Trip to Fall
by Lethe Seraph
Chapter Ten: That underneath each barrier
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Whoo! :shiny eyes: I feel like Maki Murakami, except not as skilled ...
Bonus points if you know who Maki Murakami is.
"Everything has been leading up to this point…"
--
Jonouchi was still hopelessly lost. He had been looking into every room he passed, but hadn't found his own – or even a person to guide him. The house was dark, and eerily quiet. He shivered.
He was cold, wet, and practically naked. "Come on…" he mumbled, looking into room after room.
Then he opened the next door.
-
"Wow…" he whispered, awed by his surroundings. An expansive room faced Jonouchi, filled with arcade-style games almost to the point where he couldn't navigate his way through them. Jou stepped forward cautiously, and the lights flickered on. "Amazing…"
"Duel Monsters Simulation v.1.0," declared a paper pinned to a wall in a messy scrawl. Jou examined the machine underneath it curiously. Its controls appeared simple. He found a power switch and brought the game to life, its hum making him grin widely.
The graphics were simplistic, but Jou could get into the game; it must have been one of the first that Kaiba had designed. It seemed to be an adapted version of the card game. Some of the rules were outdated, so he guessed it to be pretty old. Kaiba must have been at it for a long time now. Strangely addictive, he noted in the back of his mind.
Before he knew it, he had made his way to the sixth level and was facing what the machine called 'the number-three duelist in Germany!'. Jonouchi's grin grew as his opening hand appeared. This guy was screwed.
"Who's in here?"
And speaking of screwed…
Jonouchi whirled to face the intruder, his considerable lack of clothes coming back to his mind with a near-audible thud. "What?! I, um-"
"Jonouchi? What are you …?"
Kaiba's eyes had widened as he took a step back. He then paled slightly and brought a hand to his eyes. "I did not need to see that," he mumbled. More loudly now: "What are you doing here?"
Jonouchi fidgeted. He wasn't sure whether to be embarrassed that Kaiba had seen him in a towel or angry at the implied insult. "Um, I was looking for my room," he said lamely.
"It's not even in this wing, Jonouchi."
"I got lost."
Kaiba took his hand away to glare at the blonde. "And so you came to ask the games for help. Of course."
"And distracted, all right? It's not like the door was locked or anything."
The brunette seemed about to reply with a scathing retort, but then closed his mouth and turned away. "Follow me."
"Huh?"
"Hurry up. I'll lead you to your room."
"Um, Kaiba? A favor?"
A small twitch of one shoulder. He looked back. "What?"
"Can I finish this duel?"
"…Fine."
-
"Don't do that. Don't you see the trap he's laid out?"
"Yeah! I wasn't going to anyway."
"Then why were you about to click there?"
"How do you know I was?"
"The cursor was only hovering over that spot for the past four seconds," said Kaiba, sarcasm inherent in every word. Jonouchi rolled his eyes, turning to face the backseat duelist.
"Then what would you suggest, smartass?"
"That you watch your mouth, guest."
"Oh, that stung." Jou grinned, insult already forgotten. "Well? Thought of something yet?"
"Play that card. The one that's two from the right."
"This one?"
"That would be left."
"Oh. …I thought you meant their right, really."
"And I believe you when you say that."
"So why should I play it?"
"Think about it for a moment, would you?" Kaiba moved closer to Jou, reaching out to point at the screen. "If you play it, then that Trap card-"
Jou let out a noise of approval. "Okay, I get it. Then what?"
"Figure it out. You continue to brag about being the second-best duelist, after all…"
"Fine. I can do this." Jou played the move that Kaiba had suggested, earning a small smirk, before summoning his monster.
"I'll just attack their Life Points now, then."
"Are you sure?"
"What do you mean, am I sure? Of course I'm sure! They have nothing on the field to stop me."
"What about his hand, then?"
Jonouchi blinked. "What about his hand?"
"Are you sure that there is nothing in his hand that could stop you?" He brought a hand up, brushing coffee hair away from his eyes.
"Well … what could he do?" said Jou, uncertainly now. "It's not like he can just play a card from his hand…"
"There are cards that he could play, you know," said Kaiba. "Kuriboh, for example."
"Is that all? No problem."
"If you think so," said Kaiba.
Jou's hand hovered over the controls. "You mean there's more?"
"There could be."
"Give me a straight answer, why don't you?"
Kaiba smirked slightly at Jou's exclamation. His eyes flicked briefly across Jou's still-exposed chest before returning to Jou's face. "Think it through."
"What was that for?"
"Don't know what you're talking about. Are you going to play, or are we going to be at this all night?"
If Jou hadn't known better, he would have thought that Kaiba was playing with innuendoes of some sort. What had been up with his expression?
"Fine, fine. I'll attack."
He waited a moment, and …
"Hey! It worked!" Jou turned to glare at Kaiba. The taller boy began chuckling.
"You're too gullible. Like a-"
"If you say 'dog', I'm going to pound your face in," warned Jou.
"Actually, I would have said 'mutt'."
"Damn you!" Jou tackled Kaiba, throwing his full weight onto the CEO. Kaiba only barely managed to steer them clear of nearby gaming units; they collided with a wall.
In a swift movement, Kaiba had forced Jou to the ground. He straddled Jou's back, pinning his arms there without hesitation.
Jou was suddenly feeling very, very naked.
"Get off!" Jou struggled – it shouldn't have been too hard, considering how little weight Kaiba seemed to have – but managed nothing. His face was still but a centimeter from the floor.
"I'd rather not. You don't seem very amiable at the moment."
"This feels … really … wrong," muttered Jou, letting his head fall to rest on the floor. It was almost comfortable.
"What?" said Kaiba.
"…Nothing."
They were both silent.
Then, Jou was up! He forced his way on top of the stunned Kaiba, reversing their positions. He grinned. "Did you just let your guard down?"
"No!" Kaiba's eyes flashed, and he thrust his arms around Jou's chest in an attempt to flip him. Jou fell off of Kaiba's back, but managed to keep himself from becoming the 'underdog' again.
Jou just cracked himself up sometimes.
They stayed that way for a good two minutes or so, both thrashing about in their attempts to regain dominance.
Strangely, neither succeeded.
-
Without realizing it, the two had stopped. They lay on the floor, both breathing heavily; still tangled together.
"Hey … Kaiba?" Jou was the first to break the silence.
"Hn?"
"What were you thinking about … on that day?"
Kaiba looked the short distance into Jou's eyes, unblinking. "Which day?"
"You remember." Jou's breaths began to calm. "The day I tripped."
"And you grabbed my shirt," continued Kaiba.
"That's the one. What were you thinking when you …"
Was that a small smile on the wintry face? "I don't know," admitted Kaiba. And Jonouchi realized that he was being completely honest – that they were having a conversation about something they had done together –
It kind of freaked him out.
"I … I guess I wasn't really thinking about it either," said Jou. A chill swept over him; he shivered involuntarily. "…We've been here a while, haven't we?"
"Are you cold?" said Kaiba.
"Yeah, a bit," replied Jou. "So … uh …"
Neither of them got up.
If he were asked later, Jou wouldn't be able to say whether it had been he or Kaiba who had made that first move forward. He wouldn't recall exactly how they had ended up with their faces so close that they could make out each fleck in the other's eyes.
All he knew was that they had suddenly become so close that he could feel Kaiba's heart beat; that he could feel the soft silk of Kaiba's shirt against his bare chest.
And it felt … natural.
Normal.
He didn't want the moment to end.
"Kai…" he whispered, before the distance was closed entirely.