In the hallway outside the office Kaiba paused in his strides, released a long breath in the silent emptiness of the corridor. There was solace in the moment alone; he had been too long in the company of too many others. Even if half or more of them were only figments of his imagination. But the privacy didn't relax him; he couldn't afford to let it, needed the tension to stay off the dangerous allure of sleepiness.

His breathing sounded harsh to his own ears anyway, not calming. Every breath was more seconds wasted, and his focus was drifting too much as it were. No, it wouldn't be the help of others which would fail his brother; it would be his own weakness.

A jabber of voices sounded from the break room as he approached. Not hallucinated cards, just Yugi's two friends, talking as loudly as if they thought themselves alone in the building.

"--hate this," Honda was saying. "Mokuba's out there and those bastards might be hurting him. He's just a kid, he doesn't deserve any of this. And there's nothing we can do, we're hardly helping one bit. And then, Kaiba..."

"Yeah," Jounouchi answered. "Seeing him like this..."

Kaiba, listening outside the break room door, could hear the edge in his voice, speaking that agreement. Knew what it had to be, a suppressed hint of cruel satisfaction, that as much as Jounouchi might like Mokuba, as honestly upset as he was, at the same time he couldn't help but take a victor's pleasure in seeing the weakness of a man he hated.

"Yugi's dealing with it, but still."

"Yeah," Jounouchi said again.

There was a brief pause; Kaiba heard their sneakers scuffing the floor, and then Honda said, "You're really hating this, too."

"I can't stand it!" and such was the unexpected, honest rage in Jounouchi's growl that Kaiba was almost driven back a step. "Like you said, this shouldn't have ever happened to Mokuba, yeah--and Kaiba, too. Maybe I don't like the guy, but he doesn't deserve this, either. What he's going through here--no one does."

"I know. We've been up against Kaiba how many times?" Honda asked. "For more than two years, and I've never seen him like this. This close to--to losing it. Tell me I wasn't the only one freaked when he flipped out there."

"Damn it, we gotta find him soon, Honda. Mokuba. We have to. And he better be okay, he's gotta be." There was the sound of an impact, Jounouchi punching his fist into his hand, or perhaps into the counter. "Kaiba--the look in his eyes, it's like Duelist Kingdom. Like on that castle tower, when he was threatening to take a header off if Yugi won--the son of a bitch really would've done it, too. And that's the look in his eyes now."

Kaiba remembered that moment on the tower, and immediately afterwards, the hatred in their eyes. He had revealed Yugi's weakness then, shown him inadequate to protect what he loved. Willing to die, perhaps, but not willing to kill; Yugi had wept at his helplessness, and his friends had detested Kaiba for it, for proving that point. Except in the end Yugi had been the stronger after all, winning against Pegasus when Kaiba himself had been defeated. He had failed Mokuba in the end for all his determination, and Yugi had succeeded; he deserved their contempt after all, when even cheating he hadn't won the crucial victory.

He deserved it, and yet however hard he listened now, he could not hear that old accustomed hatred in their voices. None of the expected scorn. What he did hear he couldn't identify: sorrow, or anger, or something else; by some strange aural trick that hushed tone might even be mistaken for respect.

"You really think if we lose Mokuba, that Kaiba might..." Honda muttered. Odd how depressed he sounded, as if he regretted that prospect no less than Mokuba's possible fate.

But Jounouchi said, "No," like he was certain, like for some reason he thought he could be confident of Kaiba's intent. "No, he wouldn't just kill himself, because Mokuba wouldn't want him to, and Kaiba's gotta know that. But we'll lose Kaiba anyway. Maybe he'll become that bastard he was at Death-T again. And I don't want to see that. Kaiba now, he's an asshole, but he's got his good points. Sometimes I think Yugi's getting through to him, if he'd just admit it. Maybe in a few years he might even let us call him a friend..."

