Disclaimer: We don't own Yugioh. Be glad.
Golden:*sniffles loudly and coughs a little* Dedictions still go to Mistah T.
Silver: This chapter has been rather difficult, due to little Hikari's sudden brainlessness. She has been struck down by severe nasal allergies-- which is to say, she can't breathe and she's been sneezing like the wind.
Golden:*grabs a tissue* Honks noisily*
Silver:*~_X* Yuck.
Golden:*singing hoarsely* The PHAAAAN-Tom-of-the-op-er-a-is-THEEEERE.... Inside my mind! *laughs maniacally*
Silver:*shakes head* We call this oxygen deprivation. Now then.
Seto Kaiba and Red: Thank you and You're Welcome. Sorry THIS chapter took so long.
HCG: Mmm. We think Kekatsu is probably pretty twisted... but he's not stupid. Besides that, little Hikari is pretty contrary when she knows what people are thinking. And don't worry, Seto's in this one.
GriffenFire: Yes! You guessed right! You want to do art for WHAT? THIS? *sparkly eyes* And here we thought the only person who'd do art for this was Golden.
Lady of the Thread: ^_^ We know what you're saying. Don't worry, we'd never actually name the poor kid "Weatherby James-Quincy."
kris: Back in the notes for Chapter 3: "Since the Queliyg came nine years ago in here, it was before Seto and Mokuba's father died and therefore Gozaburo Kaiba never adopted them. He was too busy kissing alien butt." To quote a note in "Off the Deepest End," a document on our computer dedicated almost solely to making fun of Deepest Need, "Seto was never adopted by Gozaburo, and both he and Mokuba forgot or forsook their surname years ago." (Forsook as in gave it up on their own.)
Golden:*sneezes loudly* I'm MISERABLE!
Silver: You sound like it. A note: We don't know when Noa died or how old he was when it happened, or even when it happened. For the sake of the story, I've set it so that he was 13 when he died (makes sense when you think about it, he looks two or three years older than Mokuba in the pictures, and he doesn't age any) and that he died perhaps one or two years before Seto was adopted. That makes him three or four years older than Seto, and it also places him out of harm's way in this particular fanfic so that he can appear. If anyone has any thoughts on it, we'll welcome them enthusiastically.
--
Chapter 10: Much ado about NOTHING!
Ryin sat back silently in Kaiba's old office, brooding to herself. The wind whistled in through the still-shattered window and ruffled her golden feathers gently. To her, this was peace.
Finally she leaned forward a bit and flipped a switch on the computer before her, sending out a call to her mother's orbital station, but directing it to a certain human.
A young man's face with deepset blue eyes and aqua hair stared back at her. "Ryin," he said in Queliyg, "Hello." The two stared at each other for a moment longer. "So, did you find out who pushed my father out the window?"
Ryin sent the security footage to her young friend. He looked away for a moment, attention held by his secondary screen. A dark look spread across his features. "This... Seto. Do you have any information on him?"
Ryin ruffled her feathers in a shrug. "Only what little we learned from the security tapes and recent records. He has a younger brother named Mokuba, who your father interrogated personally. His parents died of differing causes, his mother sometime before the invasion. Mokuba didn't seem to know the cause. One possibility is from childbirth, your race has a somewhat dangerous method of reproduction."
The boy nodded. "I'm afraid so. Anything else?"
"Only that Seto is very protective of his brother-- and he looks frighteningly like you, Noa."
Noa glanced at a close-up of Seto's face and snorted. "What's so frightening about it? What would you know about human semblences, anyway?"
Ryin clucked at him in a way he'd learned was a chuckle. "You know, my boy, that if not for the hair-color difference, and difference in age, the both of you would be identical. Also, I am no ordinary Queliyg, being of royal breeding. Moreover... I took both your pictures and checked."
Noa shook his head. "The entire Empire is going to turn on its head if you ever ascend."
Ryin's eyes narrowed and her beak clicked in amusement. "You bet it will. I have the edges of a plan, Noa, and I want you to come here, to Japan."
