22. Mother

B. was surprised to find out his accounts remained relatively the same since he last used them, and that there had been very little activity in them, only a couple of withdrawal and deposits. He looked at the numeric pad where he had typed the code. 52422. The letters below the numbers spelled his name. He wanted to kiss his Puppy so much right now that he felt overwhelmed.

Kaiba got the addresses of all 3 private rehabilitation clinics of Domino and handed them to B. He knew they wouldn't give information over the phone, so they would have to go to each of them.

As B. parked the car on the second clinic, Kaiba saw Mokuba sitting on a bench inside. "There he is."

"What?"

"There is your brother. Inside."

"Where?"

"Where I'm pointing."

"…Behind that little punk?"

"He is that little punk."

"Ha-ha-ha. Pull the other one."

Kaiba was amused. "You guys will get along fine." They left the car, B. still disbelieving him.

"Mokuba!"

"What? Oh, the guy from yesterday." He made quotation marks in the air. "Kiryu."

B. was beaming. "Oh, very witty; I like him already."

"The Master? Seto Kaiba? So…"

"Hello, my sweet little brother. Now you don't have to do it alone anymore. I'll watch Star Wars with you whenever you want."

"Star Wars? Are you high? I hate that bullshit."

B. feigned an undignified cry with a hand in front of his mouth. "No, Mokie. You can't mean that!"

"Mokie? Who the hell is Mokie? I don't care who you are, I'll kill you if you ever call me that again."

Kaiba crossed his arms, a little impatient. "Yeah, my brother hates that too."

Mokuba looked from Kaiba to B. Now that he saw them side by side, things started to click. "You guys look… exactly the same. Are you twins or something? Am I really his brother? Are you my brother too?"

B. crossed his arms too with a proud smile on his face. "He's way more perceptive than… well, everyone else."

They told him parts of the story, even though Kaiba was pretty sure he wouldn't believe them by the end. He didn't. "Don't worry; I'll prove it to you later." He turned towards B. "Don't you wanna go see your mother or something?"

"Why should I? She abandoned me to my own luck when I was just a toddler. Okay, I wasn't a toddler. And the orphanage was actually pretty fun. And then a millionaire adopted me and gave me everything I wanted, on the condition I won some lousy Poker games. What am I doing here? I have to go thank that saint woman!" He took Mokuba by the hand. "Let's go! Where is she?"

Mokuba pulled himself from his hands. "Whoa, that's way more touchy-feely than I'm comfortable with, man. The thing is… she's kind of in a coma. The reason I didn't go back to your house like I said I would was because I was waiting to see if she would wake up."

"Oh, I… see."

"You can still go see her if you want to. She doesn't look too good though. She's like 35 but looks like she's 50."

"…Yeah, let's go see her." As he followed Mokuba along the corridor, he stopped and looked back at Kaiba, who was just standing there in the middle of the waiting room. "Do you… do you want to come too?"

He smiled faintly. "No, it's fine. I just… no offence, but I just prefer to remember my own mother the way she was. You go. I'll wait here."

B. smiled back at him. "Okay."

Kaiba watched them go, B. trying to touch Mokuba's pointy Mohawk. "How does it stand up like that? It's even weirder than Muto's hair!"

"Hey, don't get too cosy! I haven't accepted this whole brother thing yet!"

Kaiba sat down to wait for them.

oOo

"Come on, I gave them my phone number. They'll call if there are any changes with her." B. drummed his fingers on the steering wheel.

"Yeah, but… how can I go just like that? What if this whole thing is a lie and you're like organ harvesters or something?"

B. was shocked. "Organ harvesters? But… but you know me, don't you? That I'm the Master and all that?"

"I know, but I don't know what's your deal. What if you do… I don't know—"

"Kid, my deal is Poker. I make millions with games and stock market, and I don't need to steal little brats' organs."

"I'm not a little brat!"

"Then stop behaving like one and let's go already!"

Kaiba was having fun watching them. "You know, seeing you talking to your brother almost makes me think that you're not insane."

"Why, thank you, Nice Me! I'll take that as the first compliment you've ever given me."

"Don't get too used." He turned towards Mokuba. "So, are you coming or not?"

Mokuba stood outside the car, thinking, then opened the back door, sighing. "Yeah, sure. Why not."

