25. Approach

Seto stood on the sand behind his beach house looking out at the Atlantic as though it could provide him with the answers he was seeking. In his hands, he absent-mindedly fingered the gift that Isis had brought, a scarab of dark blue Turkish turquoise that matched his eyes. Despite the fact that it came from Isis, who never failed to set him a little on edge, he found the smooth surface of the scarab oddly soothing. He'd been on the beach for hours, contemplating the recent trajectory of his life as though it were a complex physics problem.

Seto felt as though the pull and push that he'd felt from Atem had put him into some sort of orbit. It was as though Atem were a star and Seto had become a comet caught in an elliptical orbit, first drawn close, then thrown far away.

Was … was Atem his … sun? His light?

Was he really so insignificant in comparison? He grit his teeth. Had he really allowed Atem to take control? Despite all the safeguards he'd put in place?

It didn't matter how far he went now. Atem would always be … somewhere. He would always be locked, here, in Seto's heart.

How could he have let this happen? How could he have let himself become so … dependent?

And, like a comet, each time he circled close … inexorably … to his nemesis, he blazed into his greatest glory … and simultaneously lost part of himself in the process.

What is happening to me?

How long before I disappear entirely?

The Atlantic continued to roar, but it wasn't speaking to him.

Atem stood in Kaiba's New York office in a bit of a snit. Yugi stood a little behind him, attempting somewhat ineffectually to calm him down. "And is Mr Kaiba in today?" he asked in his best English, learned through Yugi's lessons.

"Which Mr Kaiba, sir?" asked the assistant.

"Both. Either. At this point, I'm not picky!"

"Sir, please. I'm doing my best to assist you. Mr Seto Kaiba is not in today, but if you can tell me who's calling, I'll see if Mr Mokuba Kaiba is available to speak with you."

"Tell him Atem Ishtar and Motou Yugi are here from Domino and we're extremely tired!"

"Yes, sir," she said and bustled off.

"Thank Ra," Atem muttered under his breath.

"… and cranky," Yugi added, shooting Atem an amused look.

"You're not helping." Atem scowled. "This would be a lot easier if I were still pharaoh and could still have him dragged before me in chains …"

Yugi laughed and pulled Atem over to the waiting area. "You think that would help matters?" he asked.

"It would make me feel better," Atem said.

Mokuba appeared remarkably quickly. "Thank goodness you're here."

"And Seto?" asked Atem, anxiously.

"I thought you were angry with him," said Yugi.

"I'm worried about him! Well … yes, and a little angry, maybe …"

"Don't be mad, Atem," Mokuba pleaded, "he's only worked up because he cares about you so much. It's just that …"

"He's Kaiba Seto. He's carrying a ton of baggage. Plus … it's me."

"Uh, yeah. I noticed he couldn't concentrate at all so I sent him to our beach house on Long Island."

"You sent him?"

"I convinced him to go. He took a laptop, but promised to make it a retreat. I'll have Isono take you there." He dug in his pocket and handed Atem a key. "Don't lose this. Seto'll kill me."

Atem looked at Yugi. "Don't look at me," Yugi said. "My excuse for being here is the New York KC Invitational. Speaking of, Mokuba, is it too late to accept?"

Mokuba shot Yugi a grateful smile. "Not at all. We'll work something out!"

"Terrific!" said Yugi. "I'll call Anzu right away and see when we can get together. Atem, sorry, but you're on your own."

Atem quietly entered the beach house and removed his shoes. It was a remarkably small and unassuming affair for such an imposing personage as Kaiba Seto, but it had large, picture windows overlooking the Atlantic and was hemmed in by porches. The small entry almost immediately opened into the living area with its gorgeous ocean view.

The owner was stationed by the windows, his coat-jacket discarded carefully on a nearby chair, his arms crossed as he awaited the moonrise. Dressed all in black, it was difficult to make out his form against the darkening sky.

"Seto—"

Slowly, Seto turned, allowing a baleful blue eye to come to rest upon his companion. "How did you get in?"

"Um …"

"I'm going to have a chat with Isono tomorrow morning."

"Don't blame him. Mokuba told him to bring me here. Besides, I can be persuasive enough when I want to be."

