Kaiba clicked the office door shut as he quietly stepped inside.
The night view of the city greeted him with a bright moon, the first to extended itself across the sky after endless cloudy nights. Its silver glow gave birth to a myriad of stars sown into the dark cloth as well as down on Earth, the busy city trembling with shimmering lights.
Tired eyes wandered to the bubbles erupting in the water cooler, anxious ears listening to the constant humming of the computer waiting patiently at his desk for his return.
Slow footsteps led him to the assortment of papers scattered across his desk, a ring of keys looping around his finger as his gaze compartmentalized the tasks to complete.
As his hand reached down to a packet scribbled with notes and highlighter, the high pitched ringing of a telephone broke his action and instead summoned his attention.
Slim fingers wrapped themselves around the black receiver as he lifted it to his ear, his mouth shooting its usual greeting like smoke fired from a cigarette.
"Kaiba." He gruffed.
Silence.
"Hello?" He asked almost instinctively after hearing no response, eyes traveling down to the intercom, its red light flashing and signaling that the caller was not from within the building. That didn't seem at all likely, his secretary took every call and only passed on to him those she knew he was expecting.
A still silence lingered on the other side of the line, cut off only when Kaiba hung up, perspiration birthing on his neck.
A deep breath made its way down his throat as he picked up the receiver again, one finger pointed at the redial button.
A tall brunette entered the room just as he had pressed the button, her arms stacked with forms and contracts waiting to be delivered.
"I-I finished the-" She stuttered before being interrupted by the CEO.
"Do you not remember the knocking policy we established?" He scolded coldly whilst slamming the receiver down and remembering just how much he despised having a new secretary.
Her gaze fell to the floor as if she would find her answer there, her thickly glossed lips parting as to spit out an answer.
"It won't happen again." She managed to mumble, turning to look him in the eyes.
"Set them on the desk and go home." He ordered, his voice like bark being stripped off a tree. She took a quick glance at her employer before setting the folders down neatly on the desk and scurrying out, the clicking of her heels gradually fading.
He sighed and mentally swore he would start making the newer employees undergo IQ tests, for his sake.
He turned back to his desk and decided to let go of the telephone ordeal, surely a mistake had been made and someone had dialed he wrong number, hesitating upon hearing the wrong voice.
The building moaned in protest to the strong winds outside, its whipping tails crashing into the window behind him, signaling it was time to leave before the weather once again unleashed itself, besides he knew the fear Mokuba felt when a thunderstorm raged outside, despite his coy attitude about not admitting it.
He briskly packed a selection of files into his briefcase before clicking it shut, taking one last longing look at the telephone as he shut off the lights.
He stepped through the door and scanned the waiting room outside his office one last time, a strong stench of excessive perfume floating in the air. His features wrinkled in disgust at the intoxicating smell as he set his briefcase down on the floor and paused to lock his office.
A light beeping caught his attention just as he past the secretary's desk, a bright white light flashing rapidly in the dark.
Again, his briefcase met with the soft carpet beneath as Kaiba traced the source of the noise and light to a tattered cellphone sitting alone on the small desk. Its shattered screen flashed on and off, announcing the failure to send a message.
His eyes darted up at the sound of what he thought had been a hushed whisper, perhaps the secretary returning to retrieve the object, then lowered back to the device when he heard nothing more.
His fingers wrapped themselves around the worn cell phone lifting it up gently. A trickle of water slid out from a crack beneath the keypad and onto his wrist. Surely the new secretary wouldn't be carrying this piece of crap around, he highly doubted it even functioned properly anymore.
He pressed the send button and watched the screen flicker from color to black and white as a small envelope slid back and forth until bold black letters approved the send.
The screen flickered one last time before completely going dark.
Kaiba stood motionless, the phone in his hands, as if expecting something else to happen. Just as he was about to toss it into the trash his own cell phone loudly vibrated in his coat pocket, breaking the silence. He looked down at the bright light shining through the coat then back at the phone in his hands, confusion clouding over his orbs.
"What in the world?" He murmured to himself, setting down the phone on the desk and slipping his hand into the coat pocket.
He pulled out his cellphone, bright blue letters announcing the arrival of a new message. He hesitated briefly before tapping the screen, an envelope opening to reveal three words Kaiba had heard only once in his life from someone besides his brother and parents, someone long gone.
