It was the 57th attempt. Earlier that morning, Mokuba had joked of having a party after the 100th. Seto had glared at him rather than grace the childish comment with a response. The younger Kaiba ended up eating the rest of his breakfast in silence before he headed to work. He would be returning for his final year of college in the fall, but for the remainder of the summer he had a job to do.
The moment Seto arrived to the lab all chatter was silenced. He knew what the workers there thought of him; he'd heard the rumors.
"I hear he hasn't taken a single holiday off with his brother since starting this project…"
"Rumor has it he's planning to officially pass the title of CEO to Mokuba after he graduates…"
"Kid already runs the place as it is…"
Seto never cared much for public opinion, but no one said any of these things to his face anyway. In fact, he often worked in complete silence regardless of whether he was alone or not. He preferred it that way; music and conversation were distracting and he had work to do.
This particular project was one he did alone, so he walked through the main development lab into his own private one in the back. Before the door closed, he heard the roar begin again. Luckily, his room was sound proof.
He logged into the computer and began coding, the task allowing him to focus and cancel out any thoughts he had of firing all the idiots outside his double locked door. He spent what felt like three hours or so doing this, but when he stepped out to grab a bite to eat, he noticed the lab was empty. Frowning, Seto checked his watch.
10:15 pm it displayed happily. Damn. He'd spent another full day on this without noticing it. Grabbing a bite from the vending machine – his eating habits had rapidly deteriorated – he locked himself back in his lab and continued working.
Less than an hour later – a real hour this time – Seto was finished. He double checked his code for errors, fixed the few he encountered, and added some finishing touches. It was done. He hesitated over the run button. As much time as he'd invested into this, it would really be the last attempt. 57 was a large number and he didn't relish reaching 100, yet alone 60. No matter what happened, he was done after this. He steeled himself for a moment, before taking a deep breath. This was it. He pushed play.
Nothing happened.
He looked at the computer. There were no error remarks. He glared. Dammit.
KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK.
Seto jumped. Someone was…knocking on the door. Still glaring, but more in confusion than anger, he moved to the offending object and threw it open.
He paused for a moment, staring.
"…What you looking at, Moneybags?"
Eyes the color of honey stared at him. He stepped back, getting a full body glance. In front of him in a pair of light blue jeans – a similar style to what he wore in both college and high school – and out-of-place blond hair stood Katsuya Jonouchi. He looked exactly the same as he had last time Seto had seen him – how long ago was it now? – except he was sporting an uncharacteristic black tee-shirt.
"They must've been out of white striped shirts," he mumbled out loud, sounding slightly amused.
"What?"
"Nothing."
He stepped back a little and allowed the other to step into his lab. Jou walked hesitantly at first, looking around like a curious puppy. His hair bounced as he turned his head.
How did it do that? Seto wanted to touch it.
Jou spun around suddenly and marched away toward some machine. Seto was suddenly struck with the image of the same blond hair whipping around and stomping away from him as snow began to fall on it.
He blinked. The image was gone.
"Hey what's this thing?" Jou was pointing at a delta shaped object on the table in front of him.
Seto walked toward him. "Oh that's just an abandoned duel disk update. It was too unwieldy…" He trailed off. Jou was staring at him again, betraying no emotion.
The desire to touch the other's hair was too strong. Seto reached out and touched it. It was wirier than he remembered, but mostly the same.
"Oy! Watch it!" The blond tried to back away, but Seto grabbed him by the chin and stopped him.
"Shut up."
They stared at each other for a second before Seto moved his hand up to the other's cheek. It was soft. He ran his thumb along the bone. Jou felt so cold.
A scene where Jou was screaming at Seto, his cheeks red from the chill, played out in Kaiba's mind. He saw Jou spin around and storm away, snow falling in his wake.
Seto's hand jerked back as if shocked. The blond just continued to stare at him, not giving away his feelings for once. It was strange, nothing like Kaiba remembered.
How long had it even been?
He hadn't seen Jou since that day it snowed. He hadn't really seen anyone; he'd just thrown himself into work. How many holidays had Mokuba been forced to celebrate alone? Had he missed Christmas?
Seto checked his phone. He stared at the date, restarted his phone, and stared again. He checked it on the internet.
