Chapter 3

"The Woes of Seto Kaiba"

SLAM!!!!

Mokuba looked up from the homework he was doing on the coffee table, the entire house shaking for a second for some reason, "Seto must be home…" the boy mumbled quietly, adjusting his position on his purple pillow where he sat, nervously tapping his pencil upon his paper.

Vitani pushed her reading glasses up the bridge of her nose as she looked up from the laptop she had sitting in front of her on the couch. "Must be," she nodded, "You wanna go up to your room before he gets in here?" she offered, snapping the computer shut, "He seems to be in one of his moods…"

"Ok," he replied quickly, collecting up his things. On his way out of the living room, he looked back and grinned slightly, "Thanks for volunteering to deal with Seto. I really liked having you as his personal assistant."

"Wait – what?" Vitani asked, but the boy had already gone, and she could hear the elder Kaiba's footsteps on the stairs coming up from the foyer. Feeling a little uneasy, she crossed to the doorway of the living room, watching as he came into view, stomping up the stairs. "Rough day…?" she asked weakly as he reached the top of the flight.

In response, Kaiba set his briefcase down and pulled out his cell phone. He stared at it a moment, then spun around and flung it at the wall, smashing the bit of machinery into hundreds of pieces. The man nearly exploded, cursing as loudly and quickly as possible.

Vitani cringed slightly, "I'll take that as a yes…" she muttered, waiting patiently for him to run out of breath and end his rant. "Let me guess – you don't want to talk about it."

Kabia glared up at her, faint dark circles visible around his eyes, "How…? How was he able to do it?"

"How was who able to do what?" Vitani asked, honestly.

"Goddamn it, Vitani!" Kaiba shouted, sweeping his arm around and knocking his briefcase off of the counter, "You know perfectly well what I mean! You worked for him for two years: how did he do it? How could some psychotic maniac do what every bit of knowledge and technology I have access to can't?"

Vitani's jaw set. "Technology can't create life, Kaiba," she said quietly, "No matter how much money you have. Only magic can do what Jetsu did – extremely powerful dark magic that I could never control."

Kaiba felt his temper flare up again, threatening to bubble up to the surface once more. Magic… once again, what he needed was magic. Life wasn't fair. He bent down and retrieved his briefcase, then turned and left the room, "Sorry…" he mumbled on his way out. After all, it wasn't her fault that his life sucked.

Vitani watched him leave, her cold expression not softening until he was out of site. She shook her head and started up a different set of stairs to her own room on the third floor. If things kept going like this, pretty soon Kaiba wasn't going to be satisfied with just breaking his phone. If he didn't let off steam soon, he was liable to lose control and lash out at someone instead. Something had to be done.

* * *

Seto Kaiba lay upon his bed, staring into the nothingness of his pillow, lost in his own thoughts that seemed to drift in and around him along with the breeze from his open window. He was only vaguely aware that his eyes were leaking at a slow but steady rate and he couldn't seem to summon the strength to fight back.

After what could have been any length of time, the door opened and he could hear footsteps coming towards him. Seconds after the sound ceased, he felt the touch of cold steel on his neck and for a split second wished that it would pierce him clean through and rid him of his miserable existence.

"Get up," a familiar feminine voice said and he forced himself to turn his bloodshot eyes up towards the figure standing at the side of his bed.

It was Vitani and the metal touching him was the hilt of a silver blade she was holding out to him. Her own weapon of choice, the Millennium Sword was in her other hand, its gold blade glinting in the moonlight from his open window.

"What do you want?" he asked, his voice gravelly. She couldn't be serious, "It's not you I want to kill…"

"I don't intend to get killed," she said bluntly, shifting slightly so that the plain sword was in a better position for him to take hold of, "Get up."

He grasped the handle of the sword, wondering what she really wanted him to do with it. Seto stood up, trying to get the feel for the blade.

"I think a sparring session is in order," she said, turning her back on him and heading out onto his balcony. He watched her, wondering what she was planning. Silently, her silhouetted figure gripped the railing of the trellis with one hand and flipped herself over the edge.

Darting out to where she had stood an instant before, Kaiba was able to watch her descent end with a cat-like landing on the grass of the courtyard two stories below. She brought herself up to her full height and stuck the tip of her blade in the ground, leaning against it and staring up at him, challenging him to follow her.

Kaiba snorted softly and threw his sword down to the ground. It landed at Vitani's feet, upright and wobbling slightly next to her own weapon. He then climbed over the railing, so the young man was standing with his back turned on his assistant, feet barely keeping him balanced on the balcony. He gripped two of the bars below the railing firmly and let his feet leave the floor.

The railings were cold and difficult to grasp tightly, which nearly caused Seto to let go and fall the next story down. After a second or two, he was able to calmly let go and drop the rest of the distance, the shock being absorbed mostly by his extra-expensive boots. Immediately he straightened up and walked over to his personal aide, pulling his sword out of the ground and raising it in front of him.

"Not bad," Vitani said, smirking, uprooting her own weapon and taking a few paces backwards, gripping the hilt with both hands, holding it out at a slight angle, "Ready?" These unorthodox nighttime swordplay lessons had been born out of one of Kaiba's previous bad moods, in which she'd stopped him from taking out his anger on his equipment and placed a sword in his hands instead. He was a fast learner, but not yet able to understand the subtle art that went into the fighting style she was attempting to teach him.

Without so much as a blink the man charged forward, thrusting his sword forward, aiming at her midriff. There had been enough talk already; now was the time to fight!

Vitani rotated her blade, meeting his mere seconds before it could touch her. She then shifted her strength and forced him back, keeping the blades in contact, scraping against each other the whole time, just to force him to stay on the offensive.

