Chapter 15: The Funeral

Mokuba stood inside the funeral home with Yugi, Téa, Tristan, and Joey. Mokuba had barely stopped crying since his brother died the week before. Yami had regained his strength since then. He also felt horrible about Mokuba. How could he let this happen? Mokuba was clinging on to Yugi again. This time it was Yugi who felt helpless. He wasn't exactly a brother, but he knew he had to help Mokuba. Mokuba loosened his grip on Yugi when Roland, Tilly, and Chelsi – Tilly's younger half sister – came in. He quickly ran over to them and grabbed onto Roland.

"I'm glad you're here," sobbed Mokuba. "I didn't think you guys would come."

"Of course we would," said Chelsi with her British accent.

"What made you think that?" asked Tilly.

"Doesn't that one work at our school?" asked Joey, referring to Tilly.

"I think so," said Yugi.

"I know that one is Roland, but who's the other chick?" Joey asked Yugi.

"I don't know," he said.

"Well you should."

"Why?"

"Because you have a pharaoh in your head," Joey smiled.

"Joey," Yugi said. "Shut up."

Roland looked over at his former employer and sighed. Mokuba now had control of Kaiba Corporation. That was a big responsibility to leave a nine year old child. He wondered what Mokuba was going to do with his brother's company. Mokuba didn't really want to take it over and Seto said that was fine. He wished he knew what to do for Mokuba. Everyone wished they knew what to do for Mokuba.

"Poor Mr. Kaiba," said Roland. "He was still practically a child."

"It's so sad when people that young die," said Chelsi.

"Why didn't Jason come" Mokuba asked Tilly.

"Because that no good rotten husband of 'ers was mad at 'im and said he deserved what he got," Chelsi answered.

Mokuba gasped.

"Mokuba, don't worry about what Jason thinks," said Tilly. "He doesn't understand."

Mokuba walked over and hugged her tightly.

"Excuse me," said a girl's voice.

Mokuba, Tilly, Roland, and Chelsi turned around to find a blue-haired girl standing behind them. She wore a black long sleeved shirt and a short black skirt. Her hair was pulled back into a ponytail.

"Who are you" asked Roland.

"You can just call me Natalie for right now," she smiled.

Mokuba looked at her blue eyes. Those eyes seemed so familiar, but he didn't remember who they reminded him of.

"I'm not sure that any of us have met you before," said Roland skeptically.

"Hey, what's going on over there?" asked Tristan.

"I'm not sure," answered Yugi.

"I just wanted to talk with Mokuba," said Natalie.

Mokuba hesitantly walked over to her. She took him into the next room where they could have some privacy.

"I just want to start out by saying I'm very sorry for your loss, Mokuba," she said.

"Thanks," he said quietly.

`"I wanted to ask you something," she said.

"What?"

"It's about Kaiba Corp."

"You wanna talk business with me? This is my brother's funeral! I'm not going to talk to anyone about Kaiba Corp. right now!"

"I was just going to ask you what you were going to do with it. Are you going to keep it? I bet your brother would really love it if you did."

"I...I don't know. Please, I don't want to talk about it right now."

He started to head for the door, but Natalie stopped him.

"I think right now is the perfect time to talk about it."

"No."

"I asked you a simple question. Are you going to keep his company, or are you going to do as you want and have someone else take it over?"

"How...did you know I wasn't going to take over Kaiba Corp?" he asked, shocked.

"Your brother told me," she said.

"You knew my big brother?"

"You could say that."

"What?"

"Are you going to answer my question?"

"I don't know right now."

"Well you should have some sort of an idea."

"No, I don't. I'm not going to talk about it right now."

"Fine, but I'll be here if you want to talk it over."

"I highly doubt that I will."

Natalie looked him over and got out of the way to let him back to everyone else. After their little meeting, Natalie stayed close to Mokuba. He couldn't believe that she would come in to his brother's funeral and want to talk about Kaiba Corp. Mokuba was sick of this. Every time he turned around she was there either pretending to be doing something else or just staring at him. Mokuba stayed close to Tilly, Roland, and Chelsi. Mokuba kept thinking about what she'd said. What did she mean by "you could say that"? He was getting worried. His brother wasn't here to protect him anymore. If she came after him, he would be completely defenseless!

After awhile, everyone filed out of the room just leaving Mokuba in there alone. He walked over to where his brother laid. Mokuba liked it when he saw his brother sleeping. He looked like the brother he used to be before they were adopted, but this was different. Seto didn't look like who he used to be or who he'd be currently. This time Seto wouldn't wake up. Mokuba took hold of his brother's cold hand as tears started to form in his eyes. He half expected his brother to squeeze his hand back, but Mokuba knew it wasn't going to happen. Mokuba's tears started pouring down his face, dripping onto his brother.

"Please wake up, Seto," said Mokuba. "Please. I just want this all to be a horrible nightmare."

Yugi watched silently from the doorway. His grandfather came up behind him.

"Yugi," he said softly. "I think we should leave Mokuba alone for now."

"I know," sniffed Yugi. "I just feel so bad for him."

Yugi turned and hugged his grandpa who returned it. Solomon comforted Yugi for a few moments then led him to another room where everyone else was.

Mokuba continued crying and finally calmed down enough to whisper, "I love you, big brother."

Natalie had been watching Mokuba from the doorway. She finally got an idea. She smirked as she turned and walked out of the building. Mokuba would be seeing more of her very soon.

DGG: And here we are at my teaser ending. Of course it all led into The Book of Shadows.

Hm. Now that the annoying commentary from my 14/15-year-old self is gone...I kinda miss it. :/
It just showed who I was at the time. Ah well. I have the originals saved, so I still have my annoying author's notes to be nostalgic about. Haha.

I thank you for reading!

And I still appreciate all the reviews I received while writing this story so many years ago. I thanked all my reviewers many times, but since I took out the author's notes, you just...you don't know that anymore O.o But I still thank them even though they probably won't look at this anymore. Sad.

And if anyone else really wants to review, I will appreciate those reviews as well!

Thanks for reading and stopping by!