Pre-note: Please do not kill Sherabo for the long delay. This time my own randomness is to blame . . . and my crazy friend Azure Kite has something to do with it too .;

AK: sigh Blame the misunderstood one . . .

Haseo: You're overreacting, Kite, she's talking about the time she puts into our stories.

AK: Oh . . .

Endrance: Perhaps . . .

AK: . . .

Annyway . . .

Disclaimer: -sweatdrop- I do not own YGO 'nuff said.

Hidden Heart

Chapter 12 : Crimson Wings

Chapter by: The Not so GeniusVampire

Story by: Sherabo

'This is a joke . . .' Amelda thought as his eyes fogged over with the gray storm clouds. 'He's cracked . . . that has to be it . . .' It was easier for the redhead to accept that Seto Kaiba had finally lost his mind from hypothermia and was babbling nonsense than to admit that the brunet was sane and telling the truth.

He had no idea his hand was curled into a knuckle cracking fist until he felt Seto's clammy hands over his own in an attempt to pry them off. After all, the hand that had been gently fingering Seto's hair now threatened to uproot it. Amelda let go of his hair, but he was far from done, he settled for grabbing the latter's arms. "Is that true?!" He demanded of Seto whose left eye was shut in the pain he did not know he could still feel while the right demanded to know what wrong he had done. He nodded in hopes of having circulation returned to his arms (and the other places that were turning a faint bluish violet).

The redhead's grip only tightened. "H-how do you know?!" He insisted, shaking Seto rather roughly.

A thick bile rose in the back of the brunet's throat as he croaked "G-Gozaburo . . .! A s-search team f-found the kid's body in the t-tank's smoldering hull!" His face turned the color of spoiled milk. "He was b-burned badly, and he had a m-missing a-arm and l-leg, he's alive!" At the moment, Seto realized Amelda's viper grip had slackened; he slipped out and backed away as far as possible, breathing heavily while rubbing his bruised arms.

Amelda's arms swung deftly at his sides as his head hung at an odd angle. "He's alive . . ." He repeated slowly.



Still rubbing his arms, Seto replied "He was found in a remote abandoned lab in Cairo . . . it was the only lab I had somehow missed. The equipment still functioned . . . I now have several teams of scientists there to observe his condition, along with a few . . . other experiments I have taken a personal interest in."

". . . Oh . . . I see . . ." Amelda said hollowly. 'He must mean that kid . . . Noah . . .' the redhead held his body up by sheer will alone, and it was amazing his brain still worked properly. Then he thought of something. "Why didn't you tell me sooner? Why now?"

His reply was slow, labored and his eyes gleamed wearily. "You weren't ready to listen."

As thought Seto had predicted it, Amelda's eyes flashed like cold steel in the storm. "Who are you to decide that?!" He exploded. "Who are you to tell me that I'm not fit to know if my own brother is alive or not?!"

"It was not a matter of if you deserved to know, but the right time to tell you."

"And when was that going to be, huh; when you decided to pull the plug?!"

The brunet shook his head violently. "That's not right . . ." He whispered. "First of all, -even with my state-of-the-art technology- you are hard to find; second, you never gave a damn about what I had to say; and third I gave you a hint as to when I was going to tell you."

"What the . . ." The redhead's eyes narrowed in question. "Does this have something to do with that summer again?"

"I told you to wait a year . . . It was due to the fact I needed to regather information, however . . ." Seto's voice faded into the wind.

Not even Amelda's sharp ears caught that, he staggered to his first steps forward. Slowly, his fingers reached out to wrap around Seto's slack shoulders. Even in that slow, cold moment their hearts not only beat faster but they beat at the same pace; their breathing had even paced in tune with each other. "Well," Amelda spoke in an exhausted voice. "What stopped you?"

A violet jolt ran through the CEO's wrecked body. For the first time in hours, his mind thought of nothing else but tipping over the edge. His eyes subtly expressed this as they shifted over the edge. Little did he realize Amelda's sharp eyes were following his. 'Should I tell him about it or should I simply show him?' His hand crawled up his side to the pocket holding the letter. As each pale digit closed around it, it began to poke out of its clothing casing.

Amelda noticed. '. . . I wonder . . . what could be written on that paper . . . What words could have possibly reduced him to this?' He wanted to take it, but that would have been out of the question and pointless if Seto was making the motion anyway. Instead he simply inquired. "Is that it?"

". . ."

