~XxX~
"Urgh, don't you have a car or something we could take?" I had been walking with Yami and Kaiba for the better part of an hour without complaint, but now, my mind was wandering and when my mind wanders, I talk a lot.
"Of course I have a car Callaghan," Kaiba sighed from my right side, continuing to walk, "I have several, but I have no wish for you to dampen the seats or leave any of my expensive cars smelling like wet dog." I sighed, refusing to rise to the bait, preferring instead to rub my bare arms with my hands to stave off a chill from the wind.
The wind that was picking up drastically.
Far too drastically to be natural.
"Not again..." I moaned loud nough to be heard over the racket of the oncoming chopper, the rest of my rant about conventional methods of travel was cut short by the sight of a small body hanging from the chopper, I gaped at little at the sight, my brain unable to compute what I was seeing..
"Mokuba?" Kaiba had beaten me to the puch, my yell hitting the air a millisecond after him and Yami's a second after me, the three of us looked on in mortification, I barely knew the kid, but I had met him briefly when I was looking for Yugi and Teá a while back. Seeing him almost certain discomfort, bound and dangled out of an airborne chopper was something sadistic and I froze in disbelief at the sight. This...didn't happen in London. The sound of someone clearing their throat alerted us to the presence of another. The sound was too quiet to be heard normally, but the pitch of the man's voice was unreal, it was far to high to be human, as was one half of his face...
My brain, which had been feeling like cotton wool at the at the sadisticness of the blatent kidnapping, suddenly kickstarted into overdrive leaving me champing at the bit to rip the stupid mask off this prick's face, I didn't advance on him though, the fact that he was dangling a twelve-year-old out of a helicopter made me think he wouldn't think twice before hurting me. "WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU DEMENTED-" I was forced to bite my tongue by a look from Kaiba, but not one of the usual, "Shut the hell up Callaghan" looks.
"That's quite enough Callaghan," well, it was better than the latter, he turned his head to nail the other man with a glare, "What do you want?" The ice in his tone made me shiver, earning me a mildly concerned look fromYami, I suppose that was logical, I was still damp and the wind being whipped up wasn't doing much for my temperature, I shrugged, arms folded, and turned back to also glare my best at the half-masked man, awaiting his reply, he didn't seem in a hurry to do so though. Instead he looked from Yami, to Kaiba, to me and back to Yami again.
"In addition to the Mokuba Kaiba we kidnapped, we also came into the possesion of Teá Gardner and Joey Wheeler, if you wish to see either of them again-" he turned his eyes to Kaiba, "And if you wish to have your little brother back," eyes back to Yami, "You will duel us ontop of that building in fifteen minutes time." He stabbed his finger in the direction of a massive glass building, it looked half the size of the Kaiba Corp tower, and just as egotistical. I frowned, my health and safety brain not liking the sound of this one bit, "We await your arrival." With the last word he made a circle motion above his head, signalling the chopper, which roared upwards and away as he scaled a buildng in a manner that even the best parkour artists would be jealous. Several seconds passed with stunned silence being the topic until I decided to break it.
"Can we use your car now?"
~XxX~
Ten minutes.
It had taken us ten minutes to sprint from the plaza we were at to the last floor of this farce of an achitectural brainstorm session. Who puts a glass staircase in? As I was pondering this over my mind was still running, asking more questions.
Who were these kidnappers?
Why were they targeting these two?
Was I really going to watch two guys I considered friends duel two absolute nutcases ontop of a glass building?
I couldn't get an answer for the first two questions without asking, but the last question appeared to have a resounding "yes" sound silently between the three of us as we looked at the fire-door. It's strange, a door isn't daunting usually, but when you know that you may fall to your death, either through glass or off a buliding due to turbulence, it suddenly becomes freakishly scary.
"I-" My voice tailed off as I looked at my two current companions, for once, I was lost for words, the gravity of the situation hitting me between the eyes; lives of people we knew and cared for were at stake, over a cardgame. Instead of listening to my cowardly side, which at that current moment in time was screaming at me to run for my life, I shifted my gaze from them, straightened my back and pushed the door open and using my "arrogant" stride to get across the roof, all the feigned confidence quickly drained through my Converses the second I saw the two kidnappers, but I kept that to myself. I instead cast my eyes around the roof for possible escape routes as Yami and Kaiba began to-well, get rightfully angry at the the men.
"A Tag-Duel?" In spite of it all, I rolled my eyes from the sidelines, though Yami and Kaiba were standing side-by-side and ontop of a glass roof, Duel-Disks at the ready, Kaiba still refused to co-operate. Yami mirrored my manouvere, rolling his eyes and snapped at him to stop complaining, they had to work as a team. I stood a little off to the side, staring at the four duelists before sighing a little, I felt like a fifth wheel. Of course, seconds after the thought wandered past my mind I chastised myself for thinking selfishly under the circumstances before looking around for a second time.
Glass.
Palms.
Fire-Door.
50-metre sheer drop.
Well that was helpful Soso. I rolled my eyes at my mind's snark, but, it was right, I really couldn't be much help here. Except as a cheering squad. "Great." I muttered before taking a deep breath, I'd never really cheered anyone on before, unless you counted cheering England on at the World Cup; clapping rythmically didn't seem the way to go currently however. I let out the breath, it was pointless me trying to cheer them on, I'm no good at motivating anyone to do anything, I can manipulate them, sure, but not motivate and I've been trying to leave the "manipulative bitch" me behind. As an alternative I sat on the glass cross-legged and watched the duel with interest.
~XxX~