deadlock.
Genres: Crime, Suspense
Summary: Al-Malik Ishtar killed his brother Rishid as a child. That was just the beginning. / Apocalypshipping Seto Kaiba x Dark Marik x Ishizu Ishtar
A/N: Written for the YGO Fanfiction Contest, Season 10, Round Eleven, with the challenge pairing of Apocalypshipping (Seto Kaiba x Dark Marik x Ishizu Ishtar). This is the conclusion of the R4 universe and a sequel to Season 7's Danceshipping 11:59:59pm, Season 8's Sealshipping Parabola, and Doubleplusgoodduckspeaker's Season 10 Geminishipping Ubiquity. The universe revolves around a cast of police officer OCs and the cases they work on; this is an AU to canon that focuses on a grittier, darker version of Domino. While the stories can be read alone, they directly build off of one another and I encourage reading the preceding stories before reading this.
Warnings for some dark themes, violence, and language. I hope you enjoy.
deadlock.
Car horns honk as the earliest of the morning traffic weaves its way through downtown Domino. Captain Shuzo Ohtaki of the Domino Police Force wonders if perhaps people just don't understand that when a lane is blocked by a police car, lights flashing, something is more important than their commute.
The body is already covered up, and Officer Kogoro is handling things beautifully, talking with the others there—photographer, a couple crime scene investigators, and someone from forensics—and making the necessary arrangements. He feels a stab of pride for his staff, and how well they've adjusted with the new responsibilities that came with his new promotion.
"What have we got?" The wind blows the lapel of his coat up against his chin; he absently pats it down with one hand.
Kogoro lifts the edge of the sheet covering the body just enough for Shuzo to see his face. "Recognize this one? You should, but I wouldn't blame you if you had trouble placing it through all the stab wounds—it's Akihiro Itou."
Itou. Of course he recognizes it. "This wasn't the kind of justice I had in mind for him." He continues staring long after the cloth has been lowered back. "But I can't say I'm displeased to know he won't be causing Domino any more trouble."
"There's more. He had a page on him—a full page, neatly placed in his jacket pocket," Kogoro says. His pitch turns sour. "At least this one we'll have a shot at reading—last one was crumpled in a puddle. Turned the papyrus to pulp."
"That makes three this month." Shuzo raises his eyes from the body, and takes a step back, watching the scene. "I'd say we've got a real problem on our hands."
"What are our orders, sir?"
"It's quite simple," Shuzo says. "We're going to catch the killer."
"Forensics released the page." Kogoro leans in the doorway to Shuzo's office, one hand on the doorframe, the other on the already-open door, pushing it open even wider. It's clear he's trying to catch his breath; Shuzo wonders if he ran all the way from Forensics.
"I gave it to Detective Ishtar to translate. Thought you'd like to know she's working on it."
"Why Detective Ishtar? She's got her own cases to work on."
"Well, she's Egyptian, and I figured—" He pauses, staring sheepishly at his feet. "She gave me the same look when I asked her earlier, Captain."
He's still getting used to people calling him by that title, even though it's been a few months since he received it. "Don't be tactless." He's got a few phone calls to return, but those can wait. "Let's pay her a visit and see what it says, hmm?"
The fluorescent lighting above Detective Ishtar's cubicle is faded and flickering, but she's got a few small lamps to make up the difference, the kind of task lighting that clips to the edge of a desk. She doesn't notice them at first, and Shuzo can see just how deeply engrossed in her work she is—she's got a magnifying glass clutched tight in one hand, and her lips move with the words. The papyrus is housed in a plastic sleeve, and the way it glints in the lamp-light is abnormally bright.
When she does look up and see them, it's with a brusque, "Well, gentlemen, take a seat." There aren't any open chairs, but they cluster awkwardly around her desk, and she bends the edge of one lamp to give them a closer look.
"What does it say?" Shuzo asks.
"It's Ancient Egyptian," she says, and lifts the magnifying glass to her eye once again. "I studied it as a child. This is a Coffin Text. Essentially, it was a custom to provide the dead with these texts to see them on to the afterlife." Kogoro snorts, but there isn't any affect at all in Ishtar's voice. If she's wistful or she finds it inane, he can't say. "It is from the Book of Two Ways, as far as I can tell."
Shuzo studies the slightly yellowed page, the ragged edges, and the mottled script. It is a wonder she can read it at all. "Please translate for us."
"I made every man like his fellow; and I did not command that they do wrong. It is their hearts which disobey what I have said...I have created the gods from my sweat, and the people from the tears of my eye." Her voice breaks half-way through, and she coughs against one arm before setting the magnifying glass down. When she repeats the words in their original Egyptian, it gives a depth the translation lacked. "I admit my Egyptian is a little rusty...it has been a long time since I last needed to read it. But that is the gist of it."
"Thank you. We'll need to take the page back to Evidence, if you don't mind…?" She hands it back to Shuzo, who holds it carefully to keep the edges from bending.
She stops Kogoro from leaving. "This was found…on the body of one of your victims?"
"Yes, an Akihiro Itou," he says.
Her voice catches, and he frowns, realizing his mistake. "He was the leader of the smuggling ring who killed the late Captain Mahaado." Before he can stop himself, the words are already out of his mouth. "You gave his eulogy, didn't you?"
"Please assist your Captain and solve this case." She sidesteps his comments with grace, before returning to her work, picking up the files she had been reading before they interrupted her. Her eyes stare at the papers without seeing any of the words. "Even the killer of a criminal should be stopped."
"And a killer of multiple criminals?" he finds himself asking. "A killer of criminals and of men who have committed no crimes?"
Her eyes flit up from her desk briefly and seek out Kogoro's. "Then they should be stopped with haste."
The two officers on his immediate staff are crowded into his office, the door shut and locked. Rather than sit at his desk, Shuzo paces, his hands stuffed into the pockets of his jacket. It got too cold in the building to keep it off, but with it on, it was always just a little bit too hot. The pacing didn't help.
He stops and turns towards Officers Kogoro and Daimon. "I've got a hunch."
They stare at him expectantly. It's Daimon who answers first. "And..?"
"I think we're dealing with someone targeting members of a crime syndicate." He pauses to run a hand across his forehead, pressing against his eyebrows. He can feel the onset of a headache. "I was unclear. I meant the crime syndicate. The bōryokudan."
Kogoro doesn't stop him as Shuzo moves past him to make his way to the small window, pulling up the blinds with a single tug of the cord. The window-glass is grimy, the sill on the outside ruined from smoke and dirt, and the age of the police headquarters building stands out in stark contrast to the glitter of a few newer buildings. "I know we try not to speak of them—"
"There's a reason for that." Daimon glances between them, pulling his hands from his pockets to twist them together. The room seems colder, all of a sudden.
"I know. These people—" It is hard enough to put into words, but Shuzo sighs and massages his forehead again, trying not to think about all of the things he has to lose. "A group comprised of the city's elite and the kingpins of the underworld, working together to make sure things stay just the way they like them, and that the power they've attained never leaves their hands. No one knows their names or their faces, but it's easy enough to guess."
He continues, "Itou was a member, that much is clear. So were Gorou and Yamada, if the pages are anything to go by. And who else? That mining executive, Murakami? We were called in to assess his body, mutilated in much the same way Itou was, but his family shut the case down, refused to let us do any thorough examinations. I'm confident in saying that they are all a part of his mystery group, and that a killer is targeting them."
Daimon's reply is swift. "Shuzo. Do you know what you are doing?"