Deep oceanic eyes outlined an even deeper steel pair. Seto felt a lump in his throat, and his throat tightened around his Adam's apple. For some reason it was painful to look Amelda in the eye, especially with that shameful scrap of letter in his possession. Showing it to him would be equal to Seto himself 

putting his emotions under an X-ray, hell, he would be bearing them at all. The only person he had ever bared them to was now torn from his side, so who . . . what did he have now? What he 'had' was not there, and what he wanted was staring at him with an odd expression. Almost empathy. He paled as a single thought crossed his mind. 'Maybe . . . maybe it's time to share . . . to let go of even a margin of this pain. . .' With slight hesitancy he pulled the slightly crumpled, yellowish paper out and unfolded it in front of Amelda.

The redhead took and surveyed it with a rather dull look in his eye. He narrowed them in certain areas, but it was not out of anger or disgust, but more out of pensiveness. Those eyes shifted back to the holder of the letter after reaching the bottom of the page.

Seto's face may not have faltered, but his stomach did under that look.

A strange smirk was plastered on Amelda's lips; it was close to a grimace. He suddenly made a motion to tear it . . .

SWACK

Amelda's cheek matched his hair.

Seto's wrist hung limp and his heavily lidded eyes were devoid of all emotion. Without thought or warning, Amelda would have done what the brunet himself would not, or could not do. The real question was why: 'Why would he relieve someone like me of my pain, and without hesitation? Why . . .?' Seto mused. 'What could he possibly gain or lose from doing so?'

'Why is he holding onto this?!' Amelda thought 'He's the type of person who would stomp this thing into the ground and keep going . . . Could this part . . . the part about Mokuba . . . could it have truly crawled inside of him that deeply . . .?' He closed one eye. 'Then again why do I care . . .? It's not my business and I'd feel better if I had nothing to do with him . . . But . . .when I look into those cold, dull eyes, even for a second . . . I'd rather have him pissed . . . at least then he looks alive . . .' Holding his cheek, he turned to Seto, who turned his back.

"Mokuba . . ." The CEO's voice blew into the wind a second time. "I know I have to show him this . . . Even it hurts he needs to know the truth . . ."

". . ."

"But I'm actually afraid of his reaction . . . I honestly had no idea what of what to do, so I came up here to . . . decide on when to show him." He chuckled humorlessly. "Suicide? Oh I thought about it, but that is far from what I came up here for . . ."

Amelda looked into the not so distant sky. "So he's finally done it . . ."

"What?"

"This is just a wild guess, but I would think that Gozaburo Kaiba was a perfectionist. If something was not perfect in his eyes, it had to go. Am I right so far?"

". . . Keep going . . ."



"Well let's say he's . . . molding the perfect heir . . . For all intense purposes . . . you . . ." Seto nodded for him to continue. "Now let's say you were everything he could ever hope to deserve, but –aside from your age- you still lacked his cold, hard-edged ruthlessness . . ."

". . ."

"Well let's say your family was the reason you lacked this. That couldn't be accepted, hell he'd raise the dead before letting his perfect child slip out of his claws, and even if it did happen it would not be long lived. He'd want you to suffer for that." He looked Seto in the eye and shoved the letter into his hands. "This . . ." He closed the latter's hands over it. ". . . Is that final desperate act. Reading it I see a father's last words, and as painful as it looks to you there is no malice, he simply wanted you to know the truth, like what you want for Mokuba. However, Gozaburo knew of the bond between you and your brother and he knew that no force could tear the two of you apart . . . except each other. He used the dead man's concerns and worries to wrench the two of you apart. Judging from your reaction, I would say he did a pretty good job."

Seto chewed his bottom lip. "Why did he wait so long?"

Amelda shrugged "The only person who could tell you that died well before you could force him to."

"Mokuba . . ." Seto repeated his brother's name in a fevered tone. " . . . He's young . . . younger than I am at any rate . . . I know he'll handle this even worse than I did. I fact I'll end up making things worse for him . . . but, there are still questions I myself need to answer . . . loose ends that only I can clear up . . ." His hands curled into fists so tight his nails pierced his palms.

An equally frozen hand stretched out to touch Seto's other forlorn shoulder and slowly turned him around. Their eyes met then they became that much closer. Slowly, Amelda pulled them as close as physically possible. For a moment he thought he had crushed Seto that his state of body finally matched his state of mind, but he could feel the brunet's hands and hair, cold as he was he still felt someone there.

Seto closed his eyes and briefly allowed himself to relax. For that minute moment, he envisioned the warmth of his three dragons, of gods, of devils, and of angels . . . This one, named Amelda, was misplaced. He had not fallen far, but he had fallen far enough to have unique wings; they were bright crimson, and hotter than any flame he had come across. Along with these wings he felt two strong arms around him.

