Author's Note: Second verse, same as the first. I'm sorry I've taken so long to update! Again, I promise I'm not abandoning this story. I'm just very, very busy. Thanks you for all of your lovely reviews! This chapter is very fast paced, so it seems really short to me, but I realized it's almost a thousand words longer than the last one! Anyway, I hope you enjoy it! Thank you again for reading!
"It took you forever to get out of that box," said the younger version of Seto. "I almost can't believe we're the same person. Then again, I guess you have had a hard day."
Seto sighed in annoyance. He was still feeling the vertigo of the shift to standing, and the feeling was making him even more short-tempered than usual. A gentle throbbing was starting behind his eyes, the kind that usually came after he'd spent all night working on his computer at the expense of sleep.
"All right," he said. "What kind of virtual reality have I been trapped in this time?"
His younger self laughed mockingly, crossing his arms over his chest.
"No virtual reality," he said. "You know Bakura would come up with something more original than that."
"Right," said Seto impatiently. "Am I supposed to duel you or something?"
The little boy rolled his eyes.
"Hardly. Don't you know where we are?"
Seto looked around again, but this part of the garden looked exactly like the part he'd already seen and just as unfamiliar. He squinted. He could feel his dizziness settling into fogginess, the pounding in his head getting stronger, and he wondered if it was making him miss something obvious.
"I don't recognize it," he said.
The boy drew a finger down the cord of his locket, smirking.
"We're in your mind, of course," he said, and his smile widened. "Well, our mind, I suppose I should say."
Seto scoffed.
"Oh, please," he said. "I'm supposed to believe something like that?"
The boy shrugged.
"You don't have to. It's just true. When Bakura attacked us, he put you in a coma. You'll believe that, won't you?"
Seto remembered well what had happened to Wheeler after his duel with Marik during the Battle City Tournament. The situation wasn't exactly the same, but he could see the correlation. It wasn't completely unbelievable, at least.
"So, what, then?" he asked, glaring. "This is just a dream?"
The boy laughed.
"I never said that."
"I'm starting to lose my patience," said Seto, rubbing his throbbing temples. "If this isn't a dream, then what is it?"
"I already said that," the younger Seto said loftily. "Pay attention."
Seto frowned, but let him continue.
"Bakura didn't just shut your mind down," he said. "He stuck his grimy fingers in and messed it all up. You're here now, because your – our – conscious mind, which is you, by the way, isn't able to operate without the rest of it working right."
Seto raised an eyebrow at him.
"I'm not saying I believe you," he said, and his head throbbed with the sound of his own voice, now. "But that doesn't explain why we're here."
"You're here to stay," said the boy. "Until you can wake up from your coma."
It was as if a film was settling over Seto's brain, making everything misty and incomprehensible. He narrowed his eyes, thinking past the feeling with difficulty.
"But if I'm here, not doing anything, how will my mind get fixed?" he asked, slowly.
He saw his mirror image grin, as if from far away.
"Oh, it won't."
Everything was blurring now, shifting, and Seto heard the words muffled, as if from underwater. He tried desperately to concentrate on the conversation, on what they had been talking about, but it was all slipping away.
"Then..." he pressed both palms to his head, struggling to hold onto the thought. "Then how do I get out of here?"
Like the whisper of a dream's memory, Seto thought he heard the echo of a faraway voice saying smugly, "You don't," but as he glanced around the beautiful British-style garden behind his home, he couldn't remember who it could have possibly been.
Oh, well. It probably wasn't important.
xxxx
The elevator began gliding downward as soon as Joey pressed the button. He let out a puff of air through his nose, rocking back on his heels. He couldn't see his friends as they also shifted restlessly behind him, but he could feel it. Above him, the florescent light hummed softly and began to flicker.
'Oh, good,' he thought. 'That's not foreboding.'
He opened his mouth to express the sentiment, but before a syllable could leave his lips, the light went entirely, and the elevator gave a mighty lurch. Joey stumbled back against Tristan, turning around to speculate the pitch black emptiness surrounding them.
"What the—"
From the wall of the elevator to his right, there came a loud thump, and then another, from the wall right next to him. There was a sudden, terrible sound, and Joey knew, with a jolt of horror, that it was the screech of twisting metal.
"What's going on?" Yugi gasped frantically from somewhere nearby, as the elevator rocked again.
Above them, the light flickered on again. Joey pulled away from Tristan to inspect their surroundings. Near the ceiling, on both sides, the elevator walls were caved in, as if something had pressed inward on them with great force. Another sound started then, piercing, like nails on a chalkboard, a high-pitched, snapping noise, and Joey turned quickly to the back wall. The full length mirror was cracking, fractures spreading, web-like, from the two upper corners. In front of his eyes, they wound outward, mesmerizingly slowly. And then, it came again, so loud it made his ears ring:
Thump!
The mirror exploded.
Téa screamed, wrapping herself around Yugi and shielding her own face, as Tristan reached quickly to grab Duke by the back of his shirt and pull the other boy with him as he stumbled backward. Joey shut his own eyes, feeling tiny bits of glass stinging as they hit his face.
