Rebirth:

Kaiba's eyes snapped open, suddenly awake. His mind seemed to be clearer than it had been for years, much clearer than before... that... that... Yugi had done something to him. But what exactly was it he had done?

He lay back for a moment and considered this. it seemed that he'd been sent away somewhere deep within his mind. He vaguely recalled that he'd been doing a puzzle of some kind... was it his heart? That made sense as Yugi had told him that he had to repair his heart. It wasn't quite complete... but... what about Mokuba...

What had happened to Mokuba?

Seto almost threw himself off the bed, but he heard someone approaching the room so he quickly closed his eyes again, imitating the state he had been in before he had awoken. Something told him that it would be very bad if he were to be caught awake at this moment. The door opened and someone walked in.

"Ah, poor Seto," the voice of the strange person was mocking, but he dare not even slit his eyes open to see who it was in case they realised that he was awake. All he could tell was that the person had a male voice, and he resolved to remember it for later. As it was, he put up with the fussing over him by sheer power of will.

"with you in this state it will be so easy to take over your company, as soon as we catch that brat of a brother of yours anyway. Fancy running away to Pegasus' island. So much trouble he will be in." the voice laughed. "But you are asleep so you will never know." The person finished what they were doing and finally made to leave. "Pleasant dreams Seto," they said mockingly. Then they laughed some more as they left the room.

As the door clicked closed, Seto's eyes snapped open and his mind was already in full gear as he rose from the bed. The first thing he needed to do was get dressed... well... except that his clothes were far too small as he seemed to have grown considerably. How long had he been out for?

He put that to one side, resolving to check the date later as he rummaged around inside the walk in wardrobe for something to wear, but despite the many clothes all he could find that looked like it would fit was some hideous green shirt and trousers with a blue coat. But beggars could not be choosers and he didn't have the time to head off down the street and buy new clothes. That could happen after he got everything sorted out and at least these clothes seemed to be of a reasonable size and fit. In fact, he thought looking in the mirror, he actually made these hideous clothes look good. Finally, he found some shoes, put on a belt and tucked the locket that Mokuba had hung around his neck inside his shirt. Then he planned what to do next.

He needed to get access to his helicopter in order to get to Pegasus' island, and his brand new duel disk technology might come in handy, but first he would have to get out of this room and make his way to his 'secret bunker' without being caught. He didn't seem to know where his deck currently was, but he would cross that bridge when he came to it and he had other decks he could use in a pinch.

Right now he had a little brother to go and save!

(–)

The group watched the helicopter land on the beach and wondered who on earth could be coming to the island during this tournament. Anzu's eyes widened in shock as the person who got out of the aircraft was none other than Seto Kaiba... But this was a very different Seto Kaiba.

He had grown several inches since the last time they had seen him and he seemed slightly drawn, possibly due to whatever Yugi's strange alter ego had done to him. His hair was also not green any more and his eyes... his eyes had changed from that awful sallow yellow colour to a bright cobalt blue. But how? Well, she knew that there had been a whiff of the supernatural around for a while, so she wasn't averse to putting it down to some kind of magic. Yugi (or rather, the other Yugi) had told Kaiba after their duel that he had to put his heart puzzle back together in order to heal properly. He had obviously succeeded because he was here, but was he evil like before?

She shuddered as she thought about Death T, how Kaiba had tried to kill them all, how he had even pushed his little brother to one side in his quest to defeat Yugi. Had he changed? Had he managed to eradicate the evil in his soul? She watched as he kind of thanked Yugi for giving him his deck back, at least in his own way, which was more than he would have done the last time they met him. The 'old' Kaiba would likely have yelled at Yugi for daring to touch his deck, would maybe even have pushed him over. But now he seemed more stable...

Then her thoughts were derailed as Jonouchi jumped in, challenging Kaiba to a duel. Well, at least it gave her more of a chance to observe, to see if he had actually changed any.

Of course, Kaiba wiped the floor with Jonouchi, but then considering that Jonouchi was still learning – and wasn't really a proper competitor here in the first place – he gave a decent showing. And whilst Kaiba was ruthless he didn't seem to exude the same... wrongness that he had when he had first arrived at Domino High. She suspected that he would never be all sunshine and rainbows, but she also concluded that he still had some healing to do. If it were to be compared to a physical injury, although the outward evidence may have healed, sometimes, inside, there was still some damage to be repaired.

She resolved to watch and see how he changed after this rebirth. Maybe, eventually, one day he could become a friend.

(–)

A/N - it's been so long since I had written this that I actually had to watch part of the anime again to make sure I had part of it how I remembered. I should have more faith in 2012 me because I had. LOL

Just reiterating that I posted 'Midnight' first simply because it's the first part I wrote. The other parts will (mostly) be in chronological order. Which means I probably have an extra part to write before I post the next chapter. Oh joy... (Or I might skip it and come back to it later. I'll see how I feel.)