NOTE: Just the usual "this is not yaoi" reminder ;D


Everyone gasped in horror at Tea's announcement.

"Oh man . . ." Joey muttered.

Bakura looked faint. "Oh dear . . . oh dear . . . how horrible!"

"Yugi, what do we do?" Tea asked. "Shouldn't we call someone or something? . . ."

Yugi looked grim as he parted the cornstalks and looked down. "Oh no," he said softly.

"What is it, Yug?" Joey asked as he and the others gathered around, but then they all gasped.

"Oh no . . . it can't be . . ." Tea whispered.

"It's Kaiba!" Tristan exclaimed.

"Oh brother . . . what happened to him?!" Joey wondered, looking at the other boy's lifeless, tortured body. "What the heck is he doin' layin' . . . dead in this cornfield?!" He couldn't believe that Kaiba was really gone . . . just like that.

"I don't know, but . . ." Yugi looked up. "We're not far from where the UFO landed. . . ."

"And you're sayin' the aliens—or whoever—did this to him?" Joey asked.

Yugi nodded slowly. "It's possible."

"Poor Kaiba . . ." Tea knelt down next to the boy's body and gently smoothed back his long bangs. "I . . . I know I never liked him very much, but . . . I can't believe he's really . . ."

Yugi smiled faintly. "I don't think he is."

Almost as soon as Yugi had spoken, Seto groaned, raising a hand to rub his head.

Joey let out a breath he hadn't known he was holding. "Oh man . . . he really had me scared there . . ."

Seto's eyes opened slowly. "Tea?" he rasped, trying to focus.

Tea nodded. "I'm here, Kaiba. . . . We're all here. . . ."

Seto blinked, looking confused and unable to get his bearings.

"Kaiba, you're laying in a cornfield," Yugi told him.

Seto's expression didn't change. "A . . . cornfield? Is this your idea of a joke?"

"It's no joke," Yugi said, shaking his head.

"Yeah, man," Joey spoke up. "We all thought you were . . ."

"Dead, I know," Seto grumbled, sitting up.

"Hey, take it easy," Tristan told him. "You're pretty banged up."

Seto ignored him, trying to stand up anyway, and nearly fell over.

"Listen to someone besides yourself for once," Joey said, rolling his eyes.

"We should get you to the hospital, Kaiba," Yugi said, reaching out to help steady the other boy.

Seto gently pushed him away. "I don't think so. It's just a few scratches. I can clean them up myself."

"A few scratches!" Tea repeated. "I don't think so," she said, borrowing Kaiba's phrase. "Look at yourself, Kaiba—you're bleeding!"

Seto suddenly became aware of the blood that was trickling down his face and he brushed it away angrily. "I'm alright," he muttered, seeing Tea's worried expression. "I don't need to go to any hospital."

Joey smirked. "The only way you could get Kaiba to the hospital is if he was unconscious."

Seto raised an eyebrow. "Don't get any ideas, Wheeler," he warned.

Yugi chuckled at that, then turned serious again. "Kaiba, what's the last thing you remember?"

Seto shook his head, looking absolutely and completely bewildered. "A bright light . . . pain . . . torment . . . that's all I remember."

"Eh, so you have no clue as to where you were or how you got there?" Joey asked.

"No, I don't," Seto replied, looking around. "I am curious as to why you're all here . . . or do I really want to know?" He smirked.

"We're investigating the latest UFO sighting," Tea told him.

Seto nodded slowly. "I suspected as much."

Yugi looked at him worriedly. "Are you sure we shouldn't call a doctor or something, Kaiba? You might be hurt worse than you think you are."

"That's right," Bakura nodded. "And not being able to recall what happened is never a good sign."

Seto sighed. "I'll be fine. If I need to see a doctor, I will." He fished around among the cornstalks and pulled out his briefcase.

Joey grinned. "Yugi thinks you were kidnapped by aliens."

Seto turned to stare at Yugi, who looked embarrassed. "Well, I didn't say that, exactly . . . I said that maybe whoever was in the UFO that landed here earlier attacked you."

"Yeah, but the most logical explanation is that it was aliens, right, Yug?" Joey grinned.

Yugi scratched his head. "Uh, well . . ."

Seto turned away. "Never mind. If you don't have any objections, I'm going to take my leave." He dialed his chauffeur on the cell phone.

"We don't have any objections, if you're sure you're alright," Tea said when he hung up.

"I am," Seto told her.

Before long the limo pulled up and Seto stumbled into it, after saying goodbye to Yugi and the others, who were planning to continue their search of the cornfield.

"I hope Kaiba really is okay," Yugi said worriedly. "I think he was limping."

"Yeah, I noticed that too," Joey agreed.

"Do you think he was really attacked by whatever was in that UFO, Yugi?" Tea asked.

Yugi sighed. "I don't know, Tea. . . . If he was, then why? . . . And why didn't the police or the army find him?"

