Chapter 9: Trauma
Seto was the master of his own mind, so he never let himself relive that day.
Until the virtual world forced him to.
All at once, he was fifteen again, dressed in a blue suit and standing in his new corporate office after a hostile takeover. The office that used to be his adoptive father's. A wide, expansive room with cold overhead lighting and austere appearance, practically empty except for the curved mahogany desk at its center. That desk held a new name plaque, thick black wood with a silver, engraved plate. It read Seto Kaiba, CEO.
Seto Kaiba, CEO of KaibaCorp.
Seto slid his hands in his pockets, his eyes lingering on that plaque before moving to the far wall, which was solid glass with a dizzying view of clear blue sky, drifting clouds, and the city far below. Perhaps the view wasn't dizzying. Perhaps success was.
All his scheming was over. All his sleepless, fearful nights. Mokuba was safe. Gozaburo was defeated. He'd won. Against the most powerful opponent in the world, Seto had won.
For a moment, he allowed himself a rare, wide smile.
Then the door to his new office swung open.
Seto's smile vanished.
Gozaburo entered the office the way a panther entered its den. Silent as a hunter. Filled with a liquid grace that belied his thick-shouldered form. He seemed to be more predator in these surroundings than he'd ever been. His dispassionate gray eyes roamed the room before locking on Seto.
Showing weakness would be a mistake, so Seto raised his chin, and with cold eyes of his own, he watched his father stalk closer.
Taller, stronger, bigger. Seto assessed the dangers calmly even as his mind spun to create a plan of dealing with the enemy. He wasn't afraid of being struck—he'd felt the flat of Gozaburo's hand many times since being adopted. They were familiar enemies, after all. But now Seto had won the war, and he was afraid of what a predator did when its home was taken, when it was cornered, when a new predator replaced it on the food chain. For months, Seto had worked in the shadows to steal the company, but now he faced Gozaburo as a lion in the light, and Gozaburo Kaiba was not the type of man to have ever faced another predator of his own caliber.
Seto had stolen his territory, and it remained to be seen if his father would slink off in submission or sink his teeth into Seto's throat. Either way, there was no room for both of them on the savannah.
Like a chess player setting out his pieces, Seto took inventory of ways to defend if Gozaburo decided to kill him. The plaque on the desk, a weapon. The office door, an escape hatch. The secretary just down the hall, a guard.
And each moment, his father prowled closer.
Then stopped.
Slowly, steadily, Gozaburo reached a hand out. Not to strike. He gripped Seto's shoulder. Seto tensed. His eyes flickered toward the plaque, out of reach while restrained. If he was thrown backward, he would hit the wall, and—
"Son," said Gozaburo, his gravelly voice hoarser than usual. "You have become all I envisioned and more."
Son. Every defensive thought fled, and Seto stared upward with a slack jaw, his carefully crafted mask of ice melted away by a single moment of conversation that had not been in any of his anticipated attacks.
Gozaburo's gray eyes were not dispassionate now. They glittered with emotion. In five years, Seto had never seen that, never seen so much as a spark of caring in his father's expression when they locked eyes. Now he saw an entire world, heard it echoed in a word that spoke volumes. Son.
Seto swallowed heavily, unable to form any response. More vulnerable than he'd ever been. Gozaburo patted his shoulder once before stepping away, admiring the desk that had previously been his. He lifted the new plaque, ran his strong thumb along its engraved words. The corner of his lips twitched.
With reckless abandon, Seto's own smile returned.
All I envisioned and more.
Had Gozaburo truly cared? He'd always claimed that every lesson, every cruelty, was meant to turn Seto into a businessman worthy to inherit KaibaCorp, but Seto had never believed that. He'd known he was a science experiment, a pet project, and he was happy to be that because it had given him the opening he'd needed to secure a future for himself and his brother.
Maybe he'd never needed it. Maybe if he'd let things play out naturally instead of trying to be a damn strategy master, always thinking twenty moves ahead, maybe Gozaburo would have named him heir, given him the company, passed it on proudly from one Kaiba to another.
