Series Title: Gifts of Power||Title: Breaking Barriers
Characters: Mokuba, Seto, Noah||Pairing: N/A
Chapter Word Count: 2,646||Story Word Count: 2,646||Chapter Count: 1/3
Genre: Family||Rated: G
Challenge: Diversity Writing, H5, three-shot; Dice Gods Challenge: Mokuba; Word Count Set Boot Camp, #6, 8,000; Character Diversity Boot Camp, #26, sent
Notes: This takes place in the same world as Dragonsight and details what Seto and Mokuba were doing before, during, and after Kisara's unwanted attack on the city.
Summary: There was a very good reason why Seto didn't help with a mind-controlled Kisara attacking the city. It's a little hard to do so when you're not actually in the same world.

Mokuba didn't always like being ignored. Most people paid far more attention to his brother than they did to him, finding a dragon tamer, the world's finest duelist – Mokuba did not actually care who the official 'King of Games' was, he knew his brother's skills – and one of the richest people in the entire world to be more interesting than his little brother.

Sometimes that annoyed him. It wasn't as if he didn't have his own skills and powers.

Right now, he thoroughly enjoyed being ignored, because he got a front row seat to his brother verbally shredding an idiot who thought he could pull off the little scheme he'd put together.

Honestly, what kind of an idiot walks into big brother's office and just tells him to hand over all of his dragon records, like they're some kind of a burden to him?

Mokuba wished he had popcorn right now. But he'd been busy doing some small practicing with his own skills and that required a laptop more than it did a snack. His fingers continued to fly over the keyboard while he paid just enough attention to the man standing in front of his brother to get what information he needed.

Let's see… His mind reached out to touch the international web. Noah? Are you there?

That was a ridiculous question. Noah was always there, because Noah had nowhere else to be. His attention might not necessarily be on what Mokuba wanted to know, but he would be there.

And he always kept an eye out for Mokuba's calls anyway. Part o that made Mokuba a trifle nervous: they didn't have the best history, after all. But today it could be useful.

Yes?

Noah appeared in Mokuba's mind in the flawless image of who he'd once been: heir to the Kaiba corporation and a young genius with the same gift Mokuba himself had: technopathy. Noah had it on an entirely different level now that he lived in the data world.

We've got a small issue, Mokuba said, quite glad that thought and data moved at such speeds. Seto would keep the idiot talking while he and Noah worked out what was going on and figured out how to put a stop to it.

Do tell.

In quick bursts Mokuba passed what they knew on: that this dimwit strolled up through the security features with a couple of small dragons at his heels – already offending Seto since he'd done so without asking so much as a breath of permission to bring strange dragons into his territory – and casually demanding that Seto turn over his dragon records.

It took Noah a few minutes to stop laughing. Once he did, he had a single question.

Does brother intend to throw him out a window?

Technically Noah wasn't their brother. They didn't share any blood with one another. But they'd been adopted by his father after Noah's not-death and legally they were related.

Mokuba sort of suspected that a lack of siblings in his original life was what kept Noah calling them that now. He'd never asked. Some things he didn't want confirmed.

I think he wants to. That was only a tiny fib. Mokuba knew his big brother very well and from the moment the interloper crossed into Domino City without clearing his dragons, and without being a proper dragon tamer, let alone trying to demand all the records of Seto's dragons, he'd all but signed his own death warrant.

Not to mention that just being around him made Mokuba's hackles rise. He wasn't a dragon himself, but you couldn't hang around them as much as he and his brother did and not pick up on a few things. Something was really off about this guy and Mokuba wanted him out of the city before anything actually happened.

He tilted his head, bringing his attention back to the somewhat conversation going on between the stranger and his brother.

"They're nothing but dumb beasts, Kaiba-san, as I'm certain any dragon tamer would agree. Why else would they need to be tamed in the first place?" The stranger smiled a smile that he'd surely practiced a thousand times. Mokuba wanted to wipe it off of his face, and maybe wipe his mouth off his face while he was at it. "Someone with your skills and talents shouldn't waste his time with brutes like that. I can take them off of your hands."

"You've said the same thing four different ways already and my answer is the same as it was then: no." Seto tapped one finger on his desk in a particular coded pattern. Mokuba knew what that meant: get security.