The use of his name over his title is enough to snap his focus back, and feeling oddly heavy, he leans his weight against the desk at his back. "Think about it. If we catch the killer, we can expose the group. Try them as one unit. If we can pin them with something—extortion, racketeering, political bribery—it would not surprise me if there are politicians in the bōryokudan."
The excitement that had been growing with each of Shuzo's words is cut off, to be consumed by a sudden silence. He catches his breath and the others process his words.
"Forgive me if I am being frank." Kogoro glances down at his feet, scuffing the edge of a black loafer over the faded blue carpet. "But you do not have to do something remarkable with your position like the late Captain. You do not have to rush to your death."
"I believe that each of these cases is connected—the presence of the Egyptian Coffin Texts is proof enough of that." He gets his confirmation in the others' nods. "But these people are not. What do they have in common? They all hold power in the city, and their business practices are shady at best and downright illegal at worst. A bōryokudan is the only explanation I can come up with. I welcome your thoughts."
"I think," Daimon speaks up, "that if we are to tackle something like this, we will need more support."
"I couldn't agree more. We'll bring Detective Ishtar on-board," Shuzo says. He turns towards the window, looking at the skyscrapers surrounding them, counting the corporate logos. Most of the surrounding buildings were simple offices—the businesses headquartered in Domino did not want their buildings so close to the Police, even if they felt they had little to fear from them.
"We'll also need to get someone on the inside." The rest is said more as a mutter. Shuzo tugs the blinds closed.
"What? Captain-?"
"Let me take care of that." The excitement returns, bubbling up inside him like a spring. "Let's see if my hunch is correct."
The thing that strikes him most on his trek to the main office on the top floor is how for all the style and decadence of the place—black and white marble squares on the floor, tall statues by the doors, and sparkling glass that stretches all the way to the ceiling to form windows larger than any Shuzo has ever seen—the public spaces are almost entirely devoid of personality. The other corporations have large photographs of their founders in their lobbies, or bright colors, or magazine racks or music, but this has none. It does more to help him understand the man behind it all more than a scattering of personal effects could. His office is literally on the top floor—save an observation balcony, but he can hardly have his office up there—of the tallest building in Domino, and that is even more telling.
One side of the elevator is glass, showing the city rush by as it climbs, but the other sides are paneled in mirrors. The effect is dizzying, multiplying the sweeping view and his own face. None of this has been designed with the occupant's comfort in mind, he knows.
The door opens with a chime, and Shuzo makes his way to the massive desk in the center of the room, where the CEO of Kaiba Corporation sits, a phone pressed tight against his left ear.
"So you let a member of the Domino Police Force bully his way into my private elevator? Oh, don't bother with security, he's already here." He sets the phone down and leans his elbows on the polished wood of his desktop, resting his chin on his clasped hands.
"While I would consider it a supreme irony to call my security to rid me of a police officer, I don't want to have to deal with you more than once. State your business quickly, I am a busy man."
There is no introduction; Shuzo hardly expects to receive even the most basic of hospitalities, and he almost considers asking for tea if he thinks his efforts at intimidation would work half as well on this man as they would on the secretaries in the lobby. But this is no time for obstinacy.
"Listen, while I am here in my capacity as a police Captain, my presence here has nothing to do with your company." He's rehearsed the words dozens of times in his head over the preceding day, but it doesn't help him now, face to face with the piercing stare of Seto Kaiba.
"Would I be correct in assuming you're familiar with the bōryokudan?"
The effect is immediate; Kaiba straightens and his eyes narrow. "If you are accusing me of something, be clear and say it. Otherwise, this conversation is over. And before you speak, I would have you know that the lawyers in my employ are the best. I hope you know that you stand to lose more from this conversation than you could possibly ever hope to gain."
Shuzo's response is a thin smile, and he dips his head in apology. "Of course I am not accusing you of anything. In fact, I am confident out of any executive in the city, you are the one I would say without a doubt has nothing to do with them."
"Then why are you here?" he asks.
"They came to you, didn't they?" Shuzo is going out on a limb, here—the entire trip has him dangling on the very edge of a branch, he knows, but he's confident enough in his hunch to play it out to the end.
"Once. A few years ago. I turned them down."
"Brave." Shuzo's esteem of Kaiba grows at that. "I'm trying to catch a killer, Mr. Kaiba, to answer your previous question. In order to do that, I need information about the bōryokudan. And to get that, I need someone like yourself."
"I don't know much about them. A man named Ichiro Sato tried to recruit me, but that's as fake a name as I've ever heard. I wasn't interested then, and I'm not now." Shuzo notices that Kaiba has never broken eye contact throughout their conversation, and the excitement he'd tried to tamp down earlier bubbles up again. This man is trying to study him every bit as deeply as Shuzo is doing in return, and Shuzo knows he chose correctly in Seto Kaiba.
"But you have a way of contacting someone in their membership? You must run into their influence every day, I'd wager. You know how much of Domino they control. Sales fall when things are as rocky as they have been lately." He thinks of Murakami, the CEO who died brutally at the hands of their killer. "You could gain a lot from not only knowing the faces of those in the bōryokudan, but also realizing the complete dismantling of their group, yes? It is in your best interests."
"I told you, get to the point," Kaiba says. "I have a meeting in twenty minutes."
"We would like to ask you to assist us in our investigation by joining the bōryokudan so you can give us a direct link to the inside." He holds up his hands, foreseeing Kaiba's reaction. "As a civilian, we can offer you protection. You'll wear a wire the entire time, and you can stop anytime you like. It should not be difficult for someone of your standing to gain access on a trial basis. I have a feeling the bōryokudan will be stepping up their recruitment after their recent losses."
"After their what?" If he didn't have it before, Shuzo has his full attention now.
"I am afraid I cannot release any more details unless you agree to join us. The Domino Police Force would be in your debt. I know you value justice as highly as I do, and I hope you decide to assist us in solving this case."
"What makes you say that?"
If there is a time to impress, it is now. "All of your manufacturing and operations work in done in this country—your wages are fair, and you do not use sweatshops. All of this is on record, and your company really does not get enough credit for it. While you hire lobbyists and attend fundraisers, the reputation of yourself and your company rests solely on your products, and you have never been the target of a scandal. In addition, I get the feeling that the charities you fund are personal, and not merely something to use as a tax refund. Nearly every orphanage in the city has your name on it somewhere, doesn't it?"
The last is added almost as an afterthought, but it gets him thinking. "You have family, don't you? A brother? Would we need to extend our protection to him as well?"
"My brother is attending the best boarding school money can buy. He's better protected where he is."
"It's not in this country, then, is it?" Shuzo chuckles to himself. "Europe, I'd guess? Switzerland?"
"You've done your homework." He does not want to admit it, but the police Captain is right on all counts—including the ones where he pegged his reasons for wanting the bōryokudan dissolved.
"I'm interested." He reaches into a pocket for a business-card, and holds it out towards Shuzo. "You can contact me at these numbers. I'll see if I can't get an invitation to their next meeting."
"We'll be ready whenever you are," Shuzo says, and takes it, exchanging a card of his own. Kaiba does not even look at it before he places it into his jacket pocket.
He excuses himself and takes the dizzying ride back down to the ground floor in the glass elevator, his heart pounding in his chest. He knows he should call Kogoro and share the good news, but that can wait until he can return to their headquarters and tell him in person.
Besides, his hands are shaking almost too badly to grip the phone. He's got them shoved in the pockets of his coat so no one can see, and as he walks across the cool marble tiles of the lobby he feels light enough to float.
He cannot tell if the shaking is from apprehension over the danger of the case, or anticipation of the same.