Father to son.
Gozaburo circled the desk. He rested one hand on the back of the heavy, metal-framed office chair, his eyes lingering on the expansive window. Then, with a swift movement, he heaved the chair with great force.
Something shattered—Seto's hope, along with the glass wall that looked down on Domino City, fifty stories below.
A sharp wind blew in through the jagged opening.
"You've won, Seto," Gozaburo said. He straightened his tie, pulled taut the sleeves of his red suit and touched the cufflinks, as if for good luck.
What are you doing? Seto wanted to ask, but he just stood there. Still numb. Gozaburo's first attack had been a venomous one, a poison that paralyzed him with his ears still ringing son, son, son.
His father met his gaze. The man looked regal. Red suit and gold cufflinks. Square shoulders and straight spine.
Except his eyes.
His wild, enraged eyes.
His insane, frenzied eyes.
"I'll teach you," Gozaburo said, "the fate of losers."
With all the grace of that defeated panther, he loped toward the broken window, crossing shards of glass, leaping into the open air. For one surreal moment, Seto thought he might fly.
But he fell.
Fifty stories.
While Seto stood numb.
"No!" shouted a voice that wasn't Seto's. In a strange daze, Seto watched a dark-haired boy materialize from the air, rushing to the window. For a moment, he thought it was Mokuba. Then the image flickered, changed, and the boy was taller, a few years older than Seto. He gripped the edges of the jagged hole in the window, but the glass passed right through his fingers without drawing blood. He looked back at Seto with frantic gray eyes.
"It's a lie!" he cried. "Sh-ow me the tru-th! Show me!"
Gozaburo looked regal. Red suit and gold cufflinks. Square posture.
Except his eyes.
His insane, frenzied eyes.
"I'll teach you," Gozaburo said, "the fate of losers."
With all the grace of that defeated panther, he loped toward the broken window, crossing shards of glass, leaping into the open air. For one surreal moment, Seto thought he might fly.
But he fell.
While Seto stood numb.
Ringing in his ears. Something heavy on his chest. A bird flew past the broken window, and another gust of wind swept in, moving Seto at last, pushing him back a step. He needed to . . . report it, right? His father was dead.
Like a robot, Seto managed one slow footstep in front of the next until he reached his office door. Twist, pull, release. The hallway loomed like a strange tunnel in a dream, and then he was standing in front of a secretary's desk, looking at her but just seeing a gaping hole in a window.
"Mr. Kaiba?" she smiled nervously, clearly unnerved by her new teenage CEO. "What's the matter?"
Son, son, son.
Now Seto knew what happened to a defeated predator.
Now Seto knew the fate of losers.
"Mr. Kaiba?" The woman leaned forward, frowning now. Confused.
Seto was confused too.
"He jumped," he said. His voice didn't sound like his voice. Or maybe it sounded too much like his voice. Shouldn't he be crying? His father was dead.
The woman's face changed, her hair bleeding green, her form shrinking.
"He wasn't you-r father!" the gray-eyed boy spat. "H-e was m-ine! You kill—kill—killed—"
Noah vanished, but his accusation remained, ringing in Seto's ears along with Gozaburo's final words.
You killed him.
Seto had heard that accusation before. He'd heard it from rabid tabloid writers trying to force their way through windows at the Kaiba mansion, snapping pictures of the fifteen-year-old psychopath who'd stolen a multi-million-dollar company, murdered his own father, and gotten away with it all. He'd heard it from Ghouls. From Marik.
Most damningly, he'd heard it from his own mind.
The secretary was back. She was making frantic calls to the police. The most logical part of Seto's mind, the strategy master that had won him KaibaCorp, told him to stay in her office, to stay away from his window at all costs, to not risk leaving any DNA or fingerprints that would incriminate him when surely that was what Gozaburo had wanted. A man with no suicidal tendencies, a man who left no note or explanation. Surely such a man was murdered and made to look like a suicide. Seto saw the trap with its teeth bared and mouth gaping open for him.
