Part two of what will likely be four. It's here that the story starts to truly unfold. The first section set the stage. This is what happens when the actors and actresses begin their performance, with the lights dimmed and the theater hushed, and each line echoes in the ears and minds of the audience.
That is to say, things get interesting now. Yami comes into his own, and the others are along for the ride. Furthermore, while I have attempted in the past to characterize Seto in the violent absence of his brother, it is here that I believe I've found the mark. In this way, and more than a few others, you can think of this story as the spiritual successor to the first multi-chapter story that I ever finished; the first story to garner meaningful attention on this site: "Twist of Fate." This story, however, takes a darker turn than the original, in an effort to breathe a bit more psychological realism into the premise.
And a touch of magic, of course.
Are you ready? I hope so; the ritual is about to begin.
PART TWO:
The Ritual
10.
Kaiba'd said it. He guessed it shouldn't have surprised him, then, when it proved true. Not really. Seriously, the guy was a genius, after all, and he'd been around some pretty screwed up people in his life. He knew the dark, evil truths humanity hid from itself.
Joey Wheeler liked to think of himself as a stand-up guy, so yeah, it bothered him. But then, Kaiba'd said it would happen. And for all the guy's faults (and there were a right lot of 'em), he was smart. He knew what he was doin'.
It took a week, a good solid week, but after a while, Joey started to "get over" Mokuba Kaiba's death. He was smiling on a regular basis again. He was making plans and talking on the phone and all that other normal stuff Kaiba'd said he'd be doing.
He thought about the kid, and it pissed him off to no goddamn end to think of whatever goddamn piece of shit son of a whore decided to—but he was used to anger. He knew how to hold it back. Sort of.
He thought about it, and he stared it in the face, and he told himself it shouldn't be this soon. But it was. He'd come to grips with it, and he knew he was gonna make out all right. He hadn't really known Mokuba for all that long. Good kid, loyal and brave and almost as smart as his big brother, but...not too close. Not family-outside-family material.
Yet.
Maybe it would've happened eventually.
He didn't know.
Yugi wasn't over it yet, but that wasn't much of a surprise. Yugi still sounded distant, distracted and just plain out of it, whenever Joey called. So Joey hadn't stopped by the shop in a while. He figured his best friend needed some alone time with his family right now. Yugi was a softie, through and through, and there really wasn't any fighting it.
Tristan...well, Tristan had thick skin. He'd seen death a few times in his own family. Joey thought it was an aunt who'd lost her first daughter to SIDS. So Tristan was, sad as it was, used to this kind of thing. It didn't really affect him too much anymore. Joey thought that was part of the reason he was adjusting. There were always gonna be certain things that Joey'd look to Tristan for an example, and this was one of 'em.
So yeah. He thought about it, but in that detached way that generally made you feel like a jerk until you convinced yourself to forget it. And he was just getting to that point today, as he was walking out to the grocery store to pick up a sandwich for lunch, when he heard them.
"...you believe him? He calls that a eulogy?"
"I always thought he was horrible, but that's a disgrace!"
A couple. Late twenties, early thirties. Guy, first speaker, wearing khaki pants, tan work boots, and a blue windbreaker. Beard. Trimmed. Black hair, glasses. Thin glasses. Girl, second speaker, strawberry blonde. Tall, wearing faded jeans and a long brown shirt. Matching scarf.
Joey's eyes narrowed.
Target locked.
They were sitting in front of a restaurant, the girl was eating a bagel with cream cheese and the guy was sipping some kind of coffee. There was a newspaper on the table between them, and Joey didn't need to crane his neck to see Kaiba's picture.
...Fuck.
He stopped moving. He felt something he never thought he'd feel. Ever. It was jarring, and he wasn't sure what to make of it at first. But the strangest part about the anger welling up in him right now was that it felt familiar.
And the scariest part was that it felt good.
"All those people show up to pay respect to that poor boy, and all he does is berate them!" the girl said, and Joey drew in a deep breath. Oh, this couldn't end well. Nope. The guy was nodding, nodding, with this half-frown, half-sneer manufactured to look solemn and offended at the same time, but all it said to Joey was that something about the six-dollar insulated-paper-plastic-top-frilly-whipped-cream concoction he was drinking was giving him heartburn.
Joey hated him already.
"Well, what do you expect?" the guy said, in an airy tone meant to be world-weary. This guy was just chock-full of fake. God. "It's not like he's ever had to deal with real hardship before. He was adopted into billions. Probably never paid attention to the boy in the first place. People like Seto Kaiba are just...if you ask me, it wouldn't be out of the realm of possibility that he ordered a hit on the p—"
"'Scuse me," Joey cut in, before he realized what he was doing. The couple jumped.
Big Man puffed up like a blowfish. "...Yes? May I help you?"
The blond gestured with one hand. "Yeah, yeah. Look, I'm kinda lost, and I wondered if, uh...if you could..." And he made to reach into his back pocket. "Sorry 'bout this, but I'm late for a, uh—well, my sister's in town 'n...um...could you come here for a minute? Take a look at...?"
The guy stood up, looking irritated.
And for the first time in what felt like an eternity, for the first time since meeting Yugi Mutou and discovering that life as a street thug wasn't the right way to go, Joseph Scott Wheeler reeled back his fist and sent it barreling into another man's teeth.
