21. I.D.

As it turned out, their trip to Monarch's apartment did not prove as enlightening as they'd hoped. The computer had only the most mundane of business information stored in it, although Rebecca did find enough financial records and travel schedules that she might be able to cross reference with some of their other information to narrow in on Monarch's real identity. She did find more information about Monarch Industries' connections to Kaiba Corp, which she saved off for Kaiba to sift through. Other than the computer files, they found several stashes of Orichalcos stones, a pair of passports belonging to Yugi and Rebecca that had been stolen in Egypt just prior to them leaving for the Duel at Sea tournament, and some evidence that Monarch had suffered some sort of grave illness the last time he used the apartment, which Rebecca determined from the computer files was the previous May.

"Right around the time we were marooned on that island and fighting Shadow Games." Tristan leaned back in Kaiba's stretch limo where they'd gathered to share what little they'd found.

Yugi nodded, thoughtful. "We did beat him in a shadow war. That might be enough to really mess him up. If he was here last May, he was obviously monitoring all that from here."

"Well, at least between the Orichalcos stones and yours and Rebecca's passports, we know we have the right guy. That's something."

"I still would've liked to have gotten a real name, someone we can actually look for once we get to Egypt. All we have now is the Tomb Keeper's house, and I'm not sure if that will help us find the Ishtars and Bakura, or just lead us in more circles." Yugi leaned forward, propping his chin up on his hands. "I'm sick of playing defense. We need to take the fight back to him."

"No shell company is perfect," Kaiba said, his arms crossed. "If they were, I'd have a dozen of them. Eventually, we'll be able to tie the company back to an individual."

"Way ahead of you," Rebecca said. She had her laptop open and was studying the screen. "I've thrown all the stuff we know together and am sorting through names of everyone who ever had a connection to Monarch Industries, checking for common denominators. The problem is that there are so many names to start out with that it will take a while for the program to run through them all. Even narrowing the search down to British citizens isn't helping, and that's a gamble because Valon only knows Monarch's origin, not necessarily his citizenship. But it is a place to start." She tapped a few keys.

"Did you include Duel Monsters info? We know whoever he is, he knows the game."

"Not everyone who knows the game is a registered duelist, but yeah, any familiar names that pop up will definitely be flagged—" Her eyes widened and she leaned forward to look more closely at the screen. "This is interesting."

Yugi raised his eyebrows. "You find a possible match?"

"No, maybe something better. It's one of the reports filed to the university after our dig last year."

"So? We know Ramesses was interested in our dig and must've had someone planted with us—how else would he have gotten to Marik at the beginning and stolen our passports at the end?"

Rebecca shook her head. "That's just it. Someone on our dig was connected to Ramesses, and here in his computer is the original document that was sent to the university. The file was created in May, before anything had been submitted." She tapped a few more keys. "Let me search the university's archives and find the official file and see who filed this particular report."

Yugi smiled, finally seeing where she was going. "If the report was written from Monarch's computer, the author—"

"No, this can't be right." Rebecca frowned. "But he is British. I should run some comparisons—" She resumed tapping on the keys, her frown deepening. "Travel schedule matches, and he's owned houses in both Cairo and Luxor for more than a decade." Her eyes widened. "Oh, my God, he even has ties to Marik and Ishizu's father." Suddenly the color drained from her face and she gasped, putting her hand over her mouth. "Grandpa!"

Yugi's jaw dropped. "What? You can't mean your grandfather—"

"No, Yugi. Look."

She turned the computer around to face him. There was a lot of text and numbers that meant nothing to him, but in the upper left hand corner of the screen was a passport photo of a face he recognized instantly. He looked from the screen to Rebecca. "Professor Julius?"

Sara Drake left customs at the Cairo International Airport dragging her suitcase behind her, relieved that her twenty-hour travel ordeal was finally over. It could've been worse—her flights had all been on time and pleasant enough. Customs had taken two hours, but she could put that behind her now. She was back in Egypt, back in the world of scholarship where she belonged, away from California and scary people who believed in magic and fairy tales.

Away from him.

She shook her head, pushing Seto Kaiba from her mind. It had been a stupid fling, and it was over. She was home now.

Picking up the pace, she walked quickly down the concourse past the barriers, looking for a sign with her name on it or perhaps even a familiar face from one of the professor's staff. She was surprised instead to see two familiar faces—the professor himself and his colleague, Professor Hawkins. She could feel her insides start to crumble. Professor Hawkins, who was every bit as loony as the lot of them. The last thing she wanted was to be around any of that rubbish.

