Yu-Gi-Oh is the intellectual property of Kazuki Takahashi and Konami, and is being used in this fanfiction for fan purposes only. No infringement or disrespect is intended by this fanfiction.

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Face, Voice, Hands: 2
by Animom

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The bedroom was not at all what he had imagined.

The mansion itself was huge. Tall double doors opened into a foyer the size of a hotel lobby. The bodyguards helped Kaiba take off his rain coat, steadied him as he toed off his shoes. Jounouchi expected them to then go up the sweeping double staircase and into some luxury bedroom suite the size of a tennis court, but instead they headed down a narrow hallway and into a kitchen.

"Painkiller, sir?" the oldest of the three bodyguards asked, taking a glass from a cabinet. There were several bottles of pills on the counter.

"Later," Kaiba said. His voice was hoarse and listless.

Jounouchi stood in the kitchen and watched as the bodyguards helped Kaiba down a second, even narrower hallway. They stopped outside a doorway; Kaiba took off his suit coat and tie, then moved out of sight inside the room. Jounouchi heard the senior bodyguard ask, "Pajamas?" Kaiba's quiet "No," and then rustling and creaking.

A moment later the bodyguards began to file back the way they'd come, all but one—an older man with dark gray hair and a stern face—passing him and leaving the kitchen without making eye contact. The man glanced at his phone, then asked, "Will you require a ride?"

The question hadn't sounded like a polite way of throwing him out, so Jounouchi said, "I, uh, thought I'd stay a while." After all, it was stupid to have come all the way out to the mansion just to turn around and leave. As he wiped at a trickle of water inching down the back of his neck from his rain-soaked hair he added, knowing it sounded lame, "I could sit with him. Keep him company. I'm an old school friend. Jounouchi Katsuya. You could look it up."

"No need." The old man took a towel from a drawer and held it out. "I am Noroshi. If you wish, I can arrange to have your clothes dried."

"That would be great," Jounouchi said. He took off his sodden suit jacket, then took the towel and draped it around his neck.

"Anything else?" Noroshi asked as he took the jacket.

"Well, since you're offering …" With a self-conscious laugh Jounouchi shucked his pants, then peeled off his socks as well. "Now, don't get the wrong idea. I don't usually strip for strangers."

Noroshi smiled faintly as he took the wet clothes.

Jounouchi, feeling self-conscious and more than a little stupid now that he was dressed only in his dress shirt and boxers, tiptoed down the hallway, but when he peered around the corner Kaiba seemed to be asleep, his back to the door.

Jounouchi had figured that the room would be small—since it was off the kitchen he figured that this area of the mansion was the servant's quarters, or something—but it still surprised him how very small and plain it was, with barely enough space to move around. A twin bed was against the wall opposite the door; a low dresser faced the foot of the bed, and a small desk was against the wall next to the door. The only light came from two slit-like windows just below the ceiling; there were no pictures, no mirror, no decoration of any kind; and the only color came from some folded blue clothing on the dresser.

If someone had told him to imagine Kaiba's bedroom, this—this would be the exact opposite of that.

He lifted the desk chair noiselessly and turned it sideways so that he could sit. Being quiet and doing nothing was not high on his list of favorite things: he'd rather be moving, doing something, but in this situation it seemed the right thing to do.

Which .. yeah, What exactly was this situation, anyhow? He was in the bedroom of someone that neither he nor any of his friends had seen or talked to for years, and odds were the only thing he'd accomplish when Kaiba woke up would be to get insulted and thrown out.

So why the hell had he thought this was a good idea? Ever since they'd met Kaiba he'd been a snobby, selfish asshole ninety-seven percent of the time, always ready to show how much richer, and smarter, and completely set apart from everyone else he was. The few times he had helped Yugi and the rest of them he'd snarled about it the whole time, and was extra-dickish afterward if anyone tried to be friendly … but then, like Yugi said, there was that three percent. "He's trapped inside his armor," Jounouchi remembered Yugi saying once. "I don't know if he doesn't realize it or is too proud to admit it, but I'm sure deep down he's no different than you or me."

Which is why they all kept going to the memorial service every year, and why Jounouchi was sitting half-undresed on an uncomfortable chair in a tiny dim room watching a sleeping guy who, except for two notable occasions, had never been anything but rude to him: because you just didn't abandon people, even if they were Kaiba.

