Two weeks after their falling out, Joey and Seto still hadn't spoken to each other. Mokuba hadn't reached out to Joey again, but Yugi was still working on his friend, using his diplomatic approach to try and convince him to yield and talk to Kaiba. Joey was still stubbornly refusing, but he was wearing down.
The day after Mokuba talked to Joey, he started acting differently. He stayed up way too late Friday night, slept in until noon on Saturday, then spent the whole weekend playing video games. Seto kept himself engrossed in his work to keep his mind completely occupied, so at first, he didn't realize what was going on. When Mokuba started talking back to teachers and misbehaving in school, however, Seto couldn't very well ignore the phone call he received from the principal on Wednesday afternoon. His little brother was being kept late for detention that day, but only on that day, because the teachers knew that Mokuba was a good kid and normally very well behaved. The principal advised Seto to have a talk with him, then they hung up.
The president of KaibaCorp spared a minute in his busy schedule to contemplate this. It was unusual, certainly. Mokuba'd never had trouble in school, except for issues related to Seto himself—on rare occasions, Mokuba'd gotten into a small fist-fight with other boys taunting him about a shit-filled tabloid, but he only ever came to blows when the provocation was severe. That kind of behavior, Seto understood. This, though, was different. After last Friday, Mokuba had stopped hauling his brother out of his office, letting him stay and work for as long as he cared to every night since. It was strange, for sure. He made a mental note to have a talk with Mokuba the next time he saw him. He didn't see him again after that, and promptly forgot that he'd intended to do so.
On Friday, he got another call from the principal.
"Mr. Kaiba"—the man internally cringed at referring to someone young enough to be in high school as mister—"I'm afraid your little brother has committed an act of vandalism that we simply cannot overlook."
"Vandalism?" Now that caught his attention.
"Yes, vandalism. He has defaced school property, and I need you to come in as soon as possible so that we can discuss what happened and maybe figure out why he's rebelling as he is."
Seto growled in the back of his throat. "I'll be there in half an hour." He hung up without saying anything else, which was probably rude of him, but he honestly didn't care right now. He paged his secretary.
"I need you to clear my schedule for the afternoon. I've been unexpectedly called out to handle a personal matter."
"Yes, Mr. Kaiba, right away sir," she answered promptly. She was used to him hanging up abruptly, and it no longer bothered her.
As he walked out of his office, suitcase in one hand, cellphone in the other, he called his driver with instructions to be picked up immediately. Their destination was Domino Middle School.
"Have there been any disruptions in home life recently?" the principle asked as Kaiba sat in front of his desk, his arms and legs crossed as he glared at the school administrator with impatience.
"No." Kaiba found this particular habit of the school principle—speaking to him one on one like a therapist as if he could fix all their problems with his speculation—to be quite maddening. He'd never seen any point to it.
"Behavior like this usually occurs when children are trying to get their parents'—or, rather, their guardian's attention."
Seto rolled his eyes at the man's verbal stumbling. He wasn't offended by the first term; he didn't know why the principal seemed to think that he would be.
"This behavior said usually occurs with the introduction of a new sibling or when their parents get divorced or their home situation changes in a drastic way that's upsetting to them. Sometimes it's something very small that you might not even notice, but that affects them deeply for personal reasons."
Kaiba blinked at the man in surprise. "Are you... telling me that I'm wrong?"
"Not wrong, per se," the man began, but Kaiba stopped paying attention after that. The man went on trying to explain himself, but Seto's patience ran out quickly.
"Look, I'll pay to fix whatever he did," he interrupted, starting to stand. "But this kind of discussion doesn't accomplish anything. What's his punishment?"
"It's not that simple, Mr. Kaiba." He stood as well, looking flustered. "He wasn't the only perpetrator. His gang members have been suspended because they're repeat offenders, but in his case—"
"His gang members?" Kaiba was shocked. "You're telling me he's part of a gang?"
"It would appear that way. Like I said, this behavior from a child who's usually so well-behaved is strange and usually purposeful behavior. In order to keep this from recurring, we need to uncover his motivations."
He paged his own secretary and told her to send Mokuba in before his guest could further protest.
"Please sit down, Mr. Kaiba."
Seto reluctantly complied, although he disliked being told what to do. Mokuba entered, looking strangely unashamed and unrepentant. He did cow a little, though, under his brother's withering glare.
"Mokuba, do you know why you're here?"
Seto rolled his eyes as he bit back a sharp retort. What a stupid way to start this conversation.
"Yes. I'm here because I helped spray-paint a Red-Eyes Black Dragon inside the teacher's lounge during lunch."
Seto looked at his brother sharply, and Mokuba turned to smirk back at him. The principal missed the true significance of this exchange.
"And you joined a gang," Seto added slowly, his tone of voice intimidating enough to make the principal cower a little. The man swallowed hard and tried to stay on topic.
"What we're both wondering," he said, making Seto disdain the man even more for thinking that he could speak for him. "Is why you chose to do this when you clearly know that it's wrong."
"Yes, please, enlighten me." Seto was almost sarcastic as his brother started to glare back at him.
"Because I haven't seen you once all week."
"I'm busy, you know that."
"Not that busy! You could always make time for me when Joey was around!"
"So that's what this is about?"
"Yes!" Mokuba jumped out of his chair and stomped his foot, his fists balled at his sides. "Just because you're mad at him doesn't mean that you have to shut me out too!"
Mokuba himself was just as surprised as the others when his eyes started to water with tears. This was all supposed to just be a ploy: act out to get his brother's attention and let the principal convince him that Mokuba's bad behavior was caused by his being upset by home instability; that would make Seto realize that throwing Joey out had far more repercussions than he'd anticipated, and that he should just get Joey back so that Mokuba was no longer upset. He hadn't meant to get carried away by his own con.
When tears started to wet his cheeks, Seto held out a hand to his younger brother and pulled him closer to his chair.
"I tried telling you to stop, but you wouldn't listen to me," Mokuba whispered as his brother pulled him into a tight hug. He wrapped his arms around Seto's neck and closed his eyes. "I don't like it when you work that much, Seto. You're too hard on yourself." The next part Mokuba whispered into his ear: "Just because Joey hurt you doesn't mean you have to stop feeling altogether. I still love you."
Seto's embrace tightened, and he murmured a near-silent thanks in his brother's ear. After a short while, he released him and started handing him tissues from the box on the principal's desk.
"It seems we've made some progress," the principal said, reminding Seto of his irritating presence. He cast a brief glare at the middle-aged man before standing and taking Mokuba by the hand.
"I'll send you a check for repairs," he said over his shoulder as he started walking out of the office with his brother.
"Wait, Mr. Kaiba, we still have to discuss disciplinary action—" He tried to call him back, but Kaiba didn't seem to hear him. Either that, or he was purposefully ignoring the headmaster. It was impossible to tell, really. He paged his secretary. "Ms. Parker, for the record, Mokuba Kaiba was suspended for the rest of the day." It was better than saying that he just walked out.
Author Notes: For a Joey-centered story, there was hardly any Joey in this chapter. :/ Whoops. I will post the next chapter when I have a few more reviews, so please review!