The day finally came when it was time to help the Pharaoh get his memories back. After the school day was over, Yugi and his friends went to the museum, where they met Bobasa, a servant for the Tomb Guardians who worked under Shadi's orders.
Following Bobasa's directions, Yami Yugi held up the three Egyptian God Cards against the stone slab and got transported into the World of Memories. Everyone else wanted to follow him into that world, however Bobasa first needed to test them all to see if their souls contained any evil or deception. He was to hold the Millennium Scales up to each of their hearts, and if the Scales tilted, that individual was not allowed to enter the World of Memories.
The Millennium Scales did not tilt for Anzu, Jounouchi, or Honda. But they did tilt for Ryou. Heartbroken and dejected, Ryou ran home with tears in his eyes. He arrived home and ran straight into his room where he threw himself in bed so that he could let all the tears out. He cried hysterically for a good long while, head buried into his pillow and hiding under the bedsheets.
"After all this time, I'm still an outsider," Ryou said between sobs. "Am I not worthy enough to be Yugi's friend?"
"Oh come on, Yugi should be the one who considers himself to be lucky to be your friend, not the other way around," the Spirit scoffed.
"I just don't understand why the scales tilted. Why am I not good enough? I try so hard to be a loyal friend, and it's never good enough."
The Spirit sat on the edge of the bed, arms folded, fuming with silent anger. Later he was going to kill Bobasa for making Ryou cry. In fact he was going to kill all of humanity.
"No matter what I do, no matter how much time passes or how hard I try, I'm never going to be truly part of Yugi's group because I don't fit in! I don't fit in anywhere!" Ryou complained. "And it's not like they need me to come anyways. Any adventures that they go on, they don't need me to be there. I would just get in the way. I am disposable. Whether I join them on their adventures or not doesn't make much of a difference, because there's nothing I can contribute that they can't already do themselves. I'm not needed."
The Spirit didn't know how to respond so he kept quiet, and for a while the room was filled with nothing but the sound of Ryou's gentle sobbing.
"And you," Ryou said after a silence, "you have the nerve to leave me after everything we've been through? Once you're gone, there will be no one left who really understands me, I'm going to be alone for the rest of my life!"
"…I don't have a choice," the Spirit said after a pause.
"I know. It's just not fair."
Ryou fidgeted with the Ring's prongs, his mind lost in thought. Considering how much time and effort it took them to achieve a state of healthy multiplicity, it was rather saddening to see it all go to waste. Everything they've been working for during the past year, was it all meaningless? The therapy, the games, the fights and the drama. What was the point of going through all that if the Spirit still had to leave in the end? Would it have been better if they hadn't become friends? Because then it would've been a lot easier to say goodbye.
The amount of emotions running through his mind was draining Ryou of all his energy, and that combined with the lack of sleep he had the night before left him feeling incredibly exhausted. He fell into an extremely depressed mood. "I guess this proves it. I am evil and I don't deserve Yugi's friendship."
"You're not evil!" the Spirit growled. For some reason it really angered him that Ryou was blaming himself.
"The Millennium Scales tilted for me. That means I'm evil. It is impossible for the Millennium Items to be wrong."
The Spirit shook his head. "No, stop thinking like that.
"Are you going to tell me that the scales actually tilted because of you? Because you're the evil one? I just can't accept that. If one of us is evil, it has to be me."
The Spirit scowled. There was something about this that really pissed him off. Ryou still believed the Spirit to be a good person? This idiot hadn't learned much of anything in the past year. He was still the naive, trusting little empath he had been since the beginning. Too trusting for his own good.
The Spirit wanted to talk Ryou out of that depressed, self-loathing mindset, if how was he to do that without claiming himself to be evil? There were several methods he could think of. He started with the option that was the most mild.
"Didn't you notice that Bobosa didn't hold the Scales up to Yugi's heart?" the Spirit said. "That's because it would've tilted for Yugi too."
"Really? Are you sure?" said Ryou.
"Yes, because Yugi is wearing the Millennium Puzzle. The Scales will always tilt for anyone wearing any Millennium Item no matter what, since the Items themselves contain evil energy. The real reason the Scales tilted for you is because you were wearing the Millennium Ring. It had nothing to do with you as a person."
Ryou pondered this idea for a moment, but then shook his head. "No, that's not a good enough explanation for me. It's not guaranteed that the Scales would've tilted for Yugi or not. I would have to see it for myself to believe it."