--
Four beings stood in the darkness, though only two were seen. Bakura had cast off his cloak, revealing an outfit of many pockets (useful for a merchant selling things outside the law) while Yugi had also left his trenchcoat nearby, although keeping his weapons on his person. These included a small pistol kept secure in a makeshift shoulder holster and a knife he wore on his hip.
The two stood in a very old subway station, cavernous in its emptiness.
They were sparring. Or rather, Yami and Kekatsu were, and they were "taking notes." A flash of light issued from the Millenium Ring and a rather polished looking creature in white appeared.
Yami chuckled, the darkness swallowing his voice. "Surely you can do better than THAT, my friend." The dark form pointed and summoned forth a snarling wolf. "Silver Fang! Attack!"
Yugi couldn't help wincing as Silver Fang pounced, tearing the humanoid happily to shreds.
"Adding insult to injury, are you," Kekatsu reproached, reaching out as though he was pulling his next fighter from the darkness itself. What appeared to be an autonomous suit of armour, sans helm, crunched to the ground. It struck swiftly, ribbons of blood following its blade as the sword cut through poor Silver Fang's hide. Yugi yelped.
"The Headless Knight?" Yami queried. "Pfft!" He raised his hands in preparation for a new summoning.
"Yugi? BakurAAA!!" Yami started at the voice, Kekatsu spun to look at Téa, who appeared to be rooted to the spot. She was pointing at the Knight, jaw slack in horrified amazment. "Wha? Wha?"
Before Yami could move, Kekatsu had grabbed his cloak and swept it onto his shoulders, recalling the Knight as he did so. Téa's arm dropped, but she seemed just as rooted as before.
"What are you doing here?" he demanded, advancing on her.
"I- I- was just- I'd wondered where you'd gone-- How-- What was--" she fell silent as Kekatsu put his hand up under her chin, gently closing her mouth.
"It was a magical warrior," he told her, locking her eyes with his own. Yami stood where he had been, a little startled by the straightfowardness. "I am an ancient spirit possessing Bakura, the Pharaoh over there is possessing Yugi."
Téa's eyes widened even further. "Ph- Pharaoh?" Kekatsu nodded.
"He was the king of all Egypt, once. That's the burden of a Pharaoh."
"B-but- why are you telling me this?" Téa asked fearfully. Yami was wondering about the same thing, from the look on his face.
Kekatsu smiled and stroked her cheek. "Because you are about to forget it."
Suddenly there was a flash of light and Téa yelped. "Téa!" Yami yelled, running forward. "Kekatsu! What in Ra's name do you think you're doing?!?"
When he got there, however, it was no longer Kekatsu standing there, but Bakura, who held the girl in his arms. The boy looked almost sheepish. "He's like that," Bakura said, as though that would explain everything.
Yami looked furious, and Yugi was quite furious underneath, himself. "But what did he DO?"
Bakura blushed. "Oh. That. He's erased her memory up to the point where she wondered where we'd gone and left to look for us. She'll be fine, I promise."
Annoyed, Yami insisted on taking Téa into his arms. "Tell him to warn us next time he's planning on doing something like that!"
--
Seto was fiddling around with some stolen Queliyg equipment when Bakura and Yugi walked by, the unconcious Téa in tow. He glanced up for a moment, looked back down at his project, then did a double-take and jumped up after them.
"Yugi! Bakura! What happened to Téa?!" They turned to look at him. Bakura muttered something and suddenly Yugi gave him a sharp glance. Seto came up short, wondering what Bakura could possibly say to annoy Yugi so badly.
"She- ah- Bakura kind of gave her a bad scare, and I guess it was too much for her," Yugi managed. Which was... something near a half-truth.
Seto gave them a puzzled look. "Téa doesn't scare easily," he pointed out. "She's seen a lot of nasty stuff the past nine years, just like the rest of us."
Bakura looked down at Yugi again. "Are you sure you don't want-" but shut his mouth when Yugi glared at him again. Suddenly Seto wasn't sure he wanted to know what was going on. If it was enough to make Yugi so angry...
