Collateral Damage

Chapter Three - The Solution

Roland wasn't happy. Not happy at all. First, he was leaving the task of guarding Seto Kaiba to one of his underlings. He knew that Mr. Kaiba was scheduled to remain at corporate today, and that anyone who wanted to get at him there would have to go through level after level of Roland's hand-picked security team to just get near his office -- much less trouble or threaten the man it was Roland's responsibility to serve as primary bodyguard and head of security. Still, he knew better than most that there were forces that could get through even his tightest web of security around his employer. He was a bit on edge. It had been a while since the ever-annoying Maximillion Pegasus had last troubled Seto. By Roland's way of looking at things, it was just about time for the Chairman of Industrial Illusions and the CEO of Kaiba Corporation to butt heads again, something he never looked forward to. Seto nearly always lost his cool when Pegasus was around. And, weird things nearly always happened, too. Roland feared he'd have a nervous breakdown whenever those two started skirmishing again.

The second thing bothering him was his current errand. He opted to leave his sunglasses on, even though he was in a building. It wasn't that the light inside was too bright, or even than he was trying to conceal his identity. No, it was much simpler than that.

He didn't want to meet her gaze. He didn't want to see as wariness crept into her eyes when he entered the room and she recognized him. He didn't want to watch the world-weariness take hold and force her to shutter herself off from everyone at his approach, either. She'd been in the business world long enough. She knew there were sharks in the waters. She had to know that to Seto Kaiba, in a way the biggest shark of all, she was just a weakly struggling swimmer whose strength was fading fast. And there was blood in the water.

Hers.

The elevator door opened. Directly ahead was the last defense he had to -- well, intimidate -- to get to his target and complete his mission. "I've a delivery for Ms. Patience Morgan from Mr. Seto Kaiba," Roland told the secretary whose massive desk and watchful eyes served to guard the occupants of this floor, the personnel division of Lossan and Smith, from unwanted visitors and distractions. Roland had no illusions that he was the epitome of an unwanted visitor to Patience Morgan right now, and that what he was about to give her was the biggest distraction of all -- a metaphoric bomb to destroy her life. No one crossed Seto Kaiba and emerged from the encounter unscathed. Well, no one except for that Yugi kid, but that was because even Roland could see Seto didn't really want to destroy him. After all, the kid only crossed him in that frivolous game. This was business. And when it came to business, Seto Kaiba was serious. Deadly serious.

His employer's name was all the key he had needed to gain entrance to Lossan and Smith in the first place. It worked its corporate magic again to get him waved past the secretary's desk in the direction of Patience Morgan's tiny office.

She looked up, with a professionally welcoming half-smile on her face, when his shadow fell across her desk from the doorway. Dammit, the sunglasses weren't enough. He couldn't help but see as her expression skipped both the wary regard and the world-weariness he'd feared and went right over the edge into a resigned sort of defeat.

"Oh," she said simply, before squaring her shoulders and standing to face him on equal footing. "I see that Mr. Kaiba has decided I'm not beneath his notice, after all."

Roland couldn't help but admire her show of bravado. "I've a delivery for you, Ms. Morgan," he said.

A wry, bitter smile curled her lips upward. "I should count myself lucky that Mr. Kaiba isn't known for 'eliminating' those who trouble him, in the classic sense, or I'd worry about the 'delivery' you are about to hand me. I assume it's an innocuous-seeming envelope and not something more severe -- like a bullet?"

"You are confusing my employer with his father. Seto Kaiba doesn't resort to such criminal and illegal tactics," Roland replied stiffly. Still, did it matter when he knew what he was handing her was going to destroy her life, anyway? Even though she seemed defeated, he knew she wouldn't back down. In her own modest way, Patience Morgan was just as prideful as his employer. And, if she didn't back down, Roland knew that in just a few days time, Patience would have no job, and no prospects for gaining a new one in Domino City. He had seen to the deliveries of other seemingly-innocuous envelopes to every company she had sent her resumé to, himself. None of those companies would dare to cross Kaiba Corporation's 'request' that they not consider her application for employment. In a month, maybe less, her finances would be in a shambles, she would default on her mortgage, lose her house and be forced to move from Domino City. It was better than out-and-out killing her -- but not by much.

Patience sighed, and held out her hand. "If you please, give it to me. I have a lot of work to finish up today. I'll read Mr. Kaiba's -- letter -- when I get home. I'm pretty sure I won't be able to concentrate much on my work after I read it, and I do owe the company I work for my best efforts -- while they still have me."

It was never in question. Roland might think that what was happening to Patience was unfortunate and unfair, he might consider that if Seto were just a little older, rather, a little more mature, a different outcome, a compromise of sorts, could be reached, but he wasn't about to let his employer down. Without a word he drew the damning white business envelope out of the breast pocket of his suit and handed it to the doomed woman.

