Ishizu stood and rubbed her temples. Bakura knew that meant she was raving pissed at them, but wouldn't lose her temper in front of Bastet. "Bakura, why did you think it was okay to buy her a kitten?"

Bakura couldn't help the grin. He knew it made him look like an asshole – and he was an asshole, but he wasn't trying to be a jerk, it was just his natural state of being. "Because her name is Bastet. Why on earth would you name her Bastet if you didn't want her to have a kitten?"

He could use Marik's help. It was both their idea to buy the kitten, but Marik stood with his hands behind his back and his eyes hard-lined to the floor.

"I named her Mau," Bastet said as if that justified everything. At least she had Bakura's back in this argument.

"That's great, sweetie." Ishizu grinned, but as soon as she turned her head back to Bakura, that legendary Ishtar temper flared in her eyes. "You need to consult me before you make big decisions like this."

"No mommy, Mau is very small."

The worst of that quip was the honest-to-gods candid tone in her voice. The child truly thought she was presenting a logical and valid argument for her keeping the cat (yes, obviously Seto's child. Ishtars didn't do so well with logic). Problem was, Bakura was kinda thinking the same thing, only much more sarcastically, and when Bastet pulled the words out of his head, the added irony of her sincerity gave Bakura no other choice to to burst into a fit of laughter.

"I'm glad you think this is funny Bakura," Ishizu said, "because I'm allergic to cats."

"You are?" Marik looked up.

"Bullshit," Bakura cursed in Middle Egyptian. He used to use Japanese, but they started teaching that to her as well, so he had to get creative.

"Language, Bakura," Ishizu hissed in Egyptian Arabic.

Sometimes he forgot they spoke the older dialects because of their crazy upbringing. Bakura frowned. "Are you seriously allergic?"

"I tried to get a house cat as soon as I left the tomb, but after a day I couldn't stop sneezing."

"Well, crap." Bakura crossed his arms over his chest in thought, thankful that Ishizu didn't scold him for his language again because crap was as censored as he'd get.

Ishizu couldn't take the cat home because she was allergic, but that made her look like the bad guy for something that wasn't her fault since they didn't ask her first. Oh well, what was he for if not for playing the villain? This would be easy, right? Breaking the heart of an innocent child? Easy. Just like making Ryou cry, easy peasy. Bakura gave no fucks!

Bakura crouched down so he could look Bastet in the eye.

She started crying before he said a word. She already knew what was next.

Bakura realized he needed to go on Skype and apologize to Ryou for everything he ever did to his old host. The stabbings, the soul collection, intentionally squeezing the toothpaste from the center just because he knew Ryou hated it, everything he'd ever done, because it was suddenly less funny than it'd been at the time.

"Look." Bakura rested a hand on her pitch-black hair. "It's not that you can't keep Mau, it's that she has to stay here and live with me and Uncle Marik."

He had lost his touch at villainy. He supposed a decade of cuddling on the sofa with Marik as they watched stand up and split pints of ice-cream could do that to even the most vile of souls.

Bastet blinked away most of her tears. "So, you'll take care of her?"

Bakura nodded.

"And I can visit?"

She visited just about once a week, but Bastet happened to be the one person Bakura would swallow a sardonic comment for. "Of course."

Bastet accepted the compromise with all the grace and dignity a six-year-old without a kitten could muster. After they left, Ishizu stared at Bakura with an unspoken rush of gratitude, and Bakura couldn't do anything but stand there with a small, black kitten in his arms.

Once they left, Marik stared at him, hands on his hips. "Okay."

Bakura opened his mouth to argue, and it was going to be a spectacular fight after watching a child for a week and then having to deal with an irate Ishizu.

Marik cut him off. "Before you scream your counter argument, I just want you to know that I think you've finally earned those ten consecutive blow jobs you're always trying to get."