Chapter 8: The Fifth Labor: Organize an Icy Excursion
Notes: As before, I apologize in advance for what is probably a sorry attempt at a language I do not know. This time it's German. Blame Google Translate.
So, T-minus eight days to get all of this ironed out, Mokuba thought. Arrange for a vacation for the Ishtars so I can get Isis to concede some of the ad contract to Otogi so I can get the reservation for Honda so I can get Mai her car so I can get Anzu her dress so I can get the libretto for Pegasus so I can get the paintings for Seto.
It was exhausting just thinking about it. It'd be easier—for now at least—to get back to the more mundane tasks at hand, which included getting in touch with the last few Pro Duelists or their agents, and contacting either Schroeder or Leonhart about whether or not they'd really be attending this exhibition.
It's still too early to call anyone in Germany, Mokuba realized, glancing at the media wall, with its panels of televisions featuring news tickers and clocks from around the world. It wasn't even eight o'clock in the morning there yet, and if Siegfried was anything like he had been some years ago, he preferred to take his sweet time in the morning: luxuriating in a rose-scented bath, enjoying a twelve-course breakfast, and taking the scenic route to the Schroeder Corporation headquarters.
Thankfully, most of the duelists Mokuba had yet to contact were Japan-based, so getting in touch with them would be no hassle—provided he called them within the next few hours before the official workday—or Duel Academia schedule, as it were—ended. But that didn't help him any with deciphering his brother's shorthand for the specific duelists he needed to confirm.
"Hey, Isono?" Mokuba pressed a button on his phone and glanced out toward where Isono sat, diligently doing whatever it was that executive assistants did on a day-to-day basis.
"Yes, Mokuba-sama?" Isono asked.
"Can you get me the names of all the rankings from the recent Genex Tournament over at Duel Academia? I think some of the names might overlap with this list of Pro Duelists Seto left with me, but I can't make out his shorthand otherwise."
"Of course, sir. Please give me one moment and I'll send you the file now."
A second later and the AI Mina spoke in a cheerful tone, "New file received."
Mokuba didn't bother replying to the AI vocally; he just swung his chair toward the monitor and tapped the "Open" button on-screen.
"Okay, fine, so literally half of these names make sense now that I can see the duelists, but how the heck was I supposed to know who R.O△, KKid or Math were?!" Mokuba groaned. "Bro, how do you keep track of all this stuff?"
One of these days, Mokuba thought, he'd check the back of his brother's neck and confirm he didn't secretly have a USB port there.
Two hours later, Mokuba made his way through the entire list of names—except for the only one that didn't correspond to a name on the Genex Tournament list.
KJ, KJ...who the heck is KJ?
Mokuba's attention was slipping; his eyes kept stinging in that weird way they did right before he was about to collapse face-first into his arms and fall asleep drooling onto the desk. He shook his head rapidly a few times to try and clear the sensation.
Focus, focus! You're almost done!
Maybe he could reward himself with a nice cup of coffee from the stall downstairs. Maybe he could even talk to that cute barista again. After all, what Seto didn't know wouldn't hurt him.
I'm doing all this for him, anyway! Mokuba remembered, scowling. He couldn't remember the last time his brother had attended any kind of celebration for him. He went to big ticket events strictly to rub shoulders with other executives, and then he left. He didn't make small talk, he didn't wine and dine, and he sure as hell didn't dance. He didn't celebrate his birthday. They never talked about their birth parents' deaths. He never even accepted awards on behalf of Kaiba Corporation, even though Mokuba was sure—absolutely, positive, in the core of his soul sure—that those kinds of events were the type Seto would enjoy.
He'd just… grown out of it, Mokuba supposed. No different from how Mokuba himself had grown out of some of his habits from when he was younger.
Like riding on Seto's coattails.
Not long after Egypt, Seto insisted on increasingly more "alone" time. Mokuba pressed him—tried to get him to talk, to at least spend some time together, even if it was just reading in the same room, but Seto just… couldn't handle it. And he outright refused to go to a therapist, or see a grief counselor, something Mokuba personally thought they should have done years ago. In fact, he'd made a point of talking to a therapist at least once a month in junior high; he just covered it up with other "meetings" or school events. Seto never bothered to ask him for details, so Mokuba never told him.