The shock that went up his arm, the crack against his curled fingers, it all felt familiar and satisfying and so goddamn right, and watching the bearded man with the thin glasses vault over his chair and tumble to the ground, where he curled in the fetal position and moaned like a dying goat, that was right, too. God, yes, it was right.
Joey flexed his fingers.
The man's coffee had fallen off the table and was currently painting the sidewalk.
He reached into his pocket again and produced a five-dollar bill. He tossed it in front of the stunned, wide-eyed, slack-jawed girl, and turned his attention to her crumpled, half-bawling boyfriend as he started back on his way to his goddamned sandwich.
"Sorry 'bout the coffee. Lemme guess. You're an only child."
Big Man no speak. Woman speak for him. Woman say: "...Y-Yes...he...is...?"
Scared. She was scared of him.
Well, good.
Idiot. Idiots.
Joey sneered. "Figures."
And he was gone.
He was halfway down the street when his phone rang.
11.
She'd been sent the email nearly a month ago, but it was a forward and she'd quickly lost track of it in a sudden influx of school updates and scholarship opportunities, and it didn't come up again until...well...
It was a link to an online interview. From the message before the forward, Téa Gardner knew that it had to do with one of the Kaiba Corporation's newest projects, an action-adventure computer game called Night of the End-Rider.
The interview was with the head of the development team.
Mokuba Kaiba.
One of Téa's friends from high school had sent the video to her, claiming in her message that it was, "so adorable it should be illegal." She didn't know what possessed her to watch it. Principle, maybe. But as she did, she realized her friend had been right.
Mokuba's eyes were aglow with excitement over this new project his brother had allowed him to run, and even though the video was blurry and pixelated, Téa could see it. Here was a boy who loved his life, who was at the height of happiness and pride and enthusiasm. He was so bubbly that laughter actually escaped his mouth like a living thing, with no prompting whatsoever.
The interviewer, a young woman who went by the alias of Daywalker, caught her subject's infectious euphoria partway through, and the resulting dialogue was ultimately one of the most pleasant exchanges Téa had ever seen.
Or...that would have been true.
If...
So, Daywalker asked about six minutes in, grinning like a little girl, how did you come to head this project? I know you're the company's vice-president, but Master Kaiba hasn't ever done this before. Has he?
"It was kind of a bet," was Mokuba's answer. "I was having trouble with science class last year. My grade was...pretty bad. Niisama said if I brought it up, he'd let me pick Kaiba-Corp's next project. So...well, I brought it up. So now I'm making my own game, and...it's awesome!"
Daywalker laughed. Mokuba laughed with her. She asked him the hardest part of the project so far, and Mokuba said,
"Making sure it meets up with my brother's standards. He told me that if I don't put everything I have into it, then it won't be published under our company's name. And I want people to see this game, so I have to make sure I do it right."
Wow. Harsh.
"Niisama just wants to make sure our customers are happy," said Mokuba, not quite defensive but getting there. "I think he's right. I want to make sure everybody likes my game as much as they like his."
Kaiba-Corp's games are some of the most popular in history, Daywalker said. Innovative, challenging, rewarding. The production values are ridiculous. I'm sure we can expect the same out of your project, then?
"I sure hope so."
Are you using Kaiba-Corp's usual development team?
"Mostly. I brought in a few people to help out, though. My game's based on a comic book, you know, so I have to be extra careful. Games like this usually don't do too well. Niisama says they're quicksand. But I want to prove to everybody that if you're careful, you can do it right."
It was a long video. Twenty-two minutes. Most of it centered on Mokuba's game, and how he was going about putting it together. Téa was surprised at just how well the young Kaiba presented himself. She'd only ever seen him as a little boy, and hadn't really thought about the fact that he was the vice-president of one of the largest commercial entities on the west coast, working for one of the most demanding, critical employers in the country.
But toward the end, some personal things came up. Daywalker started talking about Kaiba, and Mokuba—as always—was absolutely thrilled to wax poetic on his hero. If possible, even more pride and enthusiasm shone on his face as he spoke, and Téa was sure that it was this section of the interview that Zoe (a little sister, herself) had been most affected by.
When Daywalker admitted to being a rather big fan of Kaiba's, even blushing slightly as she said it, Mokuba looked about ready to cry. Something bordering on worship visited the young Kaiba's entire essence, and it only made Daywalker blush more furiously.
This is the first time you've done an interview without your brother, isn't it?
Mokuba nodded. "Yeah."
She asked him if there was anything Mokuba wanted to say to his brother, now that he'd shown Kaiba that he could charm the hell out of the entire internet all on his own. Téa actually found a small laugh at that. It caught in her throat, though, at Mokuba's answer.
The simplest, yet most impactful thing she'd ever heard.
He looked at the camera.
"Love you, Niisama."
...The screen went black.
And after a few seconds, bold white text faded into view. The original video had been edited.
The newly-added white message read:
Dedicated to the memory of Mokuba Yagami Kaiba
The little brother we all wish we had.
July 7, 1996 – October 13, 2006
誠心誠意
The phone rang.
Choking back tears, Téa answered.
12.
He hated the little snot.