It was all over in a matter of seconds. Joey cracked an eye open tentatively. Glass tinkled softly as it continued to break away from the frame, and as everyone began to shift, it crunched beneath their feet. Téa released Yugi, casting fearful eyes behind her, as the shorter boy brushed bits of the mirror from his hair. To Joey's right, Tristan released his grip on Duke, who swayed sideways, shuddering.
"Is everyone all right?" asked Yami, sounding calmer than Joey thought he had any right to.
"I'm okay," said Yugi, and the rest of the group mumbled their agreement.
Joey could see a few small scratches on Téa's neck and shoulders, and Duke was sporting a gash across one cheekbone, but other than that, everyone did appear to be uninjured.
"What was that?" Téa asked, still looking panicky.
"I have a better question," said Tristan, glancing around. "Are we stuck?"
Joey blinked. The elevator was indeed stationary. He reached over to the panel again, pressing the "In" button a few times. Nothing happened.
"Think we should try the escape hatch?" he asked.
As if in answer, another thump shook the elevator. A huge dent caved in the ceiling, and the case around the florescent lighting cracked in half. One of the bulbs burst, sending sparks shooting out, and Joey had to jostle Yami to avoid them.
"Oh, no," moaned Duke. "Not again!"
The elevator rocked threateningly. Outside something was creaking, shifting. The car stilled for a moment, and then Joey heard it: a great, echoing snapping sound. He didn't even have time to swear before his stomach was in his throat, and he felt himself plummeting downward.
The elevator was falling.
xxxx
Seto glanced up at the blue sky. Had he just heard something? No, not heard; perhaps, felt. A shiver ran down his spine, though he couldn't imagine why. It felt like something was wrong, but...
"Big Brother?"
He blinked, looking around for the source of the voice, and spotted Mokuba waving to him from across the garden.
"Seto? Are you listening to me?" asked the little boy, pouting slightly.
"Sorry, Mokuba," Seto said. "I was thinking. What were you saying?"
"Dinner's ready," said Mokuba, smiling.
He jogged over to grab Seto's hand and tug him over toward the gazebo, where Seto could see a nice lunch laid out, two empty chairs sitting next to the two that were already filled.
"I found him, Mom and Dad!" chirped Mokuba.
Seto's mother smiled, adjusting her floppy sunhat.
"I see that! Where did you wander off to, Seto?"
Seto took the seat next to her.
"I don't know," he said. "I was just walking, I guess."
"He said he was thinking," said Mokuba conspiratorially, climbing into his own chair.
Seto's father laughed.
"Well, when isn't he?" he asked fondly.
"Our little genius," said Seto's mother, squeezing his shoulder.
Smiling, Seto reached for the teapot and poured himself a glass. Mokuba gathered too much butter onto a knife, and Seto's mother gently took it from him, wiping a bit off and buttering his croissant for him.
"It's so nice to have you home from work for lunch, dear," she said to Seto's father, handing the bread to Mokuba, who took it happily.
"Well, it's all thanks to Seto here that I can do things like that," he said. "Before, I couldn't spend all of this time with my family. I'm much happier now."
Seto's mother cupped his hand gently in her own.
"Oh, darling, I'm much happier, too."
"Me, too!" chimed in Mokuba, winding the cord of his locket around two fingers. "I'm much happier this way! Aren't you, Seto?"
Seto tilted his head to the side. Something was off here. He was sure of it now.
"Aren't you happier, Seto?" Mokuba asked again. "Happier than before?"
Seto furrowed his brow.
"Before what, exactly?" he asked carefully.
"You know," said Mokuba, grinning. "Before this. It's all so nice now."
Seto glanced around the table, at his parents' vacantly smiling faces, at the perfectly sculpted garden, and the beautiful summer's day. He pressed his palms to his eyes. There was something he'd forgotten. He was certain of it. Mokuba's gaze remained unwavering.
"It's just like you imagined it, isn't it?" he said. "All those years ago, at Gozaburo's, when you'd look through those picture books, you'd picture us all happy like this. And now it's come true. Isn't it wonderful?"
Seto's eyes snapped open. He raised his eyes quickly to stare at the boy.
"Who are you?" he demanded.
Mokuba laughed.
"Don't be silly, Big Brother," he said, beginning to get up. "Come on, play with me!"
Seto slammed his fist on the table.
"Who are you?!"
The young boy paused. Turning to give Seto an impassive look, he sunk back in the chair. He tilted his head back and crossed his arms, looking at Seto from down his nose.
"Hmm," he said. "It took you less time than I thought it would to shake that off."
"What the hell are you talking about?" Seto asked angrily.
The air seemed to shimmer around them almost imperceptivity, and then the chairs where his parents had sat were empty and, instead of Mokuba, a younger Seto sat in front of him.
"What was it?" he asked. "Too perfect?"
It all came rushing back to Seto, then. The duel with Bakura, awakening in that empty space, what the boy had said earlier. He stood up from the table, suddenly, sending tea cups tinkling in their saucers and grabbed the boy by his collar.
"You!" he yelled. "What the hell are you trying to do?"
"Haven't you guessed, yet?" the boy sneered at him, unconcerned. "I'm keeping you here."