So while Seto was busy grieving in his way, Mokuba had to find other things to do, other people to hang out with. People at Kaiba Corporation had no problem with Mokuba asking for projects to work on, and in fact, seemed to relish the idea of a young helper, eager to learn the ins and outs of the company's inner workings.
I guess it makes sense then, why Seto always had me go to those big events where Kaiba Corporation won something.
Winning no longer sparked any joy in Seto, not if it wasn't a duel against the only person he'd ever considered a true rival. But that didn't mean Seto stopped challenging himself, or finding new "impossible" things to do before breakfast each morning. And Mokuba was sure he was proud of the company and all its workers who helped make each award possible, from the Good Design Award to the Deming Prize. His pride was just… a little less outrageous, these days.
"I wonder which of you has changed more, over the years," Mokuba remembered Pegasus musing aloud. In other words, it wasn't a question of if they had changed, but how much. Mokuba knew he had; he knew Anzu had. And over the past few days, he saw the changes in Mai, in Honda, in Otogi, and even in Malik.
If anyone's the same, it's probably Jounouchi— Mokuba smiled at the thought, and then he stared at the list in front of him.
KJ—Katsuya Jounouchi?! No way! Big Brother's inviting him to the exhibition?
Maybe Seto had changed the most out of them all.
A few seconds later, Mokuba confirmed that indeed, Jounouchi achieved his dream of becoming a Pro Duelist. He wasn't number one anywhere, but he was high-ranking in multiple Pro Leagues, including Western Europe, for some reason.
Is that a typo? Well, there was one way to find out: there was a number listed for Jounouchi—not an agent or manager, but directly to Jounouchi.
There's probably a story there, too, Mokuba thought. Could Jounouchi really have made it so far in the Pro Leagues without a manager? Since he had official Kaiba Corporation business, Mokuba had no issue using his desk phone to call the number listed.
It rang, rang, and rang—and Mokuba was about to hang up, when he heard a click and then a high-pitched, tinny ring, followed by a voice announcing "Die von Ihnen gewählte Nummer wird weitergeleitet. Warten Sie mal," followed by—to the surprise of absolutely no one—crackling music. Only this time it was Eurobeat, which Mokuba could at least tolerate for a minute or two.
"Who's calling?" a sleepy voice slurred, half into the phone and half into what was probably a pillow. "'S too early, call back in an hour!"
And before Mokuba could get a word in edgewise, Jounouchi hung up on him.
T–That Jounouchi! Mokuba tightened his jaw. Wasn't he supposed to be a lauded Pro Duelist, ranking internationally, even in—
Wait a second. That automated voice was German. And the music was probably German Eurobeat, too. Didn't Honda say something about…
"...I need the car by the time Mai gets back from Paris," Mokuba remembered telling Honda earlier that day.
"Paris? Not Germany?"
At the time, Mokuba thought it strange that Honda assumed Mai was in Germany. Honda never seemed to warm to her—not at any point when Mokuba was around, at least—and after her public falling-out with Jounouchi, her retirement from Pro Dueling was headline news, at least in the tabloids and on duelist gossip blogs. So why had he thought that Mai would be in the same country as Jounouchi?
That can't be a coincidence.
Mai hadn't answered when Mokuba told her he thought she and Jounouchi would find their way back to each other someday, either. And though Honda had flippantly called Jounouchi a "mutual acquaintance" these days, with how rarely he heard from him, Mokuba doubted their friendship had fallen entirely by the wayside.
Mokuba's fingers flew across the virtual keyboard, window after window popping up with the latest information about Katsuya Jounouchi, Pro Duelist: current ranking in the top three in Western Europe in the international division; a guest of—
No way, Schroeder Corporation!
"What the heck— Schroeder went and established his own tournament? Does Big Brother know about this?"