"Thank you, Roland." He wasn't surprised that she knew his name. Patience's gaze dropped to stare unseeingly at the surface of her desk for a moment, before looking up again. "I know you are only doing your job. Now, I have to get back to mine. I trust you can find your way out?"

Roland nearly smiled at the dismissal. Why couldn't this whole mess have happened, say, two years in the future? Perhaps Seto wouldn't be so dead-set on always having his own way by then. He bowed politely toward the woman, and left.

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Seto found a satisfied smile trying to creep across his face as he finished the report his legal department had compiled at his request and left on his desk this morning. Noticing he was alone -- he found all of his bodyguards except Roland tedious to have around so he demanded they guard him from the outer office -- he indulged and let himself smile.

Patience Morgan had been one of the very first Plaintiffs in the very first class action suit against his company. She had been one of those who'd suffered the most damage during the first tournament. However, when Seto flipped through to see the disbursements of funds from his legal team having to settle big on that first case (he'd been rather unhappy about that at the time, he recalled) she'd received no settlement.

While the details of the settlement were still being hammered out, she'd withdrawn from the lawsuit, forcing the Class Council to scramble and use one of the alternate Plaintiffs as the Class Representative, instead. In a brief letter sent to the Court, the Class Council and Seto's legal department, she'd explained that she objected to the conditions around which the class action suit was being formed, as it included too many people who were claiming 'psychological distress' who could prove no damages as shown by documented doctor visits, and that the compensation to the Class Council was far too high, in her opinion.

In other words, she thought too many people who had not been damaged in any perceptible way by the tournament, and the class action lawyers, were gouging Kaiba Corporation unfairly, using people who had suffered real and provable damages as their front men and justification for demanding such a high settlement.

Patience Morgan's name had not appeared in any other of the class action suits brought against Kaiba Corporation.

She would have received a very substantial settlement from that first suit as the Class Representative, Seto realized. He read over her letter withdrawing from the class action suit, again.

"What are you smiling about, big brother?" Mokuba asked brightly as he bounded into the office, plunked down into the chair across from Seto, placed his elbows on the desk and propped his chin on his hands. "I like to see you smile!"

For his answer, Seto got up from his chair, walked around the desk and ruffled through his little brother's unruly hair. "No reason, Mokuba. Did you complete your secret mission?"

"Of course! You can always count on me, Seto!" Mokuba grinned up at Seto, pleased to see him so happy, for once.

Seto grinned, letting Mokuba see how pleased he was with him, then walked back around to the other side of his desk, again. "Mmm. We can talk about it tonight. I declare tonight," Seto stood at his full height, lifted his right hand high into the air, and extended his index finger dramatically, "a Mokuba Night!"

"Really?" Mokuba knew then that Seto was really, really happy. He could count on a 'Mokuba Night' for his birthday and that was about it. Every once in a while Seto would surprise him with one -- a night, after work usually, where he'd cleared his calendar of everything and let Mokuba decide what they would do. He knew exactly what he wanted to do for his Mokuba Night, too.

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Patience sighed as she turned the key in the lock of her front door. She'd been tempted numerous times today to open that blasted envelope and put herself out of her misery over it. Damn that Roland for delivering it in the morning! It had been so hard to continue to work, knowing it was there, in her pocketbook where she'd put it, just waiting -- waiting to drop the bomb on her. And then, on the bus-ride home. She could have read it then. But she was so tired. She was afraid she'd lose her composure and cry in public if she'd read the letter on the bus. So, she'd left the letter, waiting to deliver its horrible message, alone in her purse. What was one more day of stress and worry after the past week she'd had? She hadn't slept well since the encounter with Seto Kaiba last week. After that, she just had a feeling ... like she was in quicksand, and going under quickly.

"That's because you are in quicksand, and going under quickly, Patience," she reminded herself aloud, as she opened the door and stepped over the messy splash of mail on the floor. After her mailbox, and the mail it had contained at the time, had been set on fire by bored duelists during a lull in one of the tournaments, Patience had a mail-slot set into her door. She didn't particularly like the sloppy way her mail was delivered now, but at least she was sure she'd receive it. She worried slightly that bored duelists might put flaming items through her mail-slot during lulls in the next tournament, so she made sure there was nothing flammable anywhere near the door. "Each day the mail is like some sick lottery from hell. I wonder how many bills I have to stare at and try to figure out how to pay I've been lucky enough to 'win' today," she grumbled as she closed and locked the door.

She stooped to gather the mail up. As she did so, she noticed that the envelopes (mostly bills, she could tell) had landed on top of a thick and somewhat larger envelope. Noticing the by-now familiar Kaiba Corporation logo in the corner, she groaned. "Dammit, Mr. Kaiba, at least let me get into my house before you start harassing me. I got your damned letter, hand-delivered by your lackey, today! Just had to follow up with one at my house, too? Bloody, single-minded, arrogant..."

