Helper of Dragons
Seto Kaiba was in possession of several randomization programs, and he made liberal use of them in the test run of the Deck Companion. He had reached the point where he quite frankly did not give half a damn about the interior decoration the computer spat out, as long as the Companion's purpose was achieved.
It wasn't as much work as it would have been if it had been necessary to put it together from scratch. He already had three-dimensional images of all the Duel Monsters created for the various duel systems he had designed, not to mention the Legendary Heroes game, and it was a relatively simple matter to adapt them. Many had access to a range of facial expressions in order to add a special touch of realism; this was most useful for his current purposes.
Seto justified his efforts by telling himself this was not for his own pleasure, or even for Mokuba's. It was a perfectly marketable concept and was capable of bringing in a considerable amount of money, target audience being the more sentimental sort of duelist- such as Yugi- who would dearly love to interact with their Duel Monsters as friends. But for now it was for him alone.
He trained himself to get to sleep as quickly as possible in order to cut down on time in bed, and when he could not sleep he worked on it some more. Seto had been going at the basic blocking-out of the Blue-Eyes White Dragons for hours, sometimes not knowing exactly what he had trusted instinct to do; he excused this by telling himself that this was the first version and he could be more precise later on. He tinkered again and again with the exact eye color of their invented human forms, the way the white-blond hair fell and how it shimmered in the light, their respectful smiles. He made one of them look quite a bit like Mokuba.
After them he turned to Maha Vailo and Hyozanryu and Battle Ox and Rude Kaiser and the others. He plugged them all into the randomizer; after all, they weren't the point.
One night, long after a reluctant Mokuba had been coaxed to bed, Seto leaned back and surveyed his rough draft.
~~~
Ryuunosuke took note of the latest change in their confinement. There had been new portals before; these generally built on the gap that dated back to when their Duel Monsters cards were created, when they all came out of Dreaming. There were portals for arenas and each type of duel disk, and for the mimicking-reality game.
This resembled the latter considerably more; he ran a mental hand over it, picking up details. It had apparently been created through serendipity, someone leaving many things to chance. Also- and this was the strangest of all- this did not seem to be made for them to go through it; it seemed more like a portal for others to come through to them.
He finished writing and closed the book, not forgetting to lock it. The book went on the desk, the key was deposited in its usual location, and then he relaxed and went to sleep. Or tried to.
Sleep was a luxury. Sometimes he was jolted out of it and had to toss on his dueling armor in a record time to be able to enter the portal and emerge on the other side without suspicious delays. Other times there was plenty of opportunity to do it, but he simply couldn't get himself to take the opportunity.
The door banged open. "Ryuu?"
Even before the visitor spoke Ryuunosuke knew. "Yes, Sapphire?"
"I had a dream that made no sense." Sapphire seated himself on the edge of the bed. "And it wasn't a nightmare." Aside from the years in Dreaming Sapphire was twelve, even though in his true form he was nearly indistinguishable from the twins. "I think something's wrong with me... there's no way Corry or Mat could've had dreams like the one I had!"
Ryuunosuke shook his head. "There isn't anything wrong with you. You aren't them, you know."
"I know," said Sapphire, "but I want to be. This is wrong! I should've hated it! I should've never wanted to see anything like it ever again! And I... Ryuu, I wanted it to happen again. If Corry or Mat find out about this..."
The name on Ryuunosuke's card was Lord of Dragons; they had all had a laugh over that misnomer. A more appropriate title, Corundum (Ryuunosuke had never thought of him as Corry; too casual) had said once, would be Helper of Dragons. That was the literal translation of his name, after all. He tried to live up to it. "You're their brother. People don't abandon their brothers because of something like that."
Sapphire nodded. Ryuunosuke was sure he could think of numerous exceptions, but that he was choosing to ignore them in the interests of peace of mind.
"Thanks. You know, they hate Pegasus just as much as they hate Master Kaiba." Ryuunosuke, having no idea what else to do, nodded. "Do you hate him?"
Ryuunosuke shook his head. "How can you really hate something you've never seen?"
~~~
Seto looked over the program and nodded in satisfaction. The randomizers were used in a lot of places, true, but he could always cut down on them later.
He tried to get himself to wait until morning, when he could think straight and Mokuba could help, but he couldn't wait. This was his gift to himself, and like Mokuba come Christmas, he couldn't help but tear away the wrapping paper a little early. The exit protocols had been thoroughly checked for bugs, so there was absolutely no way he could become trapped in this game. It was the only part of the program on which he spent so much time as to rival the time he spent working on the Blue-Eyes.
Seto slid into the pod, inserted the deck, and pressed buttons. The glass slid down, and the Deck Companion started up. All was as it should be.
He spent perhaps sixty seconds suspended in pure white. The words came to him as if they had passed through the auditory equivalent of fog.
"They hate him just as much as they hate Master Kaiba. Do you hate him?"
"How can you really hate something you've never seen?"
"Well, they've seen him. They didn't like him."
The white began to clear away, revealing still-indistinct shapes. Seto felt floor underneath his shoes.