Professor Julius caught sight of her and broke into a wide smile. "Sara! Welcome back!"

She approached him and his colleague warily. "Hello, Professor, it's good to be home. And hello to you, Professor Hawkins. I wasn't expecting to see you back in Egypt so soon."

"The truth is, my dear, I came looking for you."

Professor Julius clapped Professor Hawkins on the shoulder in friendly chastisement. "Arthur, leave the poor girl be! She's been traveling for nearly twenty-four hours. I'm sure she's rather anxious to get home."

Sara offered him a wan smile. "Yes, Professor, that would be lovely."

Professor Hawkins looked agitated, however. "No, it's not safe for you to be here in Egypt, Sara—"

"Arthur—"

Sara's smile dissolved. "Not safe? What do you mean?" Her eyes widened. "Did my name get released to the press? Do the people who desecrated the tombs know I'm the one who discovered them?"

"No, it's nothing like that, Sara. It's because—"

"Arthur!" Professor Julius's reprimand was sterner this time. "Now is not the time for this nonsense."

"How can you call it nonsense? The entire Ishtar family has disappeared, along with Ryou Bakura! Whatever you might think of the reasons, the danger is real."

Sara's mouth opened in surprise. "What? What's this about the Ishtar family?"

Professor Julius glared at Professor Hawkins before turning to her, his gaze softening considerably. "The Ishtars have disappeared. No one has seen or heard from them since Tuesday evening. They may have been… confronted at the tombs while spending the night there."

Sara gaped at him. "By the vandals?"

"Yes," Professor Hawkins said, but Professor Julius glared at him again.

"We don't know that, Arthur. Marik Ishtar disappeared from his hotel in Greece as well." He looked at Sara. "He has a rather… unsavory past, Marik Ishtar. The police suspect he might be involved."

"Poppycock!" Professor Hawkins looked indignant. "Those vigils were working to keep the Shadow Realm at bay, and that's why the Ishtars have disappeared. And you, Sara, you have made a difference as well. By reconnecting with the part of your soul that was sealed into Blue-Eyes White Dragon—"

"No!" Sara had shouted loud enough that several people stopped and stared. She lowered her voice. "I'm sorry, Professor, but I left California because I don't want to be involved in these delusions. I don't! I want to go to my flat and have a nice hot bath, some food that doesn't come on a tiny little tray, and sleep for a week or until my jetlag is gone, whichever comes last. I do not want to hear any more rubbish about the bloody White Dragon!"

"Sara—"

"No!" She turned to Professor Julius. "Please, Professor, take me home."

"Of course, Sara." Professor Julius flashed a look to Professor Hawkins that was a cross between irritation and victory, but Sara ignored both of them and started pulling her bag toward the street exit.

Both men were silent on the drive to Sara's flat near campus. She'd even dared to hope that Professor Hawkins had given up his ludicrous attempt to suck her back into the insanity, but when they walked her to the door of her flat, he took one more go at it. "Sara, please, I really do believe you may be in a great deal of danger. If Ramesses finds out who you are—"

He was cut off by a low, throaty laugh. Sara and the two professors turned to find themselves surrounded by five men dressed completely in black, with black turbans wrapped around their heads and black scarves pulled across their faces. Despite the scarf on the one nearest her, she could see the smirk in his eyes, and a moment later she saw the gun in his hand.

"It would seem that he already knows," the man in black said, and Sara screamed.

"Professor Julius?" Kaiba frowned. Why did that name sound so familiar?

Yugi looked like he was either going to be sick or strangle someone with his bare hands. "He was with us in the beginning, when Marik brought us to his home, and he was on the expedition where everything felt so wrong. He could've easily taken our passports. He knew about the vigils, about everything we were trying to do…"

Tristan rubbed his forehead. "Dude, the day we had that meeting in Ishizu's office, when all of us first met him. Didn't he say something about having been sick?"

"That's right," Téa said. "He said they thought it was malaria, but it turned out to only be the flu."

Yugi shook his head. "It could've been the shadow war instead."

Rebecca moaned into her cell phone. "Come on, Gramps, pick up…"

Kaiba was still trying to figure out who the hell they were talking about, and then it hit him. "Wait. Isn't that Sara Drake's mentor?"