He never told Big Sis that, because one of the most important things Joey had taught him was the glory of tact. Not because his blond best friend was tactful, mind, but because he wasn't. Joey liked to rush in, guns blazing, and rely on his instincts, his reflexes, and he had been courting the ever-so-seductive Lady Luck for about as long as Tristan had known him.
So Tristan knew better than to tell Stacia Taylor that he hated his only nephew. But that didn't stop the hatred from existing. He babysat a lot, ever since Johji had been born—and what the hell kind of name was Johji, anyway? Honestly, Tristan loved his sister, but sometimes he thought she was about two steps just below batshit crazy.
So yes, he'd had a lot of experience with the...ahem...boy. And it had only come to reinforce Tristan's longstanding belief that he would never have children. Ever. Johji was everything stereotypically "taxing" about toddlers, and not a weekend went by during which his sister's "little angel" (she wasn't delusional, she just had a dark sense of humor) didn't break something.
The only thing that stopped Johji's rampages (that Tristan had discovered so far) was a collection of DVDs Stacia had managed to procure from an online auction the previous year. These discs held every single Magic & Wizards match ever recorded that featured one particular person.
One of the most prolific tournament champions the game had ever seen:
Seto Sasaki-Yagami Kaiba.
Since beginning tournament-level play at the age of fifteen, Kaiba had played in nearly every major tournament, and any number of minor ones. It was speculated that this was because Magic & Wizards was one of his company's flagship franchises. Kaiba-Corp was a longstanding partner of Industrial Illusions, and the world-famous developer of the Duel Disk, and its revolutionary Solid Vision hologram technology.
All this Tristan knew both from firsthand experience and from the accursed videos his nephew loved to watch over and over and goddamn over again. He knew Kaiba's full name; he didn't have middle names, per se. He had added the surnames of his parents (Yagami, from his father; Sasaki, from his mother) to his own out of respect. Or, so the reporters claimed. Tristan had a feeling it wasn't as simple as that. Nothing involving Kaiba was ever simple.
Johji liked Kaiba because Kaiba was the best. He'd dominated the charts for almost a full year, but that year had been a takeover the likes of which nobody could have ever expected. Kaiba, like the person who would eventually dethrone him (Yugi) had come out of absolutely nowhere and clawed his way to the top of the dueling circuit in much the same way he'd claimed the title of CEO: absolutely ruthlessly.
Tristan had tried to mention that, as Pegasus Crawford had beaten Kaiba during the Duelist Kingdom tournament, and Yugi had then defeated Crawford, Kaiba wasn't the best anymore, but third best.
Johji wouldn't hear it.
"No!" he often said. "Kaiba-sama! Best ever!"
Kaiba-sama. He'd been calling Kaiba that for a while now; probably picked up from Mokuba's example. Johji had always been jealous of the younger Kaiba brother. Angrily jealous. Tristan had half-expected the kid to be excited when the news broke that Mokuba had been murdered. This hadn't been the case, though. Stacia had taught her son as well as she could, and he'd been properly, respectfully subdued about it.
The fact that Kaiba had all but laid out his plans to commit suicide probably had something to do with that. Sure, Johji didn't quite understand the full implications of suicide, or even death, yet. But he knew that his hero would be gone, forever, if it happened.
Since Mokuba's death, and Kaiba's subsequent withdrawal from the public, Johji had been watching his DVD collection even more zealously than before. As Tristan sat on the couch, in a dark mood, his nephew sat on the floor just in front of the television, watching a montage of some of Kaiba's best moments (or whatever), set to music.
A music video.
Of course.
No doubt the music had been chosen for its fast, booming, charged beat. Perfect for the fast-paced editing and the sweeping, dramatic movements Kaiba chose to employ. He was a natural showman, born to work a crowd. Rap-rock, with its crunching guitar and quick lyrics, was perfect for this kind of thing.
Kaiba probably hated it.
Fucking kid. Tristan found a sarcastic grin as he realized that he was starting to care what Kaiba liked or hated. And it was all...'cuz of him.
Tristan'd told himself he hated kids. Just in general. Not just Johji, not just infants and toddlers, but children in general. It'd seemed easier that way. Less of an attack on his family. But then Mokuba'd gone and proved him wrong. Here was somebody he could accept, somebody that didn't piss him off with every word (the boy's constant sermons on his brother's holy ascendency only bothered Tristan until he realized he'd been much the same way about Stacia when he'd been ten or so).
And then, just when he'd really started to like the little guy...
Damn it.
Damn it!
Tristan sighed and pulled himself from the couch, heading for the kitchen. He stood there, in the doorway, looking at the room in stupid wonder for a second until he remembered he was in his sister's home, not his own apartment. He shook his head and stepped onto the tile floor.
"What you doing?" Johji asked from the living room.
"Getting a drink," Tristan replied automatically.
"I want drink, too! Nilla!" This was Johji's name for vanilla-flavored...anything. Tristan checked the refrigerator and found a six-pack of vanilla-flavored cola. He grabbed one for himself and waited. A few seconds later, he heard, "Please!"
He took a second can.
For Johji, soda was a treat that bordered on mythical. The Nectar of the Gods. He was lucky if his mother allowed him a can a month. Tristan figured, considering the recent events surrounding his idol, the kid could use a pick-me-up.
He'd said please, after all, and...well, anything to shut him up.
Tristan figured that if he played the good cop, maybe it'd make things easier. Eventually.