"Tell me about it. No … on second thought, don't." He turned back to the view. "You received my message. There's no reason for you to follow me."

"Seto, I couldn't leave it like that. Walking out without even speaking with me—" Atem snapped his jaws shut to prevent himself from saying something he'd regret. "It was … it was insulting," he said quietly.

"I'm sorry, Atem, it wasn't meant to be, but … I couldn't—" Seto looked away. "I couldn't see you again. Not just then." If he'd seen him, it would have been impossible to leave.

"And just what the hell did you mean by 'ceding me another victory'? Are you saying that you think I see you as some sort of conquest? Seto, how can I see this as a conquest when …" he paused, closing his eyes, "your desire to be part of this … to make it more than just—" Atem shrugged and waved his arms in frustration. "There's no way to express it! This goes way beyond just sex, Seto!"

When Seto didn't reply to this, Atem continued. "And look what's happened. Here I am. You made me come after you. I came all the way here just to talk to you … to ask you to reconsider. If there's a victory in this … it's yours." Atem tried to determine the effect of his words, but Seto remained silent and stoic, staring out the window resolutely. "You need to know that I'm willing to pursue you, Seto. I'm willing to do whatever it takes. But … if you really are serious about needing me to back off …" he almost choked on the words, "I will. But if you want me to do that, you have to discuss this with me."

Atem could almost hear Seto's eyes slide shut for a moment. "Very well." He turned around. "Speak."

For the first time, Atem noticed that Seto had something clenched in his hand. "What's that?"

"This? Just something Isis gave me." He showed Atem the scarab.

It looks so familiar … Atem shook it off as he watched Seto set it on an end table. He couldn't afford to be distracted. "You know, dropping everything and coming to America sounds suspiciously like running away from your feelings, Seto."

"You think because you've hung out with me for a few weeks and spent a night with me you know something about me?"

"Now wait a minute. Don't give me that. With the exception of Mokuba, I probably know you better than anyone else on earth, and you know it." Night had now fallen and the room was nearly completely dark. As he spoke, Atem slowly moved around until he was standing before Seto. "You know, just after I realized I was in love with you, Yugi mentioned something to me. He said that ordinary couples helped each other, but we weren't like that because neither of us would ever ask for help and the other would never offer it because we respected each other too much to insult the other by assuming that they'd need help. But …" Atem tried to look into Seto's eyes, but in the darkness he couldn't quite discern them. "Seto, please forgive me for being an ordinary man just this once."

Atem slowly bowed, getting down on his knees, saying, "It's obvious that you're struggling with something … and it's obvious that, somehow, it must have to do with me." He continued to prostrate himself, continuing, "I'm begging you, Seto, let me help y—"

Large, strong hands gripped his arms just below his shoulders and lifted him bodily.

"Don't debase yourself!" Seto growled, his voice low and dangerous.

They found themselves staring directly into each other's eyes in the light of the rising moon. For a moment they froze that way, Atem trying to read Seto's shuttered eyes, the atmosphere between them thick and crackling with electricity.

After what seemed an eternity, Seto set Atem down and turned away, his body stiff and tense. Atem gasped, surprised to find that he had been holding his breath. He rubbed his arms, realizing that Seto's grip had been vise-like.

"Seto … please! Please try to understand. I love you. I know you don't like speaking about emotion, but you want to hear the facts. I can't be more plain than that." Atem waited, but Seto still stood, facing away, so Atem tried again. "Seto, I can't go back to how things were without pain. Maybe … maybe not at all. If I can, I need to help. Please … let me. Consider it a personal favor to me if you must."

"Atem … You speak so easily about love. But … when I think about it … the thought of letting myself … It—it just seems ridiculously dangerous. When I try to reason out why, I don't understand it, but …"

"I've thought about it, Seto. You're comfortable with technology, but not with magic. You create your own magic using technology, Seto. Emotion is … it's sort of like the magic of the mind, Seto. You're so much more comfortable with logic. You want to analyze how you feel in logical terms, but … you can only take that so far. Emotion is mysterious and irrational, but it's … magical. How can you live without it?"