Let us. Like he had any say in it; like they didn't have the free will to say whatever they wanted. Besides, hadn't Mokuba asked this enough of him already? Asked him to give them a chance, because they were Mokuba's friends, somehow--that was why they were all here, wasn't it, out of concern for their friend. His brother, who let them call him a friend.

His brother, who might never see any of them again, if he wasn't in time, and yet he was just standing here, uselessly, listening outside the door in some damned dazed fugue. Hesitating, like he was afraid to go inside. Like it mattered at all what these idiots were saying. Weren't they here only at his sufferance? In his building, blathering in his break room, drinking his coffee.

He should kick them all out. He should have never let them stick around; he never should have let Yugi inside to begin with, but he might need them--Mokuba might need them, and that was all that counted.

Kaiba opened the break room door, and the chatter inside cut off like some cosmic mute button had been pressed. Jounouchi and Honda both stared at him, a fine impression of rabbits caught in headlights. "Kaiba...?"

Kaiba glared back, stalking to the coffeemaker. Honda hastily shoved Jounouchi out of his way, hissed, "Don't get between a CEO and his coffee!" when Jounouchi looked like he might protest. They let him pour a cup in silence; he lifted it to his lips and drained half of it in a single gulp. The scalding of his tongue was painful enough to dispel the floating vagueness of fatigue, and the caffeine would keep it at bay.

"You've got some good coffee here," Honda said, a tentative foray into restarting the broken conversation, as Kaiba lowered the cup. "It, uh, must be pretty expensive, huh?"

"Of course it is," Jounouchi said, not giving Kaiba the chance to snub his friend. "Everything here's gotta be. Bet a bag of those beans costs as much as I spend on meals in a week."

"Unlikely," Kaiba muttered. "Not the way you eat."

"Yeah, well, as much as Yugi spends," Jounouchi corrected, undeterred. "And the rest of the stuff in here--Kaiba, you got your own latte machine. Why? Do you ever drink anything but straight black? And look at this jar! Chocolate sprinkles! What kind of hardass super-executive has chocolate sprinkles?"

"Mokuba likes them on lattes."

"You let Mokuba drink coffee?" Honda asked, then shut his mouth like that had slipped out by accident and he wanted to ensure no more idiocy did.

"He drinks coffee occasionally," Kaiba said, finding himself answering before he could wonder why he bothered. "Not often, he knows it's not healthy. But when it's necessary."

"Oh..."

"And the whipped cream?" Jounouchi butted in. "That also his? All six cans of it? Flavored whipped cream! Chocolate, strawberry, banana--where do you even get banana whipped cream? And the chocolate sauce...wouldn't have thought it was you, Kaiba. A set-up like this, you got the right girls in here, you could really...party..."

"Man, stop that!" Honda protested.

"Stop what?"

"You're thinking about having Mai in here! That's disgusting!"

Jounouchi's face turned as bright red as if he had downed a shot of vodka. "I--I--what's so disgusting about that?"

"Because Mai's not here, only me and Kaiba are! And I don't wanna get mixed up in one of your wet dreams, and if you do want Kaiba here for that, then I really don't want to know!"

"Ew, man, you just ruined a perfectly good--"

They were shrieking at each other, weren't even glancing at him, and yet Kaiba was suddenly struck with the realization that this whole farce was for his benefit. A private comedy performance intended to distract him, relax him, as much as Yugi's attempts at light conversation. Like he could be manipulated that easily.

Growling wordlessly, Kaiba slammed a lid on his coffee, turned on his heel and strode out of the break room, leaving the pair of them behind.

He heard the noise in his office from halfway down the hall, briefly entertained the notion that Yugi was on the phone with someone, or had turned on the radio. That hope was dashed when he clearly heard Yugi answer himself, an octave deeper and rougher in tone. And there were other voices as well, too many others to just be Yugi and the television.