"Don't worry about it, Seto," Yugi told him. "We're just going to take her to her car and let her sleep it off... I'm sure she'll be fine."
Seto put his hands on his hips as they walked away from him. "It's my job to worry!!"
Kel, who had come up behind him and knew enough to partially decipher the situation., tapped him on the shoulder. "What were you working on, Seto?"
THIS, of course, was more than enough to distract the boy. "Oh!" he exclaimed, more than happy to show off. "This used to be half a Queliyg holoprojector and parts of several different weapons... none of the killing parts, of course, or I'd be making a weapon, not a holoprojector. But holoprojectors can be weapons in themselves, you know."
Kel tilted his head to the side. "What are you planning on programming into it?" he asked. The boy shrugged.
"I'm not quite sure, yet, but something startling!"
--
When Noa arrived on Earth, Ryin was waiting for him. The young man broke into a huge grin despite himself and ran to her. "You have no idea how lonely I've been!" he exclaimed as she embraced him. "You were the only one on the entire station who didn't treat me like a pet!"
"Yes," she murmured, "And whose fault is it you ended up there?"
Noa gave her a surprised look. "Are you reprimanding me for being angry that someone pushed my father out of a window? I'm sorry, M'Lady, but I happen to know you would have been angry if someone pushed your mother out an airlock. No matter what they do, they're still our progenitors."
The Queliyg sort of sighed, then noticed the creature that had stepped out behind him and was now sniffing the air. She blinked in wonderment. "Why...?"
Noa looked back at the brightly feathered being as well. He was a handsome animal, about two thirds Ryin's size with glimmering green wings and sparkling dark eyes, although they held no special intelligence behind them like her own. His manner of movement made it clear to anyone looking that he had the mind and instinct of an eagle.
Noa chuckled ironically. "They insisted that I bring an escort, so..."
Ryin clucked in laughter. "What do you call him?" The young man grinned at his custodian.
"You know I have to name everything," he said. "I've been calling him Asaka. I think he's even learned it, you know." As if to prove the point, he called Asaka over to him. The creature trotted over happily, catching the small reward of food he was tossed and deftly ripping into it. Glancing over at Ryin, he raised a bright blue crest of feathers just a little. She shook her head at him.
"He seems very intelligent, considering," Ryin noted as Asaka trotted back to Noa, ruffling the wings extending his arms.
Noa brushed a hand over Asaka's "cheek," which made the creature close his eyes appreciativly. "They're all a bit more intellegent than they're given credit, I think."
--
A few days after Téa's "collapse," Seto was once again working on getting his new toy working. This time Mokuba and Serenity were watching him, Mokuba occasionally asking a question and getting a complex answer he seemed to understand, Serenity just staring in awe as the two spoke their own sort of language. A crash suddenly sounded nearby Mako's usual entrance, and the three looked up.
"Ah," Seto said as they saw the little scene that had unfolded. "I see he's still going at his futile attempt to teach those two to behave normally out of captivity."
Serenity looked at him. He thought. "Rex and Weevil weren't normal IN captivity, either, Seto." The two obviously were still plagued by their in-cell phobias and neuroses, seeing as how Rex seemed to have dropped his load in order to stomp at the ground, while Weevil wailed for him to stop.
Mako just covered his eyes in exasperation and let them go at it. When finally they seemed on the verge of drawing blood, however, he reached in and lifted them both off the ground to carry them off.
"What AM I going to do with you?" the onlookers heard him demanding.
The show over, everyone went back to what they had been doing. Seto grinned down at his creation. "Well, Mokuba, I think all we need now is something to scan into it and see if it works!" Mokuba grinned at his big brother.
"You think Max'll let us have one of those cool sketches he does?"
The older boy stared at the younger. "You know, I never even thought of that! Kid, you're a genius!" Seto then ruffled Mokuba's silky black hair. "C'mon, let's go ask him!"
With something like a sigh, Serenity got up to follow them.
They found Max and Cecilia talking with Solomon Moto. Yugi, Bakura, Joey, Kel, Duke and Tristan were sitting watching the discussion, Téa was reading something. Max turned and noticed the device Seto was cradling carefully.