That took a grand total of three seconds, since he just had to send a silent text over to that department. Someone would be on the way within a minute: one rule of KaibaCorp was that there were always two security members ready to go up to the boss's office, no matter what. They didn't get assigned to anything else when that was their role on the roster.

Not that Seto or Mokuba especially needed the help to defend themselves. Seto had an army of dragons who would gladly eat anyone who annoyed him too much, and if he were feeling in the mood, he could always use a certain tool of his that Mokuba knew he didn't especially like, but knew how to use. As for Mokuba himself… a technopath of his level had a lot more uses for the internet than just generic porn.

He glanced back to see the results of Noah's quick search for information on their intruder. There wasn't much interesting there; he'd come from a perfectly ordinary town, didn't have any real powers of his own, but an apparent knack for discovering enchanted items. Mokuba thought that should probably count as an actual power, or at least a useful ability. He could've made a decent living off that alone.

Then something else caught his eye: the stranger had made a recent trip out of the country, and come back with a couple of items that he insisted were magical, even if no one else could detect anything in them.

The images of what he'd brought flashed up on the screen with little more than a thought turned that way. Mokuba stared at them, a slow scrape of fear creeping its way up his spine.

I don't like it either. Those are old magic. Almost as old as the Millennium Items.

Mokuba wasn't going to disagree with Noah. He didn't know where the magic came from, but from the designs on those images, he could tell they were related to dragons somehow.

There hadn't always been dragon tamers. Most histories pinpointed their development to somewhere in the last couple of centuries, as dragons began to be more integrated into human society. No one knew where dragons even came from, only that there were on occasion people born in the world who could become dragons. It didn't come from one's parents and it didn't always get passed down to one's children.

There were also dragons who couldn't become human but there weren't many dragons who weren't at least as intelligent as humans, whether or not they could speak in human tongues.

Part of Seto's duties as a dragon tamer was to learn about dragons, to figure out a way for dragons to live peacefully with others. Sometimes this required knocking heads together. Seto was good at that part of his job.

Part of those duties also included protecting dragons from anyone who wanted to hurt them that the dragons couldn't somehow manage for themselves. Seto was extremely good at that part of his job.

In the few seconds it took for all of that to warp through Mokuba's mind, he could see the stranger getting angrier and angrier.

"If you won't give me what I want, then I'll just take it myself!"

Mokuba was already on his feet and Seto as well, reaching for something under his desk: the Millennium Rod. Mokuba knew that he didn't use it except in extreme emergencies, but anything that he considered a threat to KaibaCorp qualified.

If the stranger had intended violence on either Seto or Mokuba, then there would've been no contest at all. Seto would've had the Rod out on time to stop him and much of what happened afterward wouldn't have.

Only the stranger moved fast, faster than either of them judged, and a small blue sphere crashed down at his feet, filling the room with a thick, foul smoke that filled their throats and blinded their eyes, and Mokuba couldn't stop coughing. Nor could Seto; Mokuba could hear him clearly, even through his own coughing.

There were other noises, such as feet moving around and something being thrown here and there, and then Mokuba couldn't keep himself on his feet anymore.

The last thing he found himself fully aware of was Noah's voice in the back of his mind shouting something he couldn't understand, and then a horrible pain racked through him, and he couldn't see or hear anything at all.

"Mokuba. Mokuba!"

It drifted into his mind that Mokuba was him and therefore someone was calling to him. He thought he blinked. He didn't know for certain. He did know that he tried to wake up and he wasn't doing a very good job of it.

He groaned somewhere in there. Now he could feel hands on his shoulders, shaking him, and he tried to blink again. This time he did it, and when his eyes opened, he could see a little.

Not much. There weren't any lights on. That wasn't right. The KaibaCorp building was designed so that even in a power outage, they had backup generators ready to kick in. There should've been something that would give light.

Only there wasn't. At least not the lights that he expected. As his senses slowly put themselves back together, he realized that what he now saw by were candles, dozens of them set all over.

His big brother prepared for everything.

And now Seto sat near him, staring at him, far more worry than anyone else would see in those blue eyes of his.

"Mokuba?" There was quiet concern in his voice. Mokuba pushed himself up a little, his head spinning a bit still.