"And Ryuu, why do you always have to have that picture? It makes me look like I really am a dratted Toon-"
Someone gasped, and the white fragmented, the shreds of it fading away.
Seto promptly gasped in response.
He recognized the human form of one of the Blue-Eyes White Dragons, the one who he had designed to bear a distinct resemblance to Mokuba. He probably would never have recognized the other one if he hadn't seen the Flute of Summoning Dragon lying on the desk.
But what really caught Seto's eye was the locket.
It was on a white silk cord fastened about the neck, a simple rectangle that reminded Seto of the one around his own. This one even had a little door to open to reveal a picture; the door was currently open and the picture showed.
And it was of the Blue-Eyes before him right now, human form but perhaps a year or so younger, wearing clothes that made Seto think of when they studied Japan in history class, arms swinging by his sides in a relaxed manner, smiling, laughing. Not so much like one of those godforsaken Toons, Seto decided, as a regular child.
Like Mokuba.
His voice was a whisper. "What are your names?"
Blue eyes widened. "I'm Sapphire. Erm, welcome, Master Kaiba. Oh, and I'm not a girl."
The other's whisper was even softer than Seto's own. "My name is Ryuunosuke."
Seto frowned. "Where are all the others?"
Sapphire looked away. "... they're having a party."
Well, this was an unexpected development. "So where is this party?"
~~~
The others, Seto gathered as they rode the elevator down (the Duel Monsters had apparently taken architectural hints from the KaibaCorp building), were Corundum and Tiamat the other two Blue-Eyes, Maha (Vailo), Kongou ("but most everyone calls her Icy," said Sapphire, "because Hyouzan means iceberg"), and many others.
As they reached the ground floor Seto said, "I didn't program this."
Sapphire shrugged. "All the others made us go through to you. I guess this one has you go through to us. Oh, and we've got a few over from other... decks, I think that's the word. Is that all right with you?"
The doors were open before Seto had a chance to reply.
A girl who looked about Seto's age-another Blue-Eyes, must be Tiamat- someone Seto just barely recognized as Maha Vailo in modern clothes, and a girl with powder blue hair ("That's Icy," Sapphire whispered) all sat at a table, fiddling with what looked like Tangrams. Maha Vailo looked up and gave him a contemptuous glance before returning her attention to the Tangrams.
The final Blue-Eyes, Corundum, played chess with an unidentifiable teenager, from the other deck Sapphire mentioned, Seto guessed. After a good thirty seconds of Seto focusing his gaze, Corundum looked up and regarded him with just as cold a stare. "Oh," he said, "hello, Master Kaiba."
Corundum sounded, Seto reflected, like a more controlled version of the Big Five's greeting upon his return from Duelist Kingdom. All politeness, no true respect whatsoever.
It went on quite slowly, some of the Duel Monsters treating him with fanatical reverence; others, like Corundum and Maha Vailo, regarding him as if he were a little lost puppy who had wandered in and who they were tolerating because they didn't feel like throwing him out.
Sapphire was right. He had gone through whatever barrier there was to them; now he was on their territory.
~~~
Corundum looked over the board and smiled. "I dub you," he said, sliding his bishop into Gaia's king, "a dead knight." He frowned as he noticed that Gaia the Fierce Knight's attention was clearly directed elsewhere.
Gaia jerked back around. "Sorry." He lowered his voice. "It's just that... Yugi's never been to see us, but yours is walking about right now."
"I'd rather," Corundum growled, "have Yugi walking about. He, unlike Kaiba, is apparently sane."
"Aren't you being unusually harsh?"
Corundum swept the pieces off the board and began to reset them. "If he wants forgiveness, he can come and ask for it."
~~~
This wasn't right, he argued to himself. Why should he care about what digital renderings of Blue-Eyes White Dragons thought of him? He certainly hadn't expected them to behave like this, of course, but that could be remedied. All he had to do was exit the program and tinker with it some more, until it worked out the way it should. Take out all those randomizers, to start with.
But Seto did not feel particularly inclined to resort to that. Perhaps he could spend some more time here, try and pinpoint the exact error so he'd spend less time searching for it once he had gone.
At least, that was what he told himself.
"Ryuunosuke?"
"Yes?"
"I need to talk to you."
"Tell me," he said once they were in more-or-less privacy back in the room where he had begun, "what do you think I've done wrong?"
Ryuunosuke, sitting beside him on the bed, fidgeted slightly, reminding Seto of when he was ten and required to wear an exceedingly itchy formal suit. "I think it started with Obelisk."
Seto blinked. "Obelisk? But it's gone."
Another few fidgets. "How can I explain this? You see, Maha really didn't like being sacrificed like that. Corundum next- he said you didn't care anything about us once you got something better, so why should we care anything about you?"
Seto winced; he could see where the argument was coming from. "And they would prefer... say, Yugi, then?"
Ryuunosuke looked like he was regretting ever opening his mouth. "...some of them."
"But what about you? What do you think of me?"
"I don't know what to think!" Ryuunosuke yelled. Seto jerked back and gaped. Ryuunosuke looked down. "I apologize, but I really don't. There's one thing and there's another thing, and..."