Kaiba could feel his blood burning. She did this much too often: toy with him. He pulled his blade backwards away from hers, nearly causing her to over balance. Seto took advantage of this by side-stepping once to the right and slicing through the air in a long arch sweep of his weapon.

Vitani used the near-falling action she was in to her advantage, going into a quick roll and escaping his thrust. She was back on her feet quickly and now behind him, swinging at his back.

He jumped away, but not fast enough. First blood had been drawn, again by her. Seto could feel the chilly, stinging wind blow at his minor wound, causing more pain than a cut normally would. Kaiba, now enraged, turned around and lunged forward, sword tip being forced toward the hand that was clinging to her golden blade.

The skin on the back of her right hand tore and she instinctively let go of the blade, clutching it more tightly with her left hand, drawing her right hand in close to her stomach. Fighting left-handed was awkward, but not impossible. Still, it made her angry to think that she had been careless enough to let herself be put at a disadvantage so easily. And then, as the tiniest spark can set a whole forest ablaze, she was furious.

As Kaiba rounded for another assault, she grabbed hold of her hilt with both hands, ignoring the bleeding, fire burning in her eyes and her blade glowing red. The aura climbed up her arms and suddenly she was on the attack, coming at her employer with a force that she had not been intending to. With one swipe, she lobbed the tip off of his blade. With a second, she sliced it down so that it was barely any metal left above the hilt.

Kaiba was too stunned to avoid the roundhouse high-kick that followed. Her boot connected to his jaw and toppled the duelist, knocking him to the ground. Seto looked up, shocked. There was a deep, red glow all around Vitani's arms and in her eyes. But worst of all, Kaiba could see the ominous shadow of a black knight above her, bearing down on him in the same stance, sword pointed at his neck. She lied… she did learn his magic…

And, as quickly as it had come, the glow faded and Vitani blinked as if waking up from a trance. As soon as her eyes met his, she dropped the sword, letting it fall to the grass softly. "Omigod!" she murmured quickly, looking horrified, and then clutching her right hand, as if not realizing until then that it was hurting. 'What did I do…?'

Kaiba picked himself up slowly, the hurt look of betrayal etched on all his features. He dropped the hilt of his broken sword and slowly walked away, not looking back at his assistant.

Vitani sunk to her knees in the cool grass, watching him leave. She'd made everything worse, and she wasn't even sure how it had happened. One minute she was herself, and the next…

Her gaze fell on the Sword, and a shiver ran up her spine. She couldn't remember how she had won the match, only that she had gotten angry and it…had taken her over… She reached out and touched the blade, which was slightly stained from the wound she had dealt to Kaiba. A sharp jolt ran through her and she recoiled from it, suddenly afraid. Not knowing quite what to do, she left it in the yard, and walked slowly back into the house to tend to her injured hand.

* * *

Kaiba did not bother to change out of his blood-stained clothes or even tend to his wound. Vitani had been holding out on him… she had known all along how to control the magic he so desperately craved. She kept it from him…

He picked up the bottle of sleeping pills his doctor had prescribed for him from his nightstand and took four. It was a bit much, but anything that could end this miserable day would be fine with him. He was so sick of this day…

With that, Seto Kaiba lied down on his bed and promptly fell into another restless sleep, the pills doing their job efficiently. But nothing could stop the dreams… nothing…

* * *

Vitani entered his room a short while later, her right hand bandaged, with the antiseptic and medicinal tape in her left. Moving deftly, she managed to slip off both Kaiba's torn suit jacket and shirt . She dressed his wound with a little difficulty and then, wondering why he hadn't woken up through any of it, noticed the open bottle of pills on the nightstand. Shaking her head sadly, she knelt down on the floor beside the bed, taking one of his hands between both of hers and pressing her forehead against his fingers, silently apologizing to him for being unable to deliver to him what he wanted. Then she too drifted quickly to sleep…

* * *

When Vitani opened her eyes again, everything was black around her. She glanced around, confused and then felt cold air surround her. As she shivered, a harsh voice barked at her, "Show no signs of weakness, Vitani!! The enemy will take advantage of that. You must be heartless…as I have always taught you."

As she watched, the blackness around her shifted and the black knight emerged in front of her. "Master…" she breathed, speaking the word before realizing it, and clapping a hand over her mouth afterwards. "No…you're dead…" she said, "I'm…I'm free from you…"

The cold eyes behind the mask glinted, and the perfect white teeth were revealed in a cruel smile. "You'll never be free from me…" Just then, running footsteps echoed through the nothingness and Jetsu turned abruptly, drawing the Sword from its sheath.

Vitani came around behind Maeda just in time to see Kaiba screech to a halt in front of him, gaping at him. Before he could even get a word out, Jetsu raised his sword…

"NO!!!" Vitani cried as the blade came down and blood splattered everywhere. She tried to move forward, to get to Kaiba somehow – she had to help him! – but Jetsu thrust out and arm and caught her in the chest. Kaiba's eyes met hers for an instant before they clouded over and he fell into the blackness. "No…" she whispered, tears running down her face, as he vanished, "No…don't leave me…"

"What is this idiocy? Crying over a worthless being like Seto Kaiba? Pathetic..." Jetsu was inches behind Vitani, the Sword now poking her in the back, "Get up."

Vitani's head jerked up, shock written all over her face. Those words had been hers…or had they…? Overwhelmed, she let her head hang again, not having the energy to raise herself up.

"Nothing to say? Fine," Jetsu spat, "You were always too soft anyway." Pain erupted like wild fire in her back and she knew it was all over.

She was falling now too, down, down, down…where Seto had fallen. Soon she could see his body…drew level with it. Feeling lightheaded, she grabbed at him, clutching his blood-drenched shirt and drawing him close. As she felt fire opening up below them, she buried her face in her chest, murmuring, "I'm sorry…"