He rose an eyebrow. "What is that supposed to be?" Seto grinned.
"It's SUPPOSED to be a holoprojector, but I don't know how well it'll work yet."
Max, Cecilia and Solomon glanced at each other, then Max laughed. "You want a sketch, don't you?" Their small audience straightened, and Bakura poked Téa to get her attention. Seto nodded.
"Y'read my mind. Please?"
Max cast about for a moment, then grabbed a notebook and tossed it to the teenager. "Find something in there."
Seto knelt so Mokuba could look over his shoulder and began flipping through the sketches. They went through so fast Serenity wondered how they could see any of it-- but suddenly stopped on one page. "Wow," Mokuba said softly, reaching over and flicking a switch on the holoprojector. Seto apparently agreed with him, because he put the page up close to the projector's scanners to program it in.
The two made a few adjustments, then Seto pressed a button to activate the machine. "Here goes nothing," he muttered. Something flickered for a few moments, then a white light flared out of the machine, causing everyone but Seto to jump back in surprise. He just stared up at it in awe.
Serenity stared, almost wishing her synthetic eyes still recorded what she saw, but content to try and commit it to memory. It was a huge, glistening white dragon, body apparently armored, a blue gleam making it seem even whiter. Its neck twisted to stare at the ceiling, cold blue eyes wide and defiant. White wings spread as if it were preparing to launch itself into the heavens.
She glanced over at Seto, who, to her surprise, had the grin of a child on his face.
"Perfect!" he whispered.
--
End Chapter 10. (Circle of yawns) THAT short thing took WAY too long. The beginning of the chapter was written back in the beginning of summer, when little Hikari's allergies are at their peak (we left the little skit in because we thought it was funny) and the end was... well, you know. We have a scanner, now! (happy dance) Seto-Kaiba Red Archery Girl was wonderful enough to put up one of little Hikari's goofy fanarts on her site. Go to the fanart section at
The pic is kind of hard to look at because it's huge, but it's still funny. ^_^ Try scrolling down first, then back up, then left to right.
Golden:*sniffles loudly and coughs a little* Dedictions still go to Mistah T.
Silver: This chapter has been rather difficult, due to little Hikari's sudden brainlessness. She has been struck down by severe nasal allergies-- which is to say, she can't breathe and she's been sneezing like the wind.
Golden:*grabs a tissue* Honks noisily*
Silver:*~_X* Yuck.
Golden:*singing hoarsely* The PHAAAAN-Tom-of-the-op-er-a-is-THEEEERE.... Inside my mind! *laughs maniacally*
Silver:*shakes head* We call this oxygen deprivation. Now then.
Seto Kaiba and Red: Thank you and You're Welcome. Sorry THIS chapter took so long.
HCG: Mmm. We think Kekatsu is probably pretty twisted... but he's not stupid. Besides that, little Hikari is pretty contrary when she knows what people are thinking. And don't worry, Seto's in this one.
GriffenFire: Yes! You guessed right! You want to do art for WHAT? THIS? *sparkly eyes* And here we thought the only person who'd do art for this was Golden.
Lady of the Thread: ^_^ We know what you're saying. Don't worry, we'd never actually name the poor kid "Weatherby James-Quincy."
kris: Back in the notes for Chapter 3: "Since the Queliyg came nine years ago in here, it was before Seto and Mokuba's father died and therefore Gozaburo Kaiba never adopted them. He was too busy kissing alien butt." To quote a note in "Off the Deepest End," a document on our computer dedicated almost solely to making fun of Deepest Need, "Seto was never adopted by Gozaburo, and both he and Mokuba forgot or forsook their surname years ago." (Forsook as in gave it up on their own.)
Golden:*sneezes loudly* I'm MISERABLE!
Silver: You sound like it. A note: We don't know when Noa died or how old he was when it happened, or even when it happened. For the sake of the story, I've set it so that he was 13 when he died (makes sense when you think about it, he looks two or three years older than Mokuba in the pictures, and he doesn't age any) and that he died perhaps one or two years before Seto was adopted. That makes him three or four years older than Seto, and it also places him out of harm's way in this particular fanfic so that he can appear. If anyone has any thoughts on it, we'll welcome them enthusiastically.
