A/N: Another chapter already... Guess I can write pretty fast after all, though I wouldn't expect all the chapters this fast. A warning - Seto (and maybe Yami as well, I'm not sure) might seem a little OOC in this chapter, but I promise I have my reasons and I try to make the way the characters act believable. So please don't flame me for them being out of character. Thanks for all the great reviews; I'm so happy people like this story, and I hope I don't disappoint. Enjoy!

Disclaimer: I don't own Yu-Gi-Oh.

Chapter 2

Letting out a relieved sigh, Yami flipped the sign on the game shop door to "Closed." They had done more business that day than he'd thought, though still not nearly as much as they would normally have on a Friday, since all the normal clients were gone on that camping trip, of course. Yami still wished Jiichan had simply closed the shop instead of leaving him there to watch it; since though he'd never admit it to Jiichan or Yugi, Yami hated running the store and all the tiny details that went with it, from the annoying, rude customers to the hours of inventory and the mindless boredom of sitting behind the counter between rushes.

Yami sighed. He needed a break; needed to think about something besides the shop for a while. Maybe he just needed to get out. Grabbing his keys, Yami switched off the lights and stepped out onto the sidewalk, sure to lock the door behind him before he wandered off down the street toward the pink rays of the setting sun faintly visible above the thickly clustered buildings.

Though he originally had no real destination as he ambled slowly along the sidewalk, glancing casually into various store windows, Yami decided to stop by the library while he was out, since he'd never gotten a chance to see what sorts of books they had on the stars. He was too embarrassed to check anything out while Yugi was home and could find it, and he'd never had enough free time to just sit in the library and read there. Yugi-tachi tended to demand a lot of his time.

Yami smiled and quickened his pace. Maybe he would find something interesting today.

Seto signed the last page of his towering stacks of paperwork with a flourish. He was done for the weekend. Regardless of what people tended to say about him being a workaholic, Seto knew how much work his body could handle, and he wasn't about to kill himself. Not to say he was ever lax; running a company took a lot of time and effort; but Seto was far from stupid and he wasn't going to push himself past what he knew was the best he could do. Besides, he had to put aside time for Mokuba whenever he could.

This weekend was a prime example. The CEO didn't have any particular plans, but he had been sure to get everything done with KaibaCorp today that he possibly could, so there wouldn't be anything he needed to work on over the weekend and he could spend Saturday and Sunday simply enjoying some time at home with his little brother.

Seto was a man who had his priorities in order.

At least, he hoped he did.

He was trying, that much was certain; but Seto couldn't forget that mere months ago he had been obsessed with Duel Monsters, with taking down his opponents – which generally meant Yami – at all costs, and he hadn't bothered to stop working when his body told him it was tired or hungry. He pushed himself anyway, unable to even imagine what would happen if he let himself be less than the best at anything, be it flying a plane, raising a child, or playing the game that represented his whole life. Mokuba had been there of course; Seto would never forget his little brother – but the dark-haired youth had ended up tagging along after Seto's obsessions, expressing his devotion all the way and being the rock for his older brother that Seto should have been for Mokuba.

Yami had been the one to change all that. Not all with his speeches, really, but more just the way he lived his life, as if everything was important – as if Seto was important. As if Seto was important whether he lost or not. And Yami had this way of looking at him, those crimson eyes burning so fiercely…

It had affected Seto, sometimes more than he would like to admit.

Seto mulled over this as he locked up everything in his office and casually made his way back down to his car. It had been awhile, months perhaps, since Seto had seen the other, but that morning in the game shop the brunet could tell that nothing had changed. Still, by the merest shrug of his shoulders or the slightest hint of emotion on his face, Yami made Seto ache to prove something to him, though Yami of course was unaware of this and would only tell Seto that he had nothing to prove even if he were.

Allowing himself a grudging sigh, Seto pulled out of the parking lot and onto the darkening streets. He was tired of thinking about this. Would Yami always have this kind of effect on him, forcing Seto to reevaluate his every decision each time he happened to see the wild-haired teen? True, the CEO liked himself better now than he had as the wildly-obsessive control freak he had been before he and Yami had met, but still…

Seto hated feeling inadequate. And Yami certainly had a way of making him feel exactly that.

A scowl made its way across Seto's lips as he focused on his driving and tried to force thoughts of Yami from his mind. He was only frustrating himself; he would think about his weekend with Mokuba and the well-earned relaxation on his way, not his exasperating rival and his endless speeches, or the fascinating way Yami's hair swept over his eyes as moved, the slender form that was…

Currently walking down the sidewalk beside him.

