Drasticshipping (Kaiba Mokuba/Thief King Bakura)

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((contains Dark Side of Dimensions Spoilers))

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So, his big brother had seemed a little toounconcerned with what to do with this accidentally revived Egyptian spirit, but then again, it seemed like lately, it was Mokuba's job to figure out how to do the damage control on everything.

Mokuba peered around the corner, with just a hint of nerves.

Mokuba had hit a little bit of a growth spurt recently, but he still wasn't very tall, and this man wasn't much taller than him, despite clearly being about the same age as Seto. His white hair was shaggy and matted, clearly it hadn't been brushed, let alone cut with actual scissors, in quite some time. Mokuba fingered his own newly cut hair with some uncertainty, wondering if the man's hair was bothering him. It looked heavy and thick with snarls, falling over his eyes and even almost obscuring the scar that twisted one side of his face. Mokuba had a hair brush in one hand, debating whether or not he should go hand it to the man. He remembered how gross it had felt when he had had much longer hair, and he couldn't get the snarls out—it was part of the reason he had decided to get it cut. But would he be overstepping any boundaries?

He sat in a crouch, poking at the fake fireplace curiously. He had become fascinated after throwing a balled up piece of paper inside, saw that it wasn't burning up. Now he was letting one tanned hand snake into the alcove, eyes widening as he put his hand onto the fake log and saw that the fire wasn't real at all. Seto just thought it looked cool to have a fire in the fireplace. Honestly, he hadn't grown up at all since they were kids—case in point, the fact that he had accidentally revived an ancient Egyptian thief instead of the pharaoh he was so desperate to bring back to life. Mokuba sighed softly. He wished his brother would find a way to get over this...but for now, they had another problem to worry about.

The man didn't seem to remember anything, not even his own name, and talking to him was hard. He picked up on Japanese surprisingly quickly, but his speech was a strange, garbled mess of heavy accents and Japanese mixed with an ancient language that must be ancient Egyptian. Mokuba had tried to help him settle into the manor while they figured out what to do next, but he was a strange kind of person, and kept 'losing' all of the sweaters that Mokuba gave him against the chill of late winter, preferring instead to walk around the house in only pants—at leasthe was wearing pants, Mokuba supposed.

The man scooted closer to the fire, poking at it experimentally, tilting his head to look underneath it, as though trying to figure out where the fire was coming from.

He's really thin, Mokuba thought with some uncertainty. Even though we've been feeding him and he's been eating it...he's not putting any weight on.

Mokuba felt somewhat responsible for taking care of him...after all, his brother was too busy being obsessed, and it was Seto's fault for dragging the poor guy into a time that wasn't even his. Mokuba had to do something to make up for what his brother was unwilling to do.

He hesitated a few moments longer, shifting from foot to foot.

Then he just decided to go for it, darting forward before he could overthink it.

"Hi!" he said, and the man looked up quickly. His lips parted, and then he had to push his matted bangs out of his eyes to see. A faint smile grew on his face at the sight of Mokuba, and he stood, his bare toes curling into the carpet.

"Where does xtcome from?" he said.

"What?" Mokuba said, not recognizing the strange sound that the man had made.

The man gestured at the fire, a faint flicker of frustration coming into his eyes at not having the word.

"The fire?" Mokuba said.

The man's eyes lit up, and he nodded.

"It's...it's like a three dimensional picture," Mokuba said. "It's not real."

He wondered if that made any sense to the man, because he squinted his eyes and hmmed, as though thinking it over.

Mokuba decided to pursue the question he had come to ask, lifting up the hairbrush.

"Uh, your hair," he said. "I'm sure it feels gross...want to brush it?"

The man looked briefly uncertain, squinting at the object.

"It's a hairbrush," Mokuba said. Didn't they have hairbrushes in ancient Egypt?

He seemed to sort of get it, but the way he was staring at the brush made Mokuba think that it looked nothing like the hairbrushes that he had ever known, if he had ever seen one before at all.

"Here, sit down," he said, gesturing at him to sit down by the couch. He might be not much taller than Mokuba, but Mokuba couldn't quite reach him easily. The man looked wary, but he did so, and Mokuba plopped into the couch behind him. "See, like this."

He carefully worked the brush through the edges of the man's white hair. The man hissed briefly, probably at the pain of his hair getting pulled on.

"Sorry," Mokuba said. "Just try to hold still."

After a few moments, the pair of them settled into a strange, comfortable silence. Mokuba had never been on this side of the brush before...he remembered Seto brushing his hair every morning, careful to get all of the knots out. He hadn't done that in a while, though...too busy with the pharaoh...

Mokuba didn't realize he was crying until the tears fell onto his hands and he blinked quickly, pausing in brushing. The man looked up briefly as though wondering why Mokuba had stopped. Mokuba rubbed at his eyes.

"It's okay," he said quickly. "I'm okay."

The man blinked at him slowly with his dark violet eyes. Then he huffed.

"Your turn," he said in his accented Japanese.

"Huh?"

"Your turn," he repeated, standing up and pushing on Mokuba's shoulder. Surprised, Mokuba let himself be plopped onto the floor, and the man took Mokuba's place on the couch.

The brush moved gently through his hair, working out the knots in almost the same way that Mokuba had done it—he was a quick learner, if he really had never done this before...

More tears bubbled in his eyes—this felt so familiar...

"I want him back," he mumbled. "I...I want him back."

The man couldn't have any idea what Mokuba was talking about, but Mokuba thought he felt the brushing grow a little gentler. Mokuba just closed his eyes, and tried to pretend that Seto was back there again, brushing his long hair out one knot at a time...

. . .

A/N: Bakura can be an okay guy when he's not totally corrupted by thoughts of revenge, at least, that's my feeling. Next is Dramashipping (Jonouchi x Ryota).