This piece was inspired by a quote that you'll find somewhere in the middle of the chapter, courtesy of the indomitable Stephen King and his nonfiction discourse on the horror genre, "Danse Macabre."

Sometimes I wonder where my brain goes when I write these two.

Maybe it's a mystery better left unsolved. After all, the mystery is one reason I keep coming back to this family. Maybe the same is true for you?


It was sometime in 2003, late in the year, when Mokuba asked a dreaded question.

"Niisama? Um…Santa Claus isn't real. Is he?"

Seto, for his part, had just been getting back into the saddle that was emotional equilibrium; which was to say, he hadn't yet gotten a full handle on his own sanity. It was a time after Pegasus Crawford; after Yugi Mutou. But, and perhaps this was the saving grace behind the whole sad, sorry thing, he hadn't yet been approached by a cultured, devious woman called Ishtar who carried a certain, blue-tinted card.

So he glanced at his brother, seven years old and looking so young and vulnerable that it set Seto's teeth on edge—he'd gained just enough perspective on past events that he blamed himself for all of them—and mulled on this for a second before he finally said, "You should check into that, Mokuba. I can't tell you."

"That means he isn't real," Mokuba deduced, looking proud of his grown-up reasoning but unable to hide the dejection in his little face.

"Does it?" Seto asked mildly, raising an eyebrow. "Are you sure?"

Pouting, the black-haired boy stuck his tongue out and said, decisively, "Yes. I am. You lied to me."

"I did no such thing," Seto said airily. "I have never once advocated nor dismissed the existence of Santa Claus."

"But you know the answer," Mokuba replied sharply. "So you're just not telling me. That's lying by admission."

Seto snickered slightly. "Omission," he corrected. "Lying by omission. That's very good, Mokuba. Seems you've caught me in a bind. So, let me ask you this: do you want me to tell you? Truly? Or do you want to figure it out on your own?" Mokuba started to answer, but Seto held up a hand. "Ah. Think about it, first. Sleep on it. If you decide that you want me to tell you the answer in the morning, then I'll tell you. But only then."

Mokuba pouted again, but he sighed, gestured dismissively, and left his brother's study in a huff.

Some years later, while Mokuba sat cross-legged on the floor of the game room putting an anime-themed jigsaw puzzle together—picture facing down, because he wasn't about to let Seto win another bet—he said, with his tongue stuck out one corner of his mouth as he studied the remaining pieces, "…Why did you get Mister Shircliff to dress up like Santa Claus? That one Christmas, when I wanted to know if he was real?"

Seto, who was leaning against the wall, watching his brother work, said, "Considering the plan you put in motion, it seemed a shame for you to come away with nothing."

"You lied to me," the boy said, less pouty and more…melancholy, than he'd been so long ago. "How come? You're the one who's always talking about how people need to grow up and face the truth and stuff. You set me back two years."

"'…So many adults have confused enlightenment with emotional and imaginational bank robbery,'" Seto said, with the air of a professor laying out age-old wisdom upon a pupil. Mokuba turned to stare at the man, tilted his head to the side, and looked thoroughly confused.

"Huh?"

"My job is to teach you," Seto said, shrugging, "but I have learned something through the course of my life. That is, most people seem convinced that the job of teaching involves throwing facts and figures at their children, hoping that if they fling them with force and conviction, enough will stick. And you'll grow up into a proper adult that way."

Mokuba frowned thoughtfully. "You don't think that way."

"I do not. I could have told you that Santa Claus is a cheap marketing trick gleaned from ancient folklore. I could have told you that all those presents believed were from some omnipotent grandfather were actually from me. Or, I could let you reach your own conclusion. Your mind is your own, Mokuba. It is not my job to mold it. My job is to show you how to mold it."

"You still lied. Why did you trick me?"

Seeing that there would be no edging past this point, Seto sighed. "You want the truth."

Mokuba nodded.

Another sigh. Mokuba quirked an eyebrow when his brother wouldn't look him in the eye. Instead, Seto stared almost wistfully out the door and across the hallway.

"You've always believed in magic. You used to search for the pots of gold at the end of the rainbow, and lay out treats hoping to catch a glimpse at a unicorn. You would have conversations with garden gnomes, convinced that there was a gnome council somewhere, and that you could help them usher in a new age of gnomish prosperity."

Mokuba's mouth fell open slightly. "…Seriously?"

"The world seems hell-bent on snuffing that out," Seto muttered darkly. "Like it's offended that someone like you could possibly, conceivably, believe such nonsense and be happy about it. I told myself I'd be damned before I was a party to that sick, stupid malevolence."

This clearly wasn't the answer Mokuba had been expecting; he looked guilty. He got up from the floor, walked over to his brother, and hugged him.

Seto ruffled Mokuba's hair, still staring down the hallway, and tried not to cry.


I swear, the first draft of this chapter was happy. Honest. But, unfortunately, it just didn't feel right. I have no excuses. Except it's probably Seto's fault.

Yeah. I'll stick with that.