--
Chapter 10: Much ado about NOTHING!
Ryin sat back silently in Kaiba's old office, brooding to herself. The wind whistled in through the still-shattered window and ruffled her golden feathers gently. To her, this was peace.
Finally she leaned forward a bit and flipped a switch on the computer before her, sending out a call to her mother's orbital station, but directing it to a certain human.
A young man's face with deepset blue eyes and aqua hair stared back at her. "Ryin," he said in Queliyg, "Hello." The two stared at each other for a moment longer. "So, did you find out who pushed my father out the window?"
Ryin sent the security footage to her young friend. He looked away for a moment, attention held by his secondary screen. A dark look spread across his features. "This... Seto. Do you have any information on him?"
Ryin ruffled her feathers in a shrug. "Only what little we learned from the security tapes and recent records. He has a younger brother named Mokuba, who your father interrogated personally. His parents died of differing causes, his mother sometime before the invasion. Mokuba didn't seem to know the cause. One possibility is from childbirth, your race has a somewhat dangerous method of reproduction."
The boy nodded. "I'm afraid so. Anything else?"
"Only that Seto is very protective of his brother-- and he looks frighteningly like you, Noa."
Noa glanced at a close-up of Seto's face and snorted. "What's so frightening about it? What would you know about human semblences, anyway?"
Ryin clucked at him in a way he'd learned was a chuckle. "You know, my boy, that if not for the hair-color difference, and difference in age, the both of you would be identical. Also, I am no ordinary Queliyg, being of royal breeding. Moreover... I took both your pictures and checked."
Noa shook his head. "The entire Empire is going to turn on its head if you ever ascend."
Ryin's eyes narrowed and her beak clicked in amusement. "You bet it will. I have the edges of a plan, Noa, and I want you to come here, to Japan."
--
Four beings stood in the darkness, though only two were seen. Bakura had cast off his cloak, revealing an outfit of many pockets (useful for a merchant selling things outside the law) while Yugi had also left his trenchcoat nearby, although keeping his weapons on his person. These included a small pistol kept secure in a makeshift shoulder holster and a knife he wore on his hip.
The two stood in a very old subway station, cavernous in its emptiness.
They were sparring. Or rather, Yami and Kekatsu were, and they were "taking notes." A flash of light issued from the Millenium Ring and a rather polished looking creature in white appeared.
Yami chuckled, the darkness swallowing his voice. "Surely you can do better than THAT, my friend." The dark form pointed and summoned forth a snarling wolf. "Silver Fang! Attack!"
Yugi couldn't help wincing as Silver Fang pounced, tearing the humanoid happily to shreds.
"Adding insult to injury, are you," Kekatsu reproached, reaching out as though he was pulling his next fighter from the darkness itself. What appeared to be an autonomous suit of armour, sans helm, crunched to the ground. It struck swiftly, ribbons of blood following its blade as the sword cut through poor Silver Fang's hide. Yugi yelped.
"The Headless Knight?" Yami queried. "Pfft!" He raised his hands in preparation for a new summoning.
"Yugi? BakurAAA!!" Yami started at the voice, Kekatsu spun to look at Téa, who appeared to be rooted to the spot. She was pointing at the Knight, jaw slack in horrified amazment. "Wha? Wha?"
Before Yami could move, Kekatsu had grabbed his cloak and swept it onto his shoulders, recalling the Knight as he did so. Téa's arm dropped, but she seemed just as rooted as before.
"What are you doing here?" he demanded, advancing on her.
"I- I- was just- I'd wondered where you'd gone-- How-- What was--" she fell silent as Kekatsu put his hand up under her chin, gently closing her mouth.
"It was a magical warrior," he told her, locking her eyes with his own. Yami stood where he had been, a little startled by the straightfowardness. "I am an ancient spirit possessing Bakura, the Pharaoh over there is possessing Yugi."