It was extremely vexatious to be informed that you had lost something before you even knew you had it. If only Seto had known of the sentience of the Duel Monsters earlier. Then perhaps he would have behaved differently, done something to avert the current situation.
What could he have done? Never use Obelisk again? Hear them whispering, "He had that powerful card, practically a ticket to winning the whole thing, but he didn't use it. What a moron."
He had to face the facts. Even if he had known, he probably would have gone on and done it anyway. After all, did you ask chess pawns whether they wanted to be sacrificed?
There was no winning this game.
Oh well. Seto could always just exit, delete the program, walk away, and go on with his life exactly as it had been before...
... or not.
"I'll be back in a while," he said. "All right?" Ryuunosuke nodded. "Exit program."
~~~
He vanished with the suddenness with which he had appeared. Ryuunosuke stared at the empty space for a while. When sleep finally looked like a possibility, Corundum opened the door. "Is he gone?"
Ryuunosuke was not in the best of moods and would have liked for once to give him an acid retort, such as, "If you looked around the room, you'd see your answer." But he didn't. He nodded.
"I expect the portal'll be closing soon."
Of course after that Ryuunosuke stayed up all night, but the portal remained open, even if no-one came through it.
~~~
Upon emerging Seto first looked at the calendar to verify that the next day was a weekend. He proceeded to get a large dose of sleep.
Then, at approximately eight in the morning, he went to the nearest telephone and dialed.
"Hello, Turtle Game Shop, how may I help you?"
"Yugi."
"Kaiba?"
"Come over to the corporation building immediately."
"... Kaiba, what are you up to?"
"Just come. And bring your deck. And no, it's not a duel."
"Not a duel? Then what is it?"
"Just come here, all right? It's very important."
"How so?"
"You'll see."
Click.
~~~
Yugi viewed the VR pod with considerable suspicion- even more so when Kaiba asked him to climb into it, recalling the last experience he had had with it. Then Kaiba turned to one of the machines and showed him the listings of Duel Monsters, asking what others of Yugi's he had missed, spoke of Lord of Dragons and Blue-Eyes White Dragons, and Yugi was sold.
~~~
Once instructions were given, the deck was inserted, and the Companion started up once more, Seto had brunch delivered to the room. He ate while watching the status screens and making notes, while seeing Yugi move about in the world that was so much more than the bits and bytes he had put into it.
His experience was apparently much better than Seto's. The world of Yugi's deck was considerably less technological; it had an old-fashioned air to it, with ancient Egyptian and medieval architecture and various other styles juxtaposed in such a way that it looked like it should be. Yugi moved through this like a tropical fish transplanted to someplace that was fundamentally the same as where it had come from.
None of Yugi's Duel Monsters gave him the look that Corundum had given Seto. None of them treated him like a little lost puppy who had wandered where he shouldn't have wandered.
So this was the heretofore-unseen upside to Yugi's techniques, his Heart of the Cards doctrine. His Duel Monsters liked him.
Yugi emerged at perhaps two and made a beeline for the lavatory. Upon his return Seto said, "So. Did you have a good time?"
Yugi nodded vigorously, beaming as he did so. "They said they'd been expecting me. Did you tell them I'd be coming?"
Seto winced. "No. Perhaps mine informed yours."
Yugi, instead of laughing and assuming it a joke, nodded again, quite solemnly. "They said they'd been to visit your deck the other night. They said they'd seen you there." Finally, finally, Seto realized who the boy Corundum had been playing chess with was.
"This is real, then?"
Seto responded with his most brilliant, sophisticated, recommended-by-psychological-analyses reply. "What?"
Yugi looked up at him. "You didn't program this? It was really the Duel Monsters talking to me? Because... well... it was so real..."
Seto shrugged. "I'm not sure." But he was. "I certainly didn't intend it to be realistic to this extent."
After some small talk, Yugi very politely took his leave. Seto called a taxi for him, then climbed back into the pod and took it on its third run.
~~~
Ryuunosuke and Kongou loaded seemingly-endless piles of dishes from last night's party into the washer because it would be more efficient than disposing of them and then conjuring them all over again. Maha was cleaning up in the next room. The piles were thinning out when Seto appeared in yet another five-second light show.
"I apologize. I need to see Corundum."
Kongou regained her voice first, or at least was the first to make use of it. "You are aware that Corundum hates your guts, right?"
"That's why I want to see him."
She turned her eyes in the direction of the ceiling with the expression of a parent at the edge of her patience. "I thought you might have gone a tad wrong in the head before, but even then you retained basic survival instincts."
"I suppose I am wrong in the head. I want to see him."
"All right then," said Maha, entering with the mop slung over one shoulder, "if you want to die then I'm certainly not the one to stop you. He ought to be on the second floor. That's the computer lab. But you need a scan to get in, and-"
"I'll show him there," said Ryuunosuke quickly.
Maha laughed. "Ah, running off to leave us with the dirty work, now are you? Then again, I guess this is clean in comparison."
