you're right," he admitted.

"Not always, but in this case I would have to say that indeed I am. I have no problem with your clothes though," he added. "But I could never pull them off like you do; I don't have enough muscle." No one had ever called Alistair muscular before, given that he wasn't particularly, especially not compared to anyone he had ever found himself with before, but he supposed that compared to Ryou he was.

"You could train that though, if you wanted to." Ryou shrugged as he pulled a second frying pan out of a cupboard.

"Maybe, but then I'd have to sacrifice valuable gaming time and I'm not sure that it would be worth that." Alistair rolled his eyes.

"You and your video games…"

"It's no worse than you and your books." He opened the refrigerator to get the eggs. "Oh, and would you mind turning the radio on? I want to hear if it's supposed to rain today."

"Do you have somewhere to go?"

"I'm meeting up with Joey and Tristan in front of the Student Union; I mentioned that yesterday. We're seeing Téa off at the airport."

"Oh," Alistair said as he flipped the radio situated on top of Ryou's TV on. It was on a commercial break so the redhead tuned it out and tried to figure out what he wanted to do. He didn't have to go to work until later that afternoon so he had the whole morning free…

The radio moderator saying Seto's name suddenly caught his attention.

"…Mr. Kaiba was admitted to the Domino city hospital last night, but there has been no public statement from his brother and business partner Mokuba Kaiba with regards to what he's being treated for, though an inside source cites stress from a recent scandal involving an article in local gay magazine Out Loud as a possible ground for his hospitalization. Kaiba Corp representatives declined to comment." A second announcer chimed in.

"Isn't he a little young to be suffering from a work induced heart attack? He just turned twelve or something, right?" The female announcer tittered before giving a joking response and moving on to the next item. During the news story both Alistair and Ryou had frozen in place, Ryou looking concernedly at Alistair who was staring at the radio, his stomach suddenly completely unsettled and the hair on the back of his neck standing on end. Seto was never sick, and even if he didn't feel well, he'd never go to a hospital, not voluntarily anyway.

"What do you suppose happened?" Ryou asked, placing a hand on Alistair's shoulder.

"I don't know," Alistair replied slowly, though he had a guess, and it was causing his stomach to lurch even more uncomfortably. "I have to find out though." He hurried back to the bedroom to retrieve his cell phone.

"Of course." Ryou's voice was so soft that he wasn't even sure Alistair heard him.

After fishing his phone out of his jacket pocket, Alistair speed dialed Mokuba, but it went straight to voicemail, then he tried Roland with similar results. Next he tried Trudy's home apartment number which went through.

"What happened?" he asked with neither preamble nor formalities, but Trudy knew perfectly well who it was. She'd been thinking about calling him herself, but hadn't quite decided whether or not it would be appropriate. She was glad to hear from him though.

"Oh, Alistair," she started, still thoroughly shaken by the ordeal. "It was awful! There was so much blood…" Alistair thought he might be sick. Blood?

"What do you mean blood? What happened?"

"You don't know? I would have thought that that would be on the news this morning, but I didn't watch it. Perhaps there is such a thing as respect for privacy after all…"

"Trudy! What happened?"

"I went up to his room to see if he was hungry because he hadn't come down to dinner even though for the first time since you left he seemed better. I opened the door and he was sitting at his desk, and I thought he'd fallen asleep, but something didn't seem right somehow. The way he was sitting didn't seem normal." She inhaled sharply and Alistair could tell she was holding back tears. "And as soon as I stepped into the room properly I could smell blood and then I saw it dripping off of his hand onto the floor." At this point she really did start to cry. "There was so much of it, I thought for sure he must be dead, and he was so pale. I've never seen a living person's skin look like that." Alistair sat down heavily on the bed, feeling the blood draining from his own face.

"He'd slit his wrists," she said in a voice that was just above a whisper, confirming Alistair's fears. "I didn't know what else to do so I called an ambulance. I had to tell Mokuba, but how do you tell someone that the person they care most about in the world has tried to kill themselves? I've never seen anyone so upset. When the ambulance arrived I was afraid they'd have to load Mokuba onto it too. He wanted to go to his brother, but I wouldn't let him."

Alistair was sickened by how clearly he could picture Seto doing it. It was as though he'd been there himself. He could see the tortured yet grotesquely calm, almost happy expression marring the beautiful features.

"He's going to be ok though, isn't he?" Alistair demanded.