Johji's plump little face lit up as his uncle tossed him the soda. When Tristan flopped back down onto the couch (Stacia kept telling him to stop that, that it would eventually break the couch and then he'd have to pay her back for a new one, but he hardly ever remembered), he raised an eyebrow as his nephew clambered up with him.
Johji struggled with the tab on the top of the can, finally wrested it open and let out a little victory shout like he'd just won something, then frowned thoughtfully for a moment. He held it out to Tristan. "Cheer!" he cried.
Tristan actually chuckled.
Okay...that was cute.
He clicked Johji's can with his own. "Bottoms up," he said, and they drank.
They watched some of Kaiba's old duels, side-by-side like drinking buddies or something, and eventually, even though Tristan would've thought the drink would've had him wired for at least fourteen hours or so, Johji fell asleep.
He used his uncle's knee as a pillow, cradling his empty soda can in his tiny hands, and started to snore. Tristan sighed, smirking, and leaned back. A nap. Holy crap. Talk about a godsend.
Stacia showed up, along with Derek (her husband), about twenty minutes later. Tristan was awake, but kind of in a zone. So he blinked wearily at them and gave a halfhearted little wave. "Oi."
Johji was still snoring.
Stacia's smile reached her ears. "I swear, kid, you're the only person who can ever get that boy to take a nap." Tristan shrugged. She picked her son up with the ease of long practice (he didn't even twitch), and she saw the can he still clutched in his hands. "And he didn't start wanting this stuff until he saw you drinking it, you know. He hated vanilla."
Tristan stood up and frowned. "Seriously?"
"Yeah," Derek said. "Wouldn't even eat vanilla ice cream."
"...Huh."
"I know he's a handful," Stacia said. "But he really does look up to you. If Uncle likes something, Jo likes it, too. Your word is law. Thanks for looking after him again. I promise, I'll pay you back somehow."
Tristan gave a lopsided grin. "No worries. S'what family's for, right? I mean, besides the mental abuse." He turned toward the door. "Hey, I'm gonna head out. You guys have a good one."
"Thanks again," Stacia called out as he opened the door.
"You're a lifesaver, bro," Derek added.
Tristan waved again without turning around.
He was in the driveway, one leg swung over his bike, when his phone started to vibrate.
13.
All four of them were gathered in the same place for the first time since Mokuba's funeral.
Yugi had opted to meet out in the parking lot behind his grandfather's shop. Apparently he didn't want his family listening in, and his bedroom was too small for all of them. Joey, who had arrived first, was dribbling a faded white basketball as Tristan rode up on his ten-speed. Téa came out of the building with a pitcher of iced tea and a few plastic cups.
Yugi was standing in the middle of the lot, staring at the sky.
"All right," Joey said, tossing the ball aside as Tristan slid off his bike. "We're all here, Yug. What's goin' on?" He took a cup of tea from Téa but didn't drink. He was obviously concerned. So were Téa and Tristan. The spiky-haired teen was somber, distant, almost lethargic. As he turned to face his friends, though, they saw a kind of simmering, slow-cooking hope coming through on his face. He was torn. He looked like he wanted to believe something, but couldn't. Not yet.
He put his hands on the Millennium Puzzle hanging from his neck, cradling it. He looked at them all. "...I don't know if I could explain this if I tried. I can't...I can't...well. I'll let him tell you. I hope you can convince me. I really do."
Joey and Tristan looked at each other.
What the hell?
"Yugi...are you talking about...him?"
At this point, even Téa herself wasn't sure who she meant by "him." But Yugi nodded.
He closed his eyes, and the eye in the center of the golden pyramid in his hands began to glow. Yugi's bearing, his very being, changed. His stance turned easy, his head lifted and he looked confident. Almost cocky. His lips curved in a familiar smirk.
"...Yami..." Téa breathed.
"So I have been called," came a deep, velvety, dark voice from Yugi's lips. Joey's eyes narrowed slightly. He still wasn't sure what to make of this...version of his best friend. Tristan was less superstitious about it, but still less than comfortable.
Téa was awestruck.
"What's this about...Yami?" Tristan asked.
Yugi's body moved. It didn't feel right saying that Yugi himself moved. This wasn't Yugi. This was another entity, using Yugi's body. Pacing, arms clasped behind the back, looking as though he were briefing them on a mission they were about to undertake.
"You," he said, "at the core of it. And Yugi. And, consequently, me."
There was no response to this.
Yami continued. "It has been a week since the death of one Mokuba Yagami Kaiba. And you all have been affected by it. Perhaps more than you expected. I, myself, have been affected by it, and I can tell you that it surprises me to admit that."
"...Why? He's a kid. Kids aren't s'posed to die."
Yami chuckled in response to Joey's logic. "Your society has pampered you. I have seen innumerable children sent to Asar. In their grieving parents' arms, in their beds, abandoned on fields of war. Assassinated in the dark. Left to starve, left to freeze. Tortured, murdered, raped, eaten."
Téa blanched.
Joey stared.
Tristan looked slightly green.
"Children should be left to grow into adults before they die. This is truth. But the world lies, and you are all sorely mistaken if you think that the death of a boy of ten years, but one more of thousands in my experience, would affect me." Yami's eyes, halfway between violet and crimson like amethysts spattered with blood, gleamed hungrily.
