"we don't have a choice on whether we do social media, the question is how well we do it."

~Socialnomics: How Social Media Transforms the Way we Live and do Business, Erik Qualman

Chapter 12

Seto had been fully immersed in a report from the development lab on the latest tests of Kaiba Corp's highly anticipated VR pods when he heard a motorcycle pulling up the driveway. Instantly, his eyes went to his home office window even though there was only one person it could be. What had Alistair been doing out so late? His paranoia instantly activated, his first thought was that Alistair must have been meeting with his old colleagues to finally bring his long game to fruition and attempt to dismantle Kaiba Corporation for a second time. But even as he thought it, Seto knew it was unlikely. Without a powerful employer, what could Alistair really hope to do? He could be in cahoots with an ambitious underling, Seto supposed, but he could think of no one at headquarters with the deviousness as well as the deceit it would take to actually hurt him. And besides, when would Alistair have even met such a person? So what had he been up to? He watched as the garage door closed and debated whether or not to confront his guest once he came upstairs. He could easily beat the information out of him if he wanted to, but the idea of lowering himself to the tactics of a common thug was immensely distasteful. No, if he wanted to know what Alistair was up to, he needed to be careful. Send Saito to trail him, perhaps.

He yawned just then and sat back in his chair, his gaze flicking to the clock on his computer. As much as he wanted to have finished the report, the small number three on the desktop acted as a siren song, calling him to sleep, and he finally shut it down.

As he fell into bed a half an hour later, Seto was still thinking up reasons why Alistair might have been out until three in the morning. It was only after he'd closed his eyes that it occurred to him with an unexpected sadness that perhaps Alistair's late-night activity had had nothing to do with him at all.

For the next week, everything appeared to have returned to normal. Alistair did nothing to lead Seto to believe he was on the brink of a foray, Mokuba continued his seemingly never ending barrage of commentary about Hillary and the friends she'd introduced him to, and Seto went to work and carried on overseeing both the Kaiba Land construction developments and the progress on the VR pods. These activities in addition to his regular workload often kept him at work until late into the night. However, despite all appearances to the contrary, Seto often checked out by midday, his fingers clacking away at his keyboard, but his mind already at home.

Two distinct topics were keeping him preoccupied. The first was his brother. More specifically, his brother's recent secrecy. Because for all that he liked to talk about his girlfriend to anyone who would listen, Mokuba always managed to neglect to mention where they were going and what they were actually doing every day. Despite not having had the freedom that Mokuba did at that age, Seto felt he had a fairly accurate working understanding of what a fourteen year old boy would do if left to his own devices, and assumed that Mokuba and his newfound friend group hung out together and played video games or went to play Duel Monsters in the park and was none too concerned-especially after having Saito check into the matter to confirm his suspicions.

What was bothering Seto wasn't what Mokuba was doing, but rather that he was hiding it from him, whether purposefully or not. Did Mokuba feel that he no longer needed a confidant in him? The idea was too painful to explore for long, though it lurked on the fringes of his thoughts no matter how he tried to dispel it.

The second thing taking up his focus was Alistair. He'd told Saito and Kanzo to alert him immediately if Alistair left the grounds, and so he knew that he hadn't since returning late Friday night. That should have been the end of it, but it maddeningly wasn't. He prided himself on his ability to bind down any unwanted emotion and was therefore all the more annoyed by his increasingly impossible to ignore attraction to the Orichalcos warrior. He knew that it was unwise to risk compromising himself by letting Alistair come that close. He knew that even if he wanted to be reckless it would be impossible and he would only humiliate himself further. The irritatingly redundant inner monologue about the importance of not indulging his instinct to pin Alistair to his bed and have his way with him had become a skipping record so annoying it made him want to bang his head against a wall in frustration.

A subtle beeping broke into his already divided concentration and in the two seconds it took him to reach over and accept Valerie's message he realized he'd made several typos in the email he'd been writing.

"What is it?" he asked her with a hint of annoyance.

Completely unruffled, Valerie informed him that the PR manager and his team had arrived.

Seto closed his eyes briefly before telling her to send him in. He could only imagine what odious new plans Tanaka had cooked up since their last meeting.