Three and a half years, to the day. He had been working non-stop on a project trying to tune out memories of a fight for over three years now. He hadn't dueled, hadn't acted as CEO, hadn't been a good brother for three and a half years. And for what?
Seto looked back at Jou, who still hadn't said anything. The blond returned the stare, silent and unblinking. It was unnerving.
This had to stop. He couldn't let one day of pain ruin his entire life. But watching Jou standing there like a lost puppy made it more difficult.
Three and a half years should change a person, but Jou looked exactly the same. Seto was sure he was already developing gray hair and wrinkles from the stress he was under, while the blond still looked like a kid fresh out of college. Seeing this wrenched his heart a little.
"Puppy…" He started, not sure what to say.
"Will you stop calling me that?"
"What would you rather have me call you then?" Seto spoke softly.
"I dunno."
Seto placed his hand back on Jou's cheek.
"Can you please not do that?" The word please felt wrong coming out of Jou's mouth.
"I have something important to tell you. Something I've been waiting three and a half years to say."
"Ok…"
He stared deep into the honey eyes, searching for a hint of the feelings he wanted.
"I'm sorry. I don't know what we were even fighting about anymore. The only thing I can think of is how you ran off into the snow. It's all I see when I close my eyes."
He allowed them to shut, seeing the whole scene over again before opening them.
"It seems so dumb now. We should've gotten over it. We would've been fine in a few days, if even that."
He blinked again, this time a new image springing forth in his mind. He saw the newspapers, pictures of blood splattered across the otherwise white snow. He saw the news channels, showing Jou's driver's license. He saw the police reports, an image of blonde hair against an unrecognizable face.
Seto allowed his hand to trail across Jou's cheek again, feeling the chill coming from it. "But more importantly, I wanted to say that I love you. I know you always wanted me to say that; we fought about it all the time. Thinking back to it, it's probably what we were fighting about…"
Jou's furious look sprung in front of his eyes again as he blinked.
"Such a strange thing to fight about. You should've known how I felt without me needing to say it. I wouldn't have stayed otherwise, would I?"
He chuckled darkly. The irony could just kill him.
"…Seto?"
The sound of his own name jerked him out of his thoughts.
"What?" He barked at the blond, feeling unreasonable angry.
"Seto, I –"
"Stop." He lifted his hand to Jou's hair, feeling the wiriness beneath his fingers. His voice softened. "Just stop."
Jou didn't respond, even as Seto brushed his fingers down to the back of his neck. Kaiba leaned in close to the other's ear.
"I don't want a response. I just needed to say what I had to say," he whispered, fingers rubbing along the back of Jou's neck. He found a small bump and stopped.
"Especially since you're not my Katsuya." He pulled down on the bump and felt the blond sag into him.
Seto gently placed the body on the nearest table before sinking into his chair. Three and a half years and 57 attempts later and that was the closest he'd ever gotten. The speech patterns were perfect, the skin felt almost real, and the hair was just the right color.
He could spend an eternity trying to find just the right texture for the hair, make the cheeks emit more natural feeling heat, or have "Jou" interrupt him more. But right now Seto was tired. He was tired of waking up paralyzed because he had just relived the moment the police knocked on his door. He was sick of working until all hours of the day and night just so he could say his final words. He hated feeling a nagging regret for not running after Jou, not dying in his place.
If Seto could go back in time and change the past he would, and for the past few years he'd been pretending he was doing just that. Instead, he'd neglected his brother, his job, his life because he couldn't let Jou go.
And after 57 attempts, Seto finally understood. Jou was dead. No amount of science, or technology, or genius could bring him back, and no amount of time spent in denial would make it any less true.
Seto knew that he should go home now. He could leave a note and the janitor crew would dispose of this one, just as it had with the others. He should go home, sleep, and start acting like a human again.
But he couldn't bring himself to move. It was after 2 in the morning, and his legs weren't going to support his weight. Allowing his head to fall against the desk, he decided he'd leave after he got a few hours of sleep. Right now he needed to grieve for a bit.
AN: it's not perfect, don't kill me. i wanted to get this out before tomorrow morning because i have work all day. on a story related note, i tried to write things so you would read it a certain way the first time, but when you understood what was happening, the little quirks would make sense in a completely different way. If you can bring yourself to read it twice, let me know if I succeeded in that. I love to hear your opinions!