Author's note: Uhh..yeah. It's been about five or six months now, and I'm really sorry to anyone that's been eagerly awaiting the next chapter to this. I know there's at least one of you. I don't really have an excuse for why this chapter took me so long, I got rigorously addicted to a certain mmorpg, and only recently quit so that I could have my life back. I'll try my best to finish these chapters in a more timely fashion this time.
Resurfaced
Chapter 10
A violet sky. A face overlooking all.
"I wanna see you, father! I have always been alone.."
"You're useless to me now."
A cave. A console. Figures standing around, watching.
"Father has locked the program..we can't create an entry here..why not just give up? What if you just stay here as father has said? It's not bad to be here if you're used to it.."
Laughter...a sensation of shaking.
"Noa! How can you talk like that? Gozaburo has abandoned you!"
"..It hurts, Mokuba..."
An arcade. A game being played. A hand reaching out.
"If you swear..not to have any bad ideas, I may help you ask for a favor. I can ask my brother to give you a new body."
The hand withdrew.
...
"Well, we are brothers!"
Brothers...we are brothers... Let it be at an end..we are already dead, father... Goodbye, Mokuba...
Noa woke up to a start, and immediately sat up. Rays of the early morning sunlight were breaking through the window, but he didn't notice. Mokuba's hands moved to cling to his face as his whole body shuddered, quivered, and then bowed down further. Tears soon forced themselves out of his eyes, and crying gasps escaped from his mouth. Within a very short time, he was sobbing.
The last few memories had come back to him, as vivid and painful as gouging claws from within. All the effort he'd put forth to make his father happy was for nothing. He'd betrayed the trust of Mokuba, the one person that had showed him any kindness, and the one person that believed in him and accepted him even after all he'd done. And in the end, he had gotten everyone out of the virtual world just before it was destroyed..everyone except himself and his father..that they would be destroyed together.
All of these very emotional things occurred in such a short time, that having his memories of them dumped into his lap now made Noa breakdown. But at the same time, it was comforting. It had been many, many years since he was last able to cry.
He didn't know how long he'd been at it for, but at a certain point, his blubbering was heard though the walls, and there was then a knock at the door.
"Mokuba?" a voice he recognized to belong to Yugi's mother called. "Are you okay?"
Noa was weeping too much to be capable of responding, so he said nothing. Thus, the woman opened the door, quite surprised to see not-Mokuba in such a state. She dashed over to the bed, wearing just a nightrobe.
"What's wrong? What happened?" she quickly asked. But again, his sobs kept him too choked up to speak.
She went ahead and knelt down by the bed, reaching her arms out..hesitantly at first, but then the arms came together for a loose hug on the preteen. It felt a bit awkward to be comforting a crying child that wasn't her own, but she did so just the same, rubbing a hand gently along the boy's back.
At the ease of her touch, Noa gradually calmed down. The room became silent as his weeping winded down to convulsed sniffles, and then to a tired breathing. She continued to hold him until he finally spoke.
"..It..it was..a nightmare..."
Yugi's mother found it odd that a bad dream could get this kind of reaction from someone, but she decided it would probably be best not to ask about it.
"Are you going to be okay?" she therefore asked instead. His head nodded in her arms.
"Yeah..I'm okay.." Noa nudged himself backwards, and Yugi's mom responded by releasing him. He then brought a hand up to wipe his tear-dried eyes. "I'm sorry if I woke you up.."
"Don't worry about it." she said with a sympathetic smile before standing back up. The scenario reminded her a little of the times when Yugi used to cry. "Is there anything you need?"
The boy shook his head, "No, I'll be fine."
"Well, whenever you need something, let me know." she said as she turned, walking back to the door, placing a hand on the rim before exiting.
"I will."
The door closed. Noa dropped back into the pillow. He sighed heavily.
Mokuba..why haven't you woken up? Where did you go?
There was no answer.
Noa fell back into a restless, dreamless sleep.
By the time Noa woke up, it was closer to noon than morning. He tiredly pulled Mokuba's body to a slumped sit up. Despite the amount of time he spent sleeping, he felt like he'd hardly gotten any rest. A hand raised to rub his eyes, first the left, then the right..and from there, he dragged himself out of the bed, now standing barefoot on the mildly cool flooring. He stood there for a few minutes, his mind drawing a blank as he stared at the door of the room. Then blinking, he remembered his whereabouts, and the situation.
"..Seto. Need to find Seto." he concluded aloud. The statement was followed by a mild frown of sorts. He wasn't pleased by the idea that the only person who could turn everything around had to be Seto. It felt like a necessary evil..yet, it was one he brought about himself.
If only I hadn't...
Mokuba's head shook.
I can't let myself get distracted. Dwelling on that is just going to hold me back from making everything right again. That's the only thing that matters now.
This thought was followed by a nod, and he went straight for the door. A click and a pull, and it was open. Noa walked out into the hallway..first looking to the left, then to the right. The sound of footsteps came from the left, and he thus headed in that direction, into the welcoming room with the TV. He only stood there for a moment before he was spotted by Yugi's mother, whom walked in from the kitchen, wielding a spray bottle of some manner of cleaning solution.
