In my innumerable musings about the stresses of Kaiba-Corp and what it does to both Seto and Mokuba, I tend to focus on Seto's point of view as the consummate professional; that is, the guy who doesn't let things get to him. He's grown up in the five or so years since the beginning of the series (remember that he's twenty years old in this series).

It's rare that I look at those stresses and problems from Mokuba's point of view. Even the last chapter that tried to delve into it ("Hear Us Now, Clear and True") focused more on the other people involved. This isn't specifically from Mokuba's point of view, either, but with this chapter I tried to actually let him speak his mind about it.

As to how that turned out for him…well.

We'll see.


Seto never played his own company's games.

"How come?" Connor asked, when the subject had first come up. He seemed legitimately mystified, though Rebecca looked as though she knew the answer before Mokuba ever spoke. The three of them had taken to eating lunch together, in one far corner of the school courtyard where sat a table that Mokuba had essentially claimed as his own.

"He says he doesn't need to," Mokuba said. He assumed a lofty, aristocratic tone of voice as he added, "They stand strong enough on their own. He doesn't need to reaffirm his own work." He chuckled, but he looked almost sad. "He says he gets all the feedback he needs from customers…more than enough, actually."

"He doesn't play games for fun?" Connor asked. "Why play a game if not…?"

"Mister Kaiba does play games," Rebecca said. "Right? Just not KC's. He scopes out the competition."

Mokuba nodded. "Even when he's having fun…well, fun for him, anyway, Niisama has to be multitasking. People used to say the only reason he plays games with me is 'cuz he'd penciled 'Brotherly Bonding' into his schedule."

Rebecca frowned. "Um…there's no easy way to ask this, but…isn't that kind of true?"

Serenely, Mokuba said, "Maybe."

"That's messed up," Connor mumbled.

Mokuba shrugged. "He's a workaholic. Lots of people don't get what that means."

Though the younger Kaiba insisted that he didn't mind when his friends criticized him, or his brother, both Rebecca and Connor knew better. They shared a look, both thinking that that sounded suspiciously like an excuse. Mokuba often glossed over the negative parts of his brother's personality, if not outright ignored them.

"I don't like it," Mokuba said, half-sharply, and both of the others flinched; he'd seen that look, and knew what it meant. "But it's part of who he is. It was drilled into his head: he has to be efficient. All the time. Not just 'cuz of our…father." He seemed about to use another word, then thought better of it. "If that was all it was, he'd be over it by now. Everybody says he has to be efficient. Has to be on top of his game. Has to be available, has to be working, has to be striving. If he takes a day off, people call him lazy. If he spends money, people call him selfish. If he brushes someone off because he's too busy to talk, people call him a snob. Well, no. They call him a 'colossal prick.'"

This was one of, if not the only seriously sore spot for Mokuba Kaiba; he was "pretty chill," as a general rule. He didn't let things bother him. When people insulted him, called him names, tried to bully him, tried to make him feel guilty…almost none of it ever worked. He was a Kaiba, and a Kaiba had no time to bother with things like that.

To make Mokuba angry, what you had to do was start talking badly about his brother. It didn't matter who the person was; anyone with the temerity to criticize or analyze or scrutinize or terrorize Seto was an eternal enemy to this boy.

"When I leave Kaiba-Corp, work is over," Mokuba added. "When I tell everyone I'm going home, they wave and say goodbye. They don't call me at three in the morning because something's gone wrong. They don't drag me into a conference room an hour later, or insist that my phone should always be on, even when I'm on vacation, just in case." Mokuba's grey-violet eyes were smoldering now.

Connor and Rebecca shared another, guilty, look.

"When—" Mokuba was cut off by a mechanical beeping. He reached into the pocket of his jeans and pulled out a phone. Holding it to his ear, he said, "Kaiba…I—no, I'm at school. Uh-huh. No, I don't know why his phone is turned off. Leave him alone. Maybe you should—excuse me, do you mind? Did that really sound like the right time to start talking? Was I right in the middle of a sentence?Don't you act indignant with me. If you were talking to my brother right now, do you really think he'd put up with it? What makes you think I'm any different? Don't call me at school again. I'll get detention. If you get me into trouble because you can't figure out how to do your own job, or if I find out that you still insist on calling my brother on his day off, you're fired." Mokuba hung up.

Connor bit his lower lip.

Rebecca looked embarrassed.

Mokuba turned his phone off, scowling. "See?"


"Young Master Mokuba…do you realize who you hung up on?"