For no reason they could understand, Yami withdrew something from a pocket of Yugi's jeans: a standard deck of playing cards. He began to shuffle, slowly, mechanically, not looking at them. He stopped suddenly, and withdrew the top card. Holding it between two fingers, he flipped it to show them.
The Ace of Spades.
"But Kaiba. Now he is an anomaly."
There was a moment of silence.
Tristan was the first to recover: "Yeah. A celebrity who hates people. Shocking."
Again, Yami looked amused. "You sound so dismissive," he said. "Are you telling me that Kaiba's current...state, doesn't interest you? The man has publicly admitted plans for suicide. Even if you do not sympathize...that has to intrigue you. Hasn't it?"
Tristan didn't answer.
Joey did. "Not really. What else was gonna happen?"
Yami raised an eyebrow. "...Hm. Interesting."
"This is morbid," Téa mumbled, sullen. "Why are we talking about this? What's this about, Yami? Even if Kaiba is going to go through with it...he probably is...what can we do about it? He's not going to listen to us. The only reason he ever even talked to us is because Mokuba forced him." Her voice hitched at the boy's name.
"You don't wanna cheer Kaiba up, do you?" Tristan asked. "'Cuz even if Mokuba was alive, that guy don't do cheerful."
Yami chuckled. "Are you willing to bet on that?" he asked.
"Yeah! I mean, seriously, man! Okay, so maybe we're not all authorities on Kaiba's moods or whatever, but I'd like to think I know enough about him to know that! The guy practically—"
"Lived for the boy," Yami interrupted. "I know. Yugi believes the same, and I do not refute the claim. And that is why it is possible. That is why he can be...ahem...saved. The answer, my friends, is simple."
From Yami's voice, the word "friends" didn't come out the way it should have.
It sounded more like "puppets."
"What answer?" Tristan asked.
"Yeah, Yu—uh, Yami. What the hell can we do?"
"I would have thought," he said, "that you might have guessed by now. But, perhaps you are more...narrow in your thought processes than I thought. No matter. I will tell you. The answer, of course, is to..."
He drew a second card from the deck in his left hand and grinned at it.
He added it to the ace in his other hand and showed them.
The Eight of Hearts.
"...Give him back his brother."
14.
"Seto-sama..."
Gentle. So gentle. He would normally have taken offense at this; it implied weakness. It implied pity. So he had been taught, and so he believed. Yoshimi pitied him. But of course, why care about that now? He should be pitied now. He was a pathetic waste of resources now, and the only person for whom he'd strained so mightily to be strong was gone now.
Was that not the very definition of pitiable weakness?
So he said nothing. A part of him, long-buried, even appreciated the gesture. She slipped into the room with tea, still steaming, and nothing else. No sugar, no cream, no milk. She had learned. She said, "Have you slept, Seto-sama?"
He did not move. His eyes continued to scan the wall in front of him. He muttered, "...An hour," and left his answer at that. Yoshimi did not press. It was not her place to press. She simply sighed, nodded. She turned to leave.
"Is there anything else you need?" she asked.
He did not answer.
She nodded again. This meant no, and she knew it.
She had learned.
Not from him. No. He had no time to teach his staff how to do their jobs. Yoshimi had learned from Him. Perhaps that was why he liked her. She had listened to Him. She had paid attention to Him. And, as expected, He had liked her, in turn.
And that, for some intangible reason, still mattered to him.
Whatever He had liked...was still important.
She stopped in the doorway and turned, glancing at the articles, maps, and photographs plastering the wall of the spare bedroom in which he spent his days now, looking like the headquarters of an international spy or professional assassin, and sighed. She wanted to say something to him. She wanted to tell him that this obsession was unhealthy, that she worried for his health and his mental state, that He wouldn't have wanted this.
Of course this was true; He would have wanted him to ignore his promises, to abandon them and focus on himself for once in his life. To let Him go and find his own happiness. To stop worrying about Him, to stop sacrificing for Him, and just...live.
But he couldn't.
There was no point.
And so she knew, already, that there was no point in telling him.
She said, "I'll be cleaning the halls, then. I'll be here if you need anything else, Seto-sama." She bowed. "Good night."
He did not answer.
She did not expect one.
She had learned.
15.
Yami glanced at the cards still in his hand, gave a dark little chuckle, and put them back in the deck before slipping it back into his pocket and crossing his arms.
He said, "So...do you understand the theory, here?"
His audience looked apprehensive. Scared. Almost sick. But, of course, that was logical. He knew that much. They were brave, each in their own way, but they were still children. Still naive, still coddled, still innocent. But that, he thought, was the key to convincing them. As Yugi sat inside his mind, listening, Yami could tell that he was beginning to soften what defenses he had mustered.
He was coming around.
It was time to step back. Time to let Yugi handle them.
Yami shifted.
Watched.
Waited.
Yugi began to speak, and of course they listened. He didn't talk about Kaiba, which was fine. Yami didn't mind much if his host didn't bother mentioning his motivations for this scheme. Better to play to theirs. And so he talked about Mokuba.
About how he was so brave, in spite of what he'd had to go through in his short life. About how it was never fair for someone to die so young, and wasn't it their responsibility as his elders and as his friends to do something about it if they could? How many people wished they could do this? How many people wished with inexorably broken hearts and endlessly teary eyes to be given a chance like this?
