Chapter 28

'I passed,' Catilin's whole being filled with confusion as she found herself back in the field she'd started in, 'but I don't… I don't understand...'

It was hard to explain, but from the moment her challenge had started something had felt wrong with it. The imagery she was faced with was out of place and it was almost as if she was staring into the face of someone else's demons. Yet at the same time the feelings it invoked in her felt like her own, but she couldn't remember feeling that way about them before.

'Duel Soul,' she stared down at the soul card she was holding, 'you belong to Yugi, so why did I win you? Were those his demons just now? Did I win you because those were his demons? I don't...' she shook her head, 'I don't understand.'

The card stared silently back at her, making no attempt at a reply. Catilin sighed and glanced around for Ahna, as she did her old friend appeared out of nowhere. Laughing at the happy coincidence, Catilin leapt towards her and threw her arms around her.

'You passed.'

'Yeah, I guess I did,' she laughed in relief as she pushed Catilin off her and stared down at the card she was holding. 'Covo…'

'Ahna...' Catilin hesitated.

'What is it?' Ahna glanced up at her.

'Was... was your challenge like you thought it would be?'

'Uh... yes and no,' she shifted her gaze away. 'I mean, it matched up to what I've been feeling since I got here, but...'

'It felt like you were chasing someone else's demons, right?' Catilin wrapped her arms around herself.

'What are you thinking Cat?' Ahna's eyes lifted to study her carefully.

'I don't... I don't know,' she turned, 'I don't understand anything right now. It all feels... wrong and... and not just because the air is so still anymore or because I have a tattoo and you don't. Everything feels wrong. Look,' she held her soul card towards Ahna, 'this is Yugi's, why do I have Yugi's?'

'You're his Win, aren't you?'

'But I don't love him, I love Duke. So shouldn't I have Duke's card right now? Why do I have his? Why am I connected to him when I should be connected to Duke? I don't understand.'

'You being in love with Duke doesn't make him more connected to you by default. You're still Yugi's Win... at least I think you are,' Ahna frowned. 'I've always made that assumption because of Lillyannu and Yoam, but I guess Mokuba could be Yugi's Win. Although if that was the case I'm not sure you'd be the one holding Yugi's card right now, so I guess logic dictates that you are Yugi's Win.'

'But I don't want to be Yugi's Win and I don't want to face his demons for him, it doesn't make sense.'

'Face his demons for him?' Ahna shook her head in confusion.

'Mm, I think those were his demons just now, because they didn't look like mine. Well... they did look like mine, but they didn't feel like mine.'

'You have demons?' There was something about Ahna's tone which suggested she might be joking, but the delivery was as lame as the attempted joke itself.

'I'm a Calicaccu who can't remember her childhood,' she lowered her voice, 'of course I have demons. You know I have demons, but I always try to be brave and face them head on.'

'I know, I'm sorry, you just act so carefree most of the time it's hard to remember you actually worry about things,' Ahna placed a hand on her shoulder. 'I also know you're not always brave when it comes to facing them, unless of course you're about to tell me you have an allergy to doctors.'

'Well duh, of course I do,' Catilin poked her tongue out. 'We should get moving now, right?'

'That's exactly what I was thinking,' Ahna scanned the horizon. 'So, which way do you want to go?'

The first thing he became aware of was the sharp snapping of camera shutters, accompanied by blinding flashes. His eyes lifted to a sea of reporters stood in what appeared to be one of Kaiba Corps larger press rooms. For a few long seconds the snapping of camera shutters was the only noise in the entire room, then a wall of overlapping voices hit him like a crashing wave. It was unnervingly surreal, but all he could do was stand there and wonder what the hell had happened to Kaiba.

As his eyes glanced around the conference room, he spotted two members of Kaiba Corp PR department stood not too far behind him and the glass top podium in front of him. All these little details did was add to the complete and utterly nuts surrealism of the situation. It was finding yourself sitting a test you didn't know was coming or walking into the wrong person's birthday party. He was so baffled by the whole situation it took him a while to realise the mesh of voices had shrunken down to one.

'Mr Kaiba,' a redheaded reported in the front row waved the pad she was holding in order to get his attention, 'Mr Kaiba are you in there?'

'Err…' he found himself blinking at her.

'Mr Kaiba, I am waiting for an answer to my question,' her voice was chillingly calm, 'we all are.'

'I... I'm sorry,' he stammered, as he tried to work out which of two possible reasons she might have been calling him Mr Kaiba for was more likely, 'I didn't hear the question, could you repeat it?'

'The rumours, Mr Kaiba, are they true?'

'Rumours?' He found himself shaking his head.

'Don't play dumb with us Mr Kaiba,' a reporter from the other side of the got to his feet, 'you know full well what rumours we're talking about.'

'If I knew what rumours you were referring to, I wouldn't ask,' he tried to remain as calm as possible.

'The rumours that you're in love Mr Kaiba,' the redhead smirked at him, 'we're all dying to know if they're true.'

'Those aren't the rumours I'm interested in,' another reporter got to her feet, 'I want to know if it's true you've been running from those feelings. And if the method you've been using to run from them involves...'

Her sentence was cut off by a loud commotion at the back of the room. The sea of reporters parted to reveal five white coated men attempting to restrain a terrified Kaiba. In his chest he could feel his heart beating a mile a minute with every inch of the confusing fear he was feeling. The second the word love had been mentioned, his palms had started to sweat and everything in him had tried to suppress any certainty he might have had. And now to make matters worse he was seeing what should have been his own worst fear happening to the person who mattered most to him; this couldn't be real.

'Seto,' Kaiba managed to break free of the white coats and made a mad dash towards the podium.

