Embracing Shadows

Summary: Seto Kaiba is used to dealing with his brother being kidnapped and saving his brother from harm. What happens when the situation is reversed? He's that one that's been kidnapped. Who's going to save him? The sect that's kidnapped him doesn't want his money, Kaiba Corp. or trading cards. Not only that his kidnapper use magic. He doesn't believe in magic.

Chapter One

Everyone in the office was relaxed and talking about Christmas plans. What they were all going to do for the upcoming work Christmas party. The mood in the office changed abruptly amongst the older members of staff. They stopped what they were doing and made themselves look busy as a teenage boy walked into the office like he owned the place and was the most important person on Earth.

"He's cute, who is he?" Remus heard one of the young girls ask. He'd been wondering the same thing himself not the cute part, just who he was. The teenager looked mostly asian but his blue eyes and sandy brown hair suggested he had something else in the mix. He wondered if the boy was the son of upper management with how he held himself.

"That's Seto Kaiba, he's our boss," an older woman told the young girl in a hushed whisper.

"He doesn't look like he could be any older some of my former students." Remus told them wondering just how old his boss was guessing that he was somewhere in his early to mid twenties and not a teenager like he first assumed.

There so called young boss stopped to reprimand someone before continuing on through the office. The next few days consisted of Seto Kaiba taking up the main office and calling people in for interviews. Remus was so nervous when he was called into the office, he'd been working for the London branch of Kaiba Corp for two years now. It was the longest he'd ever held down a job.

"You're Remus Lupin from accounting, been with the company for two years" the young man asked him after he'd taken a seat.

"I am" Lupin confirmed, looking at the teenage boy in front of him. Something about his mannerisms reminded him of Severus. That he wasn't the type of person that took nonsense from anyone else. That he was to the point and didn't skim around issues.

"How have you been coping with work and your illness?" Seto asked him with genuine concern showing through his voice. Remus assumed that it was just because he was concerned about the company's overall performance, not his actual health.

"Some months are harder than others leading up to my treatment and shortly afterwards. But on a whole I'm doing as well as can be expected." Remus told him, still nervous. He hated having to talk about his made up illness, just in case he was talking to someone with more knowledge then himself. Something about the young man in front of him made him want to tell as much of the truth as possible. It was like he knew when you where lying or skimming around the edges of truth. He was intimating.

Seto questioned him about some of his previous jobs and discussing how his other employee's hadn't been as understanding of his illness which was why most of his previous jobs hadn't worked out and any other reasons certain jobs hadn't worked out.

"Your teaching job, it say's you resigned. Any reason why?" Seto asked him.

"I resigned after a year's work. My employer wanted to keep me on, but with being off sick three days a month, it was disrupting my students learning having a substitute teacher during that time." Lupin told him. That was just one of the many reasons he'd resigned from Hogwarts. Another had been he was worried about killing or turning a student during the full moon. That one close call was one close call to many.

"Any particular reason why your treatment co-insides with the full moon?" Kaiba asked him.

Remus had been shocked by the question. He'd had muggle employee's before and he was the first one to ever make the connection his treatments happened around the full moon. "I actually hadn't realised that was the case." Remus laughed.

"It's not like you're a werewolf or anything" his boss said in such a serious tone and Remus made a nervous laugh. "Even with you being off sick a few days each month your work performance has been exceptional also you haven't taken holidays since you started or any other days off excluding your special sick leave that was arranged before you started, I just wanted to remind you that you are entitled to holidays and days off."

Remus left the office stunned, he'd got a raise, the first raise he'd ever got, not counting Hogwarts and even then he thought that Albus had only given him a raise because he felt sorry for him. A raise he'd actually earned from his hard work. When he looked back Seto Kaiba was pacing back and forwards in his office.

"I wonder what upset him this time" one of the girls that came from the head office said in heavily accented English. "You didn't mention anything about magic did you?"

"Magic?" Remus asked, genuinely confused. "I mentioned no such thing."

"Oh yeah, I've seen him like this several times. Usually after a phone call with Mr Pegasus or Miss Ishtar. Pacing back and forwards muttering there's no such thing as magic. He's an eccentric one if you ask me especially when it comes to his obsession with dragons."

"You should've seen him after Duellist Kingdom and Battle City" the first girl told them.

"I still can't believe that he competed in Duellist Kingdom just after being in hospital for three months."

He wondered for a moment if Miss Ishtar was any relation to the Miss Ishtar who was currently teaching Divination at Hogwarts and why his boss had been in hospital for so long.