Three clicks later and Mokuba found an English version of the press release on Schroeder Corporation's website:
Munich, Germany (September 9, 20XX) – For thousands of Duelists from throughout the European Union, it all comes down to this: one final showdown to decide who will represent Europe at the 20XX Duel Monsters World Championship! On September 23 – 27, Schroeder Corporation, in partnership with Industrial Illusions, is proud to return to the Conference Center Haus der Bayerischen Wirtschaft in Munich, Germany, where the toughest Duelists from around the world will be in attendance to compete in the Schroeder Alpine Rose Cup, a World Championship Qualifying tournament (WCQ). The Alpine Rose Cup is unique in that it gives Duelists the opportunity to face-off against top-ranking Pro Duelists from the International League ahead of the World Championship…
If there was no such thing as coincidences, then the Goddess of Luck was definitely on Mokuba's side that day. He could finish contacting all the Pro League Duelists invited to the exhibition, confirm whether the Schroeders really weren't coming, and maybe, just maybe, he could finagle a wintery excursion for the Ishtars, too.
—Kaiba Hotel, Domino—
Mokuba's yawn stretched his mouth open so wide, his eyes started to tear up. He'd given himself permission to leave Kaiba Corporation, at least, but he was too tired to drive, so he had a towncar take him to the nearest Kaiba Hotel. Once there, he ambled in through the revolving door and waved tiredly at the front desk staff before making his way to the penthouse suite's private elevator.
The elevator just passed the 25th floor when Mokuba realized that he could finally call Jounouchi, as more than an hour elapsed since he'd last tried calling. He brought out his phone and scrolled to the entry he'd made in his internet calling app: the letters KJ, followed by a string of yellow-and-green V-shaped "Beginner Drivers' Marks."
Big Brother would appreciate that. Even if he probably hasn't spoken to Jounouchi in years, he probably still thinks of him as an amateur.
And if Seto could come up with weird shorthand for people, then so could Mokuba.
Except for Anzu. She got furious when I showed her the contact entry I made for her on my phone that one time…
Years ago, when he first met up with Anzu shortly after getting accepted at Stanford—and wanting to see as much of the States as he could before school started—he'd input her New York phone number into his address book. He'd seen other people using emoji outside of actual messages: putting them in notes, adding them to social media posts, and using them to give "nicknames" of a sort to their friends and family.
Mokuba thought since Anzu meant "apricot," he'd choose a fruit emoji that more or less resembled one, which ended up being a peach. And since her surname "Mazaki" translated to "true"—which, really, how was he supposed to come with an emoji for something as indescribable as "truth" anyway?—and "promontory," or a peninsula, he went with the closest shape to a peninsula, which was the eggplant emoji. But since he wouldn't necessarily know that it was meant to refer to a land mass and not an actual eggplant, he added the little "drops of water" character. When Mokuba handed her his phone to confirm that he'd gotten her number right, she'd taken one look at his "nickname" for her and turned the color of a ripe tomato, and demanded—not asked, demanded —he change it, and never, ever, ever use those three emoji in conjunction with her ever again.
Newly 18-year-old Mokuba hadn't wanted to rock the proverbial boat with his only "friend" in the States, so he'd readily agreed—and only understood why months later, when he met his roommates at Stanford and they'd explained what the three characters really meant.
Anyone who thinks of Anzu as just a "booty call" is an idiot, Mokuba thought. And so Anzu's name—and only her name—stayed in Mokuba's address book throughout his years at Stanford, across multiple phones and email addresses, all the way to now.
Earlier, Anzu had told him not to "put on his charm," making it abundantly clear that while they were definitely good friends and business associates, it wouldn't ever be more than that. Not after their last attempt at it, anyway.
Who am I kidding, it wasn't "our" attempt, it was mine. I had been crushing on Anzu for years, and after that cheating scandal with Eric, I figured I could be there for her, make her see I was a way better choice.
But it turned out being a rebound guy—even one fully aware walking into the "relationship" that he was a rebound guy—wasn't so fun, after all.