Even so, his steps led him back to his office. Past the desk, past the plaque. Seto Kaiba, CEO. The former CEO was now dead, and Seto was going to sit at his desk and drink coffee in his office and look over his shoulder at a window that he somehow knew would always be broken even after he paid someone to repair it.
Carefully, Seto stepped over broken shards of glass. He kept his hands in his suit pockets to ensure he wouldn't touch anything.
He stood at a shattered window, the wind howling in his ears. Far, far below, black dots littered the sidewalk, a crowd of ants gathering at the spectacle. At their center, barely a speck on the pavement, there was a splash of red. Gozaburo wore red to his own funeral, bloodied before he hit the ground.
I killed him, Seto thought. It occurred to him in a detached way. A bittersweet irony. He would tell the police he hadn't laid a hand on Gozaburo, which was true. He would tell the police Gozaburo had jumped, which was true. But Seto would not claim he was innocent. That would be a lie.
Seto had gone to war with Gozaburo. He'd stolen the man's life when he'd stolen his life's accomplishments, and like the samurai of old, the man had taken a sword to his own stomach after defeat.
The fate of losers.
Seto reached to straighten his tie. His hands shook so fiercely, he could hardly grasp it. He shoved them back in his pockets and forced himself away from the window, waiting for the police in the hall. While the strategy side of his mind was debating whether it would look more sympathetic or more condemning for him to be crying when the officers arrived, he realized the tears were already dripping down his jawline. The secretary offered him her handkerchief, even though she was crying too. Shock, most likely. For both of them.
Or perhaps Seto's was guilt.
"He jumped," Seto said again.
Was he a broken record? Was he practicing for the police? Trying to convince himself? With a scowl, he shoved the woman's handkerchief back into her hands, ignoring the way she flinched when he touched her. Maybe he looked angry. Or maybe she thought he was a murderer.
By one definition, he was.
Even in the hallway, he could feel the cold wind from the broken window.
By the time the police arrived, Seto had made a survival decision. He shoved the guilt down as deep as it would go, buried it the same way he would bury his father. With Gozaburo's leap, the man had started one final battle, and his strategy was transparent: either the murder accusations would destroy Seto's life or his own guilt would. Either way, Gozaburo would have his final victory.
But Seto wouldn't give it to him. He wouldn't allow himself to feel guilt, and he would cooperate fully with the police to prove his innocence. He would spread the truth through worthy reporters. No matter what, he would maintain public face and never allow the world to see him crack. He would win this battle just as he'd won the war. He would win. He had to win.
Because he knew the fate of losers.
While Seto was giving his police report, the world lurched around him. The colors bled together, melting down a drain, KaibaCorp headquarters disappearing to leave behind a meadow with familiar faces.
For just a moment, Seto stood face to face with Gozaburo's true son, a boy he'd thought long dead and forgotten. Noah Kaiba's face contorted in agony, his hair glitching wildly between black and green. He shrank from nearly Seto's height to nearly Mokuba's, his face growing rounder and younger but maintaining the grief.
"Noah!" shouted Mokuba.
Noah glanced toward the sound, his gray eyes filling with digital color. He fractured and reformed. Then fractured again.
And then he vanished.
Mokuba ran for his brother. It was an instinct, a need, and even when Seto tried to shy away, Mokuba threw his arms around him and held on for dear life.
"I don't know why everyone's feeling the need to hug me," Seto grumbled.
But his voice cracked at the edges, and when Mokuba heard that, he held tighter.
"I love you, Seto," Mokuba whispered. He couldn't remember the last time he'd said that out loud, and he sort of hoped Yori hadn't heard it because he felt squishy and weird giving emotional declarations around other people, but he also felt like Seto needed to hear it. Or maybe Mokuba just needed to say it.
Seto stiffened. He tried again to step away, but Mokuba held like a vise. He usually tried to give his older brother space whenever Seto needed it, and maybe he was being selfish right now, but Roland had told him to be selfish more often, and with the murder pods and Gozaburo and Noah and Priest Seth . . . maybe it was Mokuba who really needed the hug.