Fumito Tanaka was one of the only Kaiba Corporation employees that had survived the Seto Kaiba coup and consequent blitzing of his step-father's staff. He had achieved this mainly through his understanding of ambition and just how close to the sun he could allow it to take him so that he could always bask in its warmth without melting his wings. Early on, he'd made sure to make himself utterly indispensable, his meticulously crafted proposals never failing to procure positive results. Consequently, he enjoyed a certain degree of respect from the incumbent CEO even though he knew the latter didn't particularly like him or his ideas. But Mr. Kaiba's respect was valuable enough to gain him a devoted following within the company as well as a core group of jealous underlings he could boss around, and what more, besides his sizable paycheck, did he really need?

After receiving permission to enter Mr. Kaiba's office, Tanaka signaled his two lackeys to follow him so that when Valerie opened the door, they formed a sort of entourage that never failed to make him feel powerful.

From the moment Tanaka and his underlings entered his office, Seto made sure to project nothing more than a grudging willingness to listen, his hands steepled on his desk, and his face utterly void of expression. It was the same tactic he used when talking to Pegasus because, like Pegasus, Tanaka had a habit of getting under his skin. And he knew that the public relations manager knew this all too well, but because of his stellar track record and toeing of the line of subordination, Seto was forced to endure him, and even, to some extent, follow his advice.

"Good afternoon, Mr. Kaiba," Tanaka said, his voice almost as slick as his greying hair which he insisted on styling like a man twenty years his junior. "I hope you're well."

"If you don't mind, I'd rather skip the pleasantries," Seto deadpanned impatiently.

"Yes, of course." Tanaka snapped his fingers and the two members of PR he'd brought with him jumped into action, one quickly setting up a company laptop, and the other inserting a flash drive and portable projector. Within minutes, they'd pulled up their boss's most recent presentation, the Kaiba Corporation insignia now shining on the far wall, but Seto kept his eyes fixed on Tanaka.

"It's no secret that since the rather... unfortunate events of last spring we've run into a bit of trouble in terms of our image," Tanaka began with an unnecessarily theatrical lilt. "But you'll be pleased to know that in addition to the many projects we have in the works, I have contrived a foolproof plan to not only enhance the success of those ventures-I'm speaking of course of the VR pods and Kaiba Land-but also to elevate your brand overall."

Tanaka was in the full throes of his own genius now, his genuine smile one of pure self-satisfaction.

"You recall, I'm sure, the recent tabloid theory regarding a romantic relationship between yourself and Miss Mai Valentine."

Seto felt his eye twitch and redoubled his efforts to keep all the muscles in his face under control. "Vividly," he replied icily.

"While that may have been wholly fabricated," Tanaka went on quickly, "it did give me some evidence to back up the proposal I have come to you with today. First, let me ask a question: who do you think is the most talked about duelist currently on the circuit?"

Seto gave an exaggerated shrug to spur Tanaka on to his point.

"You might be surprised to know that it is neither Yugi Motou nor even yourself." He snapped his fingers again, and one of his assistants clicked to the first slide of the presentation which depicted several graphs displaying statistics for the top ten most discussed duelists across various mediums including mainstream news and social media. While Seto saw with some satisfaction that he and Yugi were neck-in-neck for the most talked about duelists on the mainstream news, he didn't even make the top three on social media. And even more infuriating, when compared with each other, it was clear that, overall, by far the most talked about duelist was-

"Mai Valentine?" Seto said through clenched teeth. "She's never even ranked in the top three of any national tournament!"

"You seem surprised," Tanaka observed with no surprise at all. "But let me explain. It's fairly straightforward. As you point out: she's not the best duelist, and yet, people are talking about her. Why? Of course, starring alongside you in an ad could be enough to explain it, but if you trace this trend back even just over a year, she has consistently far outperformed everyone else. And there's a simple explanation as to why that should be the case." Another snap led to a slide featuring a screenshot of Mai's recent posts on a popular app called "PictureThis." On it, Mai had uploaded pictures of herself at various events, provocative selfies, and pictures of her own fake nails and perfume bottles.

"What am I looking at?" Seto demanded, his patience at an all time low for the day.