There were more reasons why it could never work out than reasons why it could, least of which being that Anzu never really seemed to see him as anything more than a younger brother-type. Then there was that minor detail of Seto expecting 21-year-old Mokuba Kaiba, MBA to return home to Japan immediately after the conclusion of his VP training in San Francisco. Oh, and Grammy and Tony-award winning Anzu opting to leave New York for good and instead join the new touring cast of Millennium.
"Am I going to seriously end up calling Jounouchi, of all people, just so we can bitch about the sorry state of our love lives?" Mokuba groaned and ran the fingers of one hand through his hair in frustration.
That's what I should tell Big Brother about banning me from dating anybody at the company. If I never get the chance to meet anyone from anywhere else, I'm going to end up calling Jounouchi to complain, because it's not like Seto's got any experience!
At least, none that Mokuba knew about. But Seto was nothing if not the master of secrets, right? He hadn't so much as texted Mokuba over the past few days, which, even taking into account Mokuba's mandate for Seto to leave all his tech behind, seemed unreal. For all Mokuba knew, he was sitting in a basement cave somewhere monitoring everything happening at Kaiba Corporation via a secret satellite uplink. He hadn't had the chance to find out just where Seto was "vacationing," if anywhere.
Isono probably knows, though. That man knew everything. Which was why Mokuba couldn't risk him—or anybody at Kaiba Corporation—knowing about the call he was about to make. Even if Seto basically asked him to call Jounouchi to confirm his attendance at the exhibition, Mokuba had other reasons for getting in touch with him now.
What was it, 11:30 a.m. in Germany by now? Surely even if Jounouchi had an all-night bender celebrating some big dueling win, he'd be up by now, right? He tapped the contact entry and waited for the familiar ringing followed by the German voice saying something—Mokuba didn't know what.
"Hey, this is Jounouchi—"
For a split second, Mokuba thought he'd somehow gotten Jounouchi's voicemail. But then the same voice said, "Hello?" in Japanese, and then a second later, "Hallo?" in what Mokuba took to be Jounouchi's attempt at German.
"Jounouchi, it's Mokuba Kaiba," Mokuba said in Japanese.
"Machst du Witze?" Jounouchi sounded incredulous.
"I don't speak any German, so I have no idea what you just said. But it's not a prank call, I am Mokuba Kaiba."
"Oh really?" Jounouchi asked, switching back to Japanese, his voice in a sing-song. "Well Mokuba Kaiba would know...er, uh… would know how many Star Chips he stole off Yuugi back in Duelist Kingdom!"
Mokuba smacked a palm to his head. "Seriously, dude? That was almost 15 years ago! Ugh… it was two! I wagered five and I took two!" And then stupid Saruwatari had knocked the Chips he'd swiped—from Yuugi and from another Duelist on the island—into the ocean, setting into motion the painful chain of events that followed. Even if Pegasus had mellowed out some over the years, Mokuba still didn't like to think about it.
"Huh, it really is you. What's up, Mokuba?"
"I heard you're dueling in Germany as a guest of the Schroeder family," Mokuba began slowly, still trying to force the memories of Duelist Kingdom out of his brain.
"Well yeah, I am the Japanese rep for the International League, in case that was news to you," Jounouchi said, and Mokuba could just picture him, preening and posing in that "humble-brag" way of his.
It had been news to Mokuba as of earlier today, but he wasn't about to tell Jounouchi that. He needed to have the upper hand here.
"No, I know, but I wasn't sure if you received the invite for next month's exhibition event at the Kaiba Hotel here in Japan."
"Hm? Ah yeah, probably. Was it emailed or somethin'? I haven't had much of a chance to check these days…"
"Yes, but we tried to mail formal invites, too. Though I guess if you were on your way to Germany when we sent them out, you might not have gotten yours that way, either," Mokuba explained. The elevator dinged and he walked into the penthouse suite, making a beeline for the plush recliner in the windowed corner that overlooked Domino's east side.
"Well, I'll be there, at any rate," Jounouchi added. "Was that why you called? Kaiba's got you doin' secretary stuff now?"
Mokuba scowled at the phone. "Actually, I'm acting CEO at the moment, and Seto would be doing this himself too, if he weren't on vacation."