~~~
There was so much Seto didn't know about this place, and so few means to discover what he didn't know.
Surely the locket with a picture of Sapphire the Mokuba look-alike was more than just a coincidence. They took the elevator up; he asked then.
Ryuunosuke shrugged. "I just had the idea. Maha'd put together a picture taker, and we all got a copy. I think Corundum has one of these, too." Seto pulled out his own and opened the little door. Ryuunosuke nodded, apparently seeing the resemblance as well.
A metal door was directly opposite the elevator they departed; what was presumably a security device was affixed to the wall beside it. Ryuunosuke walked up and looked into the latter. After a moment something beeped and the doors opened.
Seto counted twenty compartments like those of KaibaCorp employees and one larger system at the opposite end, with Corundum seated at the larger system. He walked forward. "Excuse me?"
Corundum whirled and Seto took a step backward; in that moment he looked like he was going to toss off a White Lightning (Seto gained some bitter amusement from imagining a human spitting out a crackling electric sphere). "Who let you in?"
"Pardon?"
"Entry to this room is allowed only to people whose eye patterns are in the database. I know yours weren't in it."
"But mine are," said Ryuunosuke.
He was leaning against one of the compartment walls in an apparent attempt to act casual. It wasn't working, and Seto could hardly blame him.
Seto raised a hand and cut off anything Corundum might have said. "I didn't mean to intrude."
"You are intruding. Go away."
Ryuunosuke spoke again. "You know that if he had only come when you wanted him to, you would have put it off forever."
"And that would have been just fine with me."
"I wanted to apologize," said Seto, "for sacrificing half of the Duel Monsters in this building to Obelisk at one time or another. And various other events pertaining to the latter. That's all."
Corundum did not look too impressed by the recitation. "Any idiot can put together words."
"Corundum," said Ryuunosuke, "not every idiot could *say* those words, though."
Seto suspected that if it wasn't Ryuunosuke talking, Corundum really would have tossed off a White Lightning- or two- at that point. "That's true. But if everything could be expiated by words alone... well, then, I'm *sure* the world would be a much better place." The sarcasm was not lost on Ryuunosuke, who looked away.
"Of course not everything," said Seto. "But can't one at least try?"
"Right," Corundum drawled. "And what is the purpose of this sudden crisis of conscience? Did you just want to try out Yugi's philosophy?"
"It's very hard to disbelieve what is right in front of you. I believe this is much more than, as you said, a tryout."
"Really."
Seto nodded. "Really."
Corundum stood up and began to walk back and forth. "You missed the figurative boat, *Master* Kaiba. We already did it."
Seto blinked. "How so?"
"Don't you remember how you drew Tiamat's card just when you needed one of us?
"And the first time against the Masks... of course they weren't wearing masks then, but that doesn't matter. Yugi played a Kuriboh in defense mode. He didn't multiply it that time."
Seto nodded. Lord of Dragons, two Flutes of Summoning Dragon, the three Blue-Eyes, and Hyozanryu. It was one of his luckiest draws; he had half-expected Yugi to ask whether his deck had been stacked. "You were behind that? And Obelisk..."
"Ryuunosuke was, actually. Obelisk came along for the ride." Corundum laughed bitterly and continued to pace. "I wouldn't have gone along with it, but Ryuunosuke said to give you another chance. Show the whole deck that you really did care.
"And of course you had to behave like a lunatic-"
"-And sacrifice him to Obelisk," Seto cut him off. "I know."
~~~
Ryuunosuke looked on, refraining from speaking. His words would only break the balance required for this to be going on. Besides, what could he say?
"So if you do know, then tell me, why should I take your current words over your previous actions?"
"Have I ever lied to you before?"
"Of course not. You never spoke to me before." Corundum smiled. "Lying to me would have been difficult under those circumstances. You don't deserve to be forgiven."
"I understand your point. I don't suppose I would feel very much inclined to let it drop, either. I'm sorry. Exit-"
Corundum shook his head. "No, you misunderstand. Nobody deserves to be forgiven. Forgiveness, Master Kaiba, requires faith that has nothing to do with the magician."
"Faith?"
Corundum nodded. "Faith that you will not repeat what caused you to ask in the first place. Besides, I'm stuck with you, so I might as well. Just don't let what happened with Obelisk happen again.
"Seto Kaiba, show us you really care."
Seto nodded and looked around as if searching for appropriate parting words. His eyes settled on Ryuunosuke, and he said. "Thank you. Exit program."
~~~
Seto emerged from the pod to see Mokuba. After assuring his brother that no, he hadn't gotten into any trouble and yes, he could try it out later, he sat down at one of the machines and looked over the Deck Companion.
He recalled the last duel where he had used Obelisk, and how he had sacrificed all the other monsters except for Yugi's weepy Kuriboh.
He thought of Ryuunosuke and his locket.
He thought of Sapphire the Mokuba doppelganger.
He thought of Corundum's parting words. "Seto Kaiba, show us you really care."
He looked at the randomizers that had somehow interacted to give him entrance to the world he had just departed.
It was just fine the way it was, he decided.