"What you're looking at is half of the secret to her recent success," Tanaka explained with a grin. "It may look meaningless to us, but to her fans, of which almost two and a half million follow her on PictureThis, these pictures offer a window into the life of someone who has crafted herself to be a woman that every girl wants to be and every man wants to be with. And the attention she has gotten for something so simple has resulted in her being offered sponsorships by several major international clothing and makeup companies and even by us, hence her appearance in the Kaiba Air commercial. Additionally, she has seized these opportunities to launch a clothing line of her own and as a platform to discuss women's rights." The two new photos projected onto Seto's wall showed Mai standing at the end of a runway in a skimpy black dress and speaking into a microphone at a radio studio. "In other words," Tanaka continued, subconsciously running a hand down the lapel of his well tailored suit, "a woman with no ostensible right to such fame is nonetheless a rising success due purely to the power of social media."

"This is what I pay you for?" Seto snapped, his hands, though still steepled in front of him, were pressed so tightly together that they were starting to shake. "Anyone with half a brain could have told me that!"

"That may be so," Tanaka agreed, his dark eyes glittering in a way that left Seto in no doubt that he was about to be told something he wouldn't like. "But then ask yourself this, Mr. Kaiba: why is it not you at the top of those charts?"

"What does it matter?" Seto asked angrily, knowing full well but hoping to delay the inevitable conclusion.

"It matters because just like you were the one to elevate our company to a higher level than anyone would have thought possible, now that that same company is, if I may be so bold, in a slump, you are the best investment that we have at the moment."

"So what do you propose?" Seto couldn't stop himself from glaring, the expression causing the two PR reps to shift uncomfortably.

"I propose several things." Tanaka stroked his lapel again. "First, I would highly recommend that we increase your social media presence. The Kaiba Corporation 'PictureThis' account has a moderate following, but I can't say that it generates a compelling amount of interest. You, on the other hand, as evidenced by the success of Miss Valentine and, to some extent, Mr. Motou and Mr. Devlin, absolutely would."

"That's your big plan?" Seto scoffed, his posture relaxing considerably. "You're seriously saying that posting pictures of my fingernails on 'PictureThis' is going to get this company out of the slump you claim it's in? Get real. We have two major projects in the works that need my attention; I don't have time for this."

Tanaka's eyes glittered for a second time. "That's where I'm afraid you're wrong, sir." The next slide showed a comparison of discussions online about both Kaiba Land and the VR pods. Even when combined, it barely matched Mai Valentine by half. A second graph compared Mai Valentine to discussions of Seto's alleged relationship with her. It had outranked talk of just her by almost twenty-five percent. "As you can see, the people have spoken. If you want Kaiba Corporation to remain on the tip of everyone's tongue, I believe it is imperative that we provide the content they want so that when you are finally ready to officially unveil your projects, there will be the maximum number of people around to pay for them." Tanaka took his boss's stony silence as a cue to continue.

"It would require minimum effort on your part, sir. I have already shortlisted several photographers and modeling coaches who can teach you how to orchestrate flattering selfies so that in no time you'll be able to set up most of your pictures yourself. You already have experience modeling, so I'm certain it will be no problem for you. And in the meantime, this same team…"

Seto listened in silent horror as Tanaka continued to outline a schedule, mused that allowing the paparazzi a few choice shots wouldn't go amiss, and postulated possible photo suggestions. He couldn't bring himself to speak until the PR manager finally seemed to have exhausted himself.

"For the past seven years, I've worked extremely hard to be taken seriously, as you very well know," Seto said, white hot anger dripping off every word. "And I refuse to lower myself to being a desperate media whore." Tanaka's slight, condescending shake of the head was the spark that finally succeeded in igniting his temper. "Who do you think you're talking to?" he demanded, rising from his seat and slamming his palms down hard on the table. "I'm not a washed-up loser that needs to cling to fame by smiling for the paparazzi!"

With an unconcerned third stroke of his lapel, Tanaka said with astonishing candor: "that is exactly what you will be if you don't do this now."

It was checkmate, and they both knew it. After glaring at Tanaka another moment, Seto sat back down in defeat.

"When exactly would you want to embark on this...endeavor?" he asked icily.

