Sorry for the delay. But I got started on the next chapter so it wouldn't take as long to update. Trust me, you'd rather have been kept waiting for this chapter than the next.
Chapter Ten:
Mokuba stared at the fire and wondered how badly it would burn his hand if he were to put it inside. He flexed his fingers, debating the attempt.
Roland dropped another log into the blaze and stepped back, wiping his hands on his pants. He then reclaimed the seat closest to the fire and picked up the newspaper he had been reading before the fire needed tending.
Mokuba kicked his foot against the leg of the chair on which he sat. The fire had all but hypnotized him. He had been trying to read a book Roland recommended, but once the fire had been lit, he hadn't been able to pry his eyes from it.
Even his brother's letters resting in his lap couldn't draw his attention. Mokuba had flipped it to the last page, but never made it past the line which read, Dear Mokuba.
It was the last letter. Mokuba could understand that it marked the end. But the end of what, he didn't know. It wasn't the end of the pages in the notebook. Mokuba had counted the letters, and the number didn't match up with the number of pages in a standard notebook. It wasn't the end of his brother's willingness to write, at least, Mokuba didn't believe that. Nothing in the letter made it sound as though Seto was planning to quit writing.
Something had to have happened to make him stop. Mokuba had speculated over the possibilities every time he reached the end of the letters. In the past, Mokuba had assumed that it was the last letter before they moved locations. Perhaps Seto had just left the notebook behind as his kidnapper took him away. It was a safe assumption.
But it had been months since the letters were discovered. Mokuba remembered Corwin and Granlil's words that they had leads to follow. They had hope all that time ago.
What happened?
Too much time had passed. If the police and detectives had any hope of finding Seto, it had faded in the time since the case had been reopened.
Mokuba had to accept the fact that they wouldn't find Seto. He would never be found.
It was because Seto was dead. Mokuba now knew that.
A cry arose from the nursery. Roland lowered his newspaper and cast his eyes to the doorway.
"Roland, can you check on him?" Olivia called from the kitchen.
Mokuba wondered why she hadn't asked him. Of course, he wasn't Eli's father, but it wouldn't have been the first time in the past month that Mokuba had helped take care of their baby.
Roland left the room and Mokuba returned to examining the fire. It was so alive. A pang of jealously shot through Mokuba as he realized that he hadn't felt that alive in a long time. Why should fire be allowed to live while he and Seto were dead?
Mokuba was overwhelmed by the desire to put out the fire in plain spite. However, Roland had taken such careful care to tend to it. Mokuba would be hurting Roland more than the fire. Instead of acting against the flames, his eyes dropped down.
The letter Mokuba opened to was not finished. It was the last that Seto had written, and for reasons unknown, he never completed it.
Mokuba wanted to understand his brother's last words. If he could understand what Seto was thinking during his last letter, maybe Mokuba would receive closure over his brother's certain death. The words had to mean something.
'Of course," Mokuba thought grimly. 'He never finished. Maybe he realized it was pointless."
Mokuba could hear the words echoing in his mind. He was unsure as to why he carried the letters he had long ago etched to the deepest portions of this thoughts. He heard Seto's words always. They whispered in his ears, shouted from a distance - they were always there.
Why did he constantly carry the bound pages with him? All it accomplished anymore was making him appear pathetic. It garnered pity from all who saw. Mokuba didn't appreciate pity, so why carry his brother's last words with him?
The fire crackled up higher than it had before. It continued to crack, as if laughing. Did the first pity him too? Or was it mocking his loss?
It burned so brightly, as opposed to the darkness filling his conscious. The fire pulled Mokuba to his feet, drawing him in nearer until he stood above it. From his new angle, Mokuba almost looked directly down on the flames. Now they moved towards him. In his eyes, they were jumping up to burn him.
But the more Mokuba stared, the more he realized that the flames were not after him, but his brother. Maybe he had misunderstood the fire's intentions all along. Maybe it wanted to bury Seto.
As if in a trance, Mokuba dropped the notebook. The fire immediately absorbed it, and the pages began to curl in upon themselves, the edges slowly dissolving into a deep, black ash.
The words on the page were being consumed, and as they were destroyed, Mokuba recited them in his head.
Dear Mokuba,
I can't comprehend why people enjoy dancing. There is no point to it really. Well, I can understand professional dancing that actually requires some manner of skill, but the ridiculous dancing that the general population practices? It is beyond my scope of knowledge.
Then there is the prom. That is an entire night devoted to terrible dancing.
What do people see in this?
And that was all Seto had written. It could have been that Seto just had the few words to say on the subject, but by not adding a signature at the bottom of the page, Mokuba had made the assumption that his brother never received the chance.