The Spirit let out a small, inaudible sigh. He hadn't expected that explanation to work, but it was worth a try. Time to move on to the next method. There were three more options he could think of:
Option one: tell Ryou about Zorc. There was a fragment of Zorc's soul living inside the Millennium Ring, and Zorc was a demon who represented evil, so he caused the Millennium Scales to tilt.
This was forbidden. The Spirit could not tell Ryou about Zorc under any circumstances.
Option two: tell Ryou about Kul Elna. The Millennium Items were created from evil itself, which is why wearing any of them would automatically cause the Scales to tilt.
This was too personal. He wasn't ready to tell Ryou about that.
Option three: admit to lying.
Distasteful, but doable. And it was the only viable option left.
"Alright, listen up. You remember what Bobasa said about how the Millennium Scales will tilt if it detects evil or deception?" the Spirit said.
"Yeah, what about it?" said Ryou.
"Notice how he said 'or.' Not all deception is evil. Even if neither of us are evil, the Scales will still tilt if one of us is a liar."
Ryou's eyes welled up with tears again. "It's all my fault. I lied to everyone about not wearing the Ring. I should've told them the truth sooner."
"No, it's not your fault! Stop blaming yourself!" The Spirit's voice broke, and he covered his eyes in shame. "I'm the liar, okay? The Scales tilted because of me. I've been lying to you."
"About what?" Ryou said tonelessly, as if he didn't believe this to be important.
"Lots of things." The Spirit paused, hesitant to go further. "Would you still consider me a friend if I told you?"
"Sure, why not? You're still my best friend. I'm not going to revoke that status of friendship because of a few mistakes, because that's not how love works."
The amount of things the Spirit did was definitely more than just a few mistakes. Now was the final test to see how much their established relationship could withstand.
"There were certain things I did during Battle City that I wasn't completely truthful about," the Spirit admitted.
"Well, obviously you needed to lie to Malik about your intentions in order to gain his trust. Manipulation isn't always a bad thing," Ryou said.
"Yeah, but Malik was not the only one I was manipulating. I overexaggerated how evil I was in front of Malik, and I overexaggerated how good I was in front of you. When I told you Malik's Rare Hunters ganged up on us and stabbed us in the arm, that was a blatant lie. Malik never sent his Rare Hunters after us. The truth is I was the one who stabbed your arm."
"Wait…what?" Ryou sat up straight on the bed, fully attentive. "Why would you do that?"
"It was part of the plan I came up with to help Malik gain control of Jounouchi and Anzu. If he pretended to find you injured somewhere and help reunite you with your friends, he would be able to gain their trust, and that way he would be able to get close enough to touch them with his Millennium Rod to have mind control over them."
"Wait, hold on, you're the one who gave Malik that idea?" Ryou said with his voice rising an octave. "You allowed Malik to use me as a tool to gain the trust of my friends?"
The Spirit had his back turned, refusing to show his face.
"Who's side were you on anyways!? Were you really trying to help save Yugi's life of were you trying to help Malik kill him?" Ryou shouted.
"That part wasn't a lie. I was trying to save Yugi's life. I need Yugi alive because he is the bearer of the Millennium Puzzle. Without him I wouldn't be able to go to the afterlife. However, I didn't really care about the fate of your other friends. Whatever happened to Anzu and Jounouchi was none of my concern."
"Really." Now Ryou was getting angry.
The Spirit shrugged. "Everything worked out in the end. None of your friends died."
"But there were a lot of close calls! And plenty of people got hurt, including me! You do realize how you sound, right? You treated Anzu and Jounouchi as though their lives weren't worth anything!"
"I did what was necessary."
"Stabbing my arm was necessary!?" Ryou seethed. "I know I said I can tolerate a few mistakes, but this goes beyond what I'm willing to tolerate! You already gave me trauma from the first stabbing incident, so why would you stab me again a second time?! And…and it's not like this was a good plan! It's full of holes! If Jounouchi weren't so headstrong as to be able to break through Malik's mind-control, both he and Yugi would've died that day! You couldn't have found better ways to gain Malik's trust that don't involve stabbing me or putting my friends' lives at risk?"
There was a moment of silence between them as Ryou took a deep breath to collect himself. Of all the times for the Spirit to admit to his wrongdoings, this had to be the worst possible time. Ryou wasn't in the right state of mind to be able to deal with this right now. He had already been emotionally drained from crying, and he hadn't slept well the night before.
"If…if you had confided in me, we could've worked together to find a way to save all of my friends rather than just Yugi," Ryou said in a calmer, more controlled voice. "Was it me? Did I do something to make you feel like you couldn't confide in me?"
"No, it's not that. I have issues with trusting people in general. I've never had real friends before. This is new to me," the Spirit said.
