Resurfaced

Chapter 3

Mokuba was sitting on his legs, hands on his knees, looking ahead at a small, gray person floating infront of himself. It looked like a featureless and faceless action figure, having arms, but no hands..legs, but no feet..a head, but no neck.

"Kaiba." it spoke to him. "Let's play a game."

A chess board was suddenly between them, pieces all lined up in place. The boy blinked.

"Chess? Why do you want to play chess with me?" he asked, with an obviously confused expression on his face. He hadn't played regular chess since being in the orphanage.

"I'm just waiting. I wanted to pass the time. I used to play chess with my father when he wasn't busy. I was hoping you would play a game with me."

"What are you waiting for?"

The figure somehow seemed solemn as it answered, "I'm waiting to remember. I've forgotten a lot of things."

"Really? How long will it take you to remember again?"

"I don't know. But I know I'll remember. Its been coming back to me gradually."

"Uh.." Mokuba blinked again, "Who are you?"

"I'm..."

SLAM!

Mokuba's eyes snapped open at the sound of a door shutting with much force. He looked around the room, his vision cleared. It was now that he realized that this is his room, with medical equipment around. Seto walked in just then with a paper bag in one hand, and his eyes lit up at seeing his big brother.

"Seto!" he exclaimed.

The elder Kaiba brother gave a slight smile out of the corner of his mouth. "You're looking a lot better today. How are you feeling?"

"I feel a lot better. My hand still hurts, though."

"That's normal. Are you tired?"

"No, I'm awake." he shook his head as he answered.

"That's good." Seto sat himself down on the chair next to Mokuba's bed. "I got some prescription medicine for you. You'll have to take it until the bottle is finished once you're unhooked from the IV. You'll probably only need to stay on it for another day or two."

"Oh..I'll have to stay in this bed the whole time?"

"Yes, but I'll be here for you. I also brought you something." he said as his hand dove into the paperbag, fishing out a few plastic-wrapped Capmons. One of them were unwrapped already, with the number 5 set over a lavender star. Seto set the pieces down in his brother's lap.

"Capmon? Where did you get them?" Mokuba asked as he carefully sat himself up.

"These were already yours. They were in your pocket..one was in your hand."

The memory rushed to Mokuba as suddenly as a knife in the back. For an instant, he was reliving the moment, being under that cable and scared for his life. "Aa—ah.."

Seto's interrupted by pressing his hand on the younger brother's shoulder. He immediately calmed down, giving a sigh in some relief. The memory felt much too real.

"Mokuba, I'm going to tell you what you probably don't want to hear. The only explanation I can come up with as to what happened, since these were in your pocket, and one in your hand where we found you..."

Mokuba lowered his head sadly, feeling ashamed, "..I'm so sorry, Seto..I shouldn't have brought them with me. I should have waited until later."

Seto continued on, "..Is that I should have kept a better eye on you."

The preteen blinked, surprised by what his brother just said.

"If I had been watching you instead of being absorbed on the results, I could have stopped you from getting harmed. I apologize for not doing better on my part."

"Seto.." he shook his head a little. "Don't you blame me at all for what happened? I was the one acting stupid.."

The elder brother simply shut his eyes, keeping his hand in place, "When there's a parent with a child, it's the duty of the parent to make sure the child is protected, and teach them how to protect themselves. Since our parents died, its been my responsibility to take care of you, as both a brother and parent. What happened is just as much my fault as yours."

These words moved Mokuba quite a bit..his eyes getting misty with tears. "Please, don't blame yourself.."

Seto simply gave him a calm smile as his eyes reopened, looking a little misty himself. "It's what I do when anything happens to you. In this case, there will be no punishment. What happened to you is life's way of punishing those who are not careful. It's my punishment as well..to know that you could have been seriously injured. We've both been disciplined already. There's no need to say you're sorry."

"Seto.." the tears began to run thick down Mokuba's cheeks. He leaned in closer with reaching arms, and in response, his brother stood from his chair to wrap his arms around. The two hugged each other tightly, with Seto being more careful than his younger sibling.

Outside, the sun was slowly setting.


The evening was whittled away on an eager Mokuba opening his monster capsules, and Seto playing Capmon with him on one of the game boards he had laying around. Out of three games, the younger sibling won two. It was possibly the only game he was better than his older brother at. And after those few rounds had been played, the doctor came in to give Mokuba a general check-up, to see to it that everything was healing as it should without compilations. He informed them that in the morning, they would take the IV out, and he could start getting out of bed and doing things as normal, as long as he took it easy and avoided using his left hand as much as possible.

"Yes, doctor." he responded respectfully.

After all that had been said and done, the doctor left the two brothers alone once more. Mokuba blinked blankly in thought for a moment. Seto sat back down in the chair as he noticed his brother's expression.

"Something on your mind?"

The younger Kaiba whipped his head towards Seto, as though mildly surprised. "Oh..sort of. I was just wondering about that weird box..did you ever find out what that was about?"

"..Well. The information held on that box was all completely ruined." he answered, leaning back in the chair. "I kept in touch with the people I had working on it...they were trying to figure out what corrupted the data on that box. The only thing we got back from it was garbled code. We're not sure if the info was always that way, or if something caused it to happen."

Mokuba's eyes widened a little at that. "Do you think it was from being underwater? Or maybe sand from the beach?"

"No, the casing was sealed tight. Nothing got into it from outside. If anything did happen, it had to have happened after we opened it, unless it was already that way when whoever sealed it up." Seto's blue gaze lowered in disappointment. "I don't think we'll be able to find out where it came from, nor who created it."

"Oh.." Mokuba sounded a bit disappointed along with his brother. "..Do you think that what happened during the purge had anything to do with it?"

"I doubt it." he plainly put, slouching over to rest his forearms on his legs. "It's impossible for you to have interfered like that. If you were a computer, then maybe..but as you are, there's nothing that you could have done to the data just from getting shocked by a cable."

"Ah..okay. That's good." he said, feeling better about it now.

Seto nodded, "It's nothing for you to worry about, Mokuba. You had nothing to do with the failure. We might be able to look for more clues my sending a team out to the beach, but..for now, there's nothing more we can gain from the box. We'll have to focus on you getting better, and I need to get back on track with my work, as well."

"Did you miss out on work because of me?"

"It's nothing I can't make up for. Making sure you're safe and healthy takes priority over everything else."

Hearing that made Mokuba give an encouraged smile. "I'll get better very soon, and I won't let anything else happen to me like this. I promise."

Seto returned the smile with a smirk of his own. He stood up and brushed a hand on top of the younger sibling's pronged hair. "This is nothing you can't handle, you have more than enough courage. You'll still need your rest, though. Try to get some sleep now."

"Okay. Thanks for hanging out with me." he nodded with determination.

"No problem." Seto removed his hand. "I'll see if I can get started on some of my work. I'll come back in the morning, but if you need anything at any time, then let me know. I put your cellphone in the bag, too."

"Alright. Goodnight, Seto!"

"Goodnight, Mokuba."

And with that, his Nii-sama left the room, closing the door behind himself. Mokuba gently flopped backwards onto his pillow, pulled the sheets up to his chin, and shut his eyes.

Crickets were chirping outside.