For the next hour Seto allowed Tanaka to walk him through the finer points of the budget proposal he'd already had drawn up and forced himself not to be baited by the smug smirk on his subordinate's face; he'd already disappointed himself by having been rattled enough to lose his temper.

Finally, Tanaka concluded his presentation and sent his flunkies out with the projector equipment and laptop, leaving him alone with their boss.

"I know you're not happy about this," Tanaka said, not able to look the CEO in the face even in this moment of triumph. "But I really do think it's what's best. Not just for you and the company; it's good for your employees to see their leader in a more relatable light."

"And why might that be?" Seto asked sharply, his slightly slumped posture suddenly much more rigid. As much as he hated how much of a weasel Tanaka was, the trait meant that he often knew more even than Seto himself did about the goings on within headquarters.

"Well," Tanaka began, smoothing down his already sleek hair. "Let me put it this way: there's hardly anyone here who isn't at least a little afraid of you. After all, there were quite the wild rumours surrounding the sudden passing of your father…" He paused pointedly to inspect his fingernails before continuing. "But we were all scared of him too, and see how easily we all moved on. Those of us that are still around to talk about it anyway. Just something to think about." He busied himself with straightening the papers of the grudgingly signed contract to allow his boss to mull over his meaning.

Without waiting to be dismissed, Tanaka scooped up the contract and made for the door where he paused briefly to look back at Kaiba, who was still sitting stolidly at his desk. "I'm very pleased that you're allowing me to move forward with this project - I assure you that the results won't disappoint you."

For a few moments after the door closed, Seto didn't move. He focused all of his concentration on a small dust moat swirling in a sunbeam near his Blue Eyes White Dragon statue.

The quiet elegance with which it danced was immensely calming, and Seto allowed himself to put his head down on the desk, cradled in his arms. The meeting with Tanaka, more than anything, had been exhausting. The notion of having to let himself be fussed over by stylists, coaches, and photographers was exhausting, not least of all because he knew he was going to have to let them touch him. It was the part of modeling that he hated the most. Taking three hours to snap a picture was bad enough, but getting his face prodded by makeup artists, his hair pulled by hair stylists, and his body pushed into poses by creative directors was worse. And to what end? So that millions of people could pull the image apart or, even more unpleasant, salivate over it. He wanted to be known for his skills as a duelist, for his prowess as a businessman, not because of how he looked sitting on a horse or whatever other cliched concept the photographer could dream up. But on the other hand, he knew himself well enough to know that now that his appearance had been clearly established, even against his will, as a part of his brand, he would feel a certain pressure to upkeep it, and hated himself for how vain he'd allowed himself to become.

He lay quietly with his head in his arms for ten minutes, unwilling to even correct the email that still awaited him on his screen. A headache pulsed in his right temple, and even with his eyes closed the lids felt heavy. He knew he could push through his tiredness as he had so many times before, but today it didn't seem worth it.

The prospect of driving home and lying in bed for the rest of the afternoon finally spurred him to raise his head. He glanced at the clock on his screen and decided that even though it was only three, there was nothing else to be accomplished that day. He logged out of his email, shut down the PC, collected his briefcase from under the desk and his jacket from a wardrobe at the far side of the room, and shut the lights off on his way out, pausing only briefly to look out the window.

The sky was a uniform blue, and the accompanying afternoon sunshine had seemingly hoodwinked a large portion of the population into thinking the day was warm. He could see the movement of them, so far down below where he stood, no more than specks, the cars marginally larger dots. Mostly, though, the view was dominated by the glinting windows of the other skyscrapers downtown. Inside, he could imagine men and women scurrying throughout the building, trying to outperform each other and pull themselves up just one more rung. But from the outside, the buildings were calm pillars of steel and glass, betraying nothing of the melee Seto knew to be waging within. They were certainly much more beautiful that way.

As he walked past her, Seto met Valerie's eyes and nodded subtly in response to her look of inquisition. She nodded back and returned to her computer screen. He'd always liked her more than the majority of his employees. She was punctual, never complained, spoke only when necessary, and was never more than absolutely to the point. Were it not for the band on her ring finger, he might have considered marrying her. It would at least have been a very professional and calm union. Granted, he knew very little about her, but again, that was rather the point. In contrast, he felt she knew him quite well. For instance, he knew from their momentary interaction that she understood he wasn't going to return to his office that day and was already working to rearrange his schedule accordingly.