KC

As soon as Seto had walked into the London branch he could sense that there was something different about Remus Lupin. There was something about him that that he didn't understand. He sensed something different about the man compared to everyone else in the office and most people he came across and dealt with on a regular basis. He glanced at the sickly man. Today wasn't the first time he'd seen him. The first time had been when he'd come to the London branch to check how the transition from Weapons Company to Gaming Company was affecting the staff. Remus Lupin had been a sickly looking man whom been wearing clothing that were well worn and should've been retired long before hand. He had a homeless air about him. He was glad to see that he looked more professional now then when he'd first been hired. If it wasn't for the fact he did excellent work he would've fired him two years ago. He hadn't noticed anything different about him back then that was giving him this feeling. But that was also before the he'd become involved with Yugi. Before he'd known of the existence of the Millennium Items. Ever since his first encounter with Yugi Moto he'd been able to sense what Ishizu told him was magic. Not that he believed in magic, oh no he'd much prefer to think that he'd gone crazy and in a way he had gone crazy. Some of the things he'd done where borderline insane.

He paced around his small London office muttering to himself, aware that the staff where looking in on him through the glass window. There was no such thing as magic. He had to calm himself. Try to clear his mind. Why had he mentioned werewolves? There was no such thing! It was pure coincidence that his name had connection to wolves and his sick leave coincided with the full moon.

He managed to pull himself back together and one by one everyone in the London branch office had a meeting with the young CEO. Not everyone's meeting had gone as well as Remus's. Several employees' left his office in tears.

KC

It was Christmas Eve and he'd had a quiet dinner with Mokuba. One that he'd cooked himself. It wasn't often that he cooked. He was often too busy but made the point of cooking for the Christmas Eve, Christmas day, Easter, his birthday, Mokuba's birthday and his their dads death anniversary. The anniversary of his father death was also the day they spoke about their mother since she'd died the day Mokuba was born and he'd wanted Mokuba's birthday to be a happy day. Not a day of mourning though he couldn't help thinking of his mother anyway. He looked at his younger brother who'd fallen asleep in front of the fire. It was still early, a lot earlier then Mokuba normally went to bed. He picked up the young boy and carried him to his room. Tucking him into bed and brushing the hair from out of his eyes and kissing his forehead, just like his mother and father used to do for him when he was a child. "I love you Mokie," he told the younger boy before turning off the lights and walking out of the room. He'd finished all his staff interviews of the London branch office and would be returning to Japan in a few days time. There was nothing he needed to do work wise till he returned to Japan in a few days time. He was restless and couldn't sleep since he was used to doing work at all hours of the night. There was something he needed to do before he headed back to Japan. Something he hadn't had time for since he'd been busy with work, something that wasn't work related. He walked to his room and dressed in his white suit and put on his purple coat since it was cold out and informed Roland he was going out for a drive.

He drove to a small country town to pay a visit to his father who had died when he was eight years old. His father moved them to England for a fresh start after his mother died and had been a doctor at a local practice. He and Mokuba had been sent back to Japan to live with their relatives on his mother's side after his father's death. He parked his car outside the cemetery and walked to his father's grave which hadn't been maintained since he was last in London. He sat at the grave pulling weeds and telling his father about school, work, Mokuba and his duel rivalry with Yugi Moto. It always made him sad to know that his parents were buried on different continents. He'd visit the grave with Mokuba just before they returned to Japan, but he always liked his father's grave to look well maintained when his brother saw it.

He been talking to his father for a while and was feeling the chill of the weather on his face, his nose in particular. The grave was now free of weeds and moss, the headstone cleaned. He was feeling at peace for the first time in a while when that peace was disturbed by a strange tingly sensation from a distance behind him. "Who's there?" Seto turned around frantically looking around the grave yard. He wasn't expecting anyone to be there at this time of night. Normally he was undisturbed when he visited at this time of night. He was wondering if it was paparazzi, an enemy threat, someone else visiting a relative like he was doing, just some silly kids or something else entirely.

What he saw were two teenagers around his age. A boy and a girl. They looked like deer in the headlight and where pointing sticks at him. He was tempted to pull out his gun.

"We didn't realise there was anyone else here," the girl told him nervously. The boy was holding a wreath of roses in his stick free hand and laid it down at the grave they were standing at. Wiping tears away. They looked down at the grave nervously and back at him.

Seto didn't have time for small talk with teenagers and walked to the entrance of the graveyard. Like him they'd been visiting a relative when they didn't want to be seen by other people.