Mokuba stared down until the fire had completely consumed the letters. All that was left behind was an outline of ash that bore a vague resemblance to the item in its place moments prior.
Mokuba's jaw slowly fell open. What had he done? Those letters were his only connection to his dead brother and he destroyed them.
He fell to his knees and reached towards the flames, as though he were going to grab for the destroyed letters.
It was at the moment that Roland walked back into the room. Upon seeing Mokuba's position, and his hand extended to the fire, Roland ran over and wrapped his fingers around Mokuba's wrist. pulling back slightly.
"Mr. Kaiba, what are you doing?"
"I burned them, Roland. I burned the letters and now they are gone! Seto is gone!" Mokuba exclaimed. He turned his head quickly in Roland's direction, and as soon as their eyes met, Mokuba burst into tears.
"Why did you burn the letters?" Roland asked. The question came out hesitant, as though he was afraid of saying the wrong words.
"Seto is dead," Mokuba whispered.
He returned to the blaze before him. The fire had captured him. Though he had no physical contact with the flames, he could feel them wrapping around him in a grip he couldn't hope to escape.
"Wh-" Roland began, pausing to look around the room. "Where did you get that idea?"
"They should have found him by now. It has been over four years, and months since the letters. But we are no closer to Seto!"
"You can't think like that. These things take time."
"Four years! I have waited four years just for any information about him! And then they came along and gave me this stupid hope," Mokuba said, but he couldn't finish the sentence.
The hand that was free from Roland's grasp flew to cover his eyes to keep the man from watching him sob. His body shook as Roland pulled him closer until he could hold Mokuba in a tight embrace.
A part of Mokuba's mind wondered if Roland was irritated that he had two babies to take care of. He moved from one crying child to the next. Did it bother him?
But when the phone rang and Olivia didn't ask Roland to answer it, Mokuba was relieved. He wasn't sure what he would do if Roland were to let go of him. Roland's hug kept Mokuba from collapsing to the floor, a position he was certain that he would be unable to bring himself up from.
However, it did annoy Mokuba that Roland was trying to keep up the appearance that Seto was still alive. If Mokuba could accept it, then Roland should as well. Pretending was a torture that Mokuba knew he couldn't handle.
"Roland, the phone is for you," came Olivia's quiet voice from the kitchen.
Mokuba felt Roland turn his head to face his wife. "Now isn't a good time. Can you take a message?"
Mokuba made an attempt to stop crying, but all it accomplished was giving him the hiccups. That alone almost proved that Mokuba was still the child he had been when Seto was kidnapped. Had he aged at all in that time?
"Dear, I really think you should answer the phone," Olivia said more forcefully.
"I can't. Take a message."
With his head buried on Roland's shoulder, Mokuba couldn't see Olivia. But just from her sharper tone, Mokuba could tell that she was serious. He pushed himself back and rubbed his hands under his eyes to wipe the tears away. "You can go," he choked out.
"No, you need me here."
Roland might have been about to say something else, but Olivia cut in.
"Roland!" she shouted.
Mokuba had never heard her scream before, and judging from the wide eyes he saw on Roland, neither had he.
Olivia's eyes had widened too, which made her seem as if she had actually never had screamed in her life. Her hands fluttered up around her head nervously, and she began to tuck fallen pieces of blonde hair back into her braid.
"Roland dear, please answer the phone," she corrected shakily.
"It's okay," Mokuba said.
Roland watched the teen as he stood up. "I will be right back," he assured.
Both Roland and Olivia left the room, leaving Mokuba alone once more. His eyes immediately drifted to the fireplace, staring at the ashes of the only thing to bring him comfort in years.
He couldn't bear to look at it. So Mokuba gently closed his eyes, taking several deep breaths as tears continued to flow down his cheeks. The occasional hiccup escaped his lips, but he kept his breathing steady so that maybe they would stop.
Even with his eyes closed, the fire still had his attention. It was the sounds that drew him in now that his vision was cut off. The crackles and pops it emitted started to form into a song.
Mokuba shook his head. Not a song, he realized, but maybe a lullaby. It carried the same soothing notes found in most lullabies, and with his eyes closed, it did feel like it was trying to put him to sleep. The grasp Mokuba had felt earlier still remained, only now it seemed to be rocking him gently. Maybe falling asleep would help him to feel better, to forget, even just for the short time, that he truly was alone.
Mokuba became so wrapped up in his thoughts that he didn't hear Roland reentering the room. With Roland's sudden words, Mokuba snapped out of his daze.
"They found him," Roland said.
"What?" Mokuba asked. He still was under the influence of the fire and didn't understand the statement.
"They found him. They found Seto."
Hopefully I'll have the next chapter up in less than a week!