Even though he was now on his way home, Seto couldn't actually relax until he was sitting behind the wheel of his Porsche and driving down the highway. Since earning his license just the year before, Seto had loved driving. It was an absolutely solitary activity for the most part, and aside from the occasional honk, it was quiet, the only soundtrack provided by the purring of the engine and the whooshing past of the other cars. It always offered a space for him to either think or switch off where possible. Today, he chose to switch off. Instead of thinking about Mokuba or Alistair or Tanaka, he focused fully on the road, the front of his car eating away at the yellow stripes until he pulled off the highway.

As the car glided more slowly down the residential street, Seto couldn't help but recall, as he was wont, the first time he'd ever made the drive, now almost a decade ago.

He and Mokuba had been told to don their nicest clothes, which in his case had been a fraying blue sweater vest and an off-white dress shirt that had barely fit. They'd been shepherded to Gozaburo's waiting limo with their two small bags of belongings.

Seto could still remember how the car had reeked of cigar smoke even though their adopted father hadn't been in attendance, too busy, it had been explained to them by Alfred, to pick them up. He'd felt so triumphant that day. So proud of himself for having gotten them out of the orphanage. He remembered pulling up this very street, dead leaves twirling past the windshield and half barren trees revealing increasingly larger and grander homes, until finally they'd pulled up to the gates of the very manor that he pulled up to now.

Two stone pillars with an iron gate stretched across that offered a tantalizing view of the monstrously large white house. There had been many times since he'd come into ownership of the estate that Seto had considered selling it to escape the memories it contained, but he found himself unable to do so. He had earned it, wrested it from Gozaburo against all expectation. It was his trophy. Perhaps the shadows were a part of that trophy too. And because Mokuba had never expressed any wishes to move, they stayed.

After parking, Seto checked Mokuba's schedule on his phone and saw that his brother would be busy with his tutors for another several hours, which was just as well.

Inside the house, he went to the first floor kitchen and was happy to find the fridge well stocked with leftovers and selected a chicken salad sandwich which he ate lazily over the sink. Once he'd eaten, he meandered upstairs to his bedroom, wondering idly where Alistair was. Not that it mattered.

Alistair was sitting in the Kaiba library with Sewell napping on his lap. A worn copy of War and Peace was open on a small wooden table beside him, but his concentration was focused on the screen of his phone. More specifically, on the text displayed there. Darren had sent the message over fifteen minutes before, and Alistair had been attempting to interpret it ever since. The message itself was a simple "hey" without even so much as a punctuation mark. It was accompanied instead by a smiley face made up of a colon and half a set of parentheses. He'd determined that 'hey' was nothing more than an invitation to communicate, but he'd been reluctant to respond because of the smiley face. Was it merely a friendly gesture, or was it a subtle come-on? If it was friendly, he felt he ought to write back to maintain their fledgling friendship, but if it was a come-on, he intended never to speak to Darren again.

His musings were interrupted by a follow-up text: 'what are you up to?"

Alistair made a snap decision that Darren was just being friendly and texted back. This led to a rather stiff multi-message conversation before Darren got around to his true objective:

"Some friends and I are going to hang out to watch the american duel monsters semi-finals before byzantium. Wanna join?"

Alistair hesitated, his fingertips hovering over the keyboard. Truthfully, it didn't seem like much fun. But what else did he have to do? He was wary of Darren getting the wrong idea, but if it came to that, he could easily say no, and if that made it awkward, he could leave. Simple. He sent an affirmative answer, set his phone aside, and reached for War and Peace with renewed vigor.

Saito Hajime had undertaken many unsavory tasks in his duties as both security and bodyguard for the Kaibas, but had anyone ever bothered to ask him, he would have said that overall it was a tedious job. And frustrating. Despite his generous paychecks always coming on time, for the most part, his days were spent sitting silently in the booth near the front gate and opening and closing the door. Occasionally he was asked to accompany Mokuba to the mall, but that was about the biggest thrill he got these days. He stayed on despite the squandering of his abilities because, he had to admit to himself, he'd become complacent. There was a familiarity in his exasperation at Mr. Kaiba for throwing himself headlong into dangerous situations without asking for his backup despite that, ostensibly, being the reason for his employment. There was a serenity in the long hours he spent at the gates. And yet, he couldn't deny that he'd felt a rush of excitement when, at 7:04pm, he'd opened the front gate to let Alistair onto the road. He'd immediately called his employer who, with momentary and unexpectedly sleepy hesitation, gave the order that Saito had been hoping for:

"I'll get Kanzo to cover for you. Follow him."