Seto flung him back into the chair.
"Why?" he snapped. "Why keep me from waking up, then, if you're part of me?"
The boy's grin widened even further.
"Oh," he said, looking up at Seto through his bangs. "We all have our reasons."
His forehead glowed, suddenly, and Seto recognized the symbol that seemed to be etched there: the mark of the Millennium Items.
Seto breathed in sharply.
"Bakura."
The boy inspected his nails.
"Maybe Bakura got to me," he concurred calmly. "But even though you've figured that out and seen through my ruse, you're still not going to get out."
He glanced up at Seto.
"Let's try that brainwashing thing, again."
He brushed his fingers over his locket, again, tracing the edges. A thought occurred to Seto. He had an idea of how this was all working, and if it was his mind after all, he knew he had the advantage there.
"I don't think so," he said. "Time for me to go."
The boy opened his mouth to mock him again, but Seto's hand shot out and, grabbing the locket, yanked it from his neck.
"What are you doing?" shrieked the boy. "Give that back!"
Seto snapped the card-shaped necklace open. Instead of Mokuba's picture, the inside held a mirror, reflecting his own image back to him, and there, shining on his forehead, he could see the mark. He stood up quickly and moved toward the wall. The boy, still shouting, jumped from his seat and rushed toward him, but he was too slow to stop Seto from smashing the locket mirror-side down on the gazebo railing. He heard it crack, felt the ground slip from under his feet, and the world went black.
xxxx
All he could hear where screams. Joey had always enjoyed the freefall rides at amusement parks, but this was nothing like that, and when he felt his feet begin to lift off the ground, he started to yell himself. His heart was pounding so quickly he thought it might explode. There were warm bodies jostling him from all sides as his friends stumbled around the plunging structure. The elevator was twisting to the side, now, and Joey reached out to grab onto the handicap railing only to find the piece of metal coming off in his hand, its body mangled by the damage to the elevator. Téa was closest to him now, sobbing and clutching uselessly as the smooth wall. He caught a glimpse of Duke attempting to brace himself on the button pad, but he lost his balance anyway and was forcefully slammed against Tristan, who had stumbled forward to attempt to reach the escape hatch. They were falling so fast, so impossibly fast. Joey could hear himself speaking, but he had only the vaguest grasp of what he was saying.
"Oh, God! Oh, God! Oh, shit, we're gonna die! We're gonna die!"
And then, just as abruptly as they had begun falling, they stopped. The force of the sudden cessation had them all tumbling to the ground. Joey bit his tongue as the impact sent his jaw snapping shut. He heard the sickening sound of someone banging their head particularly hard on the floor. They all lay there gasping for a moment, despite the bits of glass digging into their skin, trying to regain themselves. The elevator gave a cheerful ping, and the doors slid open.
Joey stumbled to his feet, staring in apprehension at the scene in front of him. The room bore a strong resemblance to the one they'd first encountered, if that room had in fact been torched, ransacked, and abandoned for thirty years. The walls were stained black and peeling. The fountain in the middle of the room was crumbling and covered in water stains. The reception desk was cracked, its chairs lying scattered on the ground. Where the painted on hallway had been, there was a veritable wall of nailed-on planks. The ceiling lights were mostly blown and the ones that weren't were dirty and flickering.
Glancing at his friends, he could see that they were thinking the same thing he was: Did they really have to go out there?
The elevator creaked, then, making their decision for them, and they all stagger out in unison. Joey paused, though, turning around to the rail he'd been holding earlier. Grabbing the snapped off end, he gave the other a few kicks until it gave, too, leaving him with a nice make-shift weapon, before following the others out of the Elevator from Hell. Tristan raised an eyebrow at him.
"What?" asked Joey, slapping the piece of metal against his palm. "Hey, I've played Silent Hill!"
An awful rending sound, similar to the one Joey had heard earlier began, and right before their eyes, the elevator began to cave in on itself. Several more of those massive thumps, and the sides of the elevator met in the middle, and as Joey fought the urge to vomit, it folded up on itself into almost nothing and disappeared as the wall itself seemed to close up on it with a floor-shaking quake.
Joey swallowed heavily.
"Oh, good," he said, shakily. "That's not foreboding."
xxxx
Opening his eyes, Seto found himself once again lying down, this time surrounded by darkness on all sides. Moving tentatively in an attempt to orient himself to his environment, he found that he was once again enclosed in a box, but this time, he could feel the surface of it around him, recognizing the texture of the walls as wooden. A coffin, he realized, obviously designed to keep him trapped here, separated from the chaos of his unconscious. Pressing his palms against the solid roof, he twisted and manoeuvred so that he was braced solidly against one side, pressing his feet against the roof and opposite side, hearing the coffin creak in protest, feeling the panels shift a little under the force. Taking a deep breath, he used all his strength to press up again, and on the third attempt, the coffin gave way with a mighty cracking sound, the lid breaking off entirely, the side slumping away from the body. Seto sat up briskly and, lifting it off of himself, hurled the lid across the room.
So, Bakura thought he could keep Seto from interfering, did he?
"Nice try."