He presented an impressive case. For such a soft-spoken individual, he was quite persuasive when he wanted to be. He mentioned Duelist Kingdom. He mentioned that if they had been more observant, if they had been paying more attention, Mokuba never would have been thrown in Pegasus's dungeon, and he never would have had his soul stolen.
Very true.
Yami still felt a spasm of raw fury toward his host's friends for that.
He had made a promise at Duelist Kingdom. He had put himself on the line, put every last chip on the table, for that boy when the man named Saruwatari had taken him. Why he'd bothered, he still didn't know. Perhaps to see Kaiba's reaction when he found out. But Saruwatari did not play games, of course. Saruwatari did not gamble with his employer's most treasured chess piece. Not personally.
Yami had had no trouble playing against a stand-in for Mokuba's safety. Any challenge was good enough for him. And the Imposter had done a fair enough job of impersonating Kaiba that the game had been at least somewhat entertaining.
But of course, the point had been to procure Mokuba from the enemy. To give him back to Kaiba, and to handle Pegasus without interference. The absolute least he could have expected from them, (especially Joey and Tristan, who were accomplished fighters trained on the "mean streets" of Domino's underbelly), would have been to watch the boy, and make sure Saruwatari kept up his end of the bargain.
Of course, they hadn't, and Saruwatari made off with the boy..
For that failure, if absolutely nothing else, they owed this sacrifice to Mokuba.
They owed it to him.
Yugi felt his mounting indignation, and his body stiffened. He said nothing in direct response to it, but his testimony became even more impassioned. Now he began talking about Kaiba. He asked Joey, point-blank, how he would feel if it had been Serenity. He asked Tristan how his sister would feel, if it had been him.
He didn't ask Téa a direct question. Instead, he just gave her a look.
It was enough.
Their resolve was breaking.
Yugi stepped back, and Yami stepped up.
It was time to call it.
"So..." he said, now without a smile but still with some amount of amusement twinkling in his eyes. The three of them all flinched at his sudden return. He flicked the two playing cards he had displayed earlier back into his hand. "What do you say?"
He crunched them into a fist, opened his hand again, and blew a cloud of ash into the air.
"Shall we discard this dead man's hand?"
16.
All the proof she ever needed that things had changed around this estate came from the fact that he didn't order her out of the room as soon as he realized she was there. If there was one rule, one ironclad ordinance, on the Kaiba Estate, it was that no one was to disturb Seto-sama while he was sleeping.
The only person with permission to be anywhere near Seto-sama on the rare occasions he succumbed to sleep was, of course, Bocchan. But it seemed to Akiko as though the rules had changed now.
She had come into the room Seto-sama had since claimed as his private space (as far from his old bedchamber, and Bocchan's, as he could get without leaving the building) only to gather the dishes from his evening meal, but she had very nearly turned away when she saw that her employer's eyes were closed.
Of course, Seto-sama would never accept, "I didn't want to disturb you," as a valid reason to shirk one's responsibilities to the estate. Or, at least, the old Seto-sama wouldn't have. And Akiko was prepared to follow the old Seto-sama's instructions to the letter, whether the new (broken) Seto-sama expected it of her or not.
And so she entered.
Of course, Seto-sama was a light sleeper, and so it had been a fool's errand from the start to attempt not to wake him. A veteran soldier would have been too loud. The only person Akiko could think of that was silent enough to get the jump on the trained heir of Kaiba Gozaburo was Yugi Mutou.
As incredulous, indeed ridiculous, as that seemed.
Akiko turned to glance at Seto-sama as she made to leave and jumped when she realized his eyes were open. He was watching her studiously, and she felt her face grow hot. He murmured, in a tired, toneless voice, "Yoshimi."
She inclined her head. "My apologies, Seto-sama. I did not intend to disturb you."
"It's...no problem."
She blinked.
"...Seto-sama?"
But he no longer heard her. He flexed his fingers and looked down at the paperwork in his lap (not from Kaiba-Corp, of that much Akiko was sure), which he'd been marking with a thin felt marker.
He looked exhausted, but more than that, he looked completely unfocused.
His face was pinched, his eyes blank, his hair haggard and unkempt.
He looked dead.
But beneath the surface, Akiko realized, there was more to it.
He looked ready to cry.
17.
She wasn't sure what made her bring it with her. Maybe it was just for comfort.
Like a security blanket or something.
But as she walked, cold and jittery and altogether scared out of her mind, she wished she hadn't, because Yami was still in control of Yugi's body and, for the first time, Téa was face-to-face with what Yugi often called, "the reason he likes that name."
Yami had a very dark sense of humor.
As the four of them walked through the front gates of Vinewood Terrace—what Kaiba had called the neighborhood of the dead—Yami was up front, almost strolling. Joey and Tristan were tense, inching past headstones as if on a military training mission, and Téa was shivering. Her coat was too thin.
But Yami looked like he'd simply stepped out into his backyard.
He was singing something, and it took Téa a moment to realize that it was the same song filtering into her ears by way of the headphones wrapped around her head. It sent an all new shiver down her back, and she wished she hadn't brought her CD player with her.
It had seemed disrespectful to go into a cemetery listening to music, but she'd thought at the time that if she didn't have something to distract her, then she would have turned tail and been unable to go through with it. It had seemed like a way to bolster her courage.