Seto slammed on his brakes just in time to see Yami climb a few stone steps and disappear into the door of a slightly eroded red-brick building. The public library. "What is he doing?" the brunet murmured to himself. The thought that Yami was most likely doing what the general public usually did in a library – reading – briefly crossed Seto's mind, but still something kept Seto parked in that spot in the middle of the road, staring after Yami's departed form until the car behind him honked, snapping Seto out of his reverie.

A sarcastic smile quirked Seto's lips, and he pulled into the library parking lot.

"Constellations: Stories in the Sky. Hmm, looks good to me," Yami muttered to himself. He pulled the book off the shelf and made his way over to one of the tables in a quiet corner of the library, settling into the squashy cushion of one of the library's well-worn chairs. With a pensive smile on his face, the wild-haired teen opened the book and began to read, quickly finding himself immersed in the wild tales of those patterns in the sky, some vaguely similar but most vastly different from the gods and goddesses that hovered in the dark sky over Egypt.

Yami read on for several minutes, his crimson eyes sweeping rapidly over the pages while his slim fingers unconsciously traced invisible lines across the tabletop, echoing the pictures displayed on the worn pages, until suddenly he stopped. A sound, so tiny and soft that he could almost have sworn he imagined it, had torn him from his concentration, so Yami blinked slowly and glanced around to see what had caused it. It was nothing, really, most likely just someone coughing or clearing their throat, but it had drawn Yami's attention because it sounded familiar. But when Yami looked around he couldn't find whoever had made the sound, so he shrugged and turned back to his book, but just as he did, from the corner of his eye he noticed the tail of a long white coat disappearing behind the bookshelves to his right.

"Kaiba?" Yami gasped wonderingly. What was he doing in a library? He probably had one of his own in one of the hundreds of unused rooms in the Kaiba Mansion – if he ever took the time away from his computer to read anything anyway. Yami leaned forward in his seat, craning his neck to catch another glimpse of the CEO, until finally, stretched out across the table and standing on his tiptoes, he saw the back of the familiar chestnut head tilting thoughtfully as Seto retrieved a book from one of the upper shelves.

Yami leaned out even further, bracing his palms on the table and stretching until –

THUNK.

The sound of Yami's feet slipping out from under him and his chair skidding back several feet before it tipped over backwards and clattered to the floor echoed through the silent library, and Seto's head snapped up at the sound, the brunet dropping his book in surprise as Yami clutched at the table, nearly causing the heavy wood to topple backwards onto himself while he clambered for his footing. Yami's feet skidded a few more seconds against the worn carpet before he righted himself and loosened his desperate grip on the wobbling table.

He met the brunet's quirked eyebrow with a dignified gaze of his own. "Hello Kaiba."

"Yami." Seto nodded politely, though his lips still twisted in amusement.

"What are you doing here?"

Seto didn't bother to answer aloud, merely bent and retrieved his book from the floor, a flick of his wrist waving in Yami's direction.

"Oh… What are you reading?"

The brunet glanced at the book's cover and his cobalt eyes widened perceptibly. His gaze flicked to the bookshelf, then back to the book, then finally back at Yami, who by that time had approached Seto and stood directly in front of him, watching him curiously.

"Kaiba?"

"Mind your own business," Seto snapped, attempting to hide the book behind his back, but Yami grinned and reached around him, tugging it out of his hands.

"Controlling the Urges: Estrogen and Your Body." Yami pressed his lips together, but laughter spilled out anyway in a demented-sounding snort. "Is there something you're not telling me?"

Seto's eyes darkened and he whirled around, the edges of his long coat knocking against Yami's legs as the other stood rooted to the spot, doubled over with helpless sniggers. "I might have just picked up the wrong book, you know," Seto growled. He stalked rapidly away, but Yami followed him, stopping Seto with a hand on his elbow when they reached the table where the spiky-haired teen had been reading.

"Wait… Kaiba, wait," Yami gasped, his laughter finally subsiding. "What were you really doing here? Were you following me?"

Seto stood there silently for a moment, his back to the other, before he leaned over the table and grabbed Yami's book from where it lay sprawled open, pages bent and wrinkled from Yami's graceless encounter with the table. "Well, what were you doing? What were you reading about?" He flipped casually through the book before snapping it shut and reading the title.