Kaiba closed his eyes, stood stock-still in the corridor and told himself that he was hearing nothing but Yugi's lone reedy murmur through the office door. That he could not possibly be hearing those low baritones, or those feminine trills, or especially that high-pitched infernal squeaking fuzzball. He was Kaiba Seto and he was stressed and tired and pissed off, but he was not insane, and when he opened the door he was going to see no one in his office but Yugi. And only one of him.

"Kaiba, you okay?" Jounouchi and Honda had followed him out of the break room, were behind him now. It was too much to wish that they keep their distance, but at least they could have the wits to keep that open emotion from their voices. Caring is vulnerability, to show concern is to show weakness, hadn't they ever learned that? He wasn't their comrade, wasn't their ally, had been their enemy before. He certainly wasn't and never had been their friend. If he was going mad now, then what was wrong with all of them to begin with, that this most basic understanding eluded them?

"Kaiba, man, you've got to take it easy--you could lie down for an hour, whatever you're doing with the computer, we'll handle it, you just--"

"No," Kaiba said, "You can't; I have to." When he opened his eyes he discovered the cup of coffee was no longer in his hands. He glanced at the floor, expecting to see it spilled there, only to notice Jounouchi had caught it instead, was holding it awkwardly balanced on top of his own cup and was--looking at Kaiba, a repulsive look that seemed not at all surprised that Kaiba was hesitating, even knowing how urgent it was. Reassuring, understanding. As if that weakness was only to be expected, was acceptable.

He reclaimed his coffee, flung open his office door with more force than necessary and was perversely pleased that the voices inside instantly went quiet. Staring eyes watching him from every which way, Yugi's wide-eyed violet--two sets of it, one scarlet-tinged--and a dozen other pairs of all shapes and shades.

"Kaiba-kun," Black Magician Girl said, stepping up before him, like a spokesman, or a sacrifice. "We promise, we'll be quiet so we won't disturb you. But when you need our help, we'll be here." As if hallucinations could help. Her eyes reflected that same feeling he had seen in Jounouchi's brown gaze.

But in the window there were shining cobalt orbs, gleaming through the night--three pairs, the third Blue Eyes had managed to find itself a perch on the ledge beside its brethren. There was none of that nauseating sympathetic understanding in their brilliant blue, just a terrible focused fury, restrained only until it had a target. Until he found the target. Waiting for him, like his brother was waiting for him.

As Kaiba took a seat before his computer again, Yugi was explaining the situation to his friends. "But even if we can't read Arabic, there's gotta be some way we can help," Honda protested. "What are we supposed to do, just sit here?"

"You could sit elsewhere," Kaiba suggested, without raising his eyes from the screen. "Outside this office, preferably. Or better yet the building."

"Well, maybe we can't type the stuff up," Jounouchi said, ignoring him, "but Malik sent over some addresses, right?" He rifled through the pile of papers, withdrew a couple of the listings. "While Kaiba's looking up the others, we'll check out these places."

"No, you will not," Kaiba told him, reaching to take back the pages.

Jounouchi childishly yanked them out of reach. "Oh yeah, I think we will. Maybe this is your building, but you ain't my boss. We're going. Come on, guys." He started to stand. "We should call the cops, too--"

"You're not going anywhere, and you will not call the police. Try, and I'll stop you," Kaiba snarled. Before Jounouchi could take a step, Kaiba had grabbed his wrist, twisted back until the bonkotsu was forced to his knees.

"Ow, shit, ow, leggo, you asshole!" Jounouchi dropped the pages, wrenched his arm free. "Shit, Kaiba, what the hell?"

Yugi and Honda had both started forward, Honda's expression all righteous rage, eager to defend his friend; Yugi's face harder to read. Behind him, Kaiba could see the Flame Swordsman drawing his trademark fiery blade, with Wyvern Warrior hissing protectively beside him and the Red Eyes rumbling outside the window. He was making no friends here.