'What's going on?' He stared at his friend as he dove into his arms.

'They want to hurt me; you have to protect me, please.'

'What?' His eyes lifted towards the men in white coats.

'That's not true sir,' one of the white coats made his way towards them, 'we only want to help him.'

'By scaring him to death?'

'Sir, the man is mentally ill.'

'Mentally ill?'

'This man has attempted suicide on multiple occasions, he's suffering from long term depression and now there's the issue of his memory. He belongs in a home, somewhere professionals can take care of him.'

'No, no you're wrong,' he shook his head, 'none of those things are true. He doesn't need professional care. He doesn't.'

'Look at his arms, sir, the evidence is pretty clear for everyone to see.'

For a few moments he found himself hesitating. Then his hands carefully reached for the sleeve of Kaiba's black shirt. Pulling it down he revealed an arm full of familiar scars; every single one of them exactly where they should have been on him. His hand then moved towards his own sleeve, pulling it down to reveal his own arm was clear of any kind of self-mutilation.

'This isn't possible,' he shook his head, 'this isn't right; this isn't the way things are supposed to be.'

'Sir we need to take him now,' by this time the white coat had reached them, 'we need to take him somewhere secure. Somewhere he won't be a burden to others.'

'No,' he put his arms protectively around Kaiba and took a step back, 'I won't let you take him. I've been coping perfectly fine with him on my own. He doesn't need any help. He only needs me and I will find a way to fix this.'

He wasn't totally sure where these words were coming from, but for the first time since he'd arrived in this crazy place something made sense to him. These words, these feelings, sure they might have been uncertain and confusing, but they were real and they were his. And he knew... he knew he'd felt this way for a while, even if he'd been constantly suppressing it.

'There is no way of fixing this sir,' the white coat took a cautious step towards them. 'The way he is now, he's always going to be like it. His brain's been damaged you see, because a part of his soul was destroyed. He was suicidal once, you remember that, don't you sir? Just think how distressed he might become if he realises what he was capable of whilst he can't remember why? Do you really want to have to deal with that?'

'Yes, I do. I have to be the one to deal with it, because I already have. Do you really think we've gone six months without that ever becoming an issue,' again the words poured out of him before he could stop them. 'I have dealt with it. I can deal with it. I don't need anyone else to help me. He doesn't need anyone else but me. And I will fix this.'

'I told you sir; there is no way of fixing this. You can't repair this kind of damage.'

'I will find a way,' he gritted his teeth, 'and even if there isn't a way I will still be the one to look after him, do you hear me? You won't take him away from me. I won't let you take him away from me.'

Every word which came out of his mouth made his head hurt with a bizarre kind of surrealism. A part of him couldn't totally believe he was the one saying them, because he knew... he knew with a strange kind of certainty if he was the person he believed himself to be then these weren't the words he would be using. Then again he wouldn't have been the one wilfully suppressing emotions he'd spent months and months coming to terms with.

He found himself staring down at the guy in his arms. The one who looked like Kaiba but acted like Tristan. The one who was too innocent to suppress the emotions he knew was there. The one who would truly be capable of saying the words he knew beat within his own heart.

'Sir, you must let us take him, it's for his own good,' the white coat was right next to them now, reaching his hands towards them.

'You can't take him,' he felt like he was staring down into a weird reflection of himself as his head started to spin. 'I won't let you take him. I don't care what problems he has or how hard life is going to be for us, I won't let you take the person I love away from me.'

As he said the words the person in his arms transformed from Seto Kaiba into Tristan Taylor. Even though his mind had slowly been coming around to the idea that he wasn't the person he thought he was, waking up to the truth was like walking backwards through a dream. Tristan's memories, his thoughts and feelings were still floating around his head, only now they were just an abstract part of himself slowly fading away into obscurity.

'I am Seto Kaiba,' his voice was low enough for only him to hear, as if he needed to reassure himself of the information. 'I am Seto Kaiba.'

There was a sudden burst of noise from the room around him. The sea of reporters was pretty much going wild now. Cameras were snapping left, right and centre, pens were manically being scribbled across notepads, Dictaphones were being raised high and moved as close to the podium as possible. The five white coats had also disappeared, merging seamlessly into the swarming sea of people forming a tight semicircle around them.

'Mr Kaiba,' the redheaded reporter stepped forward, 'are you saying the rumours are true?'

'Yes,' after all the confusion, uncertainty and self-denial he'd been through the confession felt like a huge weight had been lifted.

'But he has so many problems, are you really willing to commit yourself to him? What if he forgets who you are? What if you never find a way to fix him? What will you do if your future together will forever be haunted by what you did to him? Is love really enough to brush something as big as that under the carpet?'

'How...?' He found himself staring at the redhead.

'Are you going to answer the question or not Mr Kaiba,' her voice was as firm as her gaze. 'Are you really willing to commit yourself to him, no matter what? Do you really, genuinely, hand on your heart honestly love him?'

Her question brought everything around them to a sudden and almost surreal standstill. For what felt like an eternity the only beings in the room who seemed to be working on real time was the redhead, Tristan and Kaiba himself. Her gaze remained cool and calm, but it faded into irrelevance the second Kaiba turned his attention towards Tristan. All the uncertainty he'd had, all the time he'd spent blaming the Pure for what he was feeling, suddenly felt stupid and ridicules; a denial he'd been forcing onto himself because he was afraid. But he wasn't afraid anymore, how could he be?

'Mr Kaiba, please, answer my question,' the redhead broke the silence, 'do you or do you not love him?'

'Yeah,' he gave a strange half laugh, 'I do.'