Patience kept muttering her string of insults as she wandered through her house, dumped the whole pile of mail on her home desk, opened her pocketbook, withdrew the letter, slammed it on top of the stack with a savage slap and stared at it sourly.

"Dammit. Just for that, Seto Kaiba, you can just wait until I've had a shower and changed before I read your bloody letter!"

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She felt somewhat better after her shower. Stalling just a bit more, she made herself a cup of tea. She wondered if she could delay long enough that the bad news in the letter would simply evaporate and blow away. What did her modest little life matter to the 'great' Mr. Seto Kaiba anyway? Couldn't he just live in his isolated, rich-boy ivory tower, and content himself with scaring her half to death with his damned flying dragon-things? Why did he feel such a need to smear her out like she was some annoying insect? Oh, yeah. Proposition 390. Her proposition. The fact that she was squarely in Seto Kaiba's sights -- and evidently targeted for what amounted to destruction, she had no doubts -- was entirely her own fault. Sighing she reached for the letter -- the one Roland had given her this morning.

I wouldn't have done anything different, even if I knew this could happen, so I might as well face the consequences, she thought to herself as she picked up her letter opener. Still, her hands shook a little as she slit open the envelope and pulled out the single piece of paper. She swayed as she read it and grabbed the edge of her desk with one hand to steady herself. She read it again, shaking her head as tears started in her eyes.

"No, no, this can't be..."

She reached an uncoordinated hand out to snatch the larger envelope that had found its way through her mail-slot. She didn't seem to mind that she scattered the rest of her mail onto the floor all around her desk with her abrupt and clumsy grab. It took her three tries to balance the weight of the envelope across her knees while trying to line up the letter opener with the top edge enough to slit it open. She finally managed the feat and pulled out the thick sheaf of papers, frantically reading the top page before she'd even put the opener down. She didn't seem to care when it clattered to the floor along with her forgotten mail as she missed the top of her desk entirely.

"Damn you, Seto Kaiba! What the hell kind of game are you playing?" She jumped up and shouted in fury at the papers in her hand.

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"I have a request, sir." Roland spoke up in the limousine ride back to the Kaiba mansion at the end of Seto's work day.

It was unusual enough for Seto to turn and look his aide right in the eyes. "Go ahead."

"Sir, when it's time, could I be the one to -- take care of Ms. Morgan?"

Seto leaned back and steepled his fingers together. He wondered what his aide thought of him.

"Take care of -- how?" he asked mildly.

Roland couldn't hold Seto's gaze. "She's a nice lady, sir. She was just in the wrong place at the wrong time, a few times too many. I know she must be dealt with, but, there's no reason to harm her -- physically -- when dealing with her. I'm afraid some of my men might be too enthusiastic about it, seeing as how she's created such problems for you. I can make certain she's not hurt, if I'm the one to take care of things."

"I see." Seto glanced over Roland's shoulder before settling his gaze on his aide's face again. "What do you think you delivered to her, then?"

"A -- uh, suggestion that she cease thwarting you. I doubt she can have Proposition 390 removed from the ballot, sir. Besides, I -- doubt she will acquiesce to your suggestion. She seems pretty strong-willed."

"I agree. I don't believe she is one to back down in the face of pressuring tactics," Seto noted.

Roland nodded. "So, I'd like to be the one to delay her so she's late for work that last time and loses her job. There's no reason she should be terrorized or hurt in the process, the effect is the same."

Seto looked at Roland's face and really wondered about his bodyguard. He couldn't help it as one of his characteristic smirks found its way across his face. He even admitted to himself that he was enjoying this. "But, I don't want her delayed. I don't want her fired."

Roland stared at him in confusion. "But -- the delivery? It was a letter -- ah, requesting her to cease all activity against you within a specified time limit -- wasn't it?"

"There was no time limit in that letter," Seto told him. "Nor was it a 'request' such as you think."

"I'm confused, sir."

Seto smirked in a completely self-satisfied way at Roland's admission. "Let me just say, Patience Morgan brought to my attention a grave matter I had been unaware of. The letter you delivered merely responded to that."

"If you don't mind me asking, what was it, sir?"

Seto shot a confident, lopsided grin at his thoroughly confused aide. It didn't hurt that this threw a curve ball at one who thought he knew Seto so well. "A job offer."

"What?"

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Author's notes --

Sorry guys, 'Mokuba Night' isn't going to be an incestuous encounter between the Kaiba brothers, no matter what it sounds like. Mokuba's a bit too sweet for that in my humble opinion, and therefore, in my story.

Next chapter teaser

Chapter Four -- The Aftermath

Kaiba Corporation already has a benefits coordinator, so just what job does Seto have in mind for Patience? And, is she even inclined to consider working for Kaiba Corporation -- and Seto -- after all she's been through?

Reviews, comments and constructive criticisms are always welcome! Please feel free to email me also if you see something awkward that needs to be clarified or fixed. I need all the help I can get.