Yu-Gi-Oh! Fan Fiction ❯ White Padded Room ❯ Fusion ( Chapter 2 )

I would like to thank my lovely 11 reviewers: Lee Ying, CelesLuvsYugi, Renee the Rabid Squirrel, Boriss533, P-chan, Chibizoo, Chibi-chan, Bakura's Baby, Dirge (*glomps*), Anzsilhouette247, Taito-kisses. I'm sorry for the wait! I hope this chapter was well worth it.

Oh yes, and I would like to note that I will now be placing the day number in which event happens. Obviously it would a boring story if I went through all the events in ever day and we have six chapters and 28 days to cover. Some chapter will contain as much as four days where as other may contain only one. *shrug* I just thought I'd let you know. I swear this is the last chapter I comment except for who one the thing above!

Chapter Two: Fusion

Somewhere in the middle of the night, my first night, the medications wore off. I found myself shaking, almost violently. I could feel the beads of sweat that hit my trickled down my forehead in thick beads as they hit the skin of my neck. Even though I was sweating, I was cold. That was part of my shivers. There other part, I'm not quite sure of, but I think I was afraid.

Afraid of what? Nothing, everything even. I was afraid of being alive, I was afraid of what was going to happen to me. I was afraid of what would happen if I didn't get any heroin into my system. I believe that most of all, if I was afraid, I was afraid of going through this alone.

You always hear those stories about addicts with a loved one by their side, helping them every step of the way to cure them of the accursed addiction to the substance. My friends, my loved ones, they didn't seem to give a damn. They had let that bastard rich-ass Kaiba have their way with me. I was alone in all of this.

Yes, I believe if I had any fear, it would be to face this alone. I know the withdrawal wasn't the first part of it. I knew I could get through that. The hard part would be the cravings. It's something that I could handle if I knew that there was someone who cared about me enough to stop me from overdosing.

My friends? I'm sure they care to an extent, but they still don't even know I'm an addict; well ex-addict really. They think I'm just suicidal, yet not even one of them was able to confront me about those feelings to my face. Not one of them, though I'm sure that they all suspected I wanted to end my life, came up to me and say "Hey Jou, don't kill yourself, it will kill me too" or "Jou, think about the people who care about you! There are plenty of people who want you alive."

How much could they really care? How long after my death would they have remembered my name if I had indeed actually died? A month? A year? Who knows how long! If no one ever cared enough to stop me, then why would they remember my name? So I am alone in this thing, at least I believe I am or I was for that matter.

That night, somewhere in the middle of the night, my first night, when I was shaking after my medications had worn off I felt someone lay beside me. I felt their long strands of hair brush against my shoulder and chin each time they moved. They smelt of a medicine cabinet and blood. The blood scent being faded as if their hair had been drenched in it for weeks strait then flushed out with only water. It wasn't a scent that was going to come out easily. The medicine smell undoubtedly came from the cheap shampoo and staying in the likes of the institution for more then their fair share of time.

I could tell their face was always towards me. From quite some time, I couldn't sleep with them in the same bed. I only gave notice to the soft silent breath that fell warmly upon my lips. It relaxed me, and entranced me with it's on going pattern of evenly drawn out breaths.

I had more then one urge to capture those soft breaths within a closer range; to feel them swirling inside of my mouth and into my own lungs as I kissed the sleeping person silently. I didn't. How could I explain to that person, who I had no idea who they where at the time, why I was kissing them? How could I explain the unexplainable urge to taste them, though I figured they would taste exactly like the smelt of, blood and medicine? I couldn't, so I refrained from doing so.

Instead, I did the next best things. It was something that I could later blame on my dreams. It would be so easy to say, "I was dreaming of cuddling with someone, I didn't think there was anyone there". It was a believable story after all. So I wrapped my arms around the person, drawing their soothing warmth closer to me. Their head lay on my shoulder with their lips barely touching the skin on my neck, as if they where doing as I would lie about later, dreaming of being held by someone.

I felt the rough feel of woven belts and loop-through buckles underneath the skin of my arms. I could feel the uncomfortable itchy fabric against my fingers. But most of all I could and smell their soft hair against my chin.