Despite his desire to pounce on this golden opportunity to dust off his special forces training, Saito carefully secured the booth, mindful to check the cameras one more time, but all on the property seemed still, as usual.

With quiet haste, he made for his car, parked several streets over, and quickly traced what he assumed was Alistair's path to the city down the highway.

From the moment he parked his motorcycle, Alistair had the feeling that something was off. He was sharply aware of the gentle wheezing of the rusty car that had pulled in next to him as the driver tried to steer it between the lines, and of the dry scratching of several flattened fast food cups dragged across the concrete by a stiff wind blowing in through the wide gaps between the first and second level of the parking garage. And yet, despite there being nothing obviously amiss, Alistair was completely on-edge by the time he made it down to the street.

But why would anyone be watching me? he wondered even as he glanced furtively behind him. Raphael and Valon were presumably long gone, Dartz was gone, and no one else in Domino knew him except for Darren, who he was on his way to see.

His imagination reminded him that it could be a mugger, hoping to score his wallet. But why choose him? He didn't think he looked an easy or obvious target. And even if he did, there was no one around, so why not attack him then? After walking to the end of the block without being able to shake the feeling, he felt forced to accept that he was just being unnecessarily jumpy. It was probably just the result of having lived under the constant threat of danger as a child, and then operating as a shadow himself as a teenager by stalking Seto Kaiba. Who he absolutely didn't want to be thinking about. He shook himself and tried to focus instead on how best to approach his impending social interaction with a roomful of likely intoxicated young adults.

It became quickly clear to Saito after the initial rush that accompanied any surveillance job that Alistair wasn't doing anything of particular interest much less plotting to endanger Mr. Kaiba. He trailed behind, lithe and light of foot as a cat, sliding in and out of dark swathes of shadow while keeping a clear eye on his target. Alistair, it appeared, had better senses than most people Saito had ever followed, and it seemingly took him several blocks before he finally relaxed.

After that, it was easy. The deserted road fed into a largely populated street, along which scores of people marched past each other in surprisingly straight lines. They were mostly college-age, Saito noticed with some dismay, meaning it would be much harder for him to fade into the crowd. He chose a different tact, and ambled seemingly carelessly through them, a businessman of some description making his way home for the night. He was careful not to jostle anyone around him and remained as far back as he could without losing sight of the back of Alistair's head.

Several blocks later and Alistair turned abruptly down a side street leading to an outcropping of hideously modern apartment buildings that jutted up from the street like crooked teeth. Here, Saito returned to slipping in and out of doorways to avoid detection, resisting the urge to curse when his foot knocked into a soda can hidden by the lip of the curb. It rubbed hollowly against the concrete, but Alistair appeared not to have heard.

Seto had been sleeping fitfully when the buzzing of his phone woke him from yet another uncomfortable dream about his step-father. Even as he reached for the phone, his hand trembled at the as yet only partially dissolved image of Gozaburo leering over him.

"What is it?" he asked with a slight rasp.

"I've been tracking Alistair as you requested," came the monotone reply from his bodyguard. "I can give you a report, but I doubt it will be of much interest to you."

"That's for me to decide," Seto snapped, sitting up more fully in bed, blinking sleepily as a beam of light hit him squarely in the eyes. He quickly looked away, annoyed at having forgotten to turn the bedroom light off until he realized with a start that it was daylight and that he'd been asleep since early the evening before. "What was he up to?" he barked as he pulled himself quickly out of bed. He stabbed the speaker button on his phone and glanced at the time, relieved that he was only slightly off schedule.

"I followed him downtown," Saito explained. "He went to visit a student or group of students living in the highrises near the university. He stayed there for about three hours, then came back down in the company of four of the aforementioned students. Then they went to a nearby gay dance club before returning to the apartment at around three this morning. Should I stay in position?" Saito asked with such a faint trace of humor that Seto wasn't sure he hadn't imagined it.

