Yugi gave Mokuba his bedroom, and piled a multitude of extra blankets on the shivering child. When that didn't keep him warm enough, he went down to the game shop and grabbed one of the little portable space heaters his grandfather kept behind the counter and brought it up to the bedroom. He plugged it in, gave Mokuba some of the cough medicine, and sat and talked quietly with the child until Mokuba dozed off. Then he turned the heater off, since it really wasn't even cold in the room, and was a little concerned about Mokuba overheating despite whatever the feverish chills were telling his body.
Yugi went to sleep on the couch in the living room, and he got (at most) a couple hours in before he felt someone shaking his shoulder. His violet eyes fluttered open sleepily, and he blinked into the darkness.
"Yugi? Are you awake?" Mokuba asked quietly.
"Yeah, I'm up," he responded, easing himself into a sitting position. "Are you all right? Do you need some more medicine?"
Mokuba paused, then nodded. "Yeah...I can't stop coughing. I didn't know where you put it, I should've asked earlier..."
Yugi stood up and touched the kid's shoulder. "It's all right. The medicine's in the kitchen, just give me a second." Mokuba nodded and curled up on the couch-in the same warm spot Yugi had just abandoned-while Yugi went back to the kitchen and measured out another dose of cough medicine for him. He walked back to the living room and handed Mokuba the little cup, and watched as he forced it down.
Mokuba handed the cup back to him. Yugi brought it back to the kitchen, and then walked Mokuba back to the bedroom. Mokuba hesitated in the doorway for a moment before speaking. "Yugi?"
"Yes?"
Mokuba fidgeted a bit. The truth was, he hadn't been sleeping well, with all the drama and anxiety from the events of the evening. Usually, when he was feeling overwhelmed like that, he'd either go sleep in his brother's bed or on the couch in his office, depending on Seto's current whereabouts at the time. Yugi was always so kind and caring, and Mokuba didn't want to be alone...but they certainly weren't as close as brothers. Mokuba swallowed and looked up at him nervously.
"Will...will you please stick around for a little bit? I'm having a hard time staying asleep."
Yugi understood, and showed him how a second bed slid out from underneath his own bed.
"Joey stays over a lot, his dad isn't a good person either," Yugi explained. "My grandpa and I put this in here so he doesn't hog the couch since he likes to sleep late and it's hard to wake him up. If you'd like, I can stay here for the rest of the night."
Mokuba smiled and threw a couple of the extra blankets over at him before burrowing under his own blankets and yawning. "Thank you, Yugi." The spiky haired boy smiled as well, happy that the kid seemed to be relaxing so quickly.
By the time seven o' clock in the morning rolled around, Joey had drawn three more daisies on the wall out of sheer boredom. As the night had progressed, he'd gotten more comfortable with the fact that Seto was sleeping. He was not dead or dying and this was not some elaborate plan to humiliate Joey in some weird, twisted way. Not to say that Seto was above trying to humiliate Joey; actually, he seemed to enjoy that quite a bit.
No, it was that Joey was pretty sure if Seto was going to try to humiliate him for some reason, he wouldn't have fake-snored so convincingly from around four in the morning straight through until sometime between five and five-thirty to sell his plan. In fact, snoring seemed like something that the brunet would get all indignant and hissy about and deny tooth and nail if teased about it. So, Joey had no choice but to draw the conclusion that Seto Kaiba was actually asleep, and whatever drugs they'd forced into him knocked him so far out that he had snored. Unless, of course, he was actually just a habitual snorer, in which case Joey would totally try to find a way to get a video of that for the internet at a more appropriate time.
Yes, Joey was very, very bored.
The blonde sighed and stretched with a yawn, then pulled out his phone to shoot Yugi a text, checking up on Mokuba and letting both of them know that the elder Kaiba had slept straight through the night and still hadn't woken up, just in case they were waiting for him to check in. When there was no response, he figured they weren't awake yet either. Ah, well, it was still pretty early. Strangely, Joey wasn't really all that sleepy, despite having stayed up the entire night and only having had half a cup of coffee. His eyelids felt scratchy when he blinked, but other than that, they remained magnetized to their respective half of his eye, refusing to meet in the middle for longer than that fraction of an instant.
Suddenly, a muted groan sounded from the slowly awakening brunet. Joey froze and watched intently as blue eyes fluttered open for a moment, focusing on the ceiling. Seto tried shifting a bit, but it appeared that he found his body too heavy to move. He let out a long exhale, and his eyelids slid shut again. Joey noticed his breathing didn't slow down again, though, and figured he must have remained awake.
"Kaiba?" he said as softly as he could, not wanting to startle Seto, all the while bracing himself to leap off the chair and slam the little blue button at an instant's notice if needed. To his complete and utter bafflement, Seto's eyes just opened slowly, and his head lazily turned to the direction of Joey's voice.
"Wheeler," he breathed the name out calmly, clearly still too dazed and out of it to use his actual voice. The blonde raised his eyebrow. No hissy fit or flippant attitude or even half of a glare or scowl?
He didn't know what the doctors and paramedics gave him, but it should probably become a regular thing.
Joey leaned forward and peered into his eyes, moving his head back and forth and side to side to determine if Seto was actually seeing him. The blue orbs followed him around just fine until Joey sat back again, blinking. He'd always thought that if the CEO had just toned it down, relaxed a bit, and stopped being such a jackass, he'd actually be a good guy.
But all this actually happening was just too bizarre.