Yugi gave a curt nod.

"Hold on," Tristan said. "Do you think Sara's working for—?"

"Absolutely not!" The intensity of Kaiba's defensiveness surprised even himself.

Téa agreed, if somewhat less forcefully. "From what Mai said, she was completely freaked out by the whole Blue-Eyes thing. I don't think—"

Rebecca, still on the phone hoping her grandfather would answer, gasped again. "Oh no!" She cradled the phone against her shoulder while she started typing something on her laptop. "Gramps sent me an e-mail telling me Professor Julius was meeting him at the airport. Yugi, he told Professor Julius about Sara. He was meeting them both at the airport—"

Kaiba clenched his hands into fists at his side. "Told him exactly what?"

Yugi closed his eyes, his face a mask of anger. "That Sara is connected to Blue-Eyes White Dragon. When Kisara sealed her Ka into Blue-Eyes, she created a rift, just like when the other me sealed himself into the Millennium Puzzle. By bringing her here and allowing her to reconnect with that part of herself, that rift began to heal. Ramesses wouldn't want that to happen."

Kaiba felt like he'd just swallowed ground glass, all protests about the absurdity of such nonsense dying in his throat. "You're saying she's in danger?"

"Yes. If Professor Julius really is Ramesses and he knows who she is—"

Kaiba pulled out his own cell phone and pressed his assistant Roland's speed-dial number. "Roland, have my jet fueled and ready for me. I'll be leaving for Egypt as soon as possible."

Téa wasn't surprised at Kaiba's sudden decision to go to Egypt once he heard Sara was in danger. What did surprise her was that he let Mokuba talk him into flying all of them out together on one of Kaiba Corp's executive jets. An hour later they were all back in Kaiba's limo, along with Duke, Serenity, and a still-unconscious Marik, headed for San Francisco International Airport's executive terminal.

"I'm still not clear why we had to bring Sleeping Beauty along." Kaiba directed a stiff nod toward Marik, who was slumped across the rearmost seat.

"Because we need him, and because it's his home and his family," Yugi said in a voice that left no room for argument, not even from Kaiba. Téa still found herself a little edgy when Yugi got like this, more Pharaoh than Yugi, but she squeezed her hands together and told herself it was because he'd accepted both halves of himself, not because the Yugi half was gone.

Kaiba crossed his arms and eyed Yugi. "You know what you need to do, don't you Yugi?"

Yugi gave him a blank look.

"You need the god cards."

The tension in the car, which was already almost palpable, ratcheted up a notch as they all looked at Yugi.

"No."

"We are talking about a deranged psychopath who has sunk an entire cruise ship, tried to kill us, desecrated two tombs, may have up to six hostages, and can somehow use his Duel Monster to control people. Now there's no doubt I can beat this loser on my own, but I also see no reason why we wouldn't arm ourselves with every powerful weapon available to us. And that means the god cards."

Téa raised her eyebrow. The Kaiba she knew not only would never admit someone else might actually be better equipped than himself to handle any problem, he would have actively repelled any attempt at teamwork. The fact that he recognized Yugi had something he didn't and actually used the word 'we' willingly was almost enough to make her think she'd crossed into some sort of an alternate universe. Then again, Kaiba had always accepted Yugi's help—however grudgingly—when Mokuba's life was at stake. Could Sara actually be that important to him?

Yugi, however, remained unmoved. "The fact that he can use Reshef to control others is exactly why I won't use the god cards. They're too dangerous."

Kaiba was no less stubborn. "Well, then it's a good thing we have on our side the one person who has defeated all three god cards in a single move."

"Kaiba, no," Yugi said, but Téa could see him falter just a little and, despite the stressful situation, she couldn't help but be a little relieved when she could see bits of Yugi poking through. "I… I can't. They're not mine."

Téa put her hand on Yugi's arm. "Yes they are, Yugi. You know they are."

He looked at her, his deep violet eyes wide and solemn and entirely Yugi. "Téa…"

"Yugi, you said you were done only being halfway here, that you were going to stop fighting yourself. So stop. The god cards are yours. The only question is whether or not you will use them."

Yugi looked around the limo, his eyes falling last on Rebecca.

"My grandfather, Yugi. He has my grandfather."

Yugi closed his eyes. "When we get to the airport, we'll radio Joey and Mai's plane and have them refuel in Japan. My grandfather can meet them at the airport and give them the god cards."