"No, of course not," Seto replied snippily even as his stomach constricted rather painfully-a side effect of having missed dinner the night before, he was sure.

By the time he'd showered and gotten dressed, Seto had received two messages that ruined the already fragile chance of him having a good day. The first was from Tanaka, letting him know that he'd already assembled a team for Seto's PictureThis debut. The second was a follow-up wherein Tanaka relayed a message from a so-called expert celebrity photographer that Seto's own house would be the ideal location for the shoot because it would come across as the most 'authentic.' Too defeated to even argue, Seto agreed. This led to a third message and the absolute final nail in the coffin: Tanaka proposing that they meet around lunchtime that day to discuss a plan of action before actually taking the picture the day after that.

The idea that one picture required two days and an entire team to execute was such a caricature of the celebrity lifestyle Seto almost wished Alistair was in on it so that at least one person would be able to voice the absurdity of it all and reassure him that it was not he but his world that had gone insane.

Over a his usual breakfast of bacon and eggs, Trudy had the misfortune of being the one to ask where Alistair was.

"He isn't back yet," she fretted as she poured Seto a second cup of coffee. "I do hope he's alright. Do you suppose we should send someone to look for him?"

"I don't pay my staff to watch over him," Seto replied with disdain, picking up his coffee cup and sipping from it unconcernedly. "And anyway," he added when she started to retort. "I know exactly where he is and it's my assumption that he'll stumble back here around lunchtime with a hangover that you're welcome to indulge in curing if you see fit, but I don't pay you to take care of him either so it's hardly a requirement."

Trudy placed one hand on her hip while wagging a finger in his direction with the other. "He's a guest in this house, Seto. Your guest no less. You ought to show more hospitality. I mean, really. It's quite ungentlemanly."

"I've never pretended to be a gentleman," Seto snapped petulantly. He hated it when Trudy lectured him as though she were the exasperated personification of his conscience rather than his housekeeper. Especially because he knew that, like Mokuba, her attempts to steer his moral compass in the right direction were usually based on truth. But he really was incredibly disinclined to show his 'guest' any sympathy.

It was with a painful jolt and a piercing headache that Alistair awoke. When he reluctantly opened his eyes with a soft groan, he saw that he was lying on the floor of Darren's living room, his face inches from the thick wooden legs of the coffee table and his back against the couch. More than a little disoriented, he realized he must have fallen onto the floor, though he couldn't remember sleeping on the couch. He allowed the table leg to fall out of focus as he tried to recall what had happened the night before. He remembered watching the tournament on TV. He remembered that they'd left to go to Byzantium. He remembered not really knowing what to order and just following everyone else's lead. He had splintered memories of sitting on a bright white tiled floor, of snatches of bass-heavy music. And he'd been talking to someone. He scrunched his eyes shut and tried to force himself to remember.

One of Darren's friends? Possibly.

And then another murky memory presented itself: a magnetic urge to collapse against this person and kiss them passionately. On the couch.

Alistair forced himself into a crouched sitting position so that he could tentatively peek over the edge.

To his by then only slight surprise, a young man was lying pressed against the back of the couch, disheveled brown bangs hiding his face down to his nose. His head was resting against a cushion next to what Alistair realized was his own shirt. All but one bare shoulder was covered by the dark fleece blanket that had previously acted as a throw cover. Alistair was afraid to check if the man was wearing anything at all under the blanket, but reasoned that since he himself was still wearing his jeans, the other man most likely was too.

After looking around and judging that they were alone in the room, Alistair decided that after a brief detour to the bathroom, it was time to go. There would be plenty of time to piece together what had happened once he was no longer physically faced with anyone that had been involved.

He struggled to his feet as quietly as he could, wincing against the excruciatingly sharp headache in his temple. Swaying slightly, he stumbled to the nearby bathroom and collapsed against the countertop, wishing he could have left the light off to save himself the added layer of discomfort.

His hair was a tangled nest of dark red made even more dramatic by the pallor of his normally healthy skin. Two dark smudges under his eyes complimented the after-party look.