"Give that back."

Yami muttered the words quietly, but his eyes flashed angrily at the other and he clenched his fists until his knuckles whitened. He didn't want Kaiba of all people finding out about his obsession and inevitably teasing him about it. The CEO would be the worst; he would most likely see Yami's fascination with something like stars as impractical, a weakness he could exploit. After all, Kaiba had always been trying to get the better of Yami, so why should this occasion be any…

Seto handed him the book.

"You like astronomy?"

"Maybe…" Yami clutched the book against his chest, eyeing the other doubtfully.

"Have you ever had a chance to really look at the stars? It's hard to see them with all these lights."

Yami's eyes widened and he stared openly at the tall brunet as Seto casually brushed a few stray strands of hair from his eyes. What was going on? Why wasn't Kaiba antagonizing him? "Sometimes… I have to go out to a park or something though," Yami admitted warily.

Seto snorted and crossed his arms across his chest. "You go to a park in the middle of the night all by yourself? Do you have a death wish?"

"How do you know I go by myself?" Yami demanded, but shrugged when the other raised a knowing eyebrow. "I can take care of myself, anyway. You know that, Kaiba."

"Ah yes. The 'mind crushing' thing," Seto observed dryly, and Yami grinned.

"You know I only…"

"Well, do you want to come over to the Manor then?"

"I… Wait, what?" Yami stared at the other a moment, wondering for a brief second if the person in front of him was really Seto Kaiba. True, before this morning it had been awhile since he'd seen the other, but Yami didn't think his antagonistic rival had missed him enough to invite him over for a friendly chat. Even inviting him to the Kaiba Manor for a duel didn't exactly seem like Kaiba's style; the arrogant brunet would be more likely to close off a busy section of town in the middle of a work day for that sort of occasion.

"Well, are you coming?"

"Why?" Yami asked suspiciously.

"I live outside of town. It's darker there," Seto answered simply. "Besides, if you're going to die – or kill anyone – I'd rather it be where I can see it."

Yami smirked. "Well, if you put it that way…"

Seto shifted uncomfortably on the couch, his eyes flicking to the darkened window for at least the tenth time in as many minutes. Mokuba sat curled up beside him, focused on the crashes and explosions from the movie the two were watching and seemingly unaware of his brother's lack of attention. As promised, Seto had come home from work that evening ready to spend time with the dark-haired boy, all but for one unexpected distraction.

Yami had ridden quietly with Seto back to the Kaiba Manor from the library, a tiny, pleased smile stretching the full lips the entire time at the prospect of a free, un-hassled night of observing the sky. At least, that was the reason Seto had determined for that tiny little smile, since he had most definitely ignored the niggling part of his mind that wished that Seto was the reason for Yami's smile.

When they had arrived at the house, Seto had told Yami he could move around as he liked, since the CEO had planned to spend the evening with his brother and didn't really have time to waste entertaining the other. Yami had simply grinned and nodded at this, hurrying off to find a good spot on Seto's spacious lawn, but as the brunet watched Yami's slim figure disappear into the darkness, Seto had to fight the strange urge to call him back – or follow him.

He settled instead for choosing a spot on the couch that offered a good view of the wild-haired teen sitting on the lawn.

Seto shifted again on the couch. As the sky darkened Mokuba had turned on a lamp, and now its yellow glow cast a glare on the dark window, effectively blocking Seto's view of the lawn and causing the brunet to grow more and more antsy as the minutes passed. Was Yami still out there? What was he doing? Would he tell Seto if he decided to leave? Seto squirmed uncomfortably yet again, finally drawing Mokuba's eyes to him and eliciting a loud groan from the dark-haired preteen.

"Just go outside, Seto. I don't care," Mokuba muttered, rolling his eyes.

"Why would I want to go outside?" Seto asked defensively, and Mokuba groaned again.

"Come ON, I'm not stupid! You can check on Yami if you want."

Seto looked away, not meeting his brother's gaze, but unfortunately when he did this his eyes automatically drifted to the dark window and effectively proved Mokuba's point. The preteen snickered. "Mokuba…" Seto sighed. "I was just doing Yami a favor by letting him come here. I'm not going to break a promise to you just because he's here."

Mokuba shrugged. "You're with me all the time. It's not like you're going to scar me for life or anything if you have a friend over. Now go away; you're distracting me from the movie." With that, Mokuba turned back to the exploding cars on the television screen.

