Chapter 2

"I can't believe Kaiba!" Joey yelled, throwing his phone back into his pocket, turning back to the others. Tea was trying to calm Abby down, she had started to cry after Kaiba left. She was a little sensitive so Kaiba's insults had seriously hurt her feelings. And that was not ok for Joey.

"I'm gonna go out on a limb here and assume that he didn't apologize." Tristan said, he wasn't surprised one bit. He knew how terribly mean Kaiba could be, and he wasn't exactly keen on the word 'sorry'. He honestly doubted Kaiba even knew the word existed.

"No." Joey said with an extremely annoyed tone. It made him beyond angry whenever Kaiba was even around. But when he insulted a girl. That was just unforgivable. Especially if he made the girl cry. And ESPECIALLY if that girl just so happened to be his Girlfriend.

"Don't worry about Kaiba. It doesn't matter what he says." Said Yami. He had taken over while Joey was yelling at Kaiba over the phone to offer Abby some encouraging words of his own.

"I know..." Abby sniffled, tears still slowly falling from her eyes. "I must seem like such a baby..."

"That's not true." Tea said, pulling her into a slightly tighter hug. "Kaiba's the only person in the world that absolutely no one is a baby for crying because of something he said."

"I guess so..." Abby sighed. She knew Tea was right, but it didn't make her feel any better about it. And she wasn't only crying because she was upset about what Kaiba said about her. She was also crying because she was angry about what Kaiba said about Joey. He said that Joey was stupid and that she was crazy and desperate for liking him. But that wasn't true. Sure Joey wasn't the best at school work, but he wasn't stupid. At leased not to her. His grades were just fine and he didn't ask for help often. And he was one of the sweetest guys she'd ever met. But she figured that was why Kaiba didn't like him much.

Seto was getting bored of waiting in the car. He glanced down at the clock above the radio, which he never used.

2:59

"Good. I'm sick of this already." Seto thought. He was trying to be patient, he knew his boredom was his own fault for being early. He sighed on account of admitting to himself that something was actually his fault. As he sighed, the bell rang, ending the school day. Seto turned to the building, waiting for Mokuba to come out. A few short minutes passed and he saw his brother exit the building. It took meer seconds for Mokuba to spot the car. And Seto could see that he looked quite happy as well as confused upon seeing that it was Seto picking him up from school today.

"Hey Seto." Mokuba said as he got into the passengers side of the car.

"Hey." Seto said, watching as Mokuba buckled his seatbelt. He started up the car and began to drive them home. "How was school today?"

"It was fine." Mokuba answered. "You know, as fine as one can be after being bullied..." Though Seto could haddly hear the last part, he could tell he was oddly carefree about it considering Seto could hear the word bully in that sentence.

"What?" Seto asked, tempted to stop the car right there in the middle of the street. "What do you mean?"

"It's not that big a deal Seto." Mokuba said, not even glancing at his brother. He just continued looking forward. Though Seto disagreed.

"Oh, I beg to differ." Seto half-scoffed. Ever since they were kids he hated bullies. Especially ones who found it fun to mess with his little brother. And that hadn't changed. "Who was it? What did they say?"

"Seto, I said it's no big deal-" Mokuba was cut off by the car jerking. Seto had stopped the car.

"Look Mokuba, it may not be a problem to you, but you know for a fact that it's a problem for me." He said, looking back over at Mokuba, who still was not looking at him, which made him worry a little. He hadn't even seen Mokuba's face on the one side at all. "Now, who was being mean to you?"

Mokuba stayed silent.

Seto couldn't take it anymore. He leaned over and turned Mokuba's face towards him. Sure enough, there was indeed a reason he hadn't looked at him the whole time. his face was kinda cut up and there was a little bit of dried blood on his forehead.

"Mokuba!" He gasped, drawing back a bit from the shock. "Who did this to you!?"

Mokuba sighed as he told Seto what had happened that day at school. He told him how he was being constantly insulted by a few of the older kids, that didn't bother him much because he knew they didn't know what they were talking about. But one of them said something mean about Seto and he got angry and punched the kid.