"What, whaaat? Did I just step into some alternate reality where Seto freakin' Kaiba takes vacations?" Jounouchi crowed. It sounded like he was doubled over in laughter and slapping his thighs, and after a moment, a distant German voice piped into the conversation, clearly asking some sort of question.
Jounouchi's voice became muffled, clearly replying in German before turning his attention back to the phone call.
"Leon wants to know if you got his RSVP yet. He says he's gonna be at the exhibition, too, but Siggy's stayin' home because of a lecture given by this famous Professor Zweinstein on Duel Physics or something."
Leonhart's coming to the exhibition? Is "Siggy"...? And what the heck is Duel Physics?
It didn't matter how exhausted he was; Mokuba had to think fast and react. "Good to hear. I'll check you both off my list then. But since when are you so close to the Schroeders, anyway?"
"Eh, we crossed paths a bit while I was on my first European tour," Jounouchi responded. "Dueled a few times, mostly for show, but a few times for fun, too."
Mokuba blinked, sure he was hearing wrong. "You… dueled Siegfried von Schroeder—this is the guy that wiped the floor with you at the KC Grand Prix a while back—for fun?"
"We both mellowed out over the years," Jounouchi chuckled. "Siggy's a cool guy. Don't tell him I told you his nickname, though. He'll probably strangle me with one of his ascots."
Well, if Jounouchi has changed after all, at least I know that Siegfried's fashion sense hasn't? Maybe Pegasus and von Schroeder had the same tailor.
"I won't," Mokuba said with a laugh. He might tell Seto, though, if just to see the look on his face.
His eyes flicked to a rather stereotypical print of a snow-capped Mount Fuji hanging in a gaudy frame above the suite's enclosed fireplace. The reminder of his secondary mission sobered Mokuba right away.
"But I do have one other thing to ask you…"
"Yeah? Go for it."
"I'm helping some friends out"—Mokuba had no idea how Jounouchi would react to the fact that it was Malik that Mokuba was assisting, but he doubted it would be with nonchalance—"And they've never been to a snowy region. Since you're already a guest of the Schroeders, maybe you could help me ask them for some special arrangements..."
"What, like a ski vacation? Who the heck's never seen snow? Where are they from, the Sahara Desert?"
Mokuba's mouth fell open in the shape of a small 'o.'
"Uh… maybe…"
"Wait, really?" Jounouchi hummed into the phone. "Is it the Ishtars?"
Mokuba deflated back into the recliner, thrusting the footrest out. He shifted the phone from one ear to another and sighed.
"Yeah. He's helping me out with another thing I've got going on, and I'm just helping him catch a break, because he's way busy with his ViewTube channel. And Isis-san and Rishid-san are always away on digs for the Egyptian Archaeological Society."
"A ViewTuber, huh? Never would've thought. Then again, I'm only really subscribed to Pro Duelin' channels, so I guess it makes sense I wouldn't've seen him. Waitasec, that means he's not doin' Duel Monsters stuff?"
"Nope. Says he's trying to make up for...everything," Mokuba said slowly. "He's actually got a pretty popular trilingual baking channel."
"Waitasec, did you say 'baking' channel?" Jounouchi spluttered. "Like cakes and cookies and stuff?"
"More like bread, most of the time, but yeah. It's called Leavens of the Levant. "
This is Jounouchi, the guy who's blunter than a rusty spoon. If he can be straight with me, I can be straight with him, too. He'd already seemed unfazed by the idea of Mokuba helping out Malik, and only mildly surprised at the idea of Malik being a popular ViewTuber. Mokuba took a deep breath and spoke again.
"So...can you help? It'd be weird if I tried to ask the Schroeders myself, and while I could get a travel agency to arrange something, I think it makes more sense for them to have locals show them the slopes, so to speak."
Jounouchi hummed into the phone again. "Hmm, hmm, never had a Kaiba ask me for a favor before. What to do, what to do?"
Exhausted by the day's activities, Mokuba blurted the first thing that came to mind that he knew Jounouchi would definitely want: "We'll let you debut the new Duel Disk."
"Done," Jounouchi replied immediately. "You better hold up your end of the bargain, though."