Not anymore.
Yami was singing, voice lilting and far happier than the somber mood of the ballad playing in Téa's ears.
Joey stared at him, stunned, for a moment. "...You're fucked up, you know that?"
Yami pretended not to hear him, grinning like a little boy at Christmas and winking at Téa as he continued to sing.
Téa, despite herself, blushed.
"Like we got room to talk, Joe," Tristan muttered, huddled in a thick leather jacket he'd gotten from his sister on his birthday. "Think of how we were, back when we first met 'im."
Joey raised an eyebrow. "...Huh. Good point."
Yami stopped, glanced down to his left. "Here we are," he said, and gestured.
Mokuba's grave was marked by a nondescript stone identical to the pair of stones next to it. Téa read the inscription, remembered the dedication at the end of the video she'd watched, and her eyes began to burn.
Mokuba Yagami Kaiba
JULY 7, 1996 – OCTOBER 13, 2006
誠心誠意
"What...does that mean?" she asked, voice hitching.
Yami glanced where she pointed. His happy smile sobered a bit, but remained on his face. He said, "Seishinseii. Whole-hearted devotion." He chuckled and glanced up at the sky. "Touching, Kaiba. Very nice."
Téa found a smile for the first time in several hours.
Until Joey pointed out, "...Oi. I think these're their parents. Look at this."
And she looked at the marker to the left of Mokuba's.
YUKI YAGAMI
JUNE 23, 1961 – JULY 8, 1996
Devoted Wife and Mother
She will be Missed
And to the left of this:
KOHAKU YAGAMI
NOVEMBER 20, 1964 – AUGUST 15, 1999
His Strength was his Weakness
"Oh, God..." Téa managed. "She...their mother, she..."
"Died right after giving birth to Mokuba," Tristan muttered. "Yeah. Father died in a car accident when he was three. Kaiba was eight." He shook his head. "Kaiba's the only real parent he ever had. Small wonder the guy put his life on the line, out at Pegasus's castle. Kaiba was...he was a dad, lookin' out for his kid."
"He put more than his life on the table in that castle," Yami murmured.
"How you know that?" Joey asked Tristan.
"My nephew," the brunette replied. "Big Kaiba fanatic. Watches anything he can on the guy." He pointed to Yuki's grave. "Her maiden name was Sasaki. Kaiba took it on when he turned eighteen, kind of like a middle name."
"Mokuba's only got the one," Joey said, gesturing.
Tristan shrugged. "Yagami. Dad's name. No clue why he don't have both."
"His strength was his weakness..." Yami murmured, thoughtfully. "I thought so. Kaiba takes after his beloved father. With that in mind, it won't be long before we hear about Kaiba being killed in an automobile accident. So what say we get to business before that happens, shall we?" He bowed to Yuki's grave. "My sincerest apologies, Okaasama, but I am sure you will understand. We must take your youngest back for now. Dear Seto-chan needs him."
"Seto-chan?" Joey repeated incredulously. "Who the fuck would call Kaiba 'Seto-chan?'"
"She would," Tristan muttered.
"Seriously?"
"He wasn't always a prick."
Joey looked skeptical.
"My, but don't you have sympathy for a man who lost his mother at eight years old and became a father at eleven," Yami said, and there was no real venom to his voice. Still, Joey flinched and fell silent.
Yami glanced down at his watch. "...Hm. Well, look at that." He showed the others that it was past midnight. "It is now, officially, Kaiba's birthday. How ironic." Nobody believed the surprise in his voice. He'd planned this from the start. "So...you understand the sacrifice you must make for this ritual to work. Yes?"
He looked at each of them in turn.
"Yes."
"Uh-huh."
"...Yeah."
"You all are willing to make this sacrifice? Understand that once I begin, there is no turning back. Interruption will kill us all. If you must take time to decide, take it now. There must be no doubt."
It didn't take long. Standing here, it felt as if Kaiba's parents were watching them, daring them to back out. All Téa had to do was look at the Japanese inscription beneath Mokuba's (pitifully short) lifespan again, and she was convinced.
"I'm ready," she said.
"Let's do this," Joey added.
"...Go," Tristan said, drawing in a shaky breath that betrayed his nervousness.
Yami closed his eyes, and let out a shaky breath.
He opened them a moment later.
The grin was back in full force.
His eyes were crazed with adrenaline.
"Well, then. Let's all give Kaiba his birthday present."
18.
"You're still here."
Akiko jumped. She whirled to face Roland Ackerman, Seto-sama's personal assistant. He did not wear his usual sunglasses, and it was strange to see his eyes. They were tired eyes, nervous eyes.
"The others have all gone home," she said. "I was just finishing up."
Roland glanced at the blanket hung over one arm of the couch of the front parlor, where Akiko had been dusting when he found her. "You haven't been sleeping at home," he observed. It didn't sound like a reprimand. Akiko blushed.
"I just...I wanted to make sure...in case Seto-sama needs anything..."
Roland smiled. "I see." The smile quickly faded. "You...do realize that Master Kaiba has been on borrowed time ever since the funeral. He won't last much longer. Once he ascertains the identity of the man responsible for Young Master Mokuba's death, and...exacts payment for the crime...there is no hope for him."
