AN: Okay. Lots of stuff happened lately. On top of my constant companion of writer's block, I started a new job and moved into an apartment in the past week. Finally got inspired today, so here's hoping.

Disclaimer: I own nothing.

Secondary disclaimer: I don't actually believe in psychic abilities. All powers that I mention in this story are my interpretation of the psychic world.

Over the next week, Kaiba found himself slowly but surely returning to normal. He still wasn't sure what the so-called 'psychic' had done to him, but once he did, he was going to sue her for everything she owned.

The only strange thing that was still a lingering effect (other than the implanted illusions, of course), was that he could not seem to take of the pendant for more than a few moments at a time. Part of it was his brother's insistence that he not take it off. Part of it was that he remembered the near insanity that he had gone through. Perhaps it was subliminal, though he doubted that subliminal messages really had as much power as people claimed they did, but he found himself completely unwilling to remove the pendant. He wasn't going to try and break whatever it was that she had done to him until he knew exactly what it was.

He decided that the only way to learn what she had done to him was to play along with her little game and in doing so closely observe her every action. To that effect, he closely observed her when she was doing her 'readings.' He grudgingly had to accept the fact that she was perhaps better at reading people than he was. Beyond the initial exchange of cards, she never once glanced at the person she read, and instead looked only at the cards.

The most confusing part of her readings was that, when he looked closely at her eyes, they did in fact take on a lighter tint. Not enough to be noticeable to anyone who wasn't looking specifically for it, but enough to give him pause to wonder, for the moment she had stopped reading, her eyes faded back to their original color. So it wasn't colored contacts that was causing the effect. Perhaps a trick of the lighting? Except that, too, didn't make sense as the light didn't reflect off of her eyes in the way that would make them appear even a little bit lighter.

Stranger still was when she made her pendants. He closely watched everything she did. While she closely guarded the secret behind how she grew her crystals, she had allowed him to see exactly what she used in making them, knowing that the nearly infinite possible combinations of ingredients would make it difficult for even him to glean the recipe without watching her. None of the ingredients were capable of, even with body heat, changing the color of the crystal. Yet time and again he clearly saw them change their color when she focused on them.

For her part, Lisa knew that Kaiba's sudden interest in her psychic abilities was false and that he had an ulterior motive. She didn't have to be psychic to see the suspicion in his eyes every time he observed her. However, she allowed the lie on his part, pretending to be innocent to it. She hoped that, in his feigning interest, he would actually learn something. It was well known that Seto Kaiba didn't miss much. She saw no problem in using that fact to her advantage. So she allowed him into her most private aspects of what she did. She allowed him what no one else had ever been allowed, a glimpse at how she made her crystals, a secret that charm-makers guarded jealously. It was her secret sanctum, and for Kaiba to be allowed to see it even once, though he didn't know it, was the highest honor that he could have been given.

Things were moving too slowly, however. At the school, Anna had gotten more anxious, and Lisa herself was starting to notice the weakening veil. It wasn't anything that was visible yet, but there was a constant aura of something she couldn't place around her. The people who she did readings for had started to notice. Lisa, who before had seemed the picture of calm, was becoming agitated. Jumping at shadows, looking around her suddenly as if she had heard something that no one else had. Constantly, she observed the elder Kaiba brother. For the moment, he noticed nothing out of the ordinary. A thing she wasn't sure was a blessing or a curse.

One day, as Kaiba was walking home from school, he heard the obnoxiously loud voice of Joey Wheeler. Of course, since dogs prefer to travel in packs, the rest of the 'gang' was with him as well. He turned in surprise when he heard a startled shout. A very large branch had fallen from a tree that the mutt was walking under. Just when he was sure that Wheeler would be crushed under its weight, he thought he saw a glint at his neck. Focusing quickly on it, he saw it was the pendant that Lisa had given him. Hearing a crash, he looked and saw that the branch, which should have hit his schoolmate, had landed centimeters in front of him.