It wasn't long before I figured out who the sleeping person in my arms was. It was Bakura. The rough fabric of belts and clothing where that of the strait jacket, the blood I smelt in his hair was obviously from torturing or killing many innocent people or small unsuspecting animals and most of all, he had disappeared months ago, months that I assume where spent locked up in here where the medicine scented shampoo would grow in their hair. I had no doubt it was Bakura.

How long it was before I fell asleep is beyond me still. When I woke up, however, Bakura was no longer there. He was huddled up on his bed in a ball. If his arms had been free at that time, I had no doubt that they would be wrapped around himself.

I asked him when he awoke, if it had been him at my bedside. As I had expected at the time he had said no along with something like "even it had been me it would've been because you teeth where chattering so loudly it kept me awake!" I did believe that explanation for a while…

…But when things began to change, I could no longer believe it.

Day Four:

Neither of them left the room very often. For Bakura it was because he was forbidden to step in any room aside from that of his doctor, whom Jou later found out his name, was Dr. Yuuki Shuichi (1), office and the room. Jou, on the other hand, was not fond of the area around him. He only left whenever Bakura was feeling violent in which he would go to this large window in a quiet room where no one seemed to wonder. The only time he left aside from that was when he was called for group therapy or to see Dr. Tenmai.

The two had come to be known as the hermits of the institute, even though Jounouchi had only been there four short days. He still felt no need to be social with people that would be soon forgotten once he got out of there. He would of course remember the nurse Julie and his doctor. They knew personal things about him so he believed it would be in his best interest not to forget about them.

It was strange to him how accustomed this his surroundings he had become already. He was used to being awakened at seven o'clock in the morning, where as Bakura would sleep all day, the nurse where too afraid to go near him even in the straight jacket. He had become accustomed to the forced study groups in which he went to once a day at four, they where followed by a six o'clock visit to Deneen. Other then that he just lay in his bed and tried his hardest not to think over everything too much.

Right then it was a little after noon and Jou found the familiar sting of restlessness coursing through him. For the most part, the symptoms of withdrawal had left them. They where only supposed to last anywhere from thirty-six to forty-eight hours, yet he still found it hard to stay still and was sweating more then the average human person should.

He was sitting on his bed, knees huddled up against his chest with his arms holding them in place. His foot was tapping as if to urge him to move from the spot, but he gave it no heed. He was too busy looking at the sleeping figure huddled up into it's normal balled up form acting as if it would shield the person from everything that went on in the world outside his dreams.

Ever since that first night, Jou had found himself drawn to Bakura. Even if the spirit did deny that he in fact did calm him in his ridged state, he still knew it was him. He acted in a way that he had never expected him to act, so he found himself spending most of the time sitting on that very bed, watching him and trying to find out exactly what went on inside that mind of his.

Bakura shifted uncomfortably in his sleep, his brows furrowed. Jou blinked at that. How odd, it was as if he was having a nightmare, another thing in which the blonde thought the silver-haired man was incapable of. "Would you stop staring at me," ocher eyes blinked at the harsh voice that came from the man in which Jou thought he had been sleeping. He previous inquisition about the nightmare was put to rest. "I hate it when people stare…" However he found that equal odd. Bakura, the one who did not care about anyone or anything aside from his sadistic existence was actually unnerved when people looked at for him for too long. He couldn't blame it; Jou hated it when people would stare.

"I'm sorry," he muttered the simple apology, and could not help the blush that crept across his cheeks before laying down on the bed, his body facing towards the wall to stop the urge to study Bakura again. He heard the shifting of bed sheets again, assuming it was the said spirit getting comfortable again.

A thick silence covered the room, smothering the both of them in its unpleasant aura. When he felt as if he couldn't take it anymore, Bakura let a frustrated growl escape from deep within his throat. It was followed by the sound of thick footsteps placed angrily against the floor. Jou felt the bed shift underneath the newly added weight as Bakura sat down beside him.

There was uncomfortable pause before a question that made Jou fidget in the bed, "Why did you do it?" The words where blunt, unexpected and crashed down upon the blonde with an impeccable weight.