"I don't know," Trudy replied helplessly. "I wasn't allowed to go with them; I am, after all, just his housekeeper. I told Mokuba to call me if there was any change, but he was so traumatized I'm not sure he heard me. I wouldn't blame him even if he did but forgot.

If Seto recovers I am going to have some things to say to him. He had no right to put that child through this! He really had no right to put that boy through a lot of things, but this, this is completely crossing a line. He knew that he was everything to Mokuba!" She was starting to become hysterical and even though he still felt horribly queasy, he wanted to comfort her.

"Do you want me to come over?" he asked.

"Please do." She was crying again. "George is visiting his sister and won't be back until this afternoon. He offered to come home yesterday, but there were no more flights by the time I called him. I hate being in this place all by myself. It's horrid!"

"I'll be there soon, just make sure that you're at the gate to let me in."

"Alright. And thank you; I really don't want to be on my own; last night was dreadful! I hardly got a wink of sleep."

Alistair felt sick as he got off the phone with Trudy. While he'd been sitting around eating chips with Ryou and his friends, Seto had been sitting at his desk with blood dripping down his wrists. While he'd been having sex, the brunette had been dying.

Nauseous, Alistair sat down heavily on the mattress, pulling his knees up to his chest and resting his forehead on them. This was his fault. If he had called he could have demanded that Seto speak to him and forced him to understand that he had not betrayed him.

Ryou stood in the hallway, not sure if he should attempt to comfort Alistair or not. He couldn't help but resent Kaiba for once again coming between the two of them. He had thought that maybe Alistair was starting to get over the sapphire-eyed CEO. Clearly not. He selfishly wished he had not told the redhead to turn the radio on.

Sewell came up behind him and rubbed against his legs until he picked her up. Ryou pressed his back against the wall and let himself slide to the ground with the cat still in his arms. He pressed his cheek against her soft multi-colored fur. Why am I always so unlucky? he thought to himself. It's not fair.

It took Alistair ten minutes to pull himself together enough to feel comfortable driving. He walked out of the bedroom and into the living room where Ryou was sitting on the beanbag chair with Sewell in his lap. Ryou didn't ask him what had happened to Seto, for which Alistair was grateful because he wasn't sure he'd have known what to say.

"I'm not sure that I'll be back here before I have to go to work," he said as he pulled on his trench coat and stuffed his wallet and motorcycle and house keys into his pocket.

"That's fine. I was planning on making tacos for dinner, should I save some for you?"

"Um, yeah," Alistair answered distractedly.

"Alistair." The redhead turned to look at Ryou, giving him his full attention for the first time since he'd heard the news.

"Yeah?"

"He's very lucky to have someone who cares about him as much as you do." Ryou did not look at Alistair as he said this, but continued to look down at the cat on his lap. Had the statement come from anyone else, Alistair's inclination would have been to assume it was made out of jealousy, but what he knew about Ryou led him to believe that it was longing that was the source. Ryou wished that he too had someone who loved him the way Alistair loved Seto.

"Ryou…"

"You'll never be over him, will you?"

"It's been two weeks; you have to give me some time. It's not like I can flip a switch and suddenly stop caring about him; it doesn't work like that no matter how much I wish that it did. I'm sorry that I'm making it seem like I'd drop everything for him even though we aren't together anymore, and I'm not sure I can explain to you why he's so important to me even still, but I have a bad feeling that he's in the hospital because of me which is why I need to find out exactly what happened. I need the closure so that I can be everything that you deserve." Ryou wasn't completely convinced, but he was terrified that if he said anything more he'd go too far and cause Alistair to leave him. And now that he'd had a taste of what it felt like not to be lonely, he hated the idea of being alone even more than he had before.

Ryou looked so sad that Alistair almost decided not to go to see Trudy after all and to stay with Ryou until he was able to ease the Brit's melancholy. He could see clearly now that it had been a mistake to pursue Ryou so soon after splitting with Seto; it wasn't fair to either of them. But he couldn't undo it, so he resolved to redouble his efforts to put his love for Seto behind him after this. But since this was his fault, he couldn't just ignore it.

"I hope he's alright," Ryou said, breaking the silence that had fallen between them even though he didn't quite mean it.

"Me too." Alistair wasn't sure that, given the circumstances, it would be appropriate to kiss the Brit goodbye, so he awkwardly waved and took his leave.