"Look at the size of that branch!" Joey exclaimed, a small amount of fear in his voice as he realized just how much damage that would have done to him. "Lucky for me it missed."

Unbidden, a voice came to Kaiba's mind as the whisper of a memory he had thought forgotten was brought to the forefront.

"The blond boy who I read earlier has a classic good-luck charm, I suspect he was drawn to it because it will enhance his own fairly uncanny good luck. Good-luck charms are signified by their pale yellow color."

He didn't want to believe it, but he had seen the yellow pendant glow with his own eyes. And as the mutt had been in complete shadow, it was definitely not the reflection of the sun or another light source.

Suddenly it was as if that one memory, that one fact opened the proverbial floodgates of his 'abilities.' There were whispers of vague threats around him. Not as an audible voice, but more the human body's natural 'sixth sense.' The instinctive ability to know when a threat is approaching. He quickly resumed walking, though he was suddenly regretting not having had Roland or someone else drive the limo to take him the short distance to Lisa's shop. Almost unaware of it, he quickened his pace to that of a quick walk, almost a jog. Almost trance-like, he reached for his deck and, pulling out the top card, saw it was the Blue Eyes White Dragon. Uncertain as to why he did it, he grabbed the next two cards. They were also his treasured Blue Eyes cards.

Another memory, unbidden, came to mind.

"The reaction that I got from this card tells me that this is what is known as a 'Soul Connection.' This card will always be in your deck when you need it, and will always come to your aid without question."

The last few blocks, to the confused and—though he would never admit it—terrified CEO seemed like a yawning abyss that he had to cross. Had he paid attention to Lisa when she spoke to him in her 'lessons' instead of trying to figure out what she had done to him, he might have been able to focus enough to reach out to his cards. To sink into the second plane and feel the comfort they were trying to give. Instead, his thoughts ran wild and, guided by an instinct that he was powerless to control, went towards the one person who had been a source of calm in this mess.

"Lisa!"

Lisa let out a cry of pain as the plea slammed into her mind, coupled by the physical pain of her wrist again being sliced open as she was making more pendants. She quickly grabbed a piece of cloth and wrapped it tightly around her hand. Telepathy was hard enough when she was completely focused, even when talking to someone who was very experienced with the power and knew to keep as many emotions out as possible, or to at least lesson their effect on the recipient. Unfocused, and trying to reach someone who was not only a skeptic, but had never even attempted to touch his secondary power, and as such had no idea how to use it, this was going to be next to impossible. She winced again as the untrained and unfocused mind again slammed into her.

"To heck with courtesy," she snarled, for there were rules of etiquette for both people. One of which was that only the power of telepathy should be used. Setting aside every rule about this that she had had drilled into her by telepaths, she spiraled into the sixth plane, calling out to the Psychic Kappa even before the card was fully able to register her need. Merging her mind with its, she was given a new clarity, and was able to, finally, respond. To Kaiba it would sound as if she was speaking to him from under water, as using a monster as buffer like this would give her voice some of the attributes of the monster, in this case the fact that it was a Water attribute would come, but it would be clear.

"Calm down, Kaiba," she commanded, rude as it was. She softened her voice when she realized both that for his secondary power to have reached her on his own, against his will, that he had to be in a very bad state emotionally and his powers, instinctively, had reached to her, as well as the fact that the cold, logical CEO wouldn't expect the response and to sound harsh would make things worse.

"Calm down. I'll explain things when you reach me," she said more kindly, already unsure how to do this. Untrained, Kaiba didn't know how to truly respond, and it was only the fact that he knew she could help him that she had been able to hear his cry at all. He also didn't know how to end the conversation. Lisa bit her lip nervously. For a primary, or even a secondary telepath, ending another telepath's initiated conversation wasn't a problem. But she could only communicate telepathically when one had reached out to her, and as such, she was uncertain how to end it properly.