But none of them were attacking, instead were only glaring. Giving him a chance to explain himself. As if he owed them any explanation.

"What the hell is your problem, Kaiba?" Jounouchi demanded, getting back to his feet, fists clenched. Kaiba was braced for an assault but Jounouchi wasn't swinging, not yet. Unusual restraint from a teen hoodlum. "I don't believe you're still pulling this crap now--do you really think Mokuba has time for your ego? Get over yourself, you need our help. Mokuba needs our help. Hell, you wouldn't have gotten this far if me and Honda hadn't found that guy. If you seriously want to save your brother, then you have to let the stupid pride go."

Strange how his speech started so charged with anger, but his tone fell as he spoke, until he ended almost quietly. A plea, instead of challenge.

"Pride?" Kaiba said, and it was just as strange, how the words coming out of his mouth didn't even sound like his own, like he couldn't recognize his own voice anymore. "This has nothing to do with pride. I don't care what you want to do or if you imagine you can help. But I will not let you jeopardize this chance." Last chance, perhaps. If it wasn't already too late.

Jounouchi blinked. "Jeopardize your chance? What are you talking about?"

He truly didn't understand, and it should have irritated him more, to confront such stupidity, but Kaiba felt his anger dying, even that last strength leeched away by fatigue. "There's no guarantee that it's any of these men who have Mokuba. But if the Ghouls are organized and in communication with one another, and if law enforcement or other strangers start visiting any Ghoul-owned properties--"

"They'll realize we're onto them," Yugi supplied. "And then they might move Mokuba-kun somewhere else, harder to find."

"Or else decide it's not worth the risk to keep him any longer," Kaiba said.

The implications of that, at least, the bonkotsu followed. He blanched. "Damn, Kaiba, I'm sorry. I didn't think..."

"Oh, are you capable of doing so?"

Jounouchi's bowed head jerked up fast, but Yugi spoke faster. "So it'd be better to wait until we have all the possible addresses before we go to any of them, that way we can figure out the best bets to check out first. Or maybe we can figure out how to investigate the places so the Ghouls won't be alerted, there's got to be a way..."

"There is a way," but that wasn't either Yugi's voice or his friends'. A low, quiet baritone, which Yugi didn't respond to, even as Black Magician stepped forward, the other cards deferentially moving out of his way. If the hallucination bore a grudge for Kaiba's attempt to knock his nonexistent head off his nonexistent shoulders, it didn't show in his expression, calm but forceful. "They won't see us, wherever we explore."

"But, Master," and Black Magician Girl hovered his side, peering up at the senior card anxiously, "if we find Mokuba-kun, what can we do? Even if Kaiba-kun," and she glanced at him, "hears us and listens, the laws--"

"What will any law matter to him?" and Black Magician nodded toward Kaiba. "There will be a way," he said. "They'll see to it," and the three Blue Eyes roared agreement, thunder to shatter the windows. Kaiba couldn't help but react.

"Kaiba," Yugi said, "what was that?" He was looking at Kaiba, keenly intent, even while oblivious to Black Magician looming over him. "What are you hearing?"

"Nothing," Kaiba said, "nothing that will do any good." Just figments, neurological misfirings of an over exhausted brain. A coping mechanism, illusions manufactured to manage unbearable despair, and he cursed his traitorous subconscious, that he was so weak as to need hallucinations to shield himself from painful reality.

Logically, it was likely too late already. Better than a sixty percent chance and rising with every minute, that the Ghouls had either gotten what they wanted--but his brother would never give in--or else decided this venture was too risky and disposed of the problem. And not even a ten percent chance that he would be able to deduce the correct location even with access to all possible data.

Kaiba had never been a gambler. Pathetic, to wish for luck instead of relying on the surety of your own strength; and he had never had anything he cared for so little that he would risk it on pure chance. But he had always found comfort in numbers, the constancy of statistics, not to play the odds, but to depend on their certainty.