Seto Kaiba was in possession of several randomization programs, and he made liberal use of them in the test run of the Deck Companion. He had reached the point where he quite frankly did not give half a damn about the interior decoration the computer spat out, as long as the Companion's purpose was achieved.
It wasn't as much work as it would have been if it had been necessary to put it together from scratch. He already had three-dimensional images of all the Duel Monsters created for the various duel systems he had designed, not to mention the Legendary Heroes game, and it was a relatively simple matter to adapt them. Many had access to a range of facial expressions in order to add a special touch of realism; this was most useful for his current purposes.
Seto justified his efforts by telling himself this was not for his own pleasure, or even for Mokuba's. It was a perfectly marketable concept and was capable of bringing in a considerable amount of money, target audience being the more sentimental sort of duelist- such as Yugi- who would dearly love to interact with their Duel Monsters as friends. But for now it was for him alone.
He trained himself to get to sleep as quickly as possible in order to cut down on time in bed, and when he could not sleep he worked on it some more. Seto had been going at the basic blocking-out of the Blue-Eyes White Dragons for hours, sometimes not knowing exactly what he had trusted instinct to do; he excused this by telling himself that this was the first version and he could be more precise later on. He tinkered again and again with the exact eye color of their invented human forms, the way the white-blond hair fell and how it shimmered in the light, their respectful smiles. He made one of them look quite a bit like Mokuba.
After them he turned to Maha Vailo and Hyozanryu and Battle Ox and Rude Kaiser and the others. He plugged them all into the randomizer; after all, they weren't the point.
One night, long after a reluctant Mokuba had been coaxed to bed, Seto leaned back and surveyed his rough draft.
~~~
Ryuunosuke took note of the latest change in their confinement. There had been new portals before; these generally built on the gap that dated back to when their Duel Monsters cards were created, when they all came out of Dreaming. There were portals for arenas and each type of duel disk, and for the mimicking-reality game.
This resembled the latter considerably more; he ran a mental hand over it, picking up details. It had apparently been created through serendipity, someone leaving many things to chance. Also- and this was the strangest of all- this did not seem to be made for them to go through it; it seemed more like a portal for others to come through to them.
He finished writing and closed the book, not forgetting to lock it. The book went on the desk, the key was deposited in its usual location, and then he relaxed and went to sleep. Or tried to.
Sleep was a luxury. Sometimes he was jolted out of it and had to toss on his dueling armor in a record time to be able to enter the portal and emerge on the other side without suspicious delays. Other times there was plenty of opportunity to do it, but he simply couldn't get himself to take the opportunity.
The door banged open. "Ryuu?"
Even before the visitor spoke Ryuunosuke knew. "Yes, Sapphire?"
"I had a dream that made no sense." Sapphire seated himself on the edge of the bed. "And it wasn't a nightmare." Aside from the years in Dreaming Sapphire was twelve, even though in his true form he was nearly indistinguishable from the twins. "I think something's wrong with me... there's no way Corry or Mat could've had dreams like the one I had!"
Ryuunosuke shook his head. "There isn't anything wrong with you. You aren't them, you know."
"I know," said Sapphire, "but I want to be. This is wrong! I should've hated it! I should've never wanted to see anything like it ever again! And I... Ryuu, I wanted it to happen again. If Corry or Mat find out about this..."
The name on Ryuunosuke's card was Lord of Dragons; they had all had a laugh over that misnomer. A more appropriate title, Corundum (Ryuunosuke had never thought of him as Corry; too casual) had said once, would be Helper of Dragons. That was the literal translation of his name, after all. He tried to live up to it. "You're their brother. People don't abandon their brothers because of something like that."
Sapphire nodded. Ryuunosuke was sure he could think of numerous exceptions, but that he was choosing to ignore them in the interests of peace of mind.
"Thanks. You know, they hate Pegasus just as much as they hate Master Kaiba." Ryuunosuke, having no idea what else to do, nodded. "Do you hate him?"
Ryuunosuke shook his head. "How can you really hate something you've never seen?"
~~~
Seto looked over the program and nodded in satisfaction. The randomizers were used in a lot of places, true, but he could always cut down on them later.
He tried to get himself to wait until morning, when he could think straight and Mokuba could help, but he couldn't wait. This was his gift to himself, and like Mokuba come Christmas, he couldn't help but tear away the wrapping paper a little early. The exit protocols had been thoroughly checked for bugs, so there was absolutely no way he could become trapped in this game. It was the only part of the program on which he spent so much time as to rival the time he spent working on the Blue-Eyes.
Seto slid into the pod, inserted the deck, and pressed buttons. The glass slid down, and the Deck Companion started up. All was as it should be.
He spent perhaps sixty seconds suspended in pure white. The words came to him as if they had passed through the auditory equivalent of fog.
"They hate him just as much as they hate Master Kaiba. Do you hate him?"
"How can you really hate something you've never seen?"
"Well, they've seen him. They didn't like him."
The white began to clear away, revealing still-indistinct shapes. Seto felt floor underneath his shoes.
