He's looking up, and all he sees is the white-haired kid, the crazy one, with the nasty smile, and the Dark Powers that are stronger than his. One minute that's all he sees, is his smile coming closer, his hand reaching to take the Eye from his face. The next minute, he opens his eyes again, and he sees…
Okay, now he's got to be crazy, because he could swear he's looking into the eyes of Kaiba Seto. But it's a young Kaiba, a skinny little-kid Kaiba, with a snotty-brat smile, and the weirdest damn mop of green hair you ever saw.
"I thought I was…" Pegasus blinks. Then, "Kaiba?" he says, and the boy nods.
The boy nods, and he smiles. And Pegasus tries sitting up (which is surprisingly easy, considering all the Shadow Battles he's been in today). "Kaiba Seto?" he says again.
And this time the green-haired boy goes crazy. "Don't you call me that," he sputters. "Don't you ever call me by that …that name."
"My name is Kaiba Noa," he introduces himself. He bows, and offers a hand, helping Pegasus to his feet. Pegasus unfolds himself, and discovers he's practically twice the height of this little, skinny Kaiba-replica (with the bad temper).
"I'm the rightful son of Kaiba Gozaburo," the kid says. "The one who calls himself Kaiba Seto is merely a pretender, a foundling that my father took in and sheltered out of the goodness of his heart. And he turned," Noa says, "and stabbed father in the back."
"Yeah, yeah, yeah." Any other time, he'd be madly curious at the thought of Kaiba-boi sticking knives into people, but right now he's got bigger questions. "Where the hell am I?" Pegasus asks instead, and then, "I thought I was…"
"Dead?" Noa's voice is very bright. It's the voice of every little nerd-kid there ever was, explaining his so-awesome mod of some video game or another, or how Shadow-Mourne gives his Level 85 Torn-Warrior +150 Strength and +150 Stamina. – 'It's rather like Kaiba-boi's voice,' Pegasus thinks, 'back the first time he explained his Duel Disk technology to me.' "Oh your dead all right," Noa says, sounding very cheerful. "Or your body is anyway. I've uploaded your mind and your memories into my Virtual World."
Little nerd-boy, with his casual nerd-voice. I've modded the game so I can play as one of the NPCs./ I've reached Level 50, unlocked the AK47, and saved enough to unlock the Huey Killstreak. – I've uploaded your mind, out of your dead, bleeding body, and put you into my Virtual World. "Your …Virtual World." Pegasus' lips feel stiff.
"Oh yes," says Noa. "My father designed it for me originally," he says, "but I've been here a few years now. I've had time to make some modifications. I can have anything I want here," he says, "and I can bring anyone I want here to share it with me – As long as I can find them and upload them before their memories have time to be corrupted."
"Yours were still nice and fresh when I got to you," he says. "You were still lying there on the floor, and the blood was still wet."
Pegasus gapes. "Who…" he says.
"Oh you don't really want to know which of your Security Guards gave you to me, do you? Or rather," Noa says, "I don't want you to know. You'll waste all your time hating him, if I tell you," he says, "and I brought you here so you could hate Seto with me."
"Hate …Seto…" Oh, how amused Yuugi-boi would be – the whole gaming world, really, if they could see him like this: The inimitable Pegasus J. Crawford, never without a wry comment, or a witty quip, and now he's reduced to stumbling and stuttering. "What the hell?"
"It's quite simple." Noa folds his skinny little arms, and looks at him with a cat-that-ate-the-canary look on his little pointed face. "That's how I choose who I bring here," he says. "I bring all of Seto's enemies here." He ticks them off on his fingers. "I've got my father," he says, "now I have you." That's it. Two.
"Not a very impressive haul," Pegasus comments.
"I'll get more," Noa says. "I have time to wait. Seto goes around making enemies all the time, all I have to do is wait for some more of them to die." He rubs his little hands together like a miser. "The one I really want is Moutou Yuugi," he says. "He's the one Seto hates the most, so it stands to reason he hates Seto too, right?"
"That's really your plan?" Now it's Pegasus' turn to fold his arms. "You're just going to keep collecting people until you have this big Army of the Dead – What if Seto's old by the time you have enough? What if he's dead?"
"Besides," he says, "Seto hates everybody, that doesn't mean we hate him back. I rather like him," he says. "He's so much fun to tease. And Yuugi…" He doesn't really want to get into the whole Moutou Yuugi-Sennen Items-Shadow Game thing, especially not since steam's already coming out of little Noa's ears, and he's practically hopping up and down with rage. "Yuugi doesn't hate anybody," he says.
"All ri-iii-iight," he continues. "I guess I'm stuck here then, aren't I? Can I at least program new characters for the Virtual World?" he asks, thinking he might try his hand again at bringing back Cynthia.
"Oh, sure, sure, sure," Noa says.
"And upload American TV shows?" Pegasus asks, thinking about Funny Bunny.
"Oh, absolutely, anything you want." Noa is looking cheerier again now. "Just as long as you hate Seto," he says.
"Fine, whatever." Pegasus heaves a huge sigh. "Consider me an official Seto-Hater from this moment on, Noa-boi."
"And don't call me Noa-boi," Noa says. And he shows his new guest the door that leads to the Virtual Duelist Kingdom he's programmed for him.