"I guess I can tolerate the arm injury, but you deliberately putting Anzu and Jounouchi in danger in order to save another person is something I can't ignore. That I cannot accept." Ryou lay back down on the bed, curled up into a ball, and shut his eyes. He was so tired.
The Spirit stared at the ceiling, contemplating what to do next. Two of his most nefarious secrets were now out in the open. There were several other things he was hiding, such as the fact that he killed Pegasus, stole his Millennium Eye, and then sent Pegasus's body to the Shadow Realm, or that he put a portion of his own soul into one of the pieces of the Millennium Puzzle so that he could spy on the Yugis. But those were irreverent to the situation. There was one thing he was hiding that was the most important secret of all that he hadn't yet admitted to. Should he tell it now?
Right now was really bad timing. Ryou was exhausted, sleep-deprived, depressed and angry, and now the Spirit wanted to admit that he never actually wanted to go to the afterlife; he was trying to take over the world, and he was planning to use Ryou's diorama as a tool to achieve that goal of taking over the world. How would Ryou take in that information? Probably not well. Perhaps it would be better to wait for a different day, when Ryou was more rested and in a more rational state of mind.
But they didn't have any more days left together. They were out of time. This was the Spirit's last chance to tell the truth.
The Spirit got up and moved closer to where Ryou was resting, and then knelt down beside the bed. Ryou's face really was beautiful, even when his eyes were tightly shut and his cheeks were red and blotchy from crying. The Spirit spent several long minutes staring at Ryou's face, thinking about whether or not he should tell the truth.
Five minutes passed in silence. For five agonizing long minutes, the Spirit didn't say anything.
Another five minutes passed, and he still didn't say anything.
Ryou opened his eyes, saw the Spirit's face in front of him, and smiled. "I've never seen you look so sad before. Do you regret what you did during Battle City?" he asked.
"I do," the Spirit answered, and it really was the truth. "I shouldn't have put your friends in danger. I should've tried to find a way to keep all of your friends safe and not just Yugi. And I probably shouldn't have stabbed you."
Ryou let out a small chuckle.
"It took a lot of time, but I understand your perspective now. I finally understand why friendship is so important to you," the Spirit said.
Ryou rolled around so that he was lying on his back. "We'll talk more about this later. Right now I'm going to take a nap."
"Mind if I front for a bit?"
"Sure, go ahead."
The Millennium Ring glowed. The Spirit disappeared from his position next to the bed and was transported back into the Ring, where he began to switch with Ryou for control of the body. During the last final moments right before losing consciousness, Ryou whispered the words, "I love you."
The moment Bakura took control, he burst into tears. Ryou chose the worst possible time to say those words, because god do those words hurt. And it was too late to say "I love you" back. He curled up in a ball and started sobbing. His eyes were already puffed and swollen because Ryou had been crying before. Now that Bakura was fronting he was crying twice as hard.
Was this what guilt felt like? No, that wasn't it. He did feel bad, but it wasn't guilt. It was a different kind of bad. He felt fear because he was afraid he was fitting into the ASPD stereotypes. He was afraid he had become the type of person who could never have real relationships, the type of person who would never do anything for the sake of another person unless he had something to gain from it. He was afraid he had become exactly what the world expected him to be.
Lose on purpose, Malik had suggested.
What was the point of destroying or ruling the world anyway? It wasn't going to make him happy in the long run. He felt so demotivated, he wanted to just lie down and take a nap, and put off his world domination plans for tomorrow.
"Get up. We have work to do," said Zorc.
Bakura groaned. "Goddammit Zorc! Get lost! I never fucking liked you! I can't have a moment to myself to just lie down and cry?"
"You are wasting time. If we don't go to the museum right now, we'll miss our chance. Now get up."
"Shut up Zorc! For the love of god, just shut up! You're so annoying! Just go away!"
"Do you want to be stuck in the Ring for another few millennia?"
"Yeah, yeah, whatever! I'm getting up! Not because you told me to, but because I want to!"
Bakura got up, went to the bathroom and washed his face, and then went back into Ryou's room where he changed out of the school uniform and into his signature striped shirt with a black trenchcoat on top. Do we ever have any real control over our own destinies, or are we all confined to our designated roles, destined to become exactly what the world expects us to be? Do we really have a choice over who we are? How much can we be outside of our social conditioning? As much as Bakura wished he could have a redemption, he didn't believe he deserved it. If the world could only see him as a villain, then a villain was all he would ever try to be. He kissed the back of his scarred left hand and whispered, "I'm sorry." Then he left the apartment, locked the door behind him, and disappeared.