Téa's eyes widened even further. "Ph- Pharaoh?" Kekatsu nodded.
"He was the king of all Egypt, once. That's the burden of a Pharaoh."
"B-but- why are you telling me this?" Téa asked fearfully. Yami was wondering about the same thing, from the look on his face.
Kekatsu smiled and stroked her cheek. "Because you are about to forget it."
Suddenly there was a flash of light and Téa yelped. "Téa!" Yami yelled, running forward. "Kekatsu! What in Ra's name do you think you're doing?!?"
When he got there, however, it was no longer Kekatsu standing there, but Bakura, who held the girl in his arms. The boy looked almost sheepish. "He's like that," Bakura said, as though that would explain everything.
Yami looked furious, and Yugi was quite furious underneath, himself. "But what did he DO?"
Bakura blushed. "Oh. That. He's erased her memory up to the point where she wondered where we'd gone and left to look for us. She'll be fine, I promise."
Annoyed, Yami insisted on taking Téa into his arms. "Tell him to warn us next time he's planning on doing something like that!"
--
Seto was fiddling around with some stolen Queliyg equipment when Bakura and Yugi walked by, the unconcious Téa in tow. He glanced up for a moment, looked back down at his project, then did a double-take and jumped up after them.
"Yugi! Bakura! What happened to Téa?!" They turned to look at him. Bakura muttered something and suddenly Yugi gave him a sharp glance. Seto came up short, wondering what Bakura could possibly say to annoy Yugi so badly.
"She- ah- Bakura kind of gave her a bad scare, and I guess it was too much for her," Yugi managed. Which was... something near a half-truth.
Seto gave them a puzzled look. "Téa doesn't scare easily," he pointed out. "She's seen a lot of nasty stuff the past nine years, just like the rest of us."
Bakura looked down at Yugi again. "Are you sure you don't want-" but shut his mouth when Yugi glared at him again. Suddenly Seto wasn't sure he wanted to know what was going on. If it was enough to make Yugi so angry...
"Don't worry about it, Seto," Yugi told him. "We're just going to take her to her car and let her sleep it off... I'm sure she'll be fine."
Seto put his hands on his hips as they walked away from him. "It's my job to worry!!"
Kel, who had come up behind him and knew enough to partially decipher the situation., tapped him on the shoulder. "What were you working on, Seto?"
THIS, of course, was more than enough to distract the boy. "Oh!" he exclaimed, more than happy to show off. "This used to be half a Queliyg holoprojector and parts of several different weapons... none of the killing parts, of course, or I'd be making a weapon, not a holoprojector. But holoprojectors can be weapons in themselves, you know."
Kel tilted his head to the side. "What are you planning on programming into it?" he asked. The boy shrugged.
"I'm not quite sure, yet, but something startling!"
--
When Noa arrived on Earth, Ryin was waiting for him. The young man broke into a huge grin despite himself and ran to her. "You have no idea how lonely I've been!" he exclaimed as she embraced him. "You were the only one on the entire station who didn't treat me like a pet!"
"Yes," she murmured, "And whose fault is it you ended up there?"
Noa gave her a surprised look. "Are you reprimanding me for being angry that someone pushed my father out of a window? I'm sorry, M'Lady, but I happen to know you would have been angry if someone pushed your mother out an airlock. No matter what they do, they're still our progenitors."
The Queliyg sort of sighed, then noticed the creature that had stepped out behind him and was now sniffing the air. She blinked in wonderment. "Why...?"
Noa looked back at the brightly feathered being as well. He was a handsome animal, about two thirds Ryin's size with glimmering green wings and sparkling dark eyes, although they held no special intelligence behind them like her own. His manner of movement made it clear to anyone looking that he had the mind and instinct of an eagle.
Noa chuckled ironically. "They insisted that I bring an escort, so..."
Ryin clucked in laughter. "What do you call him?" The young man grinned at his custodian.
"You know I have to name everything," he said. "I've been calling him Asaka. I think he's even learned it, you know." As if to prove the point, he called Asaka over to him. The creature trotted over happily, catching the small reward of food he was tossed and deftly ripping into it. Glancing over at Ryin, he raised a bright blue crest of feathers just a little. She shook her head at him.