"And Ryuu, why do you always have to have that picture? It makes me look like I really am a dratted Toon-"
Someone gasped, and the white fragmented, the shreds of it fading away.
Seto promptly gasped in response.
He recognized the human form of one of the Blue-Eyes White Dragons, the one who he had designed to bear a distinct resemblance to Mokuba. He probably would never have recognized the other one if he hadn't seen the Flute of Summoning Dragon lying on the desk.
But what really caught Seto's eye was the locket.
It was on a white silk cord fastened about the neck, a simple rectangle that reminded Seto of the one around his own. This one even had a little door to open to reveal a picture; the door was currently open and the picture showed.
And it was of the Blue-Eyes before him right now, human form but perhaps a year or so younger, wearing clothes that made Seto think of when they studied Japan in history class, arms swinging by his sides in a relaxed manner, smiling, laughing. Not so much like one of those godforsaken Toons, Seto decided, as a regular child.
Like Mokuba.
His voice was a whisper. "What are your names?"
Blue eyes widened. "I'm Sapphire. Erm, welcome, Master Kaiba. Oh, and I'm not a girl."
The other's whisper was even softer than Seto's own. "My name is Ryuunosuke."
Seto frowned. "Where are all the others?"
Sapphire looked away. "... they're having a party."
Well, this was an unexpected development. "So where is this party?"
~~~
The others, Seto gathered as they rode the elevator down (the Duel Monsters had apparently taken architectural hints from the KaibaCorp building), were Corundum and Tiamat the other two Blue-Eyes, Maha (Vailo), Kongou ("but most everyone calls her Icy," said Sapphire, "because Hyouzan means iceberg"), and many others.
As they reached the ground floor Seto said, "I didn't program this."
Sapphire shrugged. "All the others made us go through to you. I guess this one has you go through to us. Oh, and we've got a few over from other... decks, I think that's the word. Is that all right with you?"
The doors were open before Seto had a chance to reply.
A girl who looked about Seto's age-another Blue-Eyes, must be Tiamat- someone Seto just barely recognized as Maha Vailo in modern clothes, and a girl with powder blue hair ("That's Icy," Sapphire whispered) all sat at a table, fiddling with what looked like Tangrams. Maha Vailo looked up and gave him a contemptuous glance before returning her attention to the Tangrams.
The final Blue-Eyes, Corundum, played chess with an unidentifiable teenager, from the other deck Sapphire mentioned, Seto guessed. After a good thirty seconds of Seto focusing his gaze, Corundum looked up and regarded him with just as cold a stare. "Oh," he said, "hello, Master Kaiba."
Corundum sounded, Seto reflected, like a more controlled version of the Big Five's greeting upon his return from Duelist Kingdom. All politeness, no true respect whatsoever.
It went on quite slowly, some of the Duel Monsters treating him with fanatical reverence; others, like Corundum and Maha Vailo, regarding him as if he were a little lost puppy who had wandered in and who they were tolerating because they didn't feel like throwing him out.
Sapphire was right. He had gone through whatever barrier there was to them; now he was on their territory.
~~~
Corundum looked over the board and smiled. "I dub you," he said, sliding his bishop into Gaia's king, "a dead knight." He frowned as he noticed that Gaia the Fierce Knight's attention was clearly directed elsewhere.
Gaia jerked back around. "Sorry." He lowered his voice. "It's just that... Yugi's never been to see us, but yours is walking about right now."
"I'd rather," Corundum growled, "have Yugi walking about. He, unlike Kaiba, is apparently sane."
"Aren't you being unusually harsh?"
Corundum swept the pieces off the board and began to reset them. "If he wants forgiveness, he can come and ask for it."
~~~
This wasn't right, he argued to himself. Why should he care about what digital renderings of Blue-Eyes White Dragons thought of him? He certainly hadn't expected them to behave like this, of course, but that could be remedied. All he had to do was exit the program and tinker with it some more, until it worked out the way it should. Take out all those randomizers, to start with.
But Seto did not feel particularly inclined to resort to that. Perhaps he could spend some more time here, try and pinpoint the exact error so he'd spend less time searching for it once he had gone.
At least, that was what he told himself.
"Ryuunosuke?"
"Yes?"
"I need to talk to you."
"Tell me," he said once they were in more-or-less privacy back in the room where he had begun, "what do you think I've done wrong?"
Ryuunosuke, sitting beside him on the bed, fidgeted slightly, reminding Seto of when he was ten and required to wear an exceedingly itchy formal suit. "I think it started with Obelisk."
Seto blinked. "Obelisk? But it's gone."
Another few fidgets. "How can I explain this? You see, Maha really didn't like being sacrificed like that. Corundum next- he said you didn't care anything about us once you got something better, so why should we care anything about you?"
Seto winced; he could see where the argument was coming from. "And they would prefer... say, Yugi, then?"
Ryuunosuke looked like he was regretting ever opening his mouth. "...some of them."
"But what about you? What do you think of me?"
"I don't know what to think!" Ryuunosuke yelled. Seto jerked back and gaped. Ryuunosuke looked down. "I apologize, but I really don't. There's one thing and there's another thing, and..."