"Kaiba, I need you to focus right now. Picture the most important person or thing to you." Part of Lisa regretted that she had to specify it being the most important thing, as his lack of training meant that everything would be open to her, and she wouldn't be able to avoid seeing what it was he valued above all. It was an extraordinary violation of his privacy, but it had to be done. The only thing Lisa found surprising about the image that she saw Kaiba focus on was the fact that she was surprised. She should have known that the only one that could possibly take the place as the most valued would be Mokuba.

As Kaiba calmed, Lisa felt it clearly. And as she had hoped, Kaiba's rational mind would take the place of his instincts, and he would shut her out forcefully. It was painful for her, but it was the best-case scenario until he knew how to properly withdraw. She quickly took two Excedrin for her headache and then walked to the mirror, reaching out to her brother through the purest connection there was: blood.

"What's wrong?" Ray asked the second the connection had been formed. In using a power that she could not touch except through her brother, he had felt a shadow of her own pain, both physical and psychic.

"Can you get Tom? He's needed." Right after Lisa had realized what Kaib's secondary power was, she had contacted her brother asking to speak to Tom. While he was also only a secondary telepath, he was the best person possible to ask about this because his primary power was to teleport. So long as he could see where he was going, he could reach it.

Moments later, Tom appeared. Tall and dark haired, he could have been another of Lisa's siblings if it weren't for the fact that his eyes were a light brown instead of the near-black that was passed to everyone in Lisa's family.

"His secondary power awoke?" Tom asked without preamble. Lisa nodded tiredly, stepping to the side so that her friend would have room to cross. The second he appeared in her work-room, he made eye contact with Lisa, gently probing her memory so that he could quickly know what had happened.

"Ouch," he said with a sympathetic wince. "This is why we prefer to have telepaths awaken in a controlled setting. Otherwise it's messy." Gently he did what he could to sooth the headache brought on by the uncontrolled communication. Had he been a primary telepath, he could have completely removed it. Instead all he could do was reach out and take the edge off of it. Lisa smiled gratefully and then turned as the door to her shop opened.

"Kaiba," she said, walking to the door of her workroom and opening it. She had known he was close to her shop, and even knew just how far he was. The sudden and uncontrolled connection had left a temporary link that the break of the telepathy hadn't cut off. It made her acutely aware of where the CEO was and what his mental and emotional state was, a thing that she knew would be happening to him as well. She'd hoped that Tom could remove it, for that sort of connection wasn't one that should be present.

"Kaiba, this is Tom. He's a telepath like you, so he's the one who's best able to help you with this. He has a short-cut, though. Where I need several weeks, even months, to teach you the gift of the Card Speakers, he can teach you in a few hours." Tom locked eyes with Kaiba and formed a connection, jumping in surprise when he felt what he couldn't in his probe of Lisa's mind, the mental link between the two of them.

"The first thing I need to do, however, is remove this link. I unfortunately can't remove it completely, but it will stop the constant awareness."

"What all will it leave, though?" Asked Lisa. Telepaths were wary of any sort of link being left between minds that had just been in communication, as the effects were generally unpredictable.

"The two of you lucked out. It will be a very minor effect. Basically, in the same way Lisa can communicate to her brother through mirrors without him first contacting her, she'll be able to reach out to communicate with you telepathically. And only you. You, on the other hand, can talk telepathically to any psychic you want to, though the connection will probably be the quickest with Lisa." As he spoke, he was removing 'mental tie' as it was called. Lisa could instantly feel when it had left her, minus the small trace that had been explained.

"If Kaiba had gotten here a minute earlier, I could have completely removed it," Tom said with an easy-going shrug. "On the other hand, a minute later and I couldn't have done anything, so I'm not complaining. Now then, I guess you need trained. This way, please." Tom, Lisa, and Kaiba all walked to her house, settling down in the den for the sake of privacy.

As Lisa sat down quietly, Tom connected to Kaiba to teach him in what even non-telepaths agreed was the 'purest way.' Directly.

AN: Rough spot to leave it, but it's the best I've got considering that it's late. Hopefully I can update soon, but I make no promises.