"I thought you where going to sleep more," He avoided the question as best as he could, though he figured he'd pretend later that he didn't know what Bakura was talking about.

"I figured since I was up, tired and not feeling up with you being butt-hurt all day I'd start a conversation," Bakura explained rather rudely, laying himself down to get comfortable on the bed. Apparently, he hadn't planned on leaving it anytime soon. "So why did you become an addict?"

Jou cursed inwardly. His attempted to dodge the question failed. The second time around it had been strait to the point, and not leaving any chance for him to stall. With a sigh he figured it would be best to just answer the question instead of avoiding it and pissing Bakura off. "Because I didn't care," the words where softly spoken, so soft that they could not even technically be considered a whisper.

"Didn't care about what?" Bakura asked only to receive an incomprehensible mumble. "If you're going to mumble could you at least turn around so I can read your lips?" His black-coffee eyes narrowed into a firm glare aimed at the boy's back.

The only close to an answer that came from the body was a small heaving of breaths. "Remember you brought this on yourself," he warned as he leaned down and bit down rather harshly on the side of Jounouchi's shoulder.

"Ouch!" Jou yelled turning over just to glare at him.

"I told you, you brought it on yourself," Bakura all to happily reminded.

"Yeah, yeah," a frown placed itself on the blonde's lips, now noting how close they where. He hadn't realized that Bakura had sat so close to him before, mostly because he had his back turned to him.

"So are you going to answer my question?" one of the spirit's near flawless silver eyebrows quirked upwards as he asked.

"Everything."

Russet eyes blinked closed and open again a few times before he dumbly replied, "Everything? What kind of answer is that to a simple yes or no question?" Of course, after he said that he mentally smacked himself blaming his slow working mind on all the medications they seemed to inject into him on a daily basis.

"Baka! I was answering your first question!"

"Who are you calling a baka, baka?"

"You, asshole!"

"Mutt."

"Prissy-ass."

"Whore."

A seemingly random grin spread across Jou's face as he began to laugh hysterically, gaining an odd look from the silver haired man beside him. Once again Bakura found his eyebrow arched upwards questioningly, "What?"

He raised his finger and pressed it gently against the tip of Bakura's nose yelling, "Beep!" as he did so. (2)

"Mr. Jounouchi," The sound of a door opening followed by the familiar voice of Julie broke through Jou's fits of giggles. "Dr. Tenmai would like to see you early today," She said giving the laughing blonde a skeptical look, afterwards giving one to Bakura who was blushing, quite deeply, with his eyes crossed.

After recovering, which took a little more then a few minutes, Jounouchi finally vacated the bed and exited behind the room behind the nurse. Bakura frowned slightly touching his fingers to the tip of his nose. "He's an odd guy," he muttered before returning to his own bed to get more sleep.

~*~*~

"Thank you, Dr. Tenmai. I'll see you tomorrow," Jounouchi said his goodbyes to Deneen with a bow of his head, and a respectful smile. Once he had got there he had found out he would be called earlier from now on for longer sessions. The smaller ones that he was having before where to get him better acquainted with the doctor herself, so that he would be able to open up and speak of his problems to her.

He headed back to his room, thankful that he had gotten his way out of those annoying group therapy sessions for some time now. At that moment, he wanted to do nothing more then lay on own bed and take a nice long nap.

Ocher eyes closed thoughtfully, caught in what a relief it would be not to have to speak to anyone about the things that happened in your childhood, or events that happen when you attended school to make sure to find out the way you are. He knew the doctor would blame everything wrong with him on his father, not that he cared about it, but he knew it wasn't the reason. He just had nothing to care about and that's why he is the way he is. There is no deeper meaning.

When he got to his room, he frowned upon seeing Alexandra and another one of Bakura's nurses, Solo (3), talking outside of the room. Both of which, did not look too ecstatic. He had known both nurses to always be bright and cheerful, and now both of their faces where turned into a deep scowl as they spoke.

"He won't let anyone go near him," Alexandra commented letting a sigh sneak past her lips, "he's be more aggressive about it then normal. He's already sent Julie to the hospital."

The other nurse, Solo, covered her mouth in shock, her eyes wide. "What exactly happened?" She asked though her voice became muffled by the hand in which covered her lips.