"Mokuba? Good morning!" she said as her feet met with the carpet.
Noa turned, greeting her with a wary wave. "Good morning, ma'am."
"Are you feeling better today? You look better." she asked with a slight concern.
"I feel better, I just.." his fingertips lifted to briefly rest on his forehead. "..I didn't sleep too well."
"Is anything the matter?" Yugi's mom figured it had everything to do with his nightmare, or whatever had caused him to cry in the early morning. She didn't entirely believe him, but she also knew there was likely a good reason behind it.
He give a bit of a sigh as his hand fell back down. "Well..ma'am, I'm in a bit of a situation, and I don't really know what to do about it."
"Oh?" her head tilted.
Noa directed Mokuba's eyes to look off to the side before continuing, "Is Yugi here?"
"No, he went to school."
"School..a public school?" He looked up a bit as he asked, as having been home-schooled his entire living life.
"Yes, him and all his friends. You don't go to a public school?"
"No..uh..I mean..I don't.." he quickly shook his head. "..That's not really important. Are we here alone?"
"Up here, we are. Sugoroku is below in the shop."
"..Who?"
"I think you've met him before, Yugi's grandfather?"
"Uh..probably..anyways, the problem..maybe you saw on the news that Seto..my brother..is looking for me?" he asked in an increasingly timid manner.
"Oh.." she blinked. "I hadn't watched the news yet. I've been tidying up."
"Ah.." he sighed in a slight of relief. "Well, my brother is looking for me, and I need to find him without anyone else finding me first."
Mrs. Mutou pressed the nozzle of the spray bottle to her jaw as her eyes climbed to the ceiling in thought. "Hm..couldn't you just call him to pick you up, here? Or I could drop you off.."
"No, no.." not-Mokuba begged. "The situation..is really precarious. Seto has the police looking for me, even. If they find me before he does, they'll probably just take me back to the hospital.."
"Hospital?" she said with a bit of alarm.
"The hospital.." he started with a tired glare and a clench of Mokuba's fists. "Seto took me there because he thought there was something wrong with me, but..that wasn't the case. That doctor is a quack. He tried to make me sick with some strange medicine to keep me there. I overheard him saying he just wanted to use me to get money out of my brother!"
Yugi's mother blinked with obvious shock.
"If the police find me first.." Noa continued, looking up with renewed determination. "..they'll just take me back there, and I'll be at the mercy of that fraud. I can't let that happen. If we call Seto to come here, they'll probably be with him, and if you take me there, you'll get in trouble for having had me."
Mrs. Mutou set the bottle down on the nearest counter, and reapproached not-Mokuba in a worried manner, "I had no idea this was so serious... What can I do to help you, then?"
"Well.." Mokuba's eyes shut for a moment in thought, and then reopened. "I need to find Seto before anyone else can find me, as I said. I need to prove to him what the doctor wanted to do to me. From there, he'll undoubtedly take care of the rest. I had a handkerchief with some evidence in it, but..I don't know what happened to it."
"A handkerchief? A light blue one?" she asked with another tilt of her cranium.
"Yes!" he nearly shouted, eyes wide. "Have you seen it?"
"Yugi brought that here too when he brought you..I had set it down on a table in the other room, I'd forgotten all about it."
"Can you show me, ma'am? It has the only proof I've got!"
"Of course." she said, then quickly walking back into the room with the TV, as Noa followed practically at her heels. From there, she turned to walk left for the hallway, into where it sloped down to the shop's door. Opening that door revealed a small table just outside of it, where a few boxes of sealed carded were awaiting shelf-life. Also on this table, a wadded handkerchief sat, minding its own business. Mrs. Mutou plucked it up and shut the door, turning to drop it into a pair of eager hands.
Noa ran back into the TV room, and in the better lighting, pulled the cloth open. This was followed by a huge sigh of relief as he saw the object in question was indeed still there and safe. Yugi's mom walked into the room in time for not-Mokuba to turn to face her, and give a quick bow.
"Thank you so much, ma'am. You have no idea how important this is to me."
"You don't need to be so formal.." she responded with a bit of a bashful expression, waving her hand as if to fan the gesture away.
"Regardless, this is what's going to make my case." he said, whipping himself back up to a straight stand. "Otherwise, they might not believe me. Now I just need to figure out how to find him myself.."
The aloud thought was suddenly interrupted by a muffled grouwlling sound.
"Maybe you should have something to eat, first." Mrs. Mutou humbly noted.
Noa nodded, flustered.
"Please, Mr. Kaiba. You can't cancel this meeting."
Seto's agitated fist slammed down on his desk hard enough for his nearby laptop and coffee mug to quiver.
"My brother is still missing! I'm not doing anything until he's found!"
The elder Kaiba brother sat at his work desk in the office room of his estate. With a cellphone pressed to his ear, he spoke to the man on the other end in dire frustration. It hadn't been a full 24 hours that Mokuba had been missing for, but with every passing minute without any news of his wear-abouts, Kaiba felt himself getting a little more unhinged with worry. Knowing his brother escaped the hospital in a supposedly crazy state, yet, not a single person had reported seeing him since..it seemed like anything could have happened to him.