They wait in an outparcel police office, something used more for storage and administrative functions than active investigation.
"You met up with him again yesterday to fill him in on all the…unpleasant details, right? I can barely believe he still wants in. Do you think he'll show? He hasn't called to cancel yet, has he?" Kogoro leans against a filing cabinet, his lack of sleep evident in the bags under his eyes and the way his hair sticks up on the sides. "I knew we should've sent the Detective. She's prettier than the both of us, she probably would've gotten a more positive reaction out of him."
"It was like talking to a block of ice. Or maybe iron. Ice melts, after all." Shuzo looks up at a rap on the door, and Detective Ishtar enters, a black plastic case in her hands. He'd been happy when she agreed to join them on this case; he had thought it would have taken a bit more effort on his part to convince her. He supposes he's just getting better at persuasion.
"We've got the package," Shuzo says, "now we're only missing the carrier."
Ishtar sets up on a low table, snapping open the case and pulling out a roll of tape and a long black wire with budlike protrusions along one side—the microphone, a small battery, and a port to plug it back into the box. She tests it again, settling them both on the same frequency, before setting them down, satisfied.
Shuzo assures them, "He won't be late." His phone rings; it is Daimon, and he retreats to the hallway to answer it.
Seto Kaiba is all of a minute early, shrugging out of his coat with enough disdain to suggest that they are doing him the favor instead of the other way around.
"Is this building air-conditioned? It looks older than I am." He tosses the coat on the table beside the transmitter case; it draws his immediate attention. "How does this work?"
"My name is Detective Ishtar—this is Officer Kogoro. I believe you've already met Captain Ohtaki." Ishtar ignores his question in favor of protocol. "Officer Daimon is already as close to the scene as we dare. He'll be your first point of defense should anything unexpected happen."
She clears her throat. "As to the wire, I'll tape it to your chest. Do you anticipate that they will search you?"
"I'll probably be the only one there without a gun." It is clear this makes him uncomfortable, and Kaiba rocks back on his feet. "Not that any of them really care about handgun possession laws. I'd feel better about all this if I had something to protect myself with."
"That's what this is for. Unbutton your shirt, please."
He does so; the shirt is dark blue, probably expensive, and the small buttons take a few seconds to undo. He pulls up the edge of his undershirt and Ishtar rips off a section of tape.
He winces at the sound. "Don't enjoy this too much."
She touches him just above his stomach, at the slight crease between his muscles, to hold the wire in place. He grunts. "Your hands are cold."
"Sorry. It'll just take a moment." She wraps the wire around his body, securing it with enough tape to prevent it from shifting or loosening at his movements.
"Now, we can only record up to four and a half hours of audio…shouldn't be a problem, but you never know. It'll also broadcast your location to us, so we'll always know where you are in case you need backup. You'll have a code word in case you need immediate assistance—let's make it 'umbrella.' Just say something like, 'I left my umbrella at home' and Daimon will be with you in less than two minutes."
"Got it." He finishes buttoning up his shirt and grabs his coat, sliding his arms through the sleeves. "Anything else?"
"No." Ishtar slides the headset on; each word repeats through the wire. "It's working. Best of luck."
"I don't believe in luck," Kaiba says. The thinnest of smiles twists his mouth. "I don't believe it's raining today, either."
Ishtar gathers up the transmitter case, one narrow wire snaking up from it to disappear behind her hair to the headset tucked against one ear. "Where you're going, it is."
The ground is dampened with puddles collecting in the uneven asphalt, but Seto pays it no attention. He's concentrating on keeping his palms from sweating and trying to remember if he turned his cellphone off or not. A hand reaches into his coat pocket, slides it loose. Off, definitely off. Good.
His driver hadn't been allowed to pull up right next to the building; there is an alley in the way, too small for his least conspicuous car—a sedan in dark blue, driven twice if that, purchased only because he wanted to see if Audis really had an engine worth raving about. He hadn't been impressed.
The sky provides barely enough light to see by, but the thin neon sign hanging above the window in the shape of a cocktail glass is enough to let him know he's in the right place. The meeting location changes every week, his sponsor had said, and they seemed to like to alternate between run-down buildings in empty parts of Domino or private rooms in windowless bars that cater to a seedier clientele. He doubts the place has a legitimate liquor or food license. On second thought, he doubts the place even exists on the records.
The bouncer all but blends into the smoke-stained stonework of the wall, and when he asks for Seto's name, the stare he gives him is one of his best. "I'm expected. You know who I am. Open up." It would impress him more if there was a person in the city who didn't know his face.
The bouncer's laugh is something low and gravelly, and it reminds him of thunder. "Back room. Down the hall to your left."
He climbs the uneven stairs and the door swings open. It's barely lighter inside than it was in the alley, but the smell hits him first. Smoke—cigars, not cigarettes, although there's plenty of those, too—cheap perfume, and the underlying sour smell of stale beer.
He makes sure to look carefully at everyone in the bar in case he needs to recall them later to Ohtaki. The people inside are better-dressed than he would have thought, but there's an unctuous air to them that makes him want to turn away.
Their private room is cleaner than the bar itself, with a single oversized table surrounded by thickly padded chairs. The room is already half-full, and while most of the men don't look up when he enters, the ones that do nod at him and he nods back.
Information travels fast. He tucks that away for further examination.
"Seto Kaiba." A man moves from his original chair to settle into the one on Seto's right. He recognizes him as a city Finance Minister, and has to physically control himself to keep his lip from curling in disgust.
"Saitou," Seto responds in kind. The recognition is enough for Saitou, and he radiates smug pride. The dim light from the wall sconces shines off of his heavily oiled hair.
"We're very glad to see you so interested in Yamada's old seat. You don't, ah, have the connections he had, I'm sure, but you can just make that up. Tanaka is looking for contributions to his reelection fund—and of course, I'm always looking for representation on more executive boards…"
Seto doesn't offer him the slightest reaction, choosing instead to let his eyes casually wander from one person to the other. He shouldn't be shocked by how many people he recognizes—Ohtaki had prepared him for this, and even suggested names that turned out to be right on the money—and he feels another stab of unease as he spots several holsters hidden under tailored suit coats.
He expects the mob representatives to have weapons, but not some of the others, and thinks about letting Ohtaki give him an unloaded one to have on his person next time. If there is a next time.
"C-call to order." A stick-like man in oversized, thick glasses at the head of the table stands and coughs into one hand. He calls the names of those who are here in his reedy, wavering voice, and Seto tries not to flinch when his own name is called. The place where the wire is taped itches.
"Akihiro Itou is dead," he continues in displeasure. "Three others are absent."
"Ichiro Sato's one of them." Saitou's voice sounds more like a whine. Seto finds himself looking forward to seeing this man behind bars. A few others speak up.
"Suppose he's dead?"
"No. Sato's a weasel. He's underground somewhere—he'll surface when this is all over."
"I thought you were going to find the son of a bitch responsible for all of this? Show him what happens when he crosses us."
"If he crosses me, I will." Someone cracks their knuckles. "I'll put a bullet between his eyes."
The secretary at the head of the room coughs again. "I d-do not think we should m-meet again until this problem is put down."
"Who will kill him if not us? The police?"
A laugh. "Do not worry about the police. They are like flies. Such short lives…and if one buzzes too close, you simply swat it away."
Seto cannot resist the challenge. "Are you afraid of him?" he asks, and the room grows quiet.
The man sitting across from him leans forward; his broad shoulders stretch his suit jacket, the build of his own body a kind of silent intimidation. "Someone is killing our own. We protect our own. You…" He tilts his head, the gesture dismissive. It is enraging. "You are not our own."