If it were possible, Seto would have melted to nothing right then and there.

Amelda looked into the blank sky again. He did not know what he was doing or thinking. He knew very little about comforting others, he himself did not even know what it felt like . . . there were even times when he stood a distance from Raphael and Valon. He knew very little, but he still felt as though he was doing something right, and that was his first step forward.

But what would Seto's first step be? As far as he could tell the brunet was only talking about making a move, but he had yet to even lift his foot. What could he possibly be waiting for? Without much stock in his words Amelda spoke up. "You mean WE have some loose ends to clear up."

Seto stared at him.



"Don't forget, my brother happens to be one those loose ends, and I won't rest until he's no longer a vegetable."

". . ." Without warning, Seto leaned forward but his knees did not buckle. Their lips brushed only so lightly. They did not want to admit it, not out loud, but they did not want to let go, so all they could do was pretend to struggle while secretly touching each other's hair; hair that had aged almost as much as their souls.

Breaking from his trance-like state, Amelda pushed Seto away. "What was that for?!" he demanded with little real objection.

"It's my insurance, you won't rest until your brother is awake but I do not think I'll allow you to leave even after that."

". . . You're losing your mind . . ."

"Perhaps . . ."

'It sounds as though he's saying he can't do this alone anyway.' The redhead mused. 'I think it's truly time to leave.' He closed his eyes.

Echoing his thoughts, Seto said in an almost airy tone. "I think it's time to leave this place . . . I think I'm hearing footsteps."

For a final time Amelda looked up at the sky. Even though he was not listening, Dartz had not left the scene for a second. The final bit of eye contact from Amelda told him everything.

It was time to go.

-Below the KaibaCorp building-

The crowd of people down below began to wane, the few that were there kept their eyes glued as close to the rooftop as they could. All of a sudden a strong, hard gust of wind blew, knocking almost everyone below off their feet. Cars shook, some rolled down the slopes they were parked on while the windshields cracked. Mai and Ken were among the first to recover. Their equipment remained functional. Mai looked up at the rooftop, and as though she had a divine revelation she turned to Ken. "We're off." She simply stated.

Ken almost dropped his camera. "Huh?! B-but Miss Mai you said we we're not leaving until Mr. Kaiba either jumped or left the building!"

"I know and he's left the building. Hell, he's out of this city."

"Wh-wh-what? How do you know?" The younger reporter gaped.

She kneeled down and picked something up, it was a red cap. "I have my reasons." To herself she thought. 'Looks like he did it . . .'

-KaibaCorp Rooftop-



"Seto! Seto! Where are you?!" Mokuba called, screamed for his brother, but no matter how hard he hoped, prayed, even wished for him to appear the cold reality had hit him. His brother had abandoned him. His concern was not how he did it but why, and who was it that finally convinced him not to jump? Who had done what his only family could not, and where in hell were they now?

He walked slowly to the place his brother sat and willed himself not to wail. He told everyone else not to follow him he would bring Seto back even if it were by force. But now what was he supposed to do? No one was here, the only thing around was a balled up scrap of paper floating in the waning wind. He did not know why but it felt as though he should pick it up, unravel it, and read whatever message it have, perhaps it would lead him to Seto.

It appeared to have been folded and balled several different ways and it appeared partially torn. Due to the abuse the raven teen could barely read it, but each word he could catch hit him a new tender emotional spot. As his eyes touched the bottom of the page he dropped it soundlessly, its descent quickened with a flow of fresh tears. His shock had taken his voice away. Unable to scream anymore and his only source of comfort gone, Mokuba fell to the ground in a crumpled heap next to the letter that had taken his brother from him. That second look at it alone was enough. He snatched it up and with all the rage his body could conjure he ripped in halves, then in quarters, then those sections became smaller, and smaller, and smaller until they were nothing more than powder in the dying wind.

-Fin-

GV: Aieyya that was sooo hard to write . . . . . well please review –sweatdrop-faint-

Sherabo: Carries exhausted writer to her resting chair. Cast of 'Hack' her favorite fans wait while Azure Kite brings her back to life.

'Sighs'

Sherabo Note: We have not forgotten you guys out there and I hope you enjoy this chapter. This story will be the best in my profile because it has been written by five great authors on the net. I am so honored to be a part of such an awesome project and have their names connected with me. It gives my writing a lift and my spirit becomes so light, I can fly. Thanks Review leave comments, sent emails let them know how you feel.