Child of Fate

Chapter 6


Seto felt mostly cold. He wondered where Mokuba was. Pegasus had fallen asleep beside him. Seto had thick blankets, but even that wasn't enough to block the cold out.

He started shivering. And when he started he couldn't stop.

" Seto?"

Seto froze. He woke up. Seto just woke him up.

Pegasus sighed. He had felt the bed shaking and noticed that Seto was shivering. He noted how Seto froze at his voice. Pegasus reached a hand over and stroked Seto's cheek.

" It's alright." He said. Seto didn't believe him. He stared at the man with his terror filled eyes. Who was he? Is he bad?

Pegasus pulled the frightened boy into his embraced and slowly rocked him.
" It's alrilght, everything is okay. You're safe now."

Seto jerked.

*FLASH!*

" There will be a time, when you will perish."
" Why?"
" Traitors..."

Seto sobbed as the axe came down and for a moment there was blackness. Then he darted out of that court with everyone watching, the humiliation, the shame and despair. He rose over them all and darted as fast as he could up past the clouds, faster and faster, not daring to look back-

*FLASH!*

Yami Bakura growled.
" Just how long is this going t'take?" He asked grumpily.
" Patience." Yami was equally annoyed. " If we want to find this out we'll have to "

*FLASH!*

Seto blinked.

Pegasus briefly scanned his mind before tightening his embrace.
" Don't worry." He promised. " You'll be fine."

Seto felt mostly cold, but other then that he was fine now. He felt almost unuse to his body. Briefly wondering why, he stumbled a little in the hallway.

" Oni-chan!"

Seto turned. It was Mokuba, that he knew. Everytime he was with his brother he managed to peek out of the room. So Mokuba he was familiar with.
" Hey, Seto." Yugi waved. " Are you feeling better?"

Seto decided to first give his brother a hug before dealing with Yugi. Apparently whatever took his place made a big deal out of this boy.

" Ano...hi." He was unsure of how to cope with the boy. He searched back to his memories. Alright, he nearly ruined his grandfather, made a big deal out of a stupid card, dueled him twice, this boy saved his life, then what?

His mind went blank.

" You don't remember anything, do you?" Yugi smiled, a little sadly.
" Iie, I remember." Seto still had a puzzled expression. " But...not very clearly. Everything is fuzzy."

Yugi nodded in understanding.

" So, how does it feel getting your thing back?" Honda asked. The question didn't make sense, but Seto knew what he meant.
" Cold." Was his answer. He gave Mokuba's hand a squeeze. " Small and cold."


Bandit Keith was in truth, not very pleased with the entire ordeal. One of the reasons was because the duelists were all too easy, and he was in a hurry to kick that Kaiba's butt.

Except for this one.

She was a tall woman. She had a very...special look, he would say. She was not the most beautiful woman in the world, but she was very pleasant to look at in any case. She had long eyes, but rather narrow, which were so brown they were almost black and seemed like hollow voids. She had a slightly flat nose and thin lips. Her hair was wavy and brown. Her skin had a gray tint to it, as if she was made out of marble. She had a rather short neck and slim shoulders, wearing a fine robe that was out of the ordinary. She spoke with a strange accent too, but she dueled as well as...

Well, Yugi Motou.

It seemed she knew every move he would make, right before he made it, and what was chilling was the fact that she knew it before he thought about it too, which was different from Pegasus. She had an inhuman glow to her and an aura of power that demanded obedience.

Naturally, Bandit wasn't someone who will bend down to someone else so easily. He was always proud of his skills and had plenty of arrogance to show it. Even after the duel with Jou, he was proud of his skills, unlike that weak Kaiba, who went away crying like a baby after being defeated by that Motou.

So he was very shakened as his points, once again, dropped down to zero, this time defeated by a woman he never heard of or saw instead of Jou or Pegasus.

The strange woman did not shout for joy as the kids did, nor did she sigh in relief like Yugi. She was composed and it seemed that she didn't care about the duel at all. Like she knew, that this was how it will turn out.

As a result, Bandit Keith lost two beads to this woman, and ten was required to enter that castle, like the last competition.



The reason there was a competition in the first place was because Pegasus had planned it before there was any Seto Kaiba lurking in that room with his leeches.