"Yeah, I mean you'd think they'd notice a body laying in a cornfield," Joey said.

Tea cringed, remembering the horror she'd felt upon discovering Seto's limp, bloody hand laying among the cornstalks. That was a nightmarish image that would likely stay with her for a long time.
****
Seto sighed as he got out of the limo and walked up to his mansion. Try as he might, he could not remember anything about what had happened. It wasn't that easy to take him by surprise and then get away with it . . . but he couldn't have been kidnapped by aliens . . . could he? It sounded so ridiculous . . .

When he opened the door, he was suddenly overcome by a wave of dizziness and nearly collapsed on the floor, but as quickly as it had come, it passed, and the boy stumbled into the house.

"Big brother!" Mokuba gasped, coming out from the library upon hearing the door open. "You're hurt!"

Seto tried to smile weakly. "I'll be alright, Mokuba . . . I just need to rest . . ." He limped over to the couch and collapsed on it.

Mokuba climbed up next to him, looking horrified. "Oh, big brother . . . what happened to you?"

"I wish I knew, Mokuba," Seto replied, rubbing at his aching temples. "I woke up laying in a cornfield with Yugi Muto and his friends gathered around me."

Mokuba gasped. "Should I go find the first aid kit, big brother?"

Seto tried to act strong and not worry his brother, but he was suddenly too powerless to do anything of the sort. He nodded weakly. "Yeah, Mokuba . . . maybe you'd better." He found himself falling into oblivion.
****
When Seto next opened his eyes, Mokuba was looking down at him worriedly. When he saw that his beloved brother was awake, the little boy hugged him tightly, looking immensely relieved. "Oh Seto! I was so worried . . ."

Seto hugged him back. "What happened, Mokuba?" he asked.

"You fainted, big brother!" Mokuba told him.

"Fainted, huh?" Seto rose up slowly. He was still on the couch, but Mokuba—or someone—had laid him across it, and his shirt was unbuttoned, revealing a nasty-looking red mark across his chest.

Mokuba nodded. "You'd better just rest now, Seto," he said, laying a hand on his brother's shoulder.

Seto sighed and leaned back against the couch. "Mokuba . . . how long was I unconscious?" he asked.

"Just a few minutes," Mokuba replied, "but it was still really scary to see you like that, big brother," he whispered.

Seto hugged his brother comfortingly. "It's alright, Mokuba," he said softly. "I'm alright."
****
Seto took a long look at himself in the mirror. He didn't look sick, exactly . . . but he did look pretty beat up. He had obviously been through some kind of rough ordeal . . . one that he couldn't even remember a thing about.

He examined the red mark on his chest. It looked like the result of an assault with a whip in some ways, but in other ways it didn't look like anything he'd seen before.

"What happened to me?" Seto muttered as he climbed into bed after cleaning his wounds. He soon slipped into a troubled sleep, peppered with odd and uneasy dreams filled with pain and torture.

Later that night, Seto awoke suddenly from his nightmare, breathing heavily. He couldn't remember his dream in detail, but one part stood out—a part in which he was being struck down by a laser beam. Seto knew that it was not just a random nightmare; deep in his subconscious mind, he was remembering what had happened, recalling the memories that had been erased.

He growled to himself. Whoever had done this to him was going to be sorry. It looked like he was now involved in a new mystery, whether he wanted to be or not.
****
Seto was awakened the next morning by the sharp jangling of the telephone. With a groan, the injured boy groped for the receiver and finally found it. "Kaiba," he muttered.

"Hey, Kaiba," came Yugi's familiar voice.

"I'm fine, Yugi," Seto replied dryly, already having figured out what the other boy was calling about.

"You sure, man?" Joey's voice came on the line. "We heard you passed out."

Seto groaned inwardly. "Maybe you heard wrong, Wheeler," he snapped.

"I don't think so." Joey snickered, picking up on the embarrassed tone to Seto's voice.

Seto rolled his eyes. "Wheeler, do you know what time it is?!"

"Yeah," Joey replied. "It's about five-thirty in the morning."

"Exactly," Seto grumbled, and hung up.
****
Joey looked at the receiver briefly and then put it back in its cradle. "He hung up on me," he announced.

Yugi shook his head worriedly. "I wish he wouldn't be quite so independent all the time," he sighed. "I'm afraid he really is hurt bad and he just won't admit it."

Joey shrugged. "That's Kaiba for ya," he said, idly turning on the TV. A picture of a pretty reporter came on, and in the background was a mansion in the high-class neighborhood of Summit Hills, a suburb of Domino City.

"I'm here reporting at Summit Hills, where there's been a strange break-in," the reporter was saying.

"I see," the news anchor said thoughtfully. "Kim, what is so strange about this particular break-in?" she asked.

The reporter called Kim paused, then said, "Well, Janet, what's odd about this break-in is that the robbers appeared to be aliens!"