"She was walking down the hall when she heard a thumping noise from outside of the door. When she checked to see what it was she found Bakura banging his head against the side of the wall, (4)" Alexandra spoke her words slowly, her voice would crack every now in then thinking about her injured friend, "His head was split open and bleeding pretty badly. When she went to help him he attacked her using his feet to throw against the wall. She ended up breaking her back and one of her arms."

"Poor sweet Julie," Solo muttered slightly under her breath, before she realized that Alexandria had informed her Bakura's head was split open, "Is Bakura alright?"

"Yes, he's fine now. Dr. Yuki sedated him and fixed up his wound," a sigh of relief was heard from the nurse opposite of her.

Placing a fake grin upon his face, Jounouchi walked up to the worried looking nurses, passing by them easily. They both gave him a look of concern, or perhaps it was warning, but he had dealt with Bakura enough to know that he was capable of worse the nurse saw.

Upon entering, the muscles in the blonde's stomach tightened at the site before him. The wall corner of the wall near the door to the bathroom was covered in a small, but not unnoticeable layer of blood. The now limp body of Bakura was underneath it, his body lazily spread out in a sleeping position though he wasn't quite sleeping yet.

Cautiously, Jou approached him, kneeling down beside him. He looked at whatever parts of Bakura's face weren't shielded by his face; he couldn't help but grimace upon looking at him. Though the thick locks of silver hair he could see the patch, which covered his self-inflicted wounds. Deciding that he really didn't care whither or not Bakura attacked him, he lifted his hand and moved the surprisingly soft strands hair out of the way so he could get a better look at both Bakura's wounds and eyes.

"I don't understand you," the silver-haired spirit said, his voice monotone and his usually full-of-life, even if it was negative emotions that powered them, where glazed over and near black. He looked like he was staring at something, when he was indeed looking at nothing. "I don't understand you," he said again.

"What do you mean?" Jounouchi asked letting the hair he had pushed away slid off his hands and back into the lifeless face of Bakura.

"I don't understand how you can act so cheerful and laugh so full of life over such a childish then yet be unhappy enough with your life to take a powerful drug like heroin," He began to list off all of the things he had observed about the blonde, the monotone sound to his voice refusing to face, "Or why you let Kaiba put you in this place under some of the conditions that he did. Or why you act like you care about the well-being of everyone, even those that you hate. Or how you can always make your friends laugh when they're feeling down."

There was a long pause. All Jounouchi could do was stare at the spirit before him. He didn't know how explain why he did the things he did. He just did them because that's who he was, but he knew that answer would not be a satisfying one for Bakura. So rather then saying something and upsetting him, he just made a small noise and hung his head in silence.

It wasn't a very comfortable silence, but even when they where speaking it wasn't all that comfortable either. Just as he was about to retreat, Jou heard one last thing from Bakura, "I don't understand that when I laid in your bed your first night, you held me."

After that he banished all thought of moving from that spot. "I can't even remember the last time I've had anyone hold me, let alone hug me," Bakura continued on, not exactly sure why he was telling all of this to Jounouchi of all people. This was after all, the same street pup that's mouth and quick temper always got him into more trouble then he seems worth. "I tried to hug Ryou once. He thought I was planning something and called the cops to take me away for a night."

He chuckled slight at the sweet irony of it. It was stopped short however, when he felt two strong arms wrap around him. Finally, Bakura lifted his head and looked into the smiling face of Jounouchi. "You don't have to do this to make me feel better, you know? Actually I'd quite prefer not to have your pity," He frowned, the first sign of emotion he had shown since Jou had returned from his meeting with Deneen.

"I'm not hugging you because I pity you," the blonde whispered letting his head rest atop of Bakura's while he held him in his arms, "I'm hugging you because I want to." Bakura gave him a perplexed look, which quickly turned into a glare. "What?" Jou asked, blinking slightly, "It's the God honest truth."

They sat in silence, the first real comfortable silence they had, had since Jounouchi had been admitted to the place. Bakura let himself fall limply into the arms, though he was mentally kicking himself repeatedly for actually enjoying it. He was, after all, not suppose to give a damn about anything.