"Then I would not protect you, if given the chance." He shrugs and turns his head away, copying the other man's gesture. Immediately, he wishes he had turned the other way; now he has to look at Saitou.
A second thought strikes Seto, and he is unable to keep from voicing it. "Itou was the third to die, yes?"
"Fourth," Saitou answers with a sniff.
"One every week, like clockwork." He looks at each one in turn, finally settling on the massive man across from him. "Itou died six days ago. For someone in this room, their time is just about up. I'd be less worried about how to catch him, and start worrying about how he's able to track you."
Silence, as heavy as an anchor. Then everyone seems to speak at once.
"A mole? Impossible—"
"Electronic bugs would have been spotted—"
Seto wants to tell them that they don't understand. That all this killer had to do was see them once, know their membership once, and pick them off at his leisure. He wants to tell them that they would probably be safer holding their meetings at the busiest Starbucks in the city instead of empty, isolated places like these. But let them work it out on their own. Let them die on their own; perhaps if they are lucky and kill the man responsible they can spare Ohtaki and his team the trouble. But Seto Kaiba does not believe in luck.
The volume in the room rises to the point where everyone is shouting. Seto wonders if the microphone will be able to pick all of it up. He sighs and stares at the ceiling, counting the tiles. Half of them have mold spots.
"M-meeting adjourned!" The secretary is red-faced, his eyes watering behind his glasses. He coughs again. "I suggest we pool our resources. P-put out a reward for the head of Itou's killer."
Seto does not want to be the last in the room, so when they all stand and gather their things he is one of the first to leave.
"This was very nearly a waste of my time," he tells Saitou, who stumbles behind him in an attempt to keep up. "I hope future meetings are a bit more productive."
"Oh, they will be!" His smug little face brightens. "Wait, don't go that way. We all leave out the back—it's better than walking through the bar. Come on."
Seto's car isn't out back. His driver should be parked right where Seto left him, and when Saitou leads the way out the door at the end of the hallway, Seto stands in the landing, unsure just where he is. The alleyway behind the bar is wider, enough to keep a few cars—Saitou leaves his side almost immediately and heads for the second black one in line. Its headlights flare up, and for a second he is blinded, his hand scraping against the splintered back of the door for purchase.
There is a narrower alleyway to the left, branching off in the direction he thinks the main entrance is. When he moves towards it and ducks his head, he cannot see the pink neon cocktail glass, but the curve of the building could be hiding it. Knowing he's got the eyes of the others watching him, he keeps going, sticking a hand in his pocket for his phone.
The alleyway is filled with everything but people—litter collects in the little alcoves where the path turns, out of the way of the wind, and he steps over cigarette butts and broken bottles. Rainwater drips from the fire escapes overhead. The last he takes as a sign that he's on the right path, but when he passes the next turn and he still cannot see the main road, he pulls his phone from his pocket and turns it on, planning to call his driver and have him meet him wherever this path lets out.
The second before the screen flickers to life he thinks he sees something in the reflection of the glass. Before he can turn around, something slams into the back of his head.
He all but chokes on his own breath as he crashes forward, slumped against the wall, his fingers scrabbling against the brick to keep himself standing. The pain is so blinding for a second he wishes for unconsciousness to take it away, but then he hears the laughter and his blood freezes in his veins.
It's low and masculine, wholly unnatural-sounding. Nothing should sound like that.
"I'm surprised you're still awake. I should have hit you harder."
It takes Seto a few moments to realize he's said anything at all. He turns, stumbling over his own feet, and the simple act of turning his head sends him reeling with pain again. His chin drops to his chest, and the stranger's lower body comes into view. His hands are hidden behind his back; Seto wants to know just what he hit him with. It felt like a truck, but he knows that's impossible. If he could get a truck in here, Seto's driver could have come for him, and he wouldn't be in this mess.
"Here, here. Look up." Strong hands grip his chin, and Seto realizes his mind is wandering again. His chin is lifted and his head is held firmly in place, and nausea floods him as his vision is forced to adjust.
The man is standing too close. He has a funny smell about him—herbs and dust and something old. He sniffs again. Even his clothes smell old.
When he finally sees the face, he wishes he hadn't. It's a grinning leer, so close to his own face that he jerks backwards, only for his vision to swim in doubles and triples again, the pain brighter in his temples, behind his ears. He has the sudden urge to lift a hand to the back of his head and check for bleeding. He probably is.
"Um, umbrella." His senses return to him enough to croak out the word, and the stranger frowns.
They said two minutes. How long had it been? They must be listening to this. Is he getting mugged? That's embarrassing. Would they risk their cover to stop him from getting mugged?
"Do you want my wallet?" He fumbles for it with one hand before realizing he's still clutching his phone too tightly. He loosens his fingers and it clatters to the ground. Did it fall in a puddle? He wants to see, but when he tries to look down the stranger's fingers tighten around his chin again.
He sees what he was hit with. There's a gun in his right hand. Suddenly, it is pointed at him again.
"Keep your hands where I can see them." There's a strange accent to his voice, and Seto spends a whole ten seconds thinking about it before realizing he's still there, and there's still a gun pointed at him. The man laughs again.
"And no, I don't want your wallet. I have one of my own. I bet yours doesn't even have much cash in it? That's hardly worth my time."
The indifference rankles him more than he'd care to admit. His left leg is threatening to give out, and his vision grows blurry again. The stranger's face leans close to his own again, and Seto can smell mint on his breath. Not the artificial mint from gum, but the kind that comes from chewing spearmint leaves. The smell of it is strong enough to redouble his nausea.
His fingers are clenched tight on their own accord in front of his chest. The stranger has noticed. "If you don't want my money, what do you want? Make it quick, I'm a busy man." He left his umbrella at home.
From the other man's laugh, he must have said that out loud. Good. Maybe the Detective heard it.
"I am trying to figure out what you are. You need to breathe, Seto Kaiba," he adds, almost as an afterthought. The use of his name is like an electric shock, and Seto jerks back again, his chin slipping out of the other's grasp. He's a little too stubborn to take his advice, and with his breathing coming in such short gasps he blinks to try and clear the black spots from his vision.
"You're not a cop, but you're wearing a wire…"
Seto clutches at his shirt, but the stranger is there first, and grasps the hemline, ripping it up and scattering the buttons. He mourns it for a moment—the sentiment is useless, he has six more just like it—and the next second the man is ripping the tape from his chest.
He is too surprised to cry out, but the pain burns a moment later, crowding out the competing pain in his head. The wire is clutched in those strong, smooth fingers, turning it over in his hands. Seto's left leg finally gives out, and he falls back against the cracked brick, liking the way the friction of it helps keep him standing. He doesn't even notice when he finally blacks out.
"I think it's best we're left alone for this," he says, before dropping it on the ground and grinding the heel of his boot over the microphone.
"—Damn it!" Detective Ishizu Ishtar rips the headset away from her ears, still ringing with the piercing squeak of interference from the broken connection. A second curse in Egyptian follows.
"Daimon? Where are you?"
A sizzle from the headset clutched in Ohtaki's hands. "These alleys are like a maze, I'm almost there—"
She turns to Ohtaki. "We've lost the connection."
"What does that mean?" He lifts the microphone to his lips. "Daimon! Get to him, now!"
The transmitter box before her registers no signals; their frequency is nothing but static now. She takes a deep breath. "It means we've lost him, Captain."
When Seto opens his eyes, his body feels like it's not his own. His arms are heavy and awkward, and when he tries to lift one it flops back down by his side. He realizes he's been sleeping with it lying above his head, and his next thought is to wonder why he decided to sleep in his clothes.