"Mokuba, let go." Seto's quiet voice had an edge to it, and Mokuba released him immediately, stepping back. He tried not to let his expression show the sting he felt burning inside.
"I'm not . . ." Seto clenched his jaw, closing his eyes briefly. When he opened them again, he looked at a spot somewhere to Mokuba's left. Avoiding him. "I'm not who you think."
"Priest Seth, you mean?" Mokuba didn't mean for his voice to be so flat.
When Seto darted a glance at him, Mokuba recognized something familiar in his brother's expression. It was the same way Seto had looked while facing a dropping anchor.
On the blimp, the thought of his brother being scared had been crippling for Mokuba. He'd wanted to do anything, say anything, to make it go away. To make Seto his unbreakable big brother again. He felt that desire again now, but stronger, like a gravity pulling him down. He wanted things to be the way they used to be. He wanted to pull the past around himself like a blanket and hide under it from all the present monsters.
Mokuba felt that blanket of the past all around him, pressing in, filtering the light. Memories from his real home teased at his mind, back when he'd been Mokuba Akiyama, with a mom and a dad and a big brother who all loved him. Back when the world wasn't complicated.
"Mokuba!" Seto reached out sharply.
It was too late.
The ground melted, and Mokuba dropped straight through.
As soon as Seto reappeared in the meadow, Yori focused on summoning his Ka again, hardly noticing as Noah Kaiba disappeared. The second summoning was harder than the first; her breathing grew labored, and sweat dotted her forehead. She swiped it away. Like a whisper on the breeze, she heard the voice of the shadows laughing at her, prowling just beyond her vision, gauging her strength, which felt much more fragile than it should have been.
Like water through her hands, her hold on Seto's dragon slipped away. She cursed.
"It isn't easy," said Dante beside her. "Wielding a Millennium Item."
Yori swallowed and rolled her shoulders to dispel the tension. "I don't remember you having one."
"I was meant to inherit the Millennium Ring from Mahad. But the tomb robber took it after his murder." He hesitated, his crimson eyes darting toward her bracelet before he spoke again. "Then the High Priest Council decided I would inherit Shada's, but he gave it to you."
Shada's voice echoed in her mind. When I had my pick of priests in training, some with heka much greater than mine, you are the woman I entrusted my item to.
Yori felt a little surge of strength that pushed the shadows back. Perhaps she should have apologized for robbing a dragon, but all she said was, "Sounds like we have a complicated history."
Dante gave a little smirk, so she hoped the history was at least as fun as it was complicated.
Mokuba rushed past her, throwing himself at his brother, and she bit back a smile. Two hugs in one virtual world. Surely that was Seto's limit. She'd have to be careful not to touch him for a week while he recovered.
To give them privacy, she stepped away, and Dante trailed after her. Despite its eerie stillness, the virtual world was certainly impressive. The meadow stretched in waves of grass that finally gave way to gentle green hills obscured by light fog. Above, the sky held the same infinite depth she was used to in the real world, even if the clouds hung frozen like a holographic rendering.
"Strange world we live in," she said quietly, and she didn't really mean virtual. Her thoughts were still on the ancient. She snuck a glance at Dante. "Do you remember the pharaoh?"
"Oh, you mean your secret lover?"
While Yori's face transformed into a heated iron, he gave a fanged grin. Even as she watched, his canines shrunk back to normal just before his grin calmed to a smile.
"Some of the dragon features sharpen or fade with emotion." Cocking his head, he paused to run his tongue along his teeth. "Strange world indeed."
"You weren't like this in the past."
"Well, I was never normal." Dante spun his staff for emphasis. "But no. I . . . I don't remember what happened. Not yet, anyway."
"We should get jackets," Yori said dryly. "Anyway, the pharaoh. Do you remember his name?"
She anticipated the answer a moment before she received it:
"No." Dante pursed his lips. "I still can't even remember my own."