It was extremely vexatious to be informed that you had lost something before you even knew you had it. If only Seto had known of the sentience of the Duel Monsters earlier. Then perhaps he would have behaved differently, done something to avert the current situation.
What could he have done? Never use Obelisk again? Hear them whispering, "He had that powerful card, practically a ticket to winning the whole thing, but he didn't use it. What a moron."
He had to face the facts. Even if he had known, he probably would have gone on and done it anyway. After all, did you ask chess pawns whether they wanted to be sacrificed?
There was no winning this game.
Oh well. Seto could always just exit, delete the program, walk away, and go on with his life exactly as it had been before...
... or not.
"I'll be back in a while," he said. "All right?" Ryuunosuke nodded. "Exit program."
~~~
He vanished with the suddenness with which he had appeared. Ryuunosuke stared at the empty space for a while. When sleep finally looked like a possibility, Corundum opened the door. "Is he gone?"
Ryuunosuke was not in the best of moods and would have liked for once to give him an acid retort, such as, "If you looked around the room, you'd see your answer." But he didn't. He nodded.
"I expect the portal'll be closing soon."
Of course after that Ryuunosuke stayed up all night, but the portal remained open, even if no-one came through it.
~~~
Upon emerging Seto first looked at the calendar to verify that the next day was a weekend. He proceeded to get a large dose of sleep.
Then, at approximately eight in the morning, he went to the nearest telephone and dialed.
"Hello, Turtle Game Shop, how may I help you?"
"Yugi."
"Kaiba?"
"Come over to the corporation building immediately."
"... Kaiba, what are you up to?"
"Just come. And bring your deck. And no, it's not a duel."
"Not a duel? Then what is it?"
"Just come here, all right? It's very important."
"How so?"
"You'll see."
Click.
~~~
Yugi viewed the VR pod with considerable suspicion- even more so when Kaiba asked him to climb into it, recalling the last experience he had had with it. Then Kaiba turned to one of the machines and showed him the listings of Duel Monsters, asking what others of Yugi's he had missed, spoke of Lord of Dragons and Blue-Eyes White Dragons, and Yugi was sold.
~~~
Once instructions were given, the deck was inserted, and the Companion started up once more, Seto had brunch delivered to the room. He ate while watching the status screens and making notes, while seeing Yugi move about in the world that was so much more than the bits and bytes he had put into it.
His experience was apparently much better than Seto's. The world of Yugi's deck was considerably less technological; it had an old-fashioned air to it, with ancient Egyptian and medieval architecture and various other styles juxtaposed in such a way that it looked like it should be. Yugi moved through this like a tropical fish transplanted to someplace that was fundamentally the same as where it had come from.
None of Yugi's Duel Monsters gave him the look that Corundum had given Seto. None of them treated him like a little lost puppy who had wandered where he shouldn't have wandered.
So this was the heretofore-unseen upside to Yugi's techniques, his Heart of the Cards doctrine. His Duel Monsters liked him.
Yugi emerged at perhaps two and made a beeline for the lavatory. Upon his return Seto said, "So. Did you have a good time?"
Yugi nodded vigorously, beaming as he did so. "They said they'd been expecting me. Did you tell them I'd be coming?"
Seto winced. "No. Perhaps mine informed yours."
Yugi, instead of laughing and assuming it a joke, nodded again, quite solemnly. "They said they'd been to visit your deck the other night. They said they'd seen you there." Finally, finally, Seto realized who the boy Corundum had been playing chess with was.
"This is real, then?"
Seto responded with his most brilliant, sophisticated, recommended-by-psychological-analyses reply. "What?"
Yugi looked up at him. "You didn't program this? It was really the Duel Monsters talking to me? Because... well... it was so real..."
Seto shrugged. "I'm not sure." But he was. "I certainly didn't intend it to be realistic to this extent."
After some small talk, Yugi very politely took his leave. Seto called a taxi for him, then climbed back into the pod and took it on its third run.
~~~
Ryuunosuke and Kongou loaded seemingly-endless piles of dishes from last night's party into the washer because it would be more efficient than disposing of them and then conjuring them all over again. Maha was cleaning up in the next room. The piles were thinning out when Seto appeared in yet another five-second light show.
"I apologize. I need to see Corundum."
Kongou regained her voice first, or at least was the first to make use of it. "You are aware that Corundum hates your guts, right?"
"That's why I want to see him."
She turned her eyes in the direction of the ceiling with the expression of a parent at the edge of her patience. "I thought you might have gone a tad wrong in the head before, but even then you retained basic survival instincts."
"I suppose I am wrong in the head. I want to see him."
"All right then," said Maha, entering with the mop slung over one shoulder, "if you want to die then I'm certainly not the one to stop you. He ought to be on the second floor. That's the computer lab. But you need a scan to get in, and-"
"I'll show him there," said Ryuunosuke quickly.
Maha laughed. "Ah, running off to leave us with the dirty work, now are you? Then again, I guess this is clean in comparison."