Roland Ackerman was as tactful as anyone could ever be, but it did nothing to quell the swelling anger on the young Kaiba's face today. Mokuba raised an eyebrow. "I'm surprised that you think I care," he said, in a remarkable imitation of his brother's signature sarcasm. "I was at school. I'm not allowed to answer my phone at school. If I'd been in class, I'd have gotten detention."

"But you weren't in class, and Mister Inglewood knew that."

"Does nobody listen to me?" Mokuba clenched his fists and stared up at Roland as though he'd grown an extra head. "I'm not allowed to answer my phone at school. Ever. I broke the rules. Is that clear enough for you? Do I need to put it in writing before you'll pay attention?"

Roland didn't react. "Be that as it may, we did have an emergency this afternoon, and it did require your brother's attention. He had no other recourse than to do what he did, for which you have evidently threatened to fire him?"

"Oh, boo-hoo for Mister Inglewood," Mokuba snapped. "I'll send him a card. Does my title mean anything in this building? Or should I just quit? Is that what you people want from me? Do you want me to stop wasting your time pretending like I have a right to be here?"

"That's not what I'm saying," Roland replied gently.

Something snapped, and the floodgates opened. "Then stop acting like it's my fault that I'm eleven years old! I'm not my brother, okay? I can't take college classes and have a degree by next year! I'm so stupid I only skipped one grade!"

"Mokuba—"

"I'm trying, all right?" Tears of frustration sprang unbidden from Mokuba's eyes. "I'm trying to go to class and do my homework early, and come here and work on my game, and answer emails from my team, and fix problems, and get over all the crap I have to put up with!" Roland stumbled back a step, as though physically struck. A great number of people had gathered to watch by this point, including Thad Inglewood.

And Seto Kaiba.

"I'm sorry I'm not my brother! I'm sorry I can't just…just…stop things from bothering me! It bothers me when you treat him like a tech support line whenever something breaks because you were too stupid to stop it! It bothers me when you treat me like a joke and then turn around and expect work out of me! It bothers me when people put guns in my face! It bothers me when you act like what I have to do isn't important enough! It bothers me when you act like I'm an idiot because I think my problems are just as important as yours! It bothers me when you expect me to lie down and take it when you pretend you have a bigger claim to my brother's time than I do! It bothers me when you bitch about getting called in on your day off, then turn around and do the same thing to my brother! It bothers me when you're a hypocrite and get mad at me for it! Fuck you!"

Roland, stone-faced, closed his eyes and bowed his head.

Mokuba drew in a long, shuddering breath. Something about watching him pull the same meditation trick that Seto used when he was furious was more telling than anything he'd said. "…If any one of you…was betrayed by someone you thought you could trust, and taken away from your own home, and thrown in a cell. If any one of you was tied up and used as bait. If any one of you got a gun put in your mouth, or had to…had to—" He stopped, gathered himself, and started over: "You'd quit. You'd go into counseling, or take up drinking. You'd expect a vacation. You'd expect sympathy. You'd expect support. From your coworkers. From your boss. If you said, 'Hey, I need a break,' you'd expect people to listen."

His face hardened, and the resemblance between Mokuba and his brother had never been so clear, or so heartbreaking. "I don't, because I know it won't happen. I won't get sympathy and support from my coworkers. I won't get a vacation, not without being yelled at. Not without people making me feel guilty for it and talking about how my performance is suffering, and it's starting to concern them, as if anyone put my workload onto them when they were eleven. I won't get time to readjust, I won't get slack. I won't get respect for coming back to the building responsible for everything bad that's ever happened in my life. Do you know, I'm supposed to get paid for working here? I'm supposed to get a salary. I don't, because I'm a kid and my brother takes care of me. I give the money I'm supposed to get to charity. But do I get a smile, a nod, a 'Well done?' No. I get this. I get, 'Do you realize who you hung up on?' Yeah. I hung up on my employee."

People expected Seto to step up, for Kaiba-shachou to lay down the law. They expected him to give his signature glare, to threaten everyone into submission, and dare anyone to say a single word against his brother again. They expected him to fire Thad Inglewood, to make a snide and dismissive remark to Roland. They expected him to yell at them to clear out and leave Mokuba the fuck alone.

He didn't speak at all.

He listened; he watched. But he refused to say a word.

Mokuba went on: "Everybody here, with their fancy suits and their briefcases and their curricula vitae, treats me like a kid. Then they expect me to act like an adult. They want me to do my job, but don't want to let me do it, because what do I know? I didn't earn it. I got this job because I'm the CEO's brother. And there can't be any other reason, because, well, I'm a kid. Just a stupid kid. And what do stupid kids know about making videogames? Nothing."