"Well, 'Dante' suits you." Yori gave a smirk that faded. "I got used to not having memories. Here in the modern world, I mean. I couldn't remember my family, how I was raised, anything before I ended up on the front steps of an orphanage. I learned to be okay with that, and I thought maybe I was crazy—like, deep down, I was probably faking, because wouldn't everyone feel incomplete without knowing their past?" She shook her head. "I don't think I was faking. Without a past, I got to live eight years being whoever I wanted to be. That's real freedom. All of us getting memories of the past . . . so far, it feels like it's just a bunch of weights to tie us to things we didn't even choose. Slave, priest, tomb robber, even pharaoh—who wants to be tied to those things?"
"Family, friends, love, sacrifice," Dante countered. "Who wants to be tied to those things? Who we are is a complex web, and a person's entire history can't be boiled down to a few titles of identity. You were a slave, yes, and I was a priest—one in training, anyway—but we had names and relationships, and we took actions that changed an entire kingdom, an entire world. I'd rather know the difference I made and the people I loved."
Something inside Yori burned. She swallowed. "I think I liked it better when you didn't talk."
Dante raised an eyebrow, and when he responded, his tone was challenging. "What are you afraid of hearing?"
Yori looked away. Her wrist itched beneath the bracelet, and shadows danced at the far edges of her vision. She wasn't convinced they came from the darkness of the item. This virtual world clawed to expose memories, and just beyond Dante's protection of her, she could feel one straining to break free. It carried the edges of a deep shame, faint but repulsive, like a taste that came from catching a whiff of odor. Something in her past strained to be discovered, and she didn't know what it was, but she knew she would hate the discovery of it.
"I think . . ." She hesitated. "I think I made a deal . . . with . . ."
The blue sky took on an overcast shade, the clouds darkening to gray. Yori stood at the edge of something. It was in her power to reach out and claim it.
But she shied away.
She turned abruptly back toward Seto and Mokuba. "We need some way to communicate with Zigfried, to find out—"
"Mokuba!" Seto shouted, grabbing for his brother.
The ground opened, swallowing Mokuba whole and closing.
Yori cursed again. Even though it was too late, she raced back to Seto's side, Dante just a step behind. She glanced at the magician, bracelet already glowing.
"I have to summon his Ka," she said.
With a grimace, Dante shook his head. "You can't. He hasn't been initiated. The bracelet—"
Thunder rumbled through the sky, loud and oppressive, drawing everyone's attention upward. Only a faint sliver of light remained along the horizon while the sky had turned an angry gray. A quick snake of lightning danced across the clouds and vanished.
Just as Yori was about to make a quip about virtual weather patterns—
A man's face appeared in the sky.
Yori dropped into an instinctive crouch, reaching for her switchblade before halting. Not only did this world operate on different rules, but what good would a knife do against a cloudy ghost, anyway?
The giant face leering down at them seemed to be the personification of the storm. The lines of the man's square face were accentuated by his thick eyebrows, mustache, and sideburns, everything about him harsh and imposing. His dark, graying hair blended with the thunderclouds, and his gray eyes were no better, just another piece of the storm overhead.
"Seto Kaiba." When the face spoke, his voice rumbled like thunder, and the ground itself trembled. Those stormy gray eyes narrowed down on a single figure as if Yori and Dante didn't exist.
"Seto?" Yori turned to look at her friend.
Seto stood tall, hands in his pockets, apparently unaffected by the looming giant above. But she saw the tic of a muscle along his jaw.
"Gozaburo," he said.
Note: I've been dying to write the scene of Gozaburo's death ever since part one, and it's immensely satisfying to finally write a scene that's been in my mind for years. I know some of the anime filler arcs (like the virtual world) have mixed feelings attached, and for very good reason, but boy, do they offer exciting playgrounds to experiment with. Anything can be fun in fanfiction. All hail fanfiction, haha. Thank you, again, for coming on this journey with me. You guys are the best!