Yet he found himself falling deeper and deeper into the friendly embrace. Thick lashes fell over the deep caverns of his russet eyes, and he let out one out of may three content sighs in his life. It was a wonderful feeling knowing that there was someone that was there to protect and comfort you. It was wonderful, but equally odd.

He recalled the incident from before where Jounouchi had nose-beeped him, and then burst out laughing. He still didn't quite understand why exactly he nose-beeped him; he understood why he started laughing even less. His nose scrunched up when he felt a new tingle travel to the tip of his nose. "Such an odd guy," he muttered out loud, not realizing he had done so.

The statement caused the blonde to shift slight in confusion, but rather then asking what Bakura had said, he asked him something else. "How exactly did you end up in here anyways?" Jounouchi asked carefully, his words soft and sounding only semi-interested as not to alarm the hot-tempered spirit. "I wouldn't figure you one to put yourself in here, or else you would already be gone, and I know Ryou wouldn't have the backbone to admit you without your permission."

"It was Malik…" Jou noted the twinge of pain that seemed to pass through Bakura's eyes as he said that. He was going to suggest that he waited to tell him until he was ready, but Bakura continued on. "He told me that he didn't want to deal with me anymore. He said that Ishtar was already too much for him to handle, and I was beginning to grow more and more like him each day. So he sent me here."

"Do you think he was afr-"

"I know he was afraid," The words where spoken in an unpredictably heartbreaking tone. "He knew that I had a worse time controlling my temper then Ishtar does, so he became afraid for his life and used the fact that I inflicted harm upon myself to get me inside here. And as you can see, the discovered more then what Malik told them as time passed by.

"I hear the doctor talking to the drods sometimes. He doesn't believe that I'll ever make it of there," A growl was heard coming deep with in his throat, "neither do the drods, and honestly, I'm beginning to believe it myself."

"You'll get out of here," Jou grinned as he spoke the words, causing Bakura to raise an eyebrow.

"Excuse me?"

"I promise you, I'll get you out of here myself if I have to," he poked Bakura's nose gently for the second time that day. This time, however, he left the cheerful 'beep!' out.

The grin on his face soon faded, and placed itself with a more serious one. "It's getting late," Jou said, even though it was only around eight-thirty; a time in which if you're over the age of seven is not late at all. "We should go to sleep now."

"Would you mind if I slept in your bed again tonight?" Bakura asked, feeling himself blush. It was an unfamiliar thing for him to do, and he was still getting used to it. There seemed to just be something about Jounouchi that made his cheeks turned red. "It gets kind of lonely, and I'm used to sleeping in the same bed as Ryou."

The blonde cocked his head to the side, giving a small chuckle. "Sure thing," he answered cheerfully as he picked himself up off the floor, and helped Bakura up afterwards and into the bed.

They slept the same way the had the first time; Bakura's head comfortably resting upon Jou's shoulder, sleeping with the strong arms wrapped around him as ocher eyes watched him contently. "I could get used to this," Jou whispered under his breath before letting his own eyes close and soon drift off to sleep himself.

~*~*~

(1) Did anyone catch the name reference? If you did then kudos to you! If you did then well, uh, it's a Yuki Eiri x Shindo Schuichi, the main couple of Gravitation reference. Pointless really, but it's amusing.

(2) I read a page of Arcana where Vincent did that to Holden, she made a note that we should all nose beep someone we don't know, and since I don't leave my house, I put it in the story. I even drew it similar to how it appeared in the comic: http://thirty-six.org/art/beep.jpg (uh yeah…there is no site in the /art directory… just in case anyone wanted to look at more of my crappy art)

(3) My friend, Dagny, goes by the name Solo and I couldn't think of anything else to name her. So there you go. Her name is Solo.

(4) Ahh the joys of Intermittent Explosive Disorder. Basically, it's explosive behavior of violence, it usually doesn't provoke masochistic behavior, but with someone like Bakura that enjoys pain, it could easily do so.

It's not quite as long as the last one, but if I put anymore in it, it would be too long. *smacks head on desk* I made Bakura out of character in this chapter towards the end, damnit. Please leave reviews, random comments, and constructive criticisms or just say hello!