The reason Bandit joined was because first of all, Seto disappeared, and rumor had it that he was on Duelist Kingdom behaving in a very odd way and his dueling skills had been enhanced. Bandit wanted to test that. After all, how odd can a billionaire and a CEO of Kaiba Corps with an attitude and glaring eyes to go with it behave?

Yami muttered to himself as he looked through the scrolls with Yugi and the other mortals sitting on the other side of the room, totally bored.

" How did I get into this?" He asked himself. It was bad enough he was dragged into reading Egyptian scrolls all over again like he did five thousand years ago, but no only that, he was reading Greek, Latin, Chinese and even some tablets with cuneiform on them.

" It seems those trapped within Millennium Items have the ability to read all sorts of different languages." Mai answered, reading the Japanese ones. " Where did you get these scrolls, Shadi?"
" From Pegasus's library." Isis answered. " There were some from Egypt. We also stole some from other museums."
" You stole?" Yami blinked. " I take it that Bakura helped you."
" Oh, tomb robbers can be very resourceful, when you need to steal something as important as this." Isis answered. Bakura rolled his eyes and picked up some turtle shell with ancient Chinese writing on it.
" Where is Seto?" Ryou asked, taking another English scroll from the other side of the room. " He knows Russian, and we have a few Russian scrolls here."
" He's with Mokuba, and don't expect him to come any time soon." Shadi snapped. " It's bad enough his visions are going haywire. How do you expect him to read in this dark room while wearing sunglasses?"
" He's wearing sunglasses?" Jou blinked. " Why?"
" Because it works like a blindfold." Isis answered. " Get to work!"
" Why are we doing this anyway?" Honda asked.
" Because from what Pegasus and Mokuba told us," Malik muttered, still a little jetlagged from his flight and tired from carrying the extra scrolls, " There is a reason why Seto is having all those visions, and it isn't just because of the leeches."
" Would you quit with the leeches?" Jou snapped.

There was a brief silence, with the sound of pages turning. Yugi choked and began coughing.

" Paper dust," He explained.

" Why are we reading so many languages if Seto was in Egypt before?" Jou asked suddenly.
" Mokuba says that Seto is more important and his secrets are not just in Egypt alone." Shadi answered. " Theoretically, if Fate found him, he should affect the world as a whole, otherwise it wouldn't bother getting him back here."
" Yo, creepy!" Honda shuddered. " This is a Japanese scroll. It tells of...the Child, but I'm not sure if it's the same one."
" Read it." Yami ordered.

" Well..." Honda squinted. " The Child sprung from the looms of Fate, and somehow ended up here, the part that says how was sort of erased. He came here as a human child, but in reality he's...well, it got smudged. After being executed by the Pharaoh, he escaped to the outer ends of the universe, where he...dislocated many stars." Honda cocked an eyebrow. " It was told that the Child was lured back into our part of the universe by Fate itself and was given the power to see visions of the future. Of course, Fate gave him much more than that. He was able to change the future, unlike most prophets, and his visions were extremely accurate. Since he sprang from the loom, he was known as Fate's child, so Fate does everything to protect him. Which kind of means we can't hurt him. He hovered around as a spirit for the time being, and was said to have a heart as pure as light and the intelligence of all the geniuses put together. He was also to say to have some powers, but..."

There was a pause.

" But he never really used them, except for the Pharaoh." Honda finished. " A lot of sorcerors had tried to call or lure him onto Earth itself but he never really came. It doesn't say why, and the last part is torn!"

" Well, we don't know much except that Seto was lured many times unsuccessfully." Yami muttered.

Just then, the door opened, and Pegasus came in. He sat down in a chair and picked up a random scroll, but didn't read it, just tapped it on his palm as if he was preparing to hit someone.

" I hope you're not going to start being violent today." Shadi began.
" Iie." Pegasus answered, with a rather straight face. " I'm just tired. Bandit Keith wants Seto, that Seto can handle, but there's another psychic on this island and perhaps even more that I haven't found yet. And apparently she wants Seto gone."
" Well, we know that Seto is invincible, right?" Jou asked.
" I wish." Pegasus muttered. " He's only invincible up to the point where Fate could protect him. This new psychic has strong powers."
" Is that bad?" Jou asked.

There was a long silence as everyone glared at him.

The door opened again, and this time Seto came in. Suddenly, he started coughing, and everyone watched as he waved his hand in front of his face to get rid of the dust.

" Elgh! Pegasus, you have this kind of room?" he grimaced. Pegasus didn't look at him. Seto stared at the others. " What are you all doing here?"