His mind raced with questions as he scrolled down the message, reaching the date and sender, brow furrowing into pure confusion as his eyes scanned the bright screen.
His heart began to pound in his ears, the solitude of the night creeping into his senses.
The date was exactly the same as today, except three years ago, the sender had been tagged as unknown.
A heavy knock on the door tore through his spine, leaving a harsh tremble in its path.
"Did I startle you?" Silver said with a grin on her face as Kaiba violently turned to be met with her questioning gaze.
Her thick curls cascaded down past her shoulders in waves of black like plumes of smoke tangling amongst each other. She had changed from the school uniform into a pair of jeans that lead down to brown boots and enveloped her torso in a matching dark brown jacket, her hands well tucked into its front pockets.
"What the Hell are you doing here and who in God's name let you in?" Kaiba seethed back with ice in his voice, deciding to ignore the fact that she had indeed startled him.
"Religious, are we?" She replied taking slow steps into the office, her hands still tucked inside her coat. The familiar scent of strawberry drifted into Kaiba's nose, his stomach churning in disgust.
She stopped a few steps in front of the CEO, her gaze still not accustomed to swimming in his, instead they drifted off to the tattered cellphone sitting on the desk.
"Is that yours?" She asked, having seen him holding it before, incredulous. She took one hand out of her pocket as she picked up the broken device, a bright silver ring on her finger with a large polished stone in the middle. She turned the phone over and over, her eyes traveling its every crack.
"It's very... apt for you." She joked as Kaiba snatched the phone from her hands and tucked it into his coat pocket.
"I asked you a question." He said, his tone dead like the color of the night.
"Actually you asked two and I think you know why I'm here." She replied, her expression hardening.
Kaiba stared back just as intently, his stomach flipping to the heat of a brewing lie. She couldn't know he stole the page, no one had seen him go into the basement nor come out, that he was sure of.
"I'm giving you one last chance to tell me the truth and hand it over." She said taking two more cautious steps towards him, their bodies lingering in the same aura.
She knew.
He didn't know how but she knew he'd stolen the page from her record sheet.
"Leave." He growled, peering deep into her eyes.
"If this is about the case, you're not going to find anything of use to you there." She replied, her voice becoming a plea.
"How do you know I haven't already read it?" He replied slyly as he watched her expression falter.
Her eyes widened like the moon outside, her lips curling into a frown of concern.
"Leave." He repeated, this time his confidence seeping through his triumphant grin. Her gaze dropped momentarily and Kaiba knew he had this won, whether or not anything useful was on that paper her wasn't going to give her the joy of taking it away from him.
She sighed and Kaiba watched as her eyes traveled back up meeting his.
"I'm sorry." She said in a meek whisper, the words filling the air with a strange pigment of intimacy.
Kaiba furrowed his brow at her sudden confession, her trembling eyes peering at him through her thick lashes reminding him of Mokuba when reprimanded.
"What are you talking about?" He spewed, her presence and strange behavior irritating his low amount of patience.
"The file. Your parents and my-" She began before a loud creaking interrupted her words, the building again moaning in protest and cutting into her sentence.
"What was that?" She whispered although to herself, for the CEO was no longer listening, his gaze widening in thought.
The lights in the hallway outside the waiting room began to flicker off, one by one, the computer screen on the secretary's desk doing the same.
Silver stood, hypnotized by the perfect sequencing of the lights while Kaiba nudged a key into his office door, prying it open, the girl's presence forgotten to him.
"What's going on?" She asked, panic creeping into her voice as she began to take hesitant steps towards Kaiba's office, her trembling fingers now wrapped around each other.
Her question again went unanswered as Kaiba pulled the broken cell phone from his pocket and began to take it apart. He set the pieces down on his desk and searched through them as the lamp inside his office began to dim.
Silver watched quietly as Kaiba pulled out a microchip form the phones remains, a microchip marked KC. Beneath the company's initials was a name, a name written in neat handwriting with permanent marker.
Skyelaar.
Silver panted with fear, her eyes narrowing to the name Kaiba held up with trembling fingers.
"Skyelaar?" She read aloud, questioning its significance just as the office lights went out completely, leaving her and Kaiba engulfed in a haunting darkness.