"He seems very intelligent, considering," Ryin noted as Asaka trotted back to Noa, ruffling the wings extending his arms.
Noa brushed a hand over Asaka's "cheek," which made the creature close his eyes appreciativly. "They're all a bit more intellegent than they're given credit, I think."
--
A few days after Téa's "collapse," Seto was once again working on getting his new toy working. This time Mokuba and Serenity were watching him, Mokuba occasionally asking a question and getting a complex answer he seemed to understand, Serenity just staring in awe as the two spoke their own sort of language. A crash suddenly sounded nearby Mako's usual entrance, and the three looked up.
"Ah," Seto said as they saw the little scene that had unfolded. "I see he's still going at his futile attempt to teach those two to behave normally out of captivity."
Serenity looked at him. He thought. "Rex and Weevil weren't normal IN captivity, either, Seto." The two obviously were still plagued by their in-cell phobias and neuroses, seeing as how Rex seemed to have dropped his load in order to stomp at the ground, while Weevil wailed for him to stop.
Mako just covered his eyes in exasperation and let them go at it. When finally they seemed on the verge of drawing blood, however, he reached in and lifted them both off the ground to carry them off.
"What AM I going to do with you?" the onlookers heard him demanding.
The show over, everyone went back to what they had been doing. Seto grinned down at his creation. "Well, Mokuba, I think all we need now is something to scan into it and see if it works!" Mokuba grinned at his big brother.
"You think Max'll let us have one of those cool sketches he does?"
The older boy stared at the younger. "You know, I never even thought of that! Kid, you're a genius!" Seto then ruffled Mokuba's silky black hair. "C'mon, let's go ask him!"
With something like a sigh, Serenity got up to follow them.
They found Max and Cecilia talking with Solomon Moto. Yugi, Bakura, Joey, Kel, Duke and Tristan were sitting watching the discussion, Téa was reading something. Max turned and noticed the device Seto was cradling carefully.
He rose an eyebrow. "What is that supposed to be?" Seto grinned.
"It's SUPPOSED to be a holoprojector, but I don't know how well it'll work yet."
Max, Cecilia and Solomon glanced at each other, then Max laughed. "You want a sketch, don't you?" Their small audience straightened, and Bakura poked Téa to get her attention. Seto nodded.
"Y'read my mind. Please?"
Max cast about for a moment, then grabbed a notebook and tossed it to the teenager. "Find something in there."
Seto knelt so Mokuba could look over his shoulder and began flipping through the sketches. They went through so fast Serenity wondered how they could see any of it-- but suddenly stopped on one page. "Wow," Mokuba said softly, reaching over and flicking a switch on the holoprojector. Seto apparently agreed with him, because he put the page up close to the projector's scanners to program it in.
The two made a few adjustments, then Seto pressed a button to activate the machine. "Here goes nothing," he muttered. Something flickered for a few moments, then a white light flared out of the machine, causing everyone but Seto to jump back in surprise. He just stared up at it in awe.
Serenity stared, almost wishing her synthetic eyes still recorded what she saw, but content to try and commit it to memory. It was a huge, glistening white dragon, body apparently armored, a blue gleam making it seem even whiter. Its neck twisted to stare at the ceiling, cold blue eyes wide and defiant. White wings spread as if it were preparing to launch itself into the heavens.
She glanced over at Seto, who, to her surprise, had the grin of a child on his face.
"Perfect!" he whispered.
--
End Chapter 10. (Circle of yawns) THAT short thing took WAY too long. The beginning of the chapter was written back in the beginning of summer, when little Hikari's allergies are at their peak (we left the little skit in because we thought it was funny) and the end was... well, you know. We have a scanner, now! (happy dance) Seto-Kaiba Red Archery Girl was wonderful enough to put up one of little Hikari's goofy fanarts on her site. Go to the fanart section at
The pic is kind of hard to look at because it's huge, but it's still funny. ^_^ Try scrolling down first, then back up, then left to right.