There was no comfort in these odds. There was just the increasing certainty of his failure, and his brother's voice, faint and far away as the cards were vivid, whispering in his mind, "Please, Nii-sama, I'm waiting..."

For all the duels Yugi had won against him, for all the times he thought he had tasted defeat, Kaiba knew now that he had never really lost before. Not like he was losing now. Eighteen years of victories meant nothing, greatest (second-greatest) in the world was a worthless title. He was a brother, first of anything; failing that, he was nothing at all.

"What's there, Kaiba?" Yugi asked again. The other Yugi, the phantom pharaoh, standing beside his identical counterpart, watching him. They both were watching him, with the same intense concentration, as if they were trying to will themselves to witness his hallucinations.

They both could tell that something was wrong. As if anything now was right.

"I know you can see me, Kaiba," the other Yugi said. "I don't understand how, but if you can see me, when I'm really here, then maybe whatever else you're sensing now is true, too. If it's something that can help somehow..."

"No," Kaiba said, knowing what Yugi and his friends thought of him, how close to the edge they already suspected he was. If they realized--if they tried to stop him from doing anything that he had to do... "There's nothing." He sat down before the computer again, let his eyes pass over those figures that shouldn't, couldn't, really be here. No matter what Yugi might insist. Besides, what good could a vision possibly do?

If Mokuba were here, Kaiba could tell him what he was seeing. Mokuba would be able to tell him if anything might really there, or if he actually had gone mad. He could trust his brother to answer honestly, and be safe in telling him, knowing Mokuba would never use it against him. Mokuba would believe in him even knowing he was insane.

Wherever he was, wherever the Ghouls had taken his brother, Kaiba knew that Mokuba would be believing in him even now. Waiting for him. If it wasn't too late.

"You can at least give us the names and stuff as you enter them, right?" Honda asked, his tentative uncertainty an odd contrast to the unreal reality of the hallucinations. "You've got other computers with access to the databases, right, so we can start looking things up as you go."

"Yes, that will help, won't it, Kaiba-kun," Yugi said, "the faster we get the information together, the sooner we can decide what to do next."

"And we will investigate every avenue as it opens," Black Magician stated, with such sublime confidence that Kaiba almost nodded. Almost accepted the momentary relief, a split-second conviction that this would work out, because it had to, because none of them would allow it to be otherwise. But there could be no guarantees, and he was only imagining that confidence.

His hand pushed into his pocket, fingers curling around the cool flat metal of his brother's locket. He had as little use for hope as he had for luck. Pointless to wish for what you had no control over. Weak.

But there was still a possibility, even with the odds against it. And he couldn't help but cling to that rapidly decreasing chance, couldn't help but believe in it against all logic. Believe that he would find his brother in time, because he could not imagine a future where he did not. Perhaps that was weakness. Perhaps that was madness.

Kaiba didn't care anymore. He had a task to do, the only thing he could think of. It would have to be enough. There was nothing else. No other way.

But he left the papers spread out, so the addresses written on them could be read, even if he refused to glance at the hallucinations which gathered around to study them. Refused to listen to their murmuring, sharing that information, one after another monster volunteering and departing in eager haste, channeling the frustrated urgency of their deck owners.

Jounouchi was pacing, Honda was fidgeting, Yugi was exchanging some silent communication with his other self. Kaiba ignored them all. His attention was focused on his laptop, on the task at hand that was all anyone could do now. Even though it might be too late, by the numbers. Already failed, already lost, and he would never see his brother again, and there could be no madness great enough to shield him from the pain of that.

Though when he heard the beating of great wings outside, nonexistent or not, he couldn't help the hope that flared in his heart with his dragons taking flight.


to be continued...

Of course the cards wouldn't stay away too long - I enjoy 'em too much! Contrary to Kaiba's feelings on the matter. Mokuba's up next, but for now, all my gratitude for the reviews, and happy holidays, one and all!