"I'm all right," he tried to reassure Seto. He didn't think that was absolutely true, but the less his brother had to worry about, the sooner they could get this sorted out. "What happened?"

"It was that idiot. I never did get his name." Seto snarled the words out, his anger focused on that fool most of all. "I don't know what that gas of his did other than knock us out, but he ransacked the place looking for my dragon records."

Mokuba sat up a little more, wincing. He needed something to drink; his throat cracked and parched. No sooner had the thought crossed his mind than Seto set a bottled water in front of him. He drank it down while hearing the rest of what happened.

"He didn't find them." Seto flashed a smile that most of his dragon friends would've been very proud of.

Mokuba wasn't surprised. He knew all along where Seto's records were kept and the stranger hadn't had a chance of finding them.

He looked around again. This was far too dark for afternoon. He glanced back at Seto, whose thought processes seemed to have followed his own.

"That was a few hours ago. It's almost midnight." Seto's eyes flashed with rage. "He did something to the power system and a few other things before he left, and I can't figure out how to undo them yet. I don't think it's technopathic in nature, but I can't get any of the lights on or the doors to open. I can't even get in touch with security."

Mokuba jerked his head around to where he'd been sitting. His laptop wasn't where it had been, but he quickly caught sight of it: knocked onto the floor, battered and broken. He could get it repaired or replaced within a day, since it was KaibaCorp issue, but until he did that, or until he could connect to another system or they could get the building systems going again, he didn't have a connection to anything.

That sent a strong chill of its own all through him. He hadn't been disconnected for the last three years. Even if he wasn't using the internet or the systems for anything at all – and he kind of always low-level monitored everything in KaibaCorp for any sort of problems – it was a part of him. This was almost like losing an arm or a leg.

I'll get it back, though. This was worse than if the power had been knocked out in a storm. Not only did they have the back-ups if that happened, but in that case, he could've hooked himself easily into something else to help with repairs.

Now he just had to wait. Kaibas, by blood or by adoption, weren't very good at waiting.

Seto stood up. "I've been trying to get in touch with any of my dragons, but nothing works. It's like I can't reach beyond the building itself."

Mokuba considered that carefully. "Doesn't sound like anything I know of." He hated not being able to find the instant information on what the situation was. How was he going to help his brother like this?

Seto stared at the black space that had replaced the windows. Normally they had a magnificent view of Domino City. Now Mokuba couldn't even see the stars, let alone any of the city lights.

That wasn't right at all. Even with the power out, they should've been able to see the stars.

He steadied himself on his feet, taking his time to get more assured of his balance before he headed over to the window. They did have bullet-proof glass there, and shields that could come down in case of certain other threats, but they didn't look like this.

Like a curtain of nothingness hanging just beyond his touch.

He shuddered at the thought, turning as Seto came up behind him, staring at the emptiness outside as if personally offended by it.

He probably was. Nothing that could get the jump on him like this wouldn't offend him.

"What about the phone lines?" They needed to try anything and everything they could to get through all of this. The idea of asking for help wasn't one that came naturally to either of them but sometimes allowances had to be made.

Seto shook his head. "I tried already. They're not working."

Something about all of that started to click into place into Mokuba's head. He stared back at the windows, trying to work it all into a pattern that made sense.

"So we don't have power, we can't communicate with the outside, and it almost looks like we're not even in Domino City anymore," Mokuba said, each tiny piece fitting into place.

Seto nodded, sharp eyes focused on his brother. Mokuba warmed at the thought that even without his usual connections, Seto counted on him to be useful, to help.

"I think he might've done some kind of space twisting." Mokuba started to gesture towards the remains of his laptop. "Noah and I saw a little about him before that. He had two items he dug up from somewhere out of the country. One could control dragons. I didn't check on the other one, but I wouldn't be surprised if that's what did this."

He waved all around at that. Seto folded his arms across his chest and stared thoughtfully at everything around them.

"How do we twist it back, then?"

Mokuba considered that carefully before he answered. "I haven't the faintest idea."

To Be Continued

Notes: A new chapter will be posted on Friday for the next two weeks. You people wanted to know what the Kaibas did, so now you're going to find out!