For all that he looked like a zombie of himself, it had been the best night's sleep he'd gotten in if not years, certainly months. No nightmares had awoken him, and indeed, he wasn't sure he'd dreamed at all.

After washing up in the bathroom and drying his face on a fluffy towel hanging on the back of the door, Alistair stole back into the living room, pleased that the man on the couch was still passed out, and no one else appeared to be awake yet. He slipped back into his t-shirt, holding his breath as he inched it off the couch, retrieved his rumpled jacket from the floor on the other side of the coffee table, and started looking around for his shoes which he quickly found flung beside the door.

He stealthily retrieved Britney's keys from a hook on the wall and held them away from each other between his fingers so they wouldn't rattle, recognizing only as he went to turn it in the lock that he'd be unable to lock the door behind him. But surely, no one would think to try the door, and if they did, they'd wake up the man on the couch, who would undoubtedly alert everyone else in the apartment, and the problem would be easily resolved.

The door opened obligingly, and before putting the keys back on the hook, Alistair double-checked that he still had everything he'd come with, minus perhaps, a healthy dollop of his dignity. Mokuba's debit card along with a small wad of cash still resided safely in his wallet, and his phone was still in his jacket pocket, pulsing gently to alert him of its impending death. But there was nothing he could do about it until he got back to the Kaiba estate.

It wasn't until he'd quietly closed the door of the apartment that Alistair was able to focus on the next part of his journey: retrieving his motorcycle. But even as he took his first step in that direction, nausea caused his stomach to roil uncomfortably and he paused to lean against the beige hallway wall. He had no idea what the contents of his stomach were at that moment, but he had no interest in seeing it splattered on the cheap linoleum floor. Taking several deep breaths in an attempt to keep everything down, he took another tentative step, seeing with some relief that the elevators were close at hand.

Trudy had hoped that Seto would be wrong, but like clockwork, as she was setting the dining room table for lunch, she heard footsteps coming from the back of the left wing. Mokuba never came before he was called, Seto was at work, and her husband was overseeing the clearing of the gutters, so there was only one person it could be.

"Are you feeling up to lunch?" she asked without pausing, beginning to lay out the second set of silverware she'd been hoping she wouldn't need.

Behind her, Alistair started in surprise that Trudy could tell how he was feeling without even seeing him. "Not exactly," he admitted. The ride back had been torturous, every bump in the road and every moment of acceleration jostling his stomach until he'd finally pulled over and puked in the gravel at the side of the road. Though it had effectively settled his insides, he'd been forced to sit until he'd stopped shaking. It was all he'd been able to do to make it back, and all he wanted to do was down a liter of water before sleeping for at least a year.

Trudy collected the silverware again with a sigh and turned to face him. She tutted when she saw the state of him. "Rough night?" she asked pointedly before pouring him a glass of water from the pitcher on the table.

He quickly gulped it down, collapsed into a chair, and poured himself a second. "I...er...met up with a few friends and I had a little too much to drink I think." The latter part of his statement was made in a sheepish mumble.

"Never mind," she relented, seeing that he really was in a bad way. "You ought to eat something in any case. I don't have time for anything nice, but I think I have a few cans of chicken noodle soup in the pantry. I'll heat one up for you. And drink a lot of water in the meantime," she added unnecessarily.

"What's going on?" he asked her, sensing that her underlying tone of annoyance wasn't aimed at him.

"You can tell, can you?" she asked, no longer trying to hide how put out she felt. "The cleaners will be coming in an hour to do my job for me with their fancy machines and chemicals. As though I don't keep this place spick and span. And it isn't easy, mind, but even the rooms that don't get used, I go in and I clean at least once a week. And Isobel too. Between us, there's hardly a speck of dust anywhere. But they always manage to find a way to make it seem like we're all living in filth!"

Alistair had taken the time while she ranted to drain another glass of water and was already starting to feel less on the brink of death. "I've always thought it was really clean here," he commented. "So why the sudden need for a whole team of professional cleaners?"

She closed her eyes and shrugged. "Seto's having some of his colleagues to the house tomorrow for a secret project or some such thing. God only knows why. I don't think he quite knows himself."

Normally, it was the kind of thing that would pique Alistair's interest, but he was feeling too ill to think much of it.