B. flashed one of his killer smiles. "Wonderful! Do you want to stop by your house to get your, uh… hairspray or anything else?"

Mokuba hit him over the head. "Just go already. I'll just grab my stuff some other time."

He stepped on the gas rubbing his head, wondering why it seemed like everyone did that to him.

oOo

Yugi discussed with a tall girl outside. Well, tall compared to him. "Forget it, Téa. Everything's fine now."

"But I want to help you too! I told you I don't mind giving up on my dance classes."

"No way in hell. There are too many perverts here, and they would just ogle you the whole time. Besides, Kaiba is the Master again, and he said he'd give me an extended holiday, so we could go to that resort you're always talking about." He watched them as they arrived. "Er… didn't you Kaiba?"

"Muto, I'm just so shocked right now to see that you have a girlfriend that I'll concede just this once."

The Joeys were, surprisingly, playing cards. Except it wasn't Poker; Joey had gotten out his deck and was teaching him about Duel Monsters. The former Master had removed his silly royal garments and now wore normal clothes.

Before they approached them, B. warned Mokuba not to tell anything to the pretty blond who used to be the Master about how he and Kiryu were kind of the same person, and the whole another world story.

"Yeah, whatever. Not like I believe any of that anyway… Pretty blond? You're his boyfriend or something?"

"…Right now I'm not really sure, little brother."

"Hey! He and the other guy also look—"

"Shh! I told you it was true."

"Yeah. That or you're plotting some shady scheme involving pairs of twins."

B. shushed him once again, giving up on trying to convince him for now.

Both Joeys turned to look when they entered the room. "You're back! How was— oh, he's here!"

"Hey, Puppy. Uhh…Mr. Fudo. This is my brother Mokuba. Mokuba, say hi to Puppy and Mr. Fudo."

Mokuba jerked his head. "'Sup."

Now it was B.'s turn to hit him over the head. "Like a gentleman, Mokie."

"Ow! Man, I told you not to call me that!"

"Then behave. I'll teach you all about how to be a sir. Like me."

Joey was dying to make a snarky comment, but luckily for him, so was his double. "Sir? You? Kaiba, if you're a sir, then I'm king of England."

Kaiba motioned for Joey to follow him, while the three bickered around the table.

"I'm not calling this guy Puppy!"

"Then what, are you gonna call him dog? Y'know, like, what up dog!"

"Argh, do you have any idea how lame you are?"

"Kaiba! Listen, Kaiba's little brother. You can call me Joey."

"Why does he call you Puppy?"

"'Cause he's an idiot."

Mokuba laughed out loud. "Can't argue with that."

B. pretended to be offended. "Hey, you two! More respect with the Master!"

They both spoke in a mocking tone. "Yes, Master."

"Ah! That's it! Both of you, to your rooms, now!"

"Hey, I just got here. How should I know which one is my room?"

"Follow your big brother, Mokie. I'll find a nice room for you."

Mokuba rolled his eyes. "Whatever."

B. turned to his Joey. "Will you wait for me in your room? I really have to talk to you."

He rolled his eyes too, but showed him a lopsided smile. "Whatever."

oOo

"Are we going back then?" Joey was polishing his sunglasses' lenses on his shirt.

"Why don't we spend one last night here? Since we won't be able to come back, maybe we should say goodbye to them tomorrow."

"We won't be able to come back? Why is that?"

Kaiba was tweaking with the dimension machine. "The machine is frying. I think it can be used a few more times, but not that many."

"Really? Hooo boy. Okay then. Hey y'know, you're more sociable than I've ever imagined."

"…What do you expect me to say? They're virtually us; it's easy to get along with them."

"Yeah, but… even you getting along with me was a bit of a surprise back then."

Kaiba removed his clothes and accessories. "Why don't we leave talking for tomorrow? I'm exhausted." He climbed under the covers and lay there, unmoving.

Joey was disappointed, but as soon as he met Kaiba under the covers, he didn't mind finding out he was lying about being tired once again.

TBC

Super-short guest appearance by Téa Gardner!

I'm sorry, I wanted to have more of Kaiba and Joey, but... there isn't much to do anymore. If it's any consolation, I've already started on a new story, it'll be much shorter this time, and there won't be any creeps from another dimension to steal their screen time.