1300
Bura-sama
12.21.02
12.21.02

Disclaimer: Yu-Gi-Oh is not mine. I don't claim it to be so. The characters I'm using don't even resemble the official ones, so... yeah. Not mine, no infringement is intended.

Warnings: Shounen-ai. Seto/Jounouchi. Death. OOCness. Enough sugary sappiness to choke a hummingbird.

Notes: A Christmas present for my big sister.
I'm not terribly fond of the couple, but she likes them.

I'm not sure if I should post this or not. I hope at least someone out there likes it at all.

Chilled

Ch1: Tick-tock

"Sir, may we speak in this room?"

Seto nodded weakly, already knowing what was about to be said.

The young doctor pulled him to the side, and shut the door behind her when they entered a small room. She had an expression that didn't speak well of things to come. She was pretty, he supposed. Fair blonde hair and a petit frame. It reminded him of...

"Sir, we tried everything we could..." Her voice was shaking slightly, but Seto didn't notice. The blood was pounding in his head, cutting off the noise of the young doctor talking. He could see her mouth moving, telling him something that he had no desire to hear. He could see the genuine sorrow in her eyes, but his heart refused to accept it. She was still talking, unable to acknowledge his sudden deafness. The blood was so terribly loud in his ears, drowning out everything else. Vaguely, distantly, he heard bits and pieces of her words drift into the foggy haze of his mind. "... too much internal bleeding, nothing we could possibly do..." It didn't make any sense to him. He just couldn't connect the facts set so plainly in front of him. "... only a few moments more, if you would like to be with him--"

Suddenly, reality harshly came crashing down. He hoarsely repeated, "What?"

The doctor put a compassionate hand on his shoulder, and Seto found that he didn't have the energy to brush it away. "He's dying, but he still has a few moments more. You can be with him, if you want, when he passes." The young doctor squeezed his arm again, then seemed to disappear into the throng of people milling about in the hospital floors.

Seto stood, motionless, and just stared at the doors where his lover had been rushed through earlier. He took a slow step forward, felt the stiffness in his muscles, the pain in his walk. If I don't go, and I don't see... then it doesn't have to be real. I can just wake up, and it'll all go away...

He took another slow step, and then stopped. He glanced at the clock on the wall, ticking away the seconds. He took another step toward those heartless gray doors, and stopped again. If he didn't move anymore, then he could just ignore it. It didn't have to be real. He didn't have to be in this hospital. He didn't have to be crying -- it had been so long since he had cried -- in front of all those people. He didn't have to be staring at his shoes, willing them to make a choice that he had no desire to make. He could be back at home, holding his lover. He could be designing some new program, playing cards with Mokuba. He could be anywhere but where he was, and could just turn away from that clock that was ticking down the minutes. Ticking away his life.

But if he went... If he walked into that room, it could never be just a case of mistaken identity. It could never be, "Let's go home now, I'm sorry you worried..." It could never be another warm night in his bedroom, another stolen kiss when his brother's back was turned. If he saw that dead body, then there would be no return. It would be real, and it would hurt, and he would probably never stop crying.

Seto took a step forward.

The clock on the wall seemed to mock him. It's incessant ticking hammering against his head even louder than his own blood had been just seconds before. The clock was counting away his lover's life. It wasn't stopping, and neither was his death. Dread and nausea twisted into something vile in the pit of his stomach, making him suddenly want to vomit and retch until his body was free of it. If he didn't walk into that room, at that moment, then he would never see his lover again.

Seto took another step forward.

He had to go now, or he would never go.

Seto suddenly broke out of his conflict and started sprinting towards the cool gray doors that shielded his lover, his puppy dog, from the outside world. The people in the corridor seemed to be jumping in front of him, desperate to make him give up and turn back. He shoved them away and pushed a path clear until he was able to run to the gray doors.

The clock ticked loudly after every step.

He finally made it to his destination, and slowly placed his hand against the chilling metal.

He pushed weakly, and the doors remained where they were.

He pushed harder on the second try, and one swung inward, allowing Seto inside. He pushed it shut behind him and took a deep breath.

The room was dark, gloomy with the sense of death. A machine beeped slowly next to the wall, and Seto tried to look anywhere but to the bed. All of his earlier doubts came back tenfold, and it suddenly seemed like the most easy escape to just push the door ajar and leave without ever seeing...

"... Se... to..."

Seto spun around quickly and, without thinking of the consequences, locked his blue eyes onto the frail figure lying weakly beneath the sheets. His skin was a sickly pale blue color, his once vibrant golden hair was now ashen yellow. His eyes, always full of fire and strength, were a weak brown color that spoke volumes of agony.

He still looked beautiful.

Seto took quick steps forward to the bed, trying frantically to stop the tears. He gently placed his hand over the boy's fingers, and felt the sobs tearing at his throat when the fingers weakly tried to grasp his hand. An oxygen mask was pulled to the side of his mouth, and the boy's other hand was blatantly holding the tubing. Seto reached to pull it back over his mouth.

"Se..to..." The boy croaked the word and Seto couldn't stop the tears. He let his hand fall away from the mask. The hand that was still touching his grew suddenly cold, and Seto knew what was about to happen. "Se.. to..." The boy's body convulsed, and tremors raced through both of them. The hand clutching his fingers squeezed with as much might as he could muster, and the blond boy stared into his eyes with determination, "Seto, I..." Another agonizing convulsion. "Seto, I... love... you."

The world seemed to be spinning, and Seto just stared into those chocolate orbs with pain and longing. The words wouldn't come to his throat. He tried, tried, tried to say them -- to return them with just as much passion and love as his blond had spoken them. The words wouldn't come. His throat was sticking together and he had just swallowed a box of cotton swabs. He watched in horror as those loving brown eyes changed from warm to sad, and then started to fade into nothingness.

Still unable to say those three little words he wanted so badly to return, Seto pushed his lips against the blonde's chilled ones.

It was all he could do.

He watched as the blond gave a little smile.

It was all he could do.

Then, those deep brown eyes of his seemed to dim. They lost their warm colors, and it seemed as though a light had been turned off behind them.

And it had...

Seto Kaiba didn't even need to look at the steady line of green that the machine was drawing, or to the monotonous beep it was emitting, to know that he was the only one still alive in the room.

The clock struck twelve with a loud tick.

Katsuya Jounouchi was dead.

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End part one of three. Onward ye mortals, to the promised land... ======