"Kaiba..." Joey started off, but then realized he didn't know what to say. Should he ask about what happened? Should he even mention Mokuba? He took a deep breath and decided to go for broke with some solid small talk.
"How'd you sleep?"
Seto blinked slowly before answering. "It doesn't feel like I slept. I'm tired…"
Joey paused, and quirked an eyebrow. "How the hell can you still be tired? You were out for a long time. All evening and all night."
"How long?" There was an air of familiar anxiety to his dazed voice. Joey cringed and tensed up once again.
"Almost thirteen hours," he answered reluctantly. "Um, listen..."
"Save it. I remember what happened with my brother, and I'm sure you heard about what happened too. I know you're trying to avoid it."
Joey paused, but relaxed a little. The other male seemed to be coming around a little more, but the blonde still couldn't be entirely sure what was happening here.
"Kaiba?"
"What?"
"Aren't you even going to ask what I'm doing here?"
Seto moved again, and seemed to be trying to sit up. Unfortunately, his body was still a bit out of his control. Some parts felt as though they were filled with concrete while other areas were full of helium. Joey watched for a moment before realizing what he wanted, then jumped out of the chair; he gently lifted Seto's upper body to position him better before using the little keypad to elevate the head of the hospital bed up. He smirked a bit when he heard Seto grumble at being held up. Once the brunet was comfortably set up, he let another long sigh.
"I know why you're here."
"...Care to elaborate?"
Before Seto could answer, there was a quick, sharp knock on the door, and Dr. Kurata entered the room.
"Mr. Kaiba," the doctor said, giving the CEO a quick nod in greeting. "How are you feeling today?"
"Tired," Seto responded flatly. Dr. Kurata nodded again, and quickly checked his patient's eyes.
"That's to be expected. You probably feel like you haven't rested at all," he said, quickly checking the brunet's vitals. A nurse appeared in the room briefly, depositing a small white paper cup into each of the doctor's hands before disappearing. Dr. Kurata handed them over to Seto. "Take these. They're going to make you tired again, but you should be able to sleep better this time. This is another sedative, so you'll probably feel a little woozy and drowsy upon awakening again. It's much weaker than what they injected you with last night, of course. I've asked the therapist to give you until tomorrow to speak with her. It goes against what usually happens with behavioral health cases, but seeing as I've been your personal physician since you were a child, I convinced them that it would be best to give you space and rest before moving forward."
Seto had taken the medication as soon the doctor had advised him to do so; however, he choked on a second sip of water when the word 'therapist' was spoken.
"You want me to see a shrink?" His blue eyes flashed. "Why the hell would I need to see a shrink?"
Dr. Kurata gathered his instruments and a file folder and stuck them in his bag. "Mr. Kaiba, you physically harmed your brother and your bodyguard-two people who would protect you at any cost-and after speaking with them at length about what went on last night, I have determined that there is sufficient evidence that you would benefit from exploring the...situation," the man shot a quick look at Joey, who scowled, "that brings you here."
"I hadn't slept for more than thirty minutes in over a week," Seto snapped. "That was the situation."
"Perhaps," Dr. Kurata said noncommittally, "but for now, you have been placed on a seventy-two hour hold, and you are required to stay in the hospital unless you wish to create more issues for yourself." He gave Seto an implicit look before bowing out. The brunet growled, sending a glare after the doctor.
Joey remained quiet for a while, hoping that the medicine would kick in again, since Seto appeared to be highly agitated. Ten or so minutes later, he noticed that Seto's body seemed to be melting into the bed. He sighed and reached over to press the key to lower the head of the bed.
"I could figure out how to operate that on my own," the brunet grumbled. Joey snorted and grinned.
"I'm sure you could have. I mean, you invent more complicated technology than these stupid bed levers. You looked like you were getting sleepy again and I just wanted to help you get more comfortable."
Seto shot him a look, which was undermined by the ensuing failure to suppress a yawn. His eyes closed, and for a few minutes Joey thought he was asleep again, but of course they inexplicably sprang open again. He almost forgot that he was dealing with Seto Kaiba for a second there.
"I know why you're here." His words were slightly slurred, but he was still generally coherent. "I knew if anything like this ever happened, Mokuba would call Yugi. And I told Roland that if Mokuba needed to stay with someone...Yugi would be there...and Mokuba would be safe..."
Joey nodded, not really knowing what that had to do with him and why he was there, but Seto was obviously slipping out of consciousness.
"Okay, Kaiba," he said quietly, deciding not to push it.
"And…if Yugi's somewhere, you are, too...you two never leave me alone..."
At this point, Joey knew Seto was just rambling because of the medication, and the longer he was awake, the less likely that whatever he was saying would still be said if he wasn't being sedated again. But even the blonde, who had never really liked the CEO, felt a pang of compassion at the despair inserting itself into his words. He said nothing and only silently leaned forward to lightly pull the quilts back over Seto's shoulders. A brief look of surprise passed through blue eyes at the action, and Joey fell back into the chair. Seto watched him for a moment before allowing his eyes to finally close long enough to let him fall asleep again.
Joey rubbed his own eyes, grudgingly wondering when they'd grown so heavy. He couldn't quite place it, but something had changed between the two of them. He envisioned himself always hating the rich egotist, but there was something telling him that he really wasn't so egotistical. Maybe that something was a high dosage of a nice tranquilizer, but if Joey saw that there was something else in a situation like this, then there probably was. He leaned back, yawning, and listened to Seto's soft breathing for a few moments before dozing off himself.