If the hard floor beneath him is any indication that something is strange, the sitting across from him, his back leaning against a packing crate, is a definite assurance.
"I've been waiting for you to wake up," he says.
Seto sits up with a violent quickness. Bad idea. The pain returns, a dull pulse behind his eyebrows, and his vision takes a few moments to adjust.
"What is your name?" the stranger asks.
Seto stares at him blankly, and he sighs with impatience. "I know your name. I am testing to see if you have a concussion."
"Seto Kaiba," he says after a pause.
"Good. That wasn't so hard." He continues to stare at Seto while reclining against the crate, his head tilted at a lazy angle, one arm resting on the top of the crate, the other propped on a raised knee. He manages to make the concrete floor look comfortable.
"I would test your eyes, if I had a flashlight. I'll have to check your balance instead. Stand up whenever you are ready."
He finally looks around him, and wonders how he had ignored it before—the room is monstrously large, to the point that it must have been the main floor of some kind of factory building, long in disuse if appearances are anything to go by. There's a label on the packing crate to the stranger's back, but Seto cannot read whatever is scribbled on it with his body in the way.
Candles line the wall at his left and form clusters on either side of the stranger. There are none near him, and he finds himself growing jealous of the warmth. The candles look warm, too—they're the plain ones with the fat, wide bases, stuck to the concrete from their own wax, the tops sloped and the wicks burnt black. Some are burned almost to the ground.
Immediately, he checks his watch. It hasn't been too long—but a half-dozen hours are still long enough for him to be anywhere in the city or the country, if this man had the resources.
"Am I still in Domino?" It's not a question; it's a demand. Seto can see both of his hands, and the gun isn't in either. That gives him courage.
"Yes." A grin stretches his face wide. "Why would I move someone who might have a concussion? I did my best to keep you level in transit."
Seto doesn't want to think about that. "My phone is gone." Its weight is missing from his pocket.
"You dropped it right before you collapsed." The grin widens. "Now, I believe it's my turn to have some questions asked."
He leans forward, and the golden candlelight illuminates the right half of his face, leaving the other half in the shadows. In the half-darkness, his teeth shine almost as brightly as his eyes do.
"You are not a part of the bōryokudan?"
"No."
He doesn't look disappointed. "You are working with the police? Investigating the homicides I've caused, no doubt."
The pieces click into place and Seto scrambles backwards until his back hits the wall. The stranger does not move.
"If you wanted me dead," Seto says slowly, "you would have done it by now." Ohtaki spared him the photographs, but he had heard how the others died—something ritualistic and savage. He'll be damned if he dies like that.
"Oh, I've decided I don't want to kill you." He runs a tongue along the top row of teeth. Unsettling.
"That doesn't mean you won't." It's important to him to make the distinction. It's equally important to find out where he's keeping that gun, and to keep him talking long enough for the sun to rise so Seto can see which direction is East. Maybe he'll even be close enough to a train line to hear a whistle.
"If it makes you feel better. I won't kill you," he says.
It doesn't help. "Why?"
"Don't ask a question you don't want answered."
He cannot look away. Smoke rises in languid curls from a wick about to burn out. "Then…who?"
"When I next kill one of them, I'll do it in front of you," he says. "Then you'll know."
"Tell me your name." The wall at his back is freezing; the cold leeches through his coat and into his skin. He almost wishes he had stayed in the patch he had slept on, if only not to throw away all the time he'd spent there. Being a few feet closer to his kidnapper would be a welcome price to pay for some warmth. He'd consider it a bargain at any price.
"Al-Malik." He says it slowly, like a caress. Seto doesn't want to repeat it. "Say it." There's a hard edge to his voice, and Seto stumbles over the unfamiliarity of the pronunciation.
"Mal? Malik?" There is approval in Malik's eyes, but he'll take it over rage or retaliation.
"Are you cold?" Malik must have noticed his shivers. "So am I."
He beckons Seto closer with a curl of a finger, but he does not move. "You must stand. Walk. If you require brain imaging, time is a factor."
"I'm fine."
"Stand for me." There is no room for refusal as Malik climbs to his feet, and Seto can see the gun tucked into the waist of his pants. The threat is not overt, but he hardly even needs a gun to do the threatening when the rest of him does it so well on its own.
Seto staggers to his feet; every muscle aches and protests his movements, but he straightens his back and takes a few steps to the side, keeping his head angled towards Malik so he doesn't let him out of his sight. Now that he is up he can see a row of disjointed mannequins and broken clothing frames stacked beside the box, but the only thing written on it is a postal seal. It does not help him.
"That is not a straight line, but it will do," he says. "Your balance is fine. Let us test your coordination, your reflexes."
With that, he surges forward. Seto is not expecting that, and spins to the side to avoid him, hitting his back against the wall. His hands rise as if to protect himself in case Malik decides to attack him. While every inch of Malik's posture screams predator, Seto cannot help but feel like he is only the tertiary prey. There would be no logical point in harming him now, like this.
Malik bares his teeth and lunges again, and Seto grasps his left wrist, reaching around his body with his other hand, one goal in mind. He grabs the gun and pulls it loose, aiming it at Malik.
"Coordination is sound. Reflexes are a bit sluggish." He tilts his head, watching Seto through a tangle of bone-colored bangs. "The gun is unloaded. Have you ever fired one before?"
His expression turns indulgent, and Seto wants nothing more than to whack him in the head with the side of it to see how it feels. He pulls the trigger to hear a click. No shot. And again.
"You surprised me, Seto. I did not think you would actually attempt to shoot me. Had it been loaded, you would have killed me." His eyes are wide and clouded with some emotion that makes Seto tighten his hand on the grip. A weapon is still a weapon.
"I should test your reflexes more fully. This used to be a textile factory—it made coats and dresses, I believe. Do you know I have very excellent night vision? I'd very much like to track you. It wasn't much of a challenge last night, probably because you did not know you were being followed. You may have two minutes."
Seto stands immobile for a moment, trying to determine if this is a trick.
"How you spend that time is up to you."
He runs.
The candlelight fades almost immediately, and he trips over a dress form and goes sprawling to the ground. He almost drops the gun.
He runs diagonally, wanting to put as much distance as possible between himself and the corner where Malik waits. If he can find a door or a window, he can escape, and that thought more than any fuels him into running harder. His shoes thud against the floor and he grimaces, struggling now to keep his steps as light and noiseless as possible.
Once his eyes adjust to the darkness he can see how the floor is structured—boxes are piled in haphazard arrays, and most of the wood shows signs of rot. The mannequins are the worst, and the faceless, shapeless bodies lie in piles with no disregard for their state. Some are missing heads, while at times he nearly trips over discarded legs or hands. Each time he sees a full one, propped up, he thinks it is Malik, and it reminds him that his two minutes are probably up.
His breathing is too loud to his own ears. He cannot find the far wall, so he keeps his back to a row of boxes to minimize the risk of Malik sneaking up on him.
There is a light clatter to his right, like something far away has been knocked over. For the first time Seto looks at the floor and sees the dust. Sees his footprints laid out clear as if he had been walking through snow, crisscrossed at points with the heavy print that must be Malik's.
He turns at another noise at his left, clutches the gun tighter in his hands. He is no stranger to self-defense, but he has never actually needed to put those skills to the test. The combination of adrenaline and panic would almost overwhelm him at his best, and combined with the disorientation from his unconsciousness he knows he cannot last like this for long.
A voice whispers in his ear. "I found you."