Shaking his head at his little brother and allowing himself a small smile, Seto climbed from the couch.

"See anything interesting?"

Seto carefully lowered himself onto the grass beside Yami, handing him one of the steaming cups of coffee he had carried from the house. Yami accepted with a smile, his dark eyes crinkling as he sniffed the beverage. "Mmm… Thank you," he murmured, sipping it slowly. "I was just observing. Sky's not that different from last night, you know. But still nice. I thought you were doing something with Mokuba?"

Ignoring the question, Seto raised an eyebrow at the slim figure beside him innocently sipping his coffee. "You did this last night, too? Don't you get bored?"

"Not really," Yami replied quietly, his eyes drifting north toward what Seto vaguely distinguished as the Big Dipper. "I do this a lot of nights."

Seto took a sip of his coffee, cautiously glancing at the other over the rim of his mug. With Yami's dark hair and his usual all-black, sleeveless outfit he blended in with the night, all except for the slender, pale arms resting casually in his lap and the defined profile, glowing faintly in the moonlight and raised to look at the stars. The coffee cup rested beside him on the grass. "Really? I suppose you know a lot about stars then," Seto commented vaguely when he realized he hadn't spoken in a few minutes.

Yami nodded, lifting a hand to point at the sky. "See that? That's the North Star – or it is now, anyway. And there's Ursa Major – the Big Dipper. In Egypt we called them the Imperishable Ones… gods that were in the sky all night long. They never sink below the horizon." He lowered his hand, sighing softly, and shot a brief glance at the brunet.

Seto snorted rudely.

"There you go with that Egypt garbage again. Do you really believe that?"

"Kaiba…" Yami grumbled warningly.

Seto set his coffee cup beside him on the grass and turned to the other, folding his arms across his chest. "No, let me tell you something, Yami. I know about astronomy, too, but not this Egyptian god star-gazing crap; I mean real astronomy." He raised a hand to cut off Yami's angry protest and lifted his own hand toward the sky, pointing out a small, slow-moving point of light just visible above the trees. "See that? That's a satellite. One of at least four that KaibaCorp has in geosynchronous orbit with the Earth that do everything from power my communications system to give Mokuba his own personal radio station."

Seto turned back to the wild-haired teen beside him, who was staring at the CEO with a slightly bewildered expression. "That's…"

"Impressive? I know. I've also invested in space stations and probes, lots of things like that. You never know what might come in handy for a game system." Seto let out a noisy breath and rested his palms on the grass, leaning back. "If you want I can take you inside and show you some pictures."

Yami smiled. "I think I'd like that."

BEEP. BEEP. BEEP.

Yami groaned, slinging an arm out of bed and randomly hitting everything in his reach until he finally slapped his alarm clock and shut off the obnoxious noise. He yawned and stretched, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes as he slid out of bed and padded toward the bathroom. He'd done it again, stayed up until the wee hours of the morning looking at the stars, and it was even worse this morning because he'd needed to get up early and do inventory before the game shop opened. If Yami kept this up he would eventually pass out from exhaustion.

Splashing cold water on his face helped the crimson-eyed teen wake up a bit, and Yami hurried through his morning routine so he could go downstairs and run through the inventory list before time to open the shop. He was running late, of course, and it would be harder than usual because Malik and Bakura had messed up his records by stealing all those mangas. Seto had made up for it, but Yami still didn't know how much they'd stolen – and he rather suspected that the CEO had overpaid him as well.

Finally Yami made it downstairs, muttering to himself as he pulled out his list and began to make his way through the store, his mind lingering on Kaiba. He had been so… well, nice to Yami the day before – first paying for the stolen mangas, then inviting him out to his house… And sitting out with the tall brunet under the stars had been thrilling in a way Yami couldn't fully explain – or maybe didn't want to explain. Yet Yami would admit it had been wonderful to finally talk to someone about the fascination with the sky that had been haunting him for a long time now.

And, even more incredible, Kaiba shared that fascination. In his own way at least; though all of his technological explanations had left Yami fairly baffled. But still… it had been nice. Yesterday had been…

Yami stopped in his tracks, his eyes widening in horror. He had reached the display case by the front window, the one near the stack of mangas Malik and Bakura had taken the day before. Here, in a securely locked, Plexiglas case, Sugoroku kept his rarest, most valued card, though he was generous enough to display it for the public to see. This was where he kept the ripped Blue Eyes White Dragon.

But now it was gone.