Some part of Akiko did know this. She did know that her employer was at the frayed ends of his rope, and he was only holding on because he had a final mission to complete. She wasn't sure if he would explicitly commit suicide, or if he would just stop eating. Stop drinking. Stop maintaining any semblance of health.
But she knew that once Bocchan's death was avenged, Seto-sama would have no reason to keep going.
"I...I do," she said. "I know that, and I know there's no reason to try to...convince him to stay. He won't listen, and it will...it will only make him more convinced that he has to do it." Roland nodded somberly. "But...but for now, Seto-sama is still here, and I'm still being paid to work here. If I can do anything at all to...to help him along, right now...then I intend to do it."
"He doesn't expect, nor want, that from you."
"No. He doesn't. But Bocchan would."
Roland's eyes snapped wide. He frowned thoughtfully. "...Yes. Yes, I guess that's true."
"You guess, Mister Ackerman? Come now. You spent as much time with them as any of us. You know how protective Bocchan was. I know some of the others don't care, and I know why they don't care. But if I make it to Heaven when I die, and meet Bocchan there, I intend to look him in the eye."
The smile returned. "I see. Fair enough."
He turned toward the front doors, and started for them. He said, "But you know, Akiko, somehow I doubt the young master would forgive even you. When it came to Master Kaiba, he was as strict and demanding as Gozaburo ever was. And the very fact that we intend to let his beloved Niisama die is enough to damn us all."
Akiko frowned.
"That may be," she said, "but only one person could ever convince him to stay. And unless Bocchan walks through that door and tells me the secret personally, I'm not going to insult Seto-sama any more than I already have. He's had a hard life. He deserves to rest."
Roland watched her for a moment.
Finally, he said, as he turned to leave,
"...I see why he hired you, Akiko."
19.
His eyes burned. His muscles ached. He was exhausted, and it would have been right around now that He would have come into the room to tell him to go to sleep. And he would have said, In a little bit, Mokuba, and He would have said, You said that an hour ago, Niisama, you look dead, go sleep, please? and he would have eventually let Him convince him, and he would have slept.
Not anymore.
It was about the time he realized that a part of him was relieved at the lack of interruption that he started to cry.
20.
Téa was sobbing openly, and Tristan was still vomiting.
Joey had essentially recovered, but his face was still pale, and his eyes were bloodshot. His hands shook as he reached up to run them through his sweat-drenched hair. "Holy fuck, man!" he barked at Yami. "Don't tell me all that was just to get the goddamn casket out of the ground! I could'a brought a shovel!"
Yami chuckled.
"No," he said, in a placating voice, as he approached Mokuba's coffin. "Your part is done. Rest, my friends. You've earned it. And, ah...Tristan? Take care not to make a mess of Okaasama's grave marker, won't you? I doubt it would be much appreciated."
Tristan stumbled backward and spat onto the ground. "Jesus!" he hacked, struggling back to his feet. He shuffled over to Téa and helped her stand. "That better've fucking worked," he snapped.
Yami only grinned.
He placed his hands on the surface of the coffin, closed his eyes, and waited.
"What happens now?" Téa asked, still sniffling.
"Yeah...any fire, lightning? Confetti? A fuckin' mint on our pillow?" Joey demanded, then winced and held his head.
Yami didn't answer, even when Yugi began asking the same questions.
Patience...patience...
"Asar will provide," Yami murmured, and laughed.
"...What?"
"Never mind."
Time went on, and he knew they were growing restless. It seemed too easy. So simple, so little fanfare. The only proof they had that their efforts had done anything was the pain. The fact that Mokuba's casket was lying in front of them was the only other indication that anything at all had changed.
They wondered if this was nothing but a sick joke.
In the end, Yami wasn't sure that it wasn't.
But then it came. A knock. A cry. A confused voice, soft and scratching from two weeks of absolute, stifling silence. Yami's grin widened and, with a flourish, the airtight steel container meant to house Mokuba Kaiba for eternity was thrown open again.
"...Good God..." Tristan breathed.
"Holy shit..." Joey agreed.
Téa couldn't speak.
Yami crossed his arms, adjusted his shoulders, and chuckled.
Mokuba Kaiba, sitting amidst the only casualty the magic had claimed this night—the tattered remains of the black suit in which he'd been buried—looking pale and confused and frightened and cold but alive, doubtlessly alive, stared at his brother's rival as if he were some breed of angel.
"I believe the operative phrase now is, 'ta-da.'"
END.
Asar is one interpretation of the original Egyptian name of the god we know as "Osiris," the final Judge of the Dead.
Yami's card trick refers to Aces and Eights, the "dead man's hand." The legend of this five-card draw hand refers to the cards held by Wild Bill Hickock when he was murdered in August of 1876. The mythic hand holds both black eights as well as the black aces. I bent the legend a bit so as to fit Yami's point just a bit better. I hope that I may be forgiven. The Ace of Spades is classic Seto. Powerful, singular, decisive. The eight of Hearts, thus, is Mokuba. Why Hearts? Because its shape is the precise opposite of the spade. And in several ways, the same holds true for the Kaibas. Not enough to entirely overshadow the similarities, but I hope that my point still stands.
Right now, Yami holds them both in his hand, side by side, inexorably linked, just like the cards. And I'd venture to think he enjoys it very much.
Or...does he?