A great number of faces were now lowered, like Roland's; Thad Inglewood's among them.

"I work under a supervisor. I do jobs usually left for interns. I find lectures and videos online. I practice. I ask people how to do things, and I take notes. But I still get treated like I haven't learned anything. I still get treated like I don't do enough. I get on stage, I give speeches, I make better PowerPoint presentations than most of the people here, after I get my homework done. I go to conventions to work. I get interviewed, I attend conferences. I do everything I can to promote this company, and tell people how great it is, and how dedicated we are to making the best games in the world. What more do you want from me?"

Silence.

Mokuba turned his back on them. "…I have to go home, and waste company time to study for a test. Sorry for the inconvenience. I'll make it up to you later."

He walked away.

Seto watched his brother leave, then turned and headed for his office, leaving behind the loudest silence to ever fall over the Kaiba Corporation's regional headquarters.


Thad Inglewood, Roland Ackerman, Helen Aarden, Vincent Zika, Travis Copeland, and a number of others all stood, rank-and-file, in front of their CEO's desk.

Seto stared at them all as if he had no idea who they were, or what they wanted.

"Johan Donalds will be calling tomorrow morning at 9:30 AM," Seto said after a while. "I will be sending Ackerman and Aarden to PAX East. Copeland, for the next week, I will need you to stay on call for an extra two hours in the evening. You will be compensated accordingly. Inglewood, I want that report on my desk in the morning." And so it went on; he delegated tasks and made orders just as he always did, with no indication that anything at all had happened earlier that afternoon.

Nobody said anything when he packed up and left the building at four minutes to five, nearly two hours before he'd intended.

He drove home, and walked across his front yard with his usual quick, purposeful stride. He opened the front door, stepped inside, and hung up his coat and jacket. He set his briefcase aside, removed his tie, and stepped into the front parlor.

He ascended the stairs to the second floor, went down the hall, and found his brother's bedroom door; it was closed. He knocked.

"…Come in."

Seto stepped onto the threshold to see his brother making quick jabs at the keyboard of his computer and tossing aside a wireless headset. "Recording a video?" he asked, spotting the software on the screen.

"Trying," Mokuba muttered. "I can't…think."

"May I?" Seto gestured to the bed.

"Yeah."

He sat down.

"Are you finished studying?" Seto asked.

"Test was yesterday," Mokuba muttered. "I was trying to be dramatic."

Seto chuckled; the black-haired boy turned to look at him. "It worked," Seto said.

"No, it didn't." Mokuba sighed. "That didn't do anything. It didn't even make me feel better. I just dug myself into a hole. They're all thinking what an idiot I am, what a spoiled little brat. See, we were right, he shouldn't be here."

Seto leaned forward. "Mokuba, I want you to listen to me. Okay? Can you do that?"

Mokuba nodded.

"Do you know what my job is?"

Mokuba frowned, seemed about to speak, then quieted. He shook his head.

"My job is to make sure that no matter what cataclysm shakes its foundations, Kaiba-Corp stays upright and functional. My job is to ensure that my people are able to do their jobs, and that our products are the best in the industry. But more than that…my job is to give you the opportunities you need in order to thrive. My job is to teach you. My job is to keep you fed, clothed, housed, and healthy."

The inklings of a smile twitched Mokuba's lips.

"Your job," Seto continued, "is to go to school. Your job is to keep your room clean, to brush your teeth, and get to bed on time. Your job is to find out what you want out of your life. Right now, at your age, once your homework is done and your chores are finished, your job isn't to make presentations and practice speeches. Your job is to have fun. To take your free time and do whatever the hell you want with it. And I know what you're thinking: I didn't do that. I spent my time working or sleeping. I never had time for fun. You're thinking that all my free time was spent raising you, taking care of you and making sure you were happy. You're thinking that the least you can do is help me, now that you're old enough. But if that's making your life miserable, if working at Kaiba-Corp is making you unhappy, then don't do it. Find something else that you want to do. Find something you love to do. That's your job. Do you understand me?"

Mokuba bit his lip.

"…Yes, Niisama."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes, Niisama."

"I love you. You know that, don't you?"

"Yes, Niisama. I…I love you, too."

Seto gestured, and Mokuba sat down next to him. Seto put an arm around the boy's shoulders and hugged him close. "Now," he said, in an entirely different tone of voice from before, "about your language…"