They half expected Seto to get one of his visions again, but he didn't. ( He was, after all, wearing sunglasses) and it took some stumbling on his part for them to remember that the sunglasses blocked a lot of things from his mind.

Pegasus rose and led Seto out of the room. Everyone paused for a moment.

" Should we ask what the heck is going on?" Jou asked.
" Nah, let's go on with this. Then we'll have an excuse during lunch." Honda answered.
" Good point."



Through my discoveries through the human mind, I have found a rare type of being; in fact, so rare that I have only encountered one out of the many I have seen. This person was shown to have very strong barriers and an internal child with great power. This child is capable of creating strong barriers and even a false mind to mislead any intruder. It is known that minds and souls like these tend to act with perfect logic when in the human body, but once made vulnerable they act according to their emotions and-

" Yah!"

Shadi broke out of his reading and glared at Jou.
" What now?"
" Yo, freaky, man! Seto looks like a girl!" Honda looked over.

The two boys began laughing out loud at the scroll. Curious, the others went over to see.

It was Seto, no mistake, and whether or not he actually did look like a girl would be up to those who see it. He was younger this time, around twelve or thirteen years old, rather tall and lean and almost delicate, which may be why Honda called him a girl. Or maybe it was the circlet around his head, above his forelock and around the back, with glittering stones. His hair was also longer, in a strange fashion, but his clothes were unmistakably a boy's and he was definetely a boy as well, no matter how delicate he looked. He wore a long sleeveless tunic with white sleeves from a shirt inside, and loose pants and small shoes.

There was more to the picture. There was the Seto that was already stated, and there was another Seto, presumably older as he was much taller. He was not wearing the same tunic; instead he was wearing a long robe. The scroll shows the older Seto falling, and the little Seto coming out of the older Seto, obviously translucent, as the faint lines of the older Seto went through the young one. In this particular drawing the young Seto looked terrified and the older Seto looked-well, dead.

" How did an Egyptian scroll get into my pile?" Jou asked. Shadi took a look at the drawing. The letters were Egyptian, but it was not drawn in an Egyptian style.
" This is Roman, you baka." Anzu chuckled. " But this is very puzzling. Seto's not beheaded or anything."
" Says here that this is one way that Seto had escaped the clutches of the first magician." Bakura noticed.
" By escaping out of his body?" Yami blinked, incredulous.



The sorceress looked at the hallway of the castle as the doors closed behind her.
" This way." She heard.

Following the ignorant guard she took her time to look at her surroundings. There was a sense of age to the place; something she liked. She hated new things because they were so undeveloped. The guard led her to her room and she sat down on the bed, waiting patiently for a vision to come to her.



Seto knew she was here, and more, who she was and why she was here. He wasn't as afraid as he might have been without Mokuba and Pegasus and the Millenium Holders. He wasn't as relaxed as he might have been if he was as confident as he wished he was.

Kami-sama.

Pegasus didn't listen to him nor did he penetrate his thoughts. He went back to his quarters and Seto was left alone. But even through the sunglasses the vision was too important and Fate had obviously stuffed it into his head.

So Pegasus had no idea that this very psychic is in his castle and is waiting in her room patiently for some vision to come to her.

Oh, Fate would never grant that...hopefully.

Seto had always doubted his mother. And not without reason; she had failed him so many times. Doubtless Fate was sorry for it but that did not help Seto's feeling of insecurity. Which was partly why he was afraid of failure. He lacked confidence, even with all the success he had gained. And Fate made sure he kept with his success to build his confidence-

And failed him again.

Now Seto was in shambles. It will take a long time for that confidence to grow again. This Shadi knew. But the others do not, especially Pegasus, who never actually consented in being his ' guardian' in the first place. Pegasus's heart had melted a little, but Seto knew he could not depend on the older man. Once met with a choice of Cecilia and Seto, he'll toss Seto away like a pile of worn rags.

Not that Seto wasn't use to that.

So now Mokuba alone knew that the deadly sorceress is in the castle and ready to pounce any time.

Mokuba saw to take care of that.

" Don't worry Oni-chan." The boy beamed. " I have offensive powers. I'll beat her to a pulp!"



Mokuba was pleased, even though his big brother looked worried. This is his turn to play protector, after all the times Seto had protected him.

If Fate really cared about Seto, then Mokuba will come to no harm entering that room.