"I will, I will—" Mokuba started, but Jounouchi started yelling down what was probably some opulent marble hallway at the Schroeder estate—one of them, anyway.
"...helfen, einen Skiurlaub für ein paar Freunde einzurichten, Leon?"
Jounouchi's German is actually pretty good, isn't it? Better than Mokuba's own, at any rate. He had no idea what Jounouchi was asking Leonhart.
A moment later, a softer voice came on the phone, one that Mokuba hadn't heard in years: Leonhart von Schroeder, formerly known as Leon Wilson, young Duel Monsters prodigy.
"Mokuba-san? It's Leon," he said, effortlessly switching from rapidfire German to Japanese. "I'm happy to host any friends of yours and show them the slopes, but I was hoping I might get some of your time during the exhibition to discuss a possible entertainment joint venture I'm considering."
"No problem," Mokuba agreed readily. "But you don't have to call me Mokuba-san. We're basically the same age, aren't we? And besides, Seto's been planning almost all of this himself, which means I have basically nothing to do during the exhibition. It's no trouble at all."
Seto might just change his mind, though, if he deemed all the work Mokuba was doing this week as a "successful" trial run of Mokuba as acting CEO.
Would Big Brother really be all that happy to give me more responsibilities? How does Leonhart deal with Siegfried?
All the more reason to talk with him during the exhibition.
"Excellent! Just make sure you or your friends give me about 48 hours notice for when they'd like to come to Germany, and I can host them for a week or two here at our Bavarian estate."
Which one is that, the castle in the mountains, the countryside château, or the multi-storey penthouse in Munich? Mokuba wondered absently.
Unlike Seto and Mokuba, who'd "only" inherited the Kaiba name from their adopted father, self-made industrialist Gozaburo Kaiba, the Schroeder name was steeped in history: they were distantly related to royalty, Mokuba remembered hearing. That meant they had numerous properties scattered throughout Germany and the rest of Europe, if not around the world.
As for the last two Kaibas on the planet, Seto had unloaded the former Kaiba Mansion—site of too many bad memories to count—as soon as Mokuba moved to California for college, and switched to a ritzy apartment in the center of Domino. It wasn't exactly close to Kaiba Corporation's headquarters, but supposedly Seto just stayed at the Kaiba Hotel penthouse—or worse, on the sofa in his office—when he worked late. Once Mokuba returned to Japan, Seto didn't bother clearing out the room he'd been using as his home office: he just bought the apartment below his own and told Mokuba to do with it what he pleased.
If Seto had his fingers in any other real estate pies outside of Kaiba Corporation properties, Mokuba didn't know about it.
"Mokuba-kun?" Leonhart's voice brought Mokuba back to reality.
"Yeah, I'm here, sorry about that," Mokuba apologized. "It's been a long day here."
"Understandable," Leon said. "I'll hand the phone back to Jounouchi-san now."
Jounouchi-san?! The formal honorific appended to one Katsuya Jounouchi nearly boggled Mokuba's mind. He didn't know anyone who referred to him that way. Not his little sister, not his friends, not Mai...
Speaking of which…
"Hey, Jounouchi, did you get a chance to see Mai-san on her way to Paris?"
Jounouchi was so quiet that, if it hadn't been for the sound of some distant German news report echoing through the line, Mokuba would have thought the call disconnected.
"...Nah. We just missed each other, I guess."
Mokuba frowned. He doubted it was something as simple as "two ships passing in the night" or some nonsense. But he was far from being in a place to give romantic advice to Jounouchi.
"Oh. Well, I, uh—"
"Hey wait a minute, how'd you know she was in Paris?" Jounouchi broke in.
"She works for Kaiba Corporation's fashion liaison, Jacques Mode," Mokuba explained. "I was at Paris Fashion Week—" he said casually, making it sound like he'd intended to be there the whole time, and went to each and every show— "And we just ran into each other."
"Right, right, you go to one of the biggest events in the entire city of Paris and you just 'run into each other,' sure. What kinda scam are you pullin', Mokuba Kaiba?"