Seto spins around, giving Malik the leverage to pin him to the stack of boxes. They shift under the pressure but hold.
Malik's hands are tight, one on his right shoulder, the other grasping his left wrist, strong enough to bruise. "I can track you by your breathing. By your smell. By your fear. Everyone fears something, some more than others."
He leans closer to whisper in his ear again. The edges of his hair just brush Seto's jawline, and he recoils, trying for the first time to throw off Malik's hold. It is disturbing how he still cannot see him in the darkness, only feel the bitter cold of his hands or the puff of air on his ear when he speaks or smell the mint on his breath.
"So tell me, then," he says, "What is it that you fear? Do you fear dying? I'd marked you as my next target. I would have killed you in that alleyway had you not been wearing that wire. You're too interesting to kill."
He disables Seto's thrashing in an instant by pressing his lower body against Seto's to keep him from moving. His hips and hands provide every bit as effective a cage as the darkness to trap him and render him immobile.
He is hard. "Tell me, Seto, and I'll let you go. Tell me you fear me."
Seto can place a name to that earlier, nameless emotion. He sounds delirious.
"Your body tells me," Malik says. "But I want to hear it from your mouth."
"Go to hell," he snarls, and whips the gun in his hand across what he hopes is Malik's face. It has the desired effect—he releases him immediately and falls back, spluttering and cursing in a language Seto doesn't recognize.
He spins and runs. He can see better—the light coming up through the windows helps, and he spots the door after only getting lost in a cluster of boxes once. It is not locked, but is stuck to the doorframe, and he has to kick it open.
Malik doesn't pursue him, but his coughing turns to laughter—the same low-pitched laughter that makes his skin crawl.
The street is deserted and he cannot place this part of the city.
He stumbles around the corner. Blessedly, there is a pay phone booth. He closes and locks the door behind him before realizing the absurdity of the gesture. Drops in a 500-yen coin.
His driver finds him collapsed on the rough plastic floor, the phone hanging limply from its cord.
Shuzo Ohtaki receives the barest of messages from an unfamiliar number claiming to be Seto Kaiba, telling him that he is not leaving his downtown tower for anything, and that if Shuzo wishes to see him he must come to Seto.
So he does, bringing Detective Ishtar and a sketch artist, a quiet middle-aged woman who asks him short, simple questions about the perpetrator—Kaiba and Shuzo both refuse to call him the suspect, not when he directly confirmed his role in the murders—and when she presents the sketch it is truly remarkable how much it looks like him.
She has colored it in lightly with pencil, to show the color of his hair and his skin. There is a copy and fax machine in his office, and Kaiba has already placed it into the machine before asking Shuzo's permission.
"I want the sketch. I'm going to send it to every person in the bōryokudan. Maybe that will at least slow him down."
"Won't that just paint them with a bigger target?"
"Not my problem."
He gives his report to Shuzo and Ishtar; for her part, the Detective is oddly quiet until he gets to Malik's name.
"You're pronouncing it wrong," she says, ignoring the strange looks Kaiba is sending her. "It's pronounced Mah-LEEK. It means king."
"I have created the gods from my sweat," Shuzo recites from the Coffin Text fragment. "What a presumptuous name."
"That's not the part I'm concerned about," Kaiba says. "I'm taking Malik at his word. If he said he'll kill the next bōryokudan member in front of me, then I will not leave this building. If it has already been a week since Itou died, there is no time to waste. They know he is coming, but I can give them an edge."
"I'd like to leave some kind of security here for you. Kogoro's watching the building—I can have him move into the lobby. Daimon, Ishtar, and I are heading over to investigate the factory where you were held. We'll try and get some fingerprints. You said he wasn't wearing gloves?"
"No." Kaiba shakes his head. He'd probably like to refuse the additional security, too, but after his track record decided it was best to give Kogoro fieldwork and give Daimon investigative tasks. At the rate things are going, they'll all have a turn to mess things up.
Ishtar hesitates by a framed picture of Kaiba and his brother, and picks it up. "Your younger brother?" At his nod, she smiles. "My brother died when he was about the same age yours is now. I wish I had a photograph of him. I am glad you cherish yours."
In the elevator, Shuzo watches downtown Domino whir by; his ears pop, and he can hear Ishtar's voice.
She's mumbling something again, only now he recognizes it as those same words from the Book of Two Ways, the all-too-familiar sound of Egyptian on her breath.
Seto's trying to lose himself in his work. He's also trying to convince himself his attempts have been successful.
He can't seem to forget or ignore it no matter how long he tries. Malik's stares—turning from a detached, clinical boredom to intense delirium at the blink of an eye—have burned themselves into his mind. It's hard to deny that Malik's eyes are mesmerizing. He has the darkest eyes Seto has ever seen. He supposes that should have been his first sign. The signs all told him to run.
He wonders why he ever had his office designed with so many mirrors, in every direction. The design is supposed to intimidate visitors and provide the illusion that the room is endless—mirrors on angles reflect the room to look almost infinite, save the huge bank of windows on his right to let in sunlight. Without them, he'd probably work without stopping all through the night.
He looks out the window from time to time. It looks at first like it's starting to rain.
Seto looks back up an hour later—there is a streak on the side of the glass. It's dark red in color, viscous and glossy in the sun.
He stands from his desk and takes a few steps closer. It's not rain. There's blood running down the sides of his office windows.
He presses his fingertips to a clean piece of glass; it is cool to the touch. He looks up to see a brown dress shoe and the edge of a pant-leg, dripping with blood.
Kogoro's number is dialed faster than he thinks is possible. He doesn't want to know the answer to the question, but he asks who it is anyway.
It's Saitou dangling from the railing of the observation balcony, his neck broken and a rope wrapped around his body to keep it from falling.
It's Saitou whose body has been pierced with what Kogoro calls "an oddly shaped, pronged knife" and Ishtar later tells him is a pesesh-kef, another tool used in Egyptian funerary rituals.
"How did you become so knowledgeable?" he asks her, once the blood has been cleared and he has relocated his office to one in the interior and there is an empty cup of coffee in his hand. It's convenient that they have an Egyptian expatriate to help them investigate an Egyptian killer, but only Seto seems to find the connection notable.
"I learned much about my culture as a child," she tells him, and leaves it at that. "We found fingerprints, by the way, but they did not match any found in our databases."
The bōryokudan have received his messages and want to meet again, but the secretary has approved the addition of bodyguards for protection. Ohtaki offers to go.
"Of course not," Seto says. "You're a cop. You can't not seem like a cop. You'll give yourself away before I even get a chance to breathe."
"I'll go." It is Detective Ishtar who speaks up, fixing him with a cool half-smile that makes him agree before she even states her reasons. "And I do not think any of them will have a female bodyguard in attendance. It should unsettle them."
"As long as you don't look like a cop," Ohtaki says, raising his own cup of coffee in a salute.
She's wearing a wig that makes her hair look shorter and clothes that are probably too tight for a normal bodyguard, but at least she matches with him. She's wearing makeup like graffiti, red lips and unnaturally dark eyes with splotches of color of both cheeks. He finds it equal parts repellent and enticing.
She certainly doesn't look like Detective Ishizu Ishtar, and when they get to their destination—some empty office building surrounded by a decrepit piece of twisted chain-link, nearly buried in overgrown weeds—they find that they are among the first to arrive.
The room itself is built like the first—large table, this one made of glass, surprisingly well-kept, and the place probably isn't on any official books. He and Ishtar settle into seats along the far side. Ishtar pulls the chair away from the table and crosses her legs. No one pays Seto so much as a glance.