~~~
There was so much Seto didn't know about this place, and so few means to discover what he didn't know.
Surely the locket with a picture of Sapphire the Mokuba look-alike was more than just a coincidence. They took the elevator up; he asked then.
Ryuunosuke shrugged. "I just had the idea. Maha'd put together a picture taker, and we all got a copy. I think Corundum has one of these, too." Seto pulled out his own and opened the little door. Ryuunosuke nodded, apparently seeing the resemblance as well.
A metal door was directly opposite the elevator they departed; what was presumably a security device was affixed to the wall beside it. Ryuunosuke walked up and looked into the latter. After a moment something beeped and the doors opened.
Seto counted twenty compartments like those of KaibaCorp employees and one larger system at the opposite end, with Corundum seated at the larger system. He walked forward. "Excuse me?"
Corundum whirled and Seto took a step backward; in that moment he looked like he was going to toss off a White Lightning (Seto gained some bitter amusement from imagining a human spitting out a crackling electric sphere). "Who let you in?"
"Pardon?"
"Entry to this room is allowed only to people whose eye patterns are in the database. I know yours weren't in it."
"But mine are," said Ryuunosuke.
He was leaning against one of the compartment walls in an apparent attempt to act casual. It wasn't working, and Seto could hardly blame him.
Seto raised a hand and cut off anything Corundum might have said. "I didn't mean to intrude."
"You are intruding. Go away."
Ryuunosuke spoke again. "You know that if he had only come when you wanted him to, you would have put it off forever."
"And that would have been just fine with me."
"I wanted to apologize," said Seto, "for sacrificing half of the Duel Monsters in this building to Obelisk at one time or another. And various other events pertaining to the latter. That's all."
Corundum did not look too impressed by the recitation. "Any idiot can put together words."
"Corundum," said Ryuunosuke, "not every idiot could *say* those words, though."
Seto suspected that if it wasn't Ryuunosuke talking, Corundum really would have tossed off a White Lightning- or two- at that point. "That's true. But if everything could be expiated by words alone... well, then, I'm *sure* the world would be a much better place." The sarcasm was not lost on Ryuunosuke, who looked away.
"Of course not everything," said Seto. "But can't one at least try?"
"Right," Corundum drawled. "And what is the purpose of this sudden crisis of conscience? Did you just want to try out Yugi's philosophy?"
"It's very hard to disbelieve what is right in front of you. I believe this is much more than, as you said, a tryout."
"Really."
Seto nodded. "Really."
Corundum stood up and began to walk back and forth. "You missed the figurative boat, *Master* Kaiba. We already did it."
Seto blinked. "How so?"
"Don't you remember how you drew Tiamat's card just when you needed one of us?
"And the first time against the Masks... of course they weren't wearing masks then, but that doesn't matter. Yugi played a Kuriboh in defense mode. He didn't multiply it that time."
Seto nodded. Lord of Dragons, two Flutes of Summoning Dragon, the three Blue-Eyes, and Hyozanryu. It was one of his luckiest draws; he had half-expected Yugi to ask whether his deck had been stacked. "You were behind that? And Obelisk..."
"Ryuunosuke was, actually. Obelisk came along for the ride." Corundum laughed bitterly and continued to pace. "I wouldn't have gone along with it, but Ryuunosuke said to give you another chance. Show the whole deck that you really did care.
"And of course you had to behave like a lunatic-"
"-And sacrifice him to Obelisk," Seto cut him off. "I know."
~~~
Ryuunosuke looked on, refraining from speaking. His words would only break the balance required for this to be going on. Besides, what could he say?
"So if you do know, then tell me, why should I take your current words over your previous actions?"
"Have I ever lied to you before?"
"Of course not. You never spoke to me before." Corundum smiled. "Lying to me would have been difficult under those circumstances. You don't deserve to be forgiven."
"I understand your point. I don't suppose I would feel very much inclined to let it drop, either. I'm sorry. Exit-"
Corundum shook his head. "No, you misunderstand. Nobody deserves to be forgiven. Forgiveness, Master Kaiba, requires faith that has nothing to do with the magician."
"Faith?"
Corundum nodded. "Faith that you will not repeat what caused you to ask in the first place. Besides, I'm stuck with you, so I might as well. Just don't let what happened with Obelisk happen again.
"Seto Kaiba, show us you really care."
Seto nodded and looked around as if searching for appropriate parting words. His eyes settled on Ryuunosuke, and he said. "Thank you. Exit program."
~~~
Seto emerged from the pod to see Mokuba. After assuring his brother that no, he hadn't gotten into any trouble and yes, he could try it out later, he sat down at one of the machines and looked over the Deck Companion.
He recalled the last duel where he had used Obelisk, and how he had sacrificed all the other monsters except for Yugi's weepy Kuriboh.
He thought of Ryuunosuke and his locket.
He thought of Sapphire the Mokuba doppelganger.
He thought of Corundum's parting words. "Seto Kaiba, show us you really care."
He looked at the randomizers that had somehow interacted to give him entrance to the world he had just departed.
It was just fine the way it was, he decided.