He was startled by a touch on his arm. Noroshi, in the doorway with his clothes. Jounouchi tiptoed into the hallway and smiled as he pulled on his pants, warm from the dryer. "It's kinda cold in there," he whispered as he leaned against the wall to pull on his socks. "I think he could use an extra blanket or two."

"I'll see to it," Noroshi said quietly. "May I offer you some coffee?"

"That would—" Jounouchi hesitated. He hadn't sat with Kaiba very long; would it look like he had only come to the mansion to get dry clothes and a handout?

"It was thoughtful of you to visit," Noroshi said. "But, unless he needs a painkiller, he is unlikely to wake for several hours. Public appearances take a great deal of his energy."

"Okay. Coffee would be great."

In the kitchen Noroshi asked, "Do you prefer drip or espresso?"

"Whatever's easier." Jounouchi watched as Noroshi opened a cabinet and took out a small electric coffeemaker. Just as the door was closing he glimpsed a narrow-waisted silver pot that looked familiar.

"So," he said, "Looks like he must've got hurt pretty bad in that crash." When Noroshi didn't reply it occurred to Jounouchi that he might be hesitant to say anything that might wind up in a tabloid or gossip show. "Aw, it's okay. You don't know me, you don't have to talk to me about anything."

"Would we have let you in here or left you alone with him if we didn't know anything about you?"

"Heh, I guess not." Jounouchi felt flattered. "So what, you have a file on me or something?"

Noroshi didn't answer this. He filled the carafe with water, then said as he measured out ground coffee into the filter, "He had many broken bones. It was fortunate the paramedics got there quickly."

"Does he have one of those breath-measuring things?" Jounouchi watched the coffee dripping in the glass pot, thinking of how he'd had to make his dad practice breathing between hospital stays.

"An incentive spirometer. He did. He threw it away."

"Really?" Jounouchi shook his head. "See, I would've expected Kaiba to set up a website with a chart proving that he takes deeper breaths than anyone else who's ever had broken ribs."

Noroshi suppressed a small smile and set out a mug.

"Though, I guess that's more something the old Kaiba would have done. That guy in there," Jounouchi nodded in the direction of the hallway, "Is he like that all the time, or just after the memorial?"

Noroshi was thoughtful as he poured the coffee. He set the carafe down. "It's worse this year."

"Really? That's—well, not that I ever felt like I knew him all that well, but he seems like he's just given up and waiting for death. That's not the Kaiba I knew in high school." He sipped his coffee. "If he was gonna try to kill himself, I would'a thought he'd've done it a few years ago, since Mokuba seemed to be his main reason for living."

Noroshi didn't reply, just looked out the kitchen window into the garden. After a few minutes he turned to face Jounouchi. "He finally called off the search."

"What, it was still going on?" Yugi and Jounouchi had watched the initial coverage of the search for wreckage and survivors on TV, of course, following it in newspapers and then on-line for a few months as lack of results made the story less and less exciting. The last mention they'd seen—aside from the causal mention in the rare general article about Kaiba or Kaiba Corporation itself—had been a small rumor about of lawsuits. Supposedly the families of the other victims were accusing Mokuba of having deviated from his filed flight plan.

"That was the information that the media had, yes."

Jounouchi nodded. "Makes sense. I shoulda known he'd never give up on his brother that fast."

Noroshi stood and bowed slightly. "Now, please excuse me, I have some things to attend to. Help yourself to more coffee or something to eat." He left the kitchen.

"Aw, Kaiba," Jounouchi said softly, staring at the coffee as if the steam might hold a way to give comfort to the bereaved.

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After he finished his coffee Jounouchi rinsed the mug, filled it with cold water, then took it and the bottle of painkillers back down the hall to Kaiba's room.

As he set the pills and the mug of water on the desk he was pleased to see that Kaiba was now covered with both a second blanket and an antique-looking quilt. In addition, a small upholstered lounge chair had been set next to the bed; there was a folded lap blanket on the seat.

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Jounouchi realized that he must have dozed off, because he woke to a raspy wheezing sound.

Kaiba had rolled over. His face was pinched with pain, but his eyes blazed under his disheveled hair. "Why the hell are you here?"

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~ to be continued ~

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A/N: As this is set in an AR, Kaiba's major domo is named Noroshi rather than Isono/Roland. Noroshi means "beacon, skyrocket, signal fire" in the sense of a light that guides (it's sometimes used to mean a lighthouse).

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(13) 27 September 2013