The others bring bodyguards built like tanks, all brawn, all show. It's hollow, and he wonders if anyone else knows it. Ishtar settles a hand over his knee. It's a signal, but it's also a way of keeping the others from approaching them. The visible handgun belted to her hip doesn't hurt, either.
She yawns into the back of her hand at one point—in the middle of a speech by a man Seto never bothered to learn the name of—and he has to forcibly keep himself from laughing.
He offers up another copy of the sketch, and recommends that the price on Malik's head be doubled. He has no trouble paying the difference.
Afterward, Ishtar leans in close and whispers, "I need to talk to you. Outside. Now."
She pulls him to the side of the hallway while the others file out slowly and leans back in to whisper, "Don't tell me you didn't recognize him. The taller bodyguard for the man at the head of the table. He was wearing a hat and sunglasses, but it's still—"
"Malik," Seto finishes the sentence. He hadn't noticed, but he doesn't want to tell Ishtar that.
"It's dangerous to try and take him here. Let's get back to the car and regroup, have Daimon follow him."
"Does he know we've noticed?"
She pauses. "Undoubtedly."
"He's mocking us." He tries to make it a whisper but it comes out as more of a growl. "He's mocking us and saying his next target is Fujiwara and we just have to stand here and watch him walk away."
"I didn't think you cared," she says.
"About them? Not really. But about this? About catching him? I won't stop until he's finished."
"That's the difference between someone like you and people like us." It comes out in a quick breath, and part of the fake bangs of her wig stick to her lipstick. "Ohtaki and I are professionals. We don't get in over our heads and we don't let emotion dictate our actions—"
She freezes, and switches her posture to make it look more natural, wrapping an arm around him. "Here they come."
Now that he knows it's Malik underneath that disguise, the smirk he wears gives it all away again. They pass close enough to touch, and he does, reaching out a hand just close enough to drag his fingertips across the arm of Seto's coat, masking the gesture as if he's adjusting the briefcase he's carrying. At the same time, he murmurs something, but Seto cannot make sense of it.
It's clearly Fujiwara's briefcase in Malik's hands; Seto can just see the ragged edges of a piece of papyrus sticking out of the top.
She tenses up as he passes, and he reaches for her to calm her. "Ishtar…"
At the end of the hallway, Malik straightens. He turns, just enough to stare them right in the eye before turning and following Fujiwara out the door.
And then the two of them are gone. Seto doesn't realize he's got one of Ishtar's hands clenched tightly in his, but they make their way together to the blue Audi as quickly as they can while still looking casual.
She had driven them there. "I need to make a few more calls. How's your driving?" She tosses him the keys.
He catches them, one-handed. "Better than yours."
She dials Daimon's number and gives him the license plate to Fujiwara's car as it leaves the curb.
"He'll be dead by sunup," Seto tells her as they drive back downtown as quickly as they can. "Did you see? Malik was in the driver's seat. He'll take the car back to the factory. Is anyone staking it out?"
"Captain Ohtaki and Daimon are there. Kogoro's at the precinct." She makes two more furious phone calls.
"Let me go with you."
Ishtar looks up at him through dark lashes. "No. You're a huge liability, and we won't risk your injury. You can't even protect yourself."
"You have vests. Guns." It had felt good to hold Malik's gun, to have a weapon of his own at the ready. It'd given him confidence and a sense of power. He preferred an intimation of power to having none at all.
"And you're a civilian. You've been marvelous so far, but now you'll have to stay out of this."
"You don't know what you're up against," Seto says. It comes out harsher than he intends. "Do you? If I'm right, he'll have hostages. If I'm right, you'll be walking into a trap and he'll kill you without a second thought. I've been right every time so far, Ishizu."
"Don't. Just don't." It is hard not to look at his hands, clenched around the steering wheel, the left wrist still circled with the fading bruises from Malik's grasp.
"What did he say?" He thinks he finally has it pinned down. "He said something in Egyptian when he passed us. What was it?"
She stills. "It was more fragments of the Coffin Texts. I do not suffer for any of my limbs. I shall see the horizon and dwell within it."
She pauses to swallow. "I decay in you, I grow in you, I fall down in you."
"What does that mean?" he asks.
"I don't know." She leans back against the headrest, turning her face away from his to look out the window. "I don't know."
"I think you do know. What aren't you telling me?"
"If you don't ask me, then I don't have to lie to you."
"You know, he said something very similar to me," Seto says.
"No, I don't know. It wasn't in the report."
He already made the decision the second she handed him the keys, and at the next light he turns left instead of going straight. "Let me come with you," he repeats. "I almost shot him once. The gun wasn't loaded, but I didn't know that."
He doesn't mean to add the last, but it gets her to turn back to him. "What?"
"I just told you something else that wasn't in the report. Now it's your turn. Tell me something I don't know."
"Stop the car," she says.
"We're at a light."
"I know—just pull over and stop the car."
He does, albeit begrudgingly, and when they're stopped by the side of the road, the car in park, Ishtar goes one farther and reaches over to turn the keys, switching off the car.
She turns to him. She still doesn't look a thing like herself in the wig and makeup.
"I have a brother named Malik. Malik Ishtar. No, just listen," she says. "Let me speak. And a brother, Rishid."
He ignores her instructions."I thought you said your brother was dead."
"Our eldest brother." Her smile blooms and fades in an instant to nothing, replaced again by the harsh, perennially downturned set of her lips. "He died when we were very young. Too young. And it was at Malik's own hands. You can see where it started, and what it did to him."
"You mean…" If he had still been driving, he would have pressed all of his weight against the brakes.
"I have told you something. Now tell me something else that was not in the report."
"No." He cannot stop repeating the word until he is shouting at her. "You told no one? Were you trying to…what, repent for your sins, make things right by putting him away? You put my life at risk! And that speech you gave me—we don't let emotion dictate our actions—that's pretty damn rich. People died, Ishizu, because you kept that inside. How long have you known?"
"The pages," she says, "they were like a sign to me. I do not suffer for any of my limbs. Rishid was one, and he is gone. I am his other limb. He will not suffer me."
She is not crying, but the way that her voice breaks suggests she could be. "It is your turn."
"I think you should keep talking," Seto says. "Tell me something about him. Something only you would know."
"He's cold. Practically coldblooded."
"I said, something only you would know." His stomach twists as he remembers the feel of her hands taping down the wire. They had been cold, too.
She gives him a look, then, something knowing, like he's just given away the best cards in his hand. "I'd say that he can see in dark, since we grew up in a remote area and spent most of our childhood years underground, but I think you already know that too. I'd say that his fingerprints aren't registered because there is no record at all of his birth."
She reaches over to restart the car. "I'd say that some part of you is as fascinated by him as he is of you."
He bites back the immediate denial, knowing that would only confirm her words. "That's impossible."
"Because he assaulted you? Go on, drive," she says, and he does. "He was always magnetic, even as a child. We knew he was special, that he was destined for great and terrible things. That doesn't excuse anything he's done to you, or to me"—she pauses—"or to the dead."
"You can't kill him, can you?" Seto looks at her out of the corner of his eye. "You can't kill your own brother, how could you? But Ohtaki is expecting you to try. And he doesn't even know. You'll die, willing. That's despicable."
"You can kill him." Ishtar folds her hands across her stomach, the position reminiscent of a hug. It is oddly youthful, and for a moment even without a photograph he can see her as she must have looked as a child, with her younger brother by her side. He cannot imagine the elder.
"Only if you let me." Not that he wants to. He's never fired a gun before, and he'd have to fire it at point-blank range to be sure it hit. He doesn't want to watch Malik's face as he dies.