"I'll never be first choice, will I?" Ryou said sadly to Sewell after Alistair was gone, absently scratching her behind the ears. She purred loudly and licked his hand. Of course she had no idea what the human was saying, but he fed her and rubbed her head and that was enough for her.

The engine of Alistair's red motorcycle roared loudly as he shot along several narrow side streets that acted as a shortcut to the highway. His emotions were all over the place. He thought of Seto lying in a bed in just about the last place on earth he'd want to be; a hospital. Was he conscious, or did they have him on some kind of sedative? If he was awake, what was he thinking about? Was he happy that his suicide attempt had failed, or angry? Had he left a note? If he had, had he listed him as the reason? How was Mokuba?

As he began speeding along the highway his thoughts shifted to what Ryou had said: you'll never be over him, will you? If he were to be completely honest, Alistair had no idea what it would be like to be 'over' Seto. He could barely remember a time before him.

Not too long ago the laptop that he'd gotten from Dartz had been full of thousands of photographs, videos, and scanned newspaper clippings of Seto Kaiba. He'd had pictures of him taped up on his wall at the Doma headquarters like some overenthusiastic fangirl. He'd taped those same pictures to targets when he practiced shooting. Kaiba had been the driving force behind his every thought, his every action, and his only desire had been to make the brunette suffer and suffer horribly.

Given his constant and unrelenting obsession with Seto he should have known better, after all, he'd watched Seto for years, and yet he had chosen to ignore that the object of his rage did not deserve it. Only when he realized that was he able to see Seto for who he really was, and that was when he'd fallen in love with him.

Their relationship had been dysfunctional, though looking back Alistair couldn't fathom why he'd thought the things they argued about had been so important.

Seto had represented stability and safety; two things he'd desperately been searching for. He hadn't realized before he met Seto just how much he wanted someone to lean on. After acting as caregiver and protector to Mikey, then burying his grief because he had no one to share it with after Mikey was killed it had felt so nice to finally have someone's arms to fall into.

But that was over. He was with Ryou now. He was only allowing Seto back into his life for the sake of comforting Trudy and Mokuba, and for closure. He needed to know that Seto would be ok, just as the brunette had done for him so many times. He would never forget how the CEO had risked his life to save him.

As she'd promised, Trudy met Alistair at the iron gates that acted as the only official entrance the Kaiba estate. To both of their surprise, he was still authorized to open the gate; Seto apparently hadn't told Saito or Kanzo to strike him from the database.

"I'm so glad to see you," she said as soon as he'd parked his motorcycle and taken his helmet off. She pulled him into a hug. "It's really unsettling being in this place by myself, especially right now. The police wouldn't let me clean the blood up you know. Until Seto wakes up and they can confirm that it was a suicide attempt and not attempted murder they're considering his room a crime scene. It's all taped off and everything."

"So he hasn't woken up yet?" She shook her head.

"After I got off the phone with you I called Roland who was at the hospital this morning apparently and he told me that they're keeping him sedated until he has enough blood circulating or something along those lines." Even though she looked pale and tired, she didn't seem quite as upset as when Alistair had spoken to her earlier.

"Do they know why he did it?" Alistair asked tentatively, afraid to hear the answer. Trudy knew what he was thinking. It was what they'd all been thinking.

"He's had a hard life," she started. "The thought of you betraying him was just one thing too many. That's what I think anyway. But it isn't your fault. You didn't make him do this; this was his choice."

"I can't believe that after everything we've been through together he was so easily able to turn on me." Resentment crept into Alistair's voice. "He's unbelievable. He thinks I betrayed him? He should take a long look in the mirror! Drawing his own conclusions without even bothering to hear me out is so fucking typical of him!" Trudy drew back as Alistair continued to rant, his face contorted in anger. "This time he's given me every reason to hate him! He can burn in hell for all I care!" He ran out of steam and suddenly found himself holding back tears. Would he ever be able to stop crying? Trudy's brow creased in concern and she wished there was something she could say that would make him feel better.

Author's Note: Two things:

1. I love Joey to pieces, truly, and I'm not trying to write him like a jerk or an idiot, but he's not a very subtle guy, and is oftentimes a tad abrasive even if his heart's in the right place.

2. Ryou. One of my main issues with Ryou in fanfiction is he's written as being very bland and one-dimensional. My goal is to keep his sweetness, but give him some real emotion too, and depth, hence the resentment and the jealousy that almost anyone would feel in this situation.