Yo! It's been awhile, and even longer since I've written for Yu-Gi-Oh!, hasn't it? I was actually doing some housekeeping with my computer files, and I found this thing sitting untouched and unfinished. I'd actually started it after I'd published my last SetoxKisara, Weakness (which you should check out if you haven't) due to various urgings to continue Blueshipping. For some reason, though, I never finished it and forgot about it, but here it is now. I personally find it to pale in comparison to said Weakness, but take it as you will.
Recreate
Opening his eyes, he found himself standing among the surf of a rocky beach in the cool ocean breeze, his jacket fluttering wildly about in the cool wind. A mighty cliff stood before him, at its summit standing what remained of the long-since abandoned Pegasus Castle. He craned his neck above and around, searching both his surroundings for a way up and the cold, empty recesses of his heart for a reason to continue with his ever-straining facade.
For years, he'd roamed the world alone, looking desperately for some semblance of a purpose. A shell had been left by Kisara's death. He'd gained her, yet his only memories of his past life regarding her were painful ones. No matter how many times he dreamt of her, every night of his life, the brief happiness they shared always ended in death. He hated himself for it, being weak enough to allow her into his heart- he was Seto Kaiba, the most powerful man in the world, and what he wanted he got, each time, every time.
He hadn't, the one time he'd allowed someone in. Perhaps that was why he was so reluctant to care for people; maybe he'd known everyone would betray him eventually somewhere in the back of his brain. Yet despite that betrayal, he loved her still, and he cursed himself for it. What Seto Kaiba wanted, Seto Kaiba was supposed to get.
Was he just acting like a spoiled brat, bawling for its petty needs to be fulfilled, used to getting everything it wanted? Perhaps. So be it. Pulling himself together in a now-rare display of resolve, he set up the long flights of endless stairs.
The lengthy walk allowed him to let his mind wander, and as it always did, it came back to Kisara. He craved her desperately, much to his self-loathing. This place was just one more out of hundreds he'd visited, searching for some way to reunite with her. Maybe that was it, and his travels were simply a jumped-up excuse to seek a suitable way to die, and finally see her again in the frigid embrace of death. But that would be the cowardly way out of his pain. He was many things, even pathetic, but certainly not a coward, and so he kept climbing. It was more-or-less autopilot by this point, but he climbed nonetheless.
Unlocked in their desertion, the gates to the interior swung open effortlessly. The hall was dark, the only source of light spilling in from the open doorway's glimpse of the sunset behind him. Pushing chairs out his way in a twitch of annoyance, he made his way mindlessly up the nearest staircase, tracing his hands absentmindedly along the tapestries on the wall as he ascended.
Up stairs; past doors, through halls; down more stairs; through more doors he went. They passed through his sights all the same, blurring and swirling around. Through a window, a tower to the east seemed to beckon to him motionlessly and silently; he followed it flawlessly, as if he'd lived here his whole life.
Exhausted, he finally broke through to the top room of the tower. The room was nearly empty, save for a bed, desk, and dust, the last vestiges of orange light bathing the barren room in a warm glow. He stepped forward and rummaged through the desk drawers, not bothering to close the wooden door behind him. Papers fluttered out wildly as he flipped over the drawer and cast it aside.
He reached down and picked up the nearest paper. Its contents were scribbled hastily, almost hurriedly, and were accompanied by various sketches in the margins. One seemed as if it were a rough approximation of one of the older spinning Duel Disk models: intrigued, he assembled the rest of the papers together according with the small page numbers in the corners. The sunlight was beginning to give way to dusk, he noted, and so pulled out a cell phone from his jacket pocket and flipped it upside-down for its backlight as he pulled up a chair from the corner of the room. A layer of dust followed the harsh scratching on the stone underfoot, rising into the air with the muffled thump of his sitting down and beginning to read.
Most of the pages were boring in the extreme, talking about the Duel Disk mechanics, all of which he'd done first or improved on his own later. Leave it to Pegasus to be so simple-minded, he thought with a smirk as he flipped through the files. The other pages confused him to a mild degree, referencing some woman called Cyndia in a cryptic diary of sorts. He made no effort in the time-wasting excursion that would be deciphering their meaning. The final page was the only one that managed to sufficiently pique his curiosity, housing a single sentence.
"It seems that little Kaiba is close to perfecting the Duel Disk technology- perhaps he can succeed where I have failed, my love, and recreate," he read aloud in a whisper, tracing the faded lettering. He stared at the words again, flipped back a few pages, and threw back his head, laughing a hollow laugh as he reached for his suitcase, pulling out his own model of the machine and cradling it in his arms thoughtfully. A screwdriver appeared; his left hand tinkered with the Disk, his right took a pencil and began sketching a picture.
The casing came undone, her silver hair came together. The second red wire was disconnected, her sea blue eyes were shaped. The blue wire was reconnected with the green one, her other facial features were outlined. The chip was replaced, her slim figure was filled in. A battery was rerouted, the picture was given half a looking-over, crumpled, and thrown against the wall in what would soon become a gargantuan pile of such sketches deemed failures.
Of course, no drawing would ever come close to capturing her essence, how she brought life to everything she touched, but it would have to do for now, trapped here in the mortal realm of the present day. At last, well after sundown, he came up with a somewhat acceptable rough sketch. He contemplated tossing it with the others for a moment, but his ever-present logical side reminded him that if he wanted a perfect picture then he'd quite literally never finish.
The desk he was working on, as it turned out, was a light table. He contemplated if this was where Pegasus had created Duel Monsters and its various components, but shook his head, noting that the question was a useless one as there was no one left
to answer it. His train of thought quickly followed him into noticing that the shelves above him housed labeled boxes, the nearest of which read "cards" in simple black ink, under others that all suggested some sort of relation to Duel Monster's more technical aspects. There was a single, untouched blank card laying dormant in it, as if fate or destiny or somesuch providence had left it there for him to find without even a layer of dust: but, then again, there was no such thing as destiny. He took it nonetheless, and a quick scan through the machine in his lap revealed that not only was it blank on the front, its encoding was clean as well.
His thoughts wandered as he continued to tinker. Mokuba was grown; he'd be able to take care of himself. He hadn't much attachment to KaibaCorp, but succession would doubtlessly be handled swiftly in such a case, probably through more than a few murders. He paused, blinked, and let out another laugh, marveling at the magnitude of how he lacked things and loose ends to care about.
Pegasus had kicked the bucket before he'd gotten anywhere near advancing the Duel Disk to the state both Pegasus and he- he retched at the thought of having something in common with the freak- would hold at a minimum of "acceptable" in regards to an image of a person. He, though, now had time on his side. He'd make it work on willpower alone. He paused for another moment, then turned over his phone again, slowly pressing the keys that spelled out "goodbye." Pressing send to Mokuba's phone, he tossed the device out the window: a faint crunch half a minute later allowed him slight satisfaction, probably the last time he'd feel such an emotion.
Kisara, he thought. I'm… Sorry I can't come to you now. I always did have that pride. But now… I can at least see your face, here. I'll do it, and I'll improve on it. I can't recreate you, but I can try, at least, to give you some sort of form. I'll do it. Even if it takes me forever.
He reached over, shut the door, and began to work.