Ishtar's phone has messages from Ohtaki and Daimon—they've followed the car, and it's parked right outside the factory building. When Malik arrived, he dragged the hostage inside—only Fujiwara, and Seto realizes with a fleeting pang of guilt that Malik must have killed Fujiwara's other bodyguard.
"If we go inside, he'll kill them. We want you to secure the front while we attempt to access the building through fire escapes on the sides and back." Ohtaki's voice sounds clear and confident over the phone, the message interspersed with bits of muted commands to Daimon.
He pulls the car up so it sits at an angle to the building's entrance.
Seto unbuckles his seat belt while Ishtar sits silently. "I can't. I'm sorry, but it's my job and it's my gun, and I can't let you—"
"I wasn't asking." In a beat he swings open and door and closes it behind him, her stolen gun in one hand, his car keys in the other. She reaches towards him, but her seatbelt and her locked door give him enough time to make it to the front of the building. He doesn't feel a shred of guilt as he locks the car again, locking his door and keeping her inside. It gives him the time he needs, and he glances back to make sure she is not following. He can see Ishtar shouting at him, fumbling with the lock, but he cannot hear her.
The clothing factory looks markedly different in the daylight. Dust clouds the air, and he glances down to follow the footprints laid out in it, locating his own. By a cluster of boxes the pattern becomes chaotic, the footprints jumbled on top of each other. It must have been where Malik cornered him.
It occurs to him that where he had been resting, unconscious, there was no dust on the floor. Was there dust where Malik had been sitting? He cannot remember.
Sounds draw his attention. It's a peculiar coughing, and he recognizes it as Fujiwara's. Pressing his back to the crates around him, he inches towards the corner and peers out, spotting Fujiwara, lying down with his hands clasped over his head.
"I found you." The words are spoken so close to his ear that as he spins on reflex he lashes out with the gun. Malik jumps back, his grin narrowing as he raises his hands. They are both empty.
"Don't move," Seto says, aiming the gun to point straight at his chest, holding it with both hands for stability. It's impossible to keep his eyes away from the angry-looking cuts on the side of his face where Seto had hit him earlier. Malik follows Seto's eyes, and brushes his hair out of the way so he can see it all.
Malik runs his tongue across his teeth. "I guess that makes us even."
Things are blurring at the edges, and not because of his vision or an impact to the head. "Malik Ishtar," he says. "You called yourself al-Malik, didn't you? The king."
Malik makes to open the edge of his jacket. To reach for a gun, Seto doesn't know.
"Don't move." He raises the gun higher, Malik freezes.
"I want to get something in my pocket. It's a gift, for you. I have a gift for the policemen as well as for my dear sister. Would you like to know what it is?"
"Don't. Move." He repeats it, his fingers tightening around the grip as Malik inches his hand closer. "I'll shoot you, don't you get that?"
"Is there ammunition in that gun?" He laughs at the unease that flickers across Seto's face. "Do you want to shoot me?"
"Not like this."
"Then how? Like this?" He says, and raises his hand just a little bit higher. His fingertips brush the edge of his jacket.
The gunshot sounds so loud it seems to last for minutes on end. He remembers in a concussive daze time had seemed to slow down, too, and everything in his senses was richer and sharper. He thinks his eyes were closed, or maybe he just blinked and it was all over, just like that.
He sets the gun down on the floor in a patch of dust as far away as he can reach without moving his feet. Malik lies on the floor; Seto leans over him, and he does not think he can easily forget the image of Malik like this.
The hole in Malik's head stares up at him like a third eye.
Seto cannot help himself, and stumbles forward on shaking legs to reach Malik's jacket. He opens it—the gun is there, in its holster at his side—but so are five pieces of papyrus, each inscribed with a passage from the Coffin Texts Ishizu Ishtar spoke about. The top one has flecks of blood on it. Seto wishes he could read it.
Shuzo Ohtaki runs towards the sound of the gunshot. He settles a hand on Seto's shoulder; it slides off when he reaches for Ishtar's gun.
"Fujiwara?" Seto asks.
"Daimon is seeing to him. He's unhurt, if a little shaken up. But aren't we all?"
Ishizu is at the door when they exit, and his Audi's car alarm is blaring. He silences it with a button on his keys.
She turns from Ohtaki to Seto. "What happened? I heard a shot…he's dead, isn't he? Was it…?"
"I shot him," Ohtaki speaks up. The glance he gives Seto is quick but full of meaning. "I shot Malik. He was about to draw a weapon on Kaiba and Fujiwara, there was no other choice. Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got to get a crime scene team out here to take care of this. I'll have to take a statement, so you two can't go anywhere, but as soon as I'm done you can go home. Sounds good?"
His shoulders sag as he walks away to make the call, and Ishtar slumps in despair. "My brother is gone."
Seto stares at Ohtaki for a moment, wondering if he is protecting Ishtar or himself by claiming the shot. He supposes for someone as straight-and-narrow as Ohtaki, the gesture speaks volumes about his own compromises.
"I thought you told me he died a long time ago." The words spring from his mouth before he can control them. It might be the last thing she wants to hear.
She gives the slightest of smiles, but it is enough to bring him hope. "I think he did."
Daimon leads a sniveling, coughing Fujiwara from the building and takes him to one of their police cars. The lights are flashing, so bright to be blinding in the sunlight.
"The bōryokudan is finished. Case closed." Call finished, Ohtaki returns to their side. "How are you?"
There is a measured carefulness in his voice that Seto appreciates. "I'm fine."
"You're lucky," Ohtaki says. "There's a difference."
"Yes." It comes out as a murmur. "I suppose I am."
End.
Notes:
1) deadlock is defined as "a situation in which two or more competing actions are each waiting for the other to finish, and thus neither ever does" (Wikipedia).
2) bōryokudan literally translates as "violence group," and is the name that police and the media use to refer to the yakuza; I repurposed it to refer to the shady crime group in this story.
3) One of the hallmarks of this AU 'verse is that all of the Ancient Egyptian characters have roles with either the police or city offices. Mahaado's death was a large part of Parabola, also co-starring Atemu, and Kisara is a police profiler in Ubiquity, the prequel to the universe. You may recognize that each of the names of the police officers (Ohtaki, Kogoro, Daimon) are also the Japanese names of members of the Big 5. They are not the same characters, they merely have the same names. I think it's funny. In addition, the character of "Ichiro Sato" (essentially the Japanese equivalent of "John Smith") is the name of Bakura's alias in Ubiquity. It is my headcanon that Ryuuji's father was also a member of the bōryokudan.
4) While I have fictionalized elements of the crime solving process, I attempted to keep the smaller details as factually accurate as possible. It is aggravatingly difficult to get information about body wires, but to my knowledge my descriptions of them are accurate. The Coffin Texts listed are quotes from number 1130, a speech by the sun god Re, found on Wikipedia, and 330, found on TourEgypt. The Book of Two Ways was referenced primarily because the name is very cool but it has little relation to the way I use it in the story (it was a map of the underworld, not a text, to my knowledge). A pesesh-kef is a spooned blade used in the "opening of the mouth ceremony," which involves the "symbolic animation of a statue or mummy by magically opening its mouth so that it could breathe and speak" (Wikipedia). In Japan, it is illegal for civilians to carry handguns; the gun I had in my mind for reference in the story was a Glock. 'Al-Malik' does mean 'The King' in Arabic.
5) Again, if you have not yet read them, I encourage you to read the other stories in the 'verse!
6) Thank you for reading. I would appreciate and value your reviews!
~Jess