It was nothing short of sheer agony for Kaiba.
"Please, sir." the voice begged. "I understand you're going through a troubled time, but to ignore this meeting over the issue would cause irrevocable damage to KaibaCorp. You know it's incredibly important."
"It doesn't matter, we can reschedule it!"
"We can't ask anyone to reschedule anything on the day you're supposed to have the board meeting." the man responded exasperatedly. "We have important representatives from many countries that wish to have KaibaLands built! They've traveled far to meet with you! If you were to cancel this now, we'll leave a bad mark on them, and we might not get another chance to build the theme parks for them!"
"I'm not doing anything until Mokuba is found. I don't care what the result of a canceled meeting is! It's not more important than my brother's wellbeing!" Kaiba exclaimed with suppressed rage.
"Sir.." the man said softly, as though trying to clam the young adult down. "I understand entirely. I understand completely. Your brother means more to you than anything else, I know this. But you can't halt your responsibility to the company because of it. Time isn't going to stop for you. You've mentioned before that building KaibaLands all over the world has been not only your goal, but the goal of your little brother as well. Surely, you can let the authorities handle searching for him long enough to at least go through with this meeting? If you won't do it for the company, couldn't you at least do it for him?"
Seto huffed out an aggravated sigh. That was a point he could not ignore.
"..As soon as the meeting is over, I'm going into the streets to find my brother. I'll go through the meeting, but everything else is going to be rescheduled. Got it?"
"Certainly." the man said with a sigh of ease. "Remember, it starts in an hour."
"Shut up and get back to work." Kaiba said plainly, and jammed his thumb on the device to hang up. With the closed cell still in his clenched fingers, he brought his elbows to the desk and covered his face with with hands.
He sat like this for a while.
Noa had managed to eat breakfast without getting fully stuffed up, as he was too distracted with planning how to find Seto to allow himself to go overboard.
The body of the preteen stood up from the small kitchen table.
"Thank you very much, ma'am. That was absolutely delicious." he spoke as though answering to a teacher.
"It was no trouble." Yugi's mother said with a mildly embarrassed smile. She stood up from the other end of the table, and proceeded to take the plates and bowls away. Noa looked back for a moment before Mokuba's eyes widened in response to a realization.
"Ma'am?" he said, submitting his attention to Mrs. Mutou again.
"Yes?" she responded, having set the items down next to the kitchen sink.
"Do you have a small jar I can use? If everything turns out fine, I promise I'll reimburse you for it, and for helping me out."
"A jar? Any particular kind of jar?" she asked as she opened a small cupboard, searching with a finger.
"Something small, with a tight seal, and preferably opaque." he responded with a nod.
After a moment or two of skimming, she took out a small white jar with a screw-on top that was roughly the size of a salt shaker, and held it out for not-Mokuba to take..which he took happily.
"This is perfect! Thank you again, ma'am!"
"It's nothing, we've had that and haven't used it, I was planning on getting rid of it." she said with a pleasant smile. "You don't need to worry about replacing it."
"I gave you my word, and I'm going to keep it!" he stated with a rigorous nod.
"If you insist." she responded with a slight chuckle.
"Now..may I use your restroom?"
"Oh?" she blinked, and then pointed. "It's just back there, past that door in the living room."
"Thanks!" he said quickly, and swiftly moved out of the kitchen. He stopped by the TV room table to set down the handkerchief, with Mrs. Mutou watching from where she stood. She noticed he still held onto the jar as he dashed to the appropriate room and shut the door. After staring blankly for a moment or two, she turned to busy herself with rinsing off the dishes. She didn't want to know.
When Noa came back out, he first went back to the handkerchief, unfurling it to place the jar inside the cloth, and then wrapped it back up in a tight knot. From there, he went back to Yugi's mother, whom was keeping busy with the cleaning.
"Ma'am?"
"Yes?" she stopped to face him with another slightly embarrassed smile.
"If I could ask one more favor of you..I've been thinking, if I were disguised up, I could find Seto myself without anyone knowing who I am. Do you have anything to make me look different?"
At that, she stopped her work, placing a hand to her chin and gazed up to the ceiling. Then she looked back down, giving not-Mokuba a particularly hard stare, as if dissecting him with her eyes. Noa stood stiffly to this, and Mrs. Mutou started to circle around the boy with that analyzing peer. She circled once, then stopped..then circled again, and this time, stopped behind him as he continued to keep rigid and still. He felt her hands patting at Mokuba's pronged hair from behind..she squeezed a portion of it together between her fingers, and the other hand came to press to the back of his head. He was getting nervous at this point..but then she let go, and returned to his front, getting down to one knee before him with a mischievous glint in her eye.
"Mokuba..just how different would you like to look?" she asked, bearing a sly smile.
"U-uh.." Noa stuttered. "I'd...I'd like to look as different as I can. The more, the better."
"I know exactly what to do, then." she said, standing back up, and taking the pajama-clad Kaiba by the hand. Noa couldn't shake the feeling that he was going to regret this.