"That doesn't explain what happened to your face." Seto said, interrupting Mokuba's story. Only interested in that part at that specific moment.

Mokuba gave him a 'don't interrupt' look and continued.

"I punched the guy and one of his friends grabbed me and smashed my face into the side of the building."

Seto's eyes widened slightly. Of course, the one day he picked up Mokuba himself, was the one day he got beat up. That was extremely angering.

"Joey, what are you so mad about?" Duke asked as he, Joey and Bakura walked down the hall. True it was passed 3 PM, but they were in High School. They still had a little bit of their school day left.

"Yeah, you seem rather angry today Joey." Bakura said, making the obvious observation.

"I'm mad because of Kaiba!" He answered his friends. "Just because he's completely heartless doesn't give him the right to insult my girlfriend because she's a sweet girl! Gez! I don't go around insulting Mokuba for being a nice kid do I!?"

"Joey, I think you should calm down." Bakura advised, noticing that people in the hallway had begun to stare at them.

"Yeah." Duke agreed "And besides, Kaiba doesn't like any of us. But I get it, if he insulted my girlfriend I'd probably be the same way."

"You don't have a girlfriend." Joey added with an extremely flat tone.

"Don't remind me." Duke sighed. "Somehow you got a girlfriend before me..."

"That's enough out of both of you. Duke, you could have a girlfriend if you wanted one, but you always just settle for breaking hearts, and Joey, dwelling on what Kaiba did won't make it better. I understand you're angry but that's not going to help." Bakura said. And in his defense, they did all think that Joey was acting pretty ridiculous about that whole thing. Sure Kaiba had made Abby cry, but what he said honestly really wasn't all that mean. She was just a sensitive girl.

"I guess you're right Bakura." Joey sighed. They could always count on Bakura to keep them together. Maybe it was his word choice paired with his British accent. They didn't really know, but it didn't really matter.

"Yeah, you do have a point." Duke said as they reached their lockers. Their last class was always really early getting out, so they had lots of time at the end of the day to just hang out until the last bell.

"Hey Bakura, could you talk to Abby?" Joey asked as he put his books into his backpack.

"Umm, sure. But, shouldn't you do that?" Bakura asked, confused on Joey's thinking on this.

"Yeah but you know how she is sometimes. I'm still mad at Kaiba and If she's still upset about it than I want someone with a cooler head to talk with her. Besides, you're the one who introduced us remember?" Joey said, putting a hand on Bakura's shoulder. It was true. Abby was a friend of his before she met Joey and the others. He was the one who introduced her to them, He kinda understood now.

"Yes, I remember." Bakura said. He really did remember. It was three months ago on a Tuesday, Abby had just moved to Domino a few days before and Bakura was her first friend. Once he learned that he was her only friend, he introduced her to Yugi and the gang. She and Joey seemed to have an instant connection, they started talking and hanging out a lot. Then seemingly out of the blue, they started going out a few weeks after Bakura introduced them to eachother. "Alright, I'll talk to her."

"Thanks Bakura. I just want to make sure she's ok you know. Like, one hundred percent sure." Joey said, closing his locker.

"Please Joey, you're just paranoid. I'm sure she's perfectly fine." Duke said, closing his locker as the bell rang.

"Yeah, but Kaiba insulted me too. And you know how upset that alone makes her." Joey said in response to Duke. "Anyway, I told Serenity I'd call her today, so I gotta go. I'll see you guys later." He proceeded to walk down the hall and out of the building. Bakura was right, he was making too big a deal out of this. But he couldn't help it, it was just the way he was. Short tempered, and very protective of the girls in his life. But still, he knew that was no excuse for his behavior. He knew that, and Tea always gave him a hard time about it. He knew she was only looking out for him as a friend, and he appreciated that. It was good to know there was people he could count on, people who were always looking out for him. And he promised himself that he would always do the same thing for them.

DAW! Joey you sweetie :P Anyway, so how does everybody like the story so far? I like it, but you know of course I do, it's my story. Anyway, review, follow, favorite, whatever you want to do. Whatever floats your boat. Next chapter soon! ;)