Slowly, Seto turned to face Atem again. Sighing, he said, "Atem, contrary to what you might believe, I'm not emotionless. I just prefer to have some semblance of control."

"And?"

"You … make things difficult."

"But … Seto, you know that I would never knowingly betray your trust. I don't—"

"Don't you see it's not about you? Aside from this—this issue, I still wonder if we could ever make things work, but now it's increasingly clear that there's something even deeper that … Not everything is about you."

"Then it has to be about you," Atem said, allowing himself a tight smile. "Won't you let me help you?"

Seto sighed. "I've been here all day, staring out at this damned ocean, thinking about what Isis said … and—"

"You mean she came today? What did she say?" Atem asked, surprised. "I didn't know she was coming!"

"Really. She suggested that as long as I had anything to do with you I'd continue to run into these sort of problems." Seto scowled. "I can't afford this sort of thing. It's interfering with business."

"Seto, it's interfering with your well-being. I'm concerned about you. It's true that I want you … I can't tell you how badly … but that's selfish desire. I also care about you. If it's best for you, then …" I'd let you go … somehow.

But he couldn't speak the words. He could only look into Seto's eyes longingly, willing him to understand his feelings. His heart broke at the thought of leaving him behind.

Don't make me.

"Don't be maudlin, Atem. It doesn't suit you. The only thing is, I'm not sure what I can do about this."

"It would help if you could tell me something about it. All I know is that every time we get close, you head the other direction fast—and the closer we get, the faster and farther you go."

Seto colored slightly and looked out toward the ocean. He couldn't very well deny it. "There's … Every time we get past a certain point, I begin to feel like I'm losing control of my own life—my own … self. It's … indescribable."

"But … I promise I won't—"

"This has nothing to do with you, Atem," Seto repeated. "It does, but … it's not something you can help. Even if we work out things between us, this is something … in me."

"But I don't—"

"You do, Atem. So does Isis. But you both think—"

"She thinks it has to do with your previous life!"

"That's—" Seto began to protest, but Atem was already rubbing his hands together, thinking.

"Seto, I think it actually has a lot to do with me, only not directly," he said. "I think you need to confront what's causing your problems."

"I would, only I have no idea—"

Atem smiled. "Don't worry, Seto. I do."

Author's notes:

Thanks to everyone who is still hanging in there reading and especially those who've taken time to review!

Reviews: "I just adore their [Seto/Isis] banter." I'm glad it worked—it was fun to write, and, weirdly, oddly easy.

Thanks very much for the feedback, girru, especially on Atem. I tried very hard to get him right, but I felt a little more confident about Seto than Atem. "dub really upped their [Yugi-tachi/Kaiba] mutual hostility and I don't like that" Ah, don't get me started—! (Bites tongue.) But I'll say this, in general, the dub makes Seto look much nastier and less heroic than the original. Like we can't figure out who the #1 hero is. (Same with 5D's/Jack. Guess that's why we didn't get the Nazca sequence. "Double tuning? Scar Red Nova Dragon? What's up with that?" "Beats me." Facepalm.) Sorry, mini-rant over. (Be happy you didn't get the mega-version!)

Finally, it's great to see "it's awesome to feel like I'm really getting into the characters' heads and being able to understand their motives and conflicts." I consider all the comments that my characters are in character are maybe the highest praise of all, although sometimes I worry that this is a little too much of a character study and there's not enough going on ... oh well.

Holy cow! That was way too much this time. On with the notes ...

dark blue Turkish turquoise: In my research, I came across a picture of Turkish turquoise that was just about exactly that color. I hadn't realized that turquoise could range that dark a blue, so I decided to incorporate it into this story. I can't give you the link, though, lost track of it.

Preview of chapter 26:

Just to let you know, chapter 25 is part 1 of 3 in which Atem and Seto work through Seto's issues, or 1 of 4 if you count the resolution. After that, I plan an epilogue (Which I'm still working on. I might have to split it up: it's turning out to be several pages long. Yeah, I hear you, "Cry me a river ...").

Atem smiled. "Don't worry, Seto. I do."

"You're talking about that priest."

Finally! Seto spills his guts ... next time!