"No scam!" Mokuba assured Jounouchi. "Seriously, I was there to meet someone else to arrange for a fitting and get myself a nice suit. Something that wouldn't make me look like Seto at the exhibition."
Jounouchi snickered. "Please tell me he's not wearing an upgraded version of his Battle City suit again."
Mokuba groaned. "No, thank God. I convinced him to sacrifice it to Mode so he could use it as the basis for our next wearables line. It should be out of commission for at least six months."
"Too bad you couldn't have it sent to Honda for him to rip it into shreds and stuff it into the seat of some imported car," Jounouchi said.
"Hey, speaking of which, you should call him. He says he hasn't heard from you in ages."
"Wait, what, first Mai, now Honda? What next, are you gonna tell me you're best buds with Anzu, and you've got weekly coffee dates with Yuugi?"
"No, of course not," Mokuba said with a mild laugh. He was grateful this wasn't an SV Messenger call where Jounouchi could see the sweat building on his forehead. "You know Yuugi doesn't drink coffee."
"Dammit, Mokuba!"
"It was a joke, a joke!" Even though Yuugi really didn't drink coffee, and Mokuba knew that because, well…
"No, I had to help someone with a car thing, and so I ended up talking to Honda, that's all."
For some reason, I don't think it's a good idea to say I was helping Mai out… Mokuba thought. He wasn't quite sure what Jounouchi felt about the older woman now. It had been years since their falling-out, and it seemed like they'd run into each other at least a few times, but….
"How's he doin', anyway? Treatin' my little sister right?"
"Uh…" Mokuba paused. "I don't know if I'm supposed to tell you."
"What the hell is that supposed to mean? You better 'fess up or I'm flyin' back early and I'm going to hunt you down."
Mokuba believed him.
"Honda's fine, really! He's like, district manager or something of the import export place. And… and he's going to propose to Shizuka this Christmas."
"Oh. I already knew all that."
"What? Then why the heck did you make it sound like you were going to rip me a new one?" Mokuba yelled. "You're saying Honda told you?"
Jounouchi made a noncommittal noise. "I almost killed him when I found out they'd been sleepin' together, and I told him then and there that he better break up with her or propose. That was sometime last year, I think, and since I haven't gotten a sobbing phone call from my little sis, I figured he was manning up sooner rather than later."
Mokuba almost smacked his forehead into his palm again. "You call threatening Honda into proposing to Shizuka 'manning up'? What does that say about you, Mr. On-Again, Off-Again Romance?"
Jounouchi let out a gravelly exhale. "Yeah, yeah, I know." He lowered his voice before speaking again. "I've been thinkin'..." he paused and took a deep breath. "I've been thinkin' it's about time for me to step back from Pro Dueling soon, anyway. It's great gettin' to see the world and everything, but some nights, I just want to be back in my own place, moldy grout and all."
"Ew, you have moldy grout? Why?"
"That's what you take from my big confession?" Jounouchi howled. "I got moldy grout 'cause I'm never at home to clean it, that's why, rich boy!"
"Hey, you're the Japanese rep for the International League, so you're a rich boy, too!" Mokuba shot back. And it was true. Jounouchi's earnings from Pro League tournaments were freely available to tournament runners like Kaiba Corporation, and he'd made a tidy sum in the past six months alone.
"Minor detail," Jounouchi said in a grumble. "I dunno. I'd like to… you know, come home. Be able to tell Honda, 'yeah, I'll meet you for some beer and greasy food,' or hang out with my little sister again. Or…"
"Or?" Mokuba prompted.
When did I turn into a matchmaker? It was one thing to have told Mai earlier that he believed Mai and Jounouchi inevitably would find their way back to each other, but he didn't expect to be the Tour Guide to Cloud Nine or anything like that.
"Or see Mai again. For real," Jounouchi admitted, his voice barely above a whisper. "Apologize. Figure out what she wants."
"That's easy," Mokuba replied. He didn't know where this confidence came from all of a sudden, but he knew in his gut that what he was about to say was the truth. "You just ask her."
Jounouchi let out a wry laugh. "Yeah. Maybe I will."