KC

He didn't feel quite ready to go back to his mansion so ended up going for a walk, following a path he used to know very well to the house where his family used to live. He glanced at the building that had been in ruins since he was a child. A memorial was placed at the location. This time however instead of an obelisk there was a statue of two adults and a toddler. He'd never seen before. It didn't make sense to change the war memorial to a family statue. Normally with abandoned blocks like that one the kids would dare each other to go in. But for some reason no one even mentioned the place. Everyone just stayed away. He continued on his way to his old family home. A smile graced his lips as he looked at the stood outside the double story stone home with thatch room. Happy memories of his long gone past came flooding in. He had been so happy while living here with his brother and father. That happiness had been shattered when his father had died. A school bus accident during a field trip which his father had volunteered for. Seto had survived but not without injury he was very lucky to be alive after that accident. He managed to get out of the bus and run to the day care his brother was at and tell his brother that their father was dead before falling unconscious. Even though he looked fine from the outside he had many internal injuries, a punctured lung, internal bleeding, skull fracture along with many other things that should've killed him. He could hear screams and at first he thought they were a part of his memories of the other students and adults on the bus screaming but then he realised that they were not from any of his memories. It was from a house nearby he could hear screams. His first instinct was that Mokuba was in trouble and needed help. So even though he knew his brother wasn't there, a part of him told him that he needed to check to make sure it wasn't his brother and to help whomever was in trouble. He ran towards the house of screams and saw a familiar sight. The house that once belonged to an old lady who used to give him home made chocolates and marshmallow on his way home from school. The screaming stopped and he heard a loud crack, the door was unlocked when he tried the handle. The stench of death hit him as soon as he came through the door. He made his way through the house checking each room finding nothing downstairs. As soon as he was upstairs he saw her, the old lady who was always so kind. The same one from his childhood. She was an lot older then he'd last seen her. She was unfortunately dead and had been for a long time. There was no sign of the disturbance which had alerted him to the house in the first place. He pulled out his phone intending to call Roland to arrange for someone to alert authorities to the deceased woman. He was scrolling through his phone contact list when he heard another crack. Turning around he came face to face with a group of robed people and a strange looking balled pale man with no nose. A snake that had been hiding in the room made it presence known and moved towards the man, eventually slithering its way up the pale man's body and wrapped itself loosely around the balled man's neck.

"Are you the ones who killed Mrs Bagshot?" Seto asked of the strange group wondering if they'd been in the house the whole time and why he didn't notice them earlier.

"You knew Bathilda," the creepy man asked him with a smooth commanding voice.

"She was an old neighbour," Seto replied. Reaching for his gun but keeping it hidden for the time being. He watched as the whole group pointed sticks at him. "What is it with people and sticks today? Two teenagers also pointed sticks at me earlier this evening."

"The boys a muggle," he told everyone who then laughed and leered at him.

"That's not a word I'm familiar with." Seto frowned at the unfamiliar word wondering if it was British slang that he'd never come across before. After all he normally dealt with office workers and contractors. He didn't talk to them in a relaxed environment.

"Let's find out what the boy knows before we have our fun with him." The man circled him and pointed his stick at him and muttered the word "Legilimens." In felt like his mind was being raped, just like when he'd duelled against Maximillion Pegasus. "Ah he saw Potter and the mudblood Granger girl in the local graveyard not that long ago. Standing over his mummy and daddy's grave crying." The strange mans announced in a taunting tone. "He entered the house when he heard Potter scream but they are long gone now." The others made sounds of disappointment. "Let's see what else this muggle knows before we have our fun and kill him."

He was now shuffling through memories and some of them very private. It was affecting his soul. Some of the fragmented pieces he spent months pulling back together where coming apart again. To much more and he'd end up in a coma again. The last thing he wanted to do was spend months pulling himself back together. He'd missed out on so much the last time and he couldn't do that to Mokuba again. His deck glowed as he started to concentrate on getting this man out of his head. The stranger hissed and stepped back as Seto succeeded in one fluid motion he pulled out his gun ignored the pounding of his head and shot the stranger. He'd missed hitting a vital.

"I want him alive," the man hissed before one of his loyal servants grabbed him and disappeared.

The rest of the group surrounded him further, pointed sticks at him shouting out unfamiliar words. He was hit with excruciating pain like he was being electrocuted and lost control of his body and fell to the floor in a heap. He heard an insane laugh from a woman as he crumbled. Once the pain stopped he attempted to sit. "Is that all you've got." He sneered at the woman who had laughed. He was hit over and over again until he finally fell unconscious.