I decided early on that any shadow games would be narrated in present-tense. I'm not sure what led me to that decision, and I think it might be arbitrary in the end, but I like it and I'm going to stick with it.
I think this is one of those situations where my understanding of Shadi as a villain comes through. He isn't being overtly cruel, exactly, but he's definitely banking on things going a certain way, and he isn't doing all that much to divert the outcome he … wants? It's hard to say. I can't tell what Shadi wants whenever he shows up in the story, and my own stories are no different.
I guess what I mean to imply here is: Shadi may not be a liar, outright.
But that never stops him from lying by omission.
It might be true that he isn't actively looking to fuck shit up for everybody, but I would argue that he's definitely looking to do that … passively. If that makes sense.
Verse One.
"Do you know, child," Shadi said, after a time, drawing attention to himself for the first time in hours, "why it is that I carried two of the Millennium Items?"
Seto turned to face the man wrapped in robes. "I do not," he said.
"It is to act as a barrier," Shadi said, "to keep the ambitious, the power-hungry, the avaricious, from gathering too much to themselves." He gestured. "Your light burns too brightly, and it is not tempered in the way that it ought. That, child, is why I am here."
"How ought I be tempered, then?" Seto asked, testily.
Shadi lifted up his remaining prize, the Millennium Ankh, and said: "That, child, is how we will continue. I warn you here, and now: the trial you face, to leave this arena, will be more difficult and more perilous than what you have faced thus far. The ankh represents life itself. If you would step away from me with your life, then you must hold this in your hand."
"You're telling me," Seto said, "that failure in this next trial would mean my death."
"Correct."
"In short," Seto said, "it's no different from any shadow game I've ever faced."
Shadi didn't respond to this with words, choosing instead to stare at Seto unwaveringly.
Mokuba looked irritated. "Niisama isn't doing any of this out of greed, or a lust for power," he said. "He's doing it because your master forced him into it. Don't you go calling my brother power-hungry like you know anything about him. You act like you're some arbiter of justice or whatever, but you pay as much attention to the world as any ghost. Did you give the pharaoh this little speech? Did you care when he started collecting Millennium Items? Or was he too good for that? Did you already have an idea in your head that he was worthy and didn't need to be tested?"
"The Nameless King was tested," Shadi said.
"Every test he faced," Mokuba snapped, "so did my brother. He's no better than Niisama, and don't pretend you know different. You don't."
"Long before these modern years," Shadi said, "the Nameless King was tested."
"How? When he died? Dying for your principles is easy. Niisama did something with his."
Seto held out a hand toward his brother. "Mokuba," he said, gently, "it's okay. Words mean nothing. Even if you backed him into a corner and forced him to admit he's threatening me, that he treated . . . him . . . with favoritism, it wouldn't change anything. Let's just get on with this."
Noa, stone silent, looked quite smug; he was supremely proud of both his brothers in this moment.
The Kaiba legacy was as strong as it had ever been.
Bakari, standing near Ryo and looking like he was only keeping his feet out of sheer stubbornness, said: "Take care with what you do, in your journey for the Ankh. There are worse things than death, especially when dealing with blood magic. You know that now."
Seto turned his head, glancing over his shoulder. "I know," he said, softly.
"After what you pulled in that tribunal," Bakari said, "you'd better not die. You hear?"
Verse Two.
Back in the dining hall.
Seto doesn't suppose he's surprised to see it again, but he thinks he'd much rather be away from this space. Let him be done with it. At the very least, he wishes there was a more direct way of influencing the damn place. He already suspects that, were he to approach someone about it, someone who knew how soul rooms worked, they would say something like:
It's a reflection of your soul. It's you. If you want to change it, you have to change yourself.
That's all well and good, but Seto still finds himself more than a little irritated that this would be the answer, even if he isn't sure, because he can't work out what the hell this place is trying to tell him about himself. If anything. If Seto isn't comfortable in his own soul, with his own soul, what is the answer? Clearly, it means that there's something about himself that he doesn't like, right? That must be what it means.
And yet, for all that, what recourse does Seto have?
So distracted by these musings, Seto doesn't notice that he isn't alone in the dining hall for quite a while.
As he approaches the table, Seto finally sees that there are other people in the room with him, stepping up from the opposite end of the room. Not just one, or two, but three. Three people step up to him, and it strikes him that he knows who they are, before they even make their way out of the shadows of obscurity; before he establishes, in his memory, that he's seen them together before.
Seto closes his eyes, draws in a breath, and lets it out carefully.
"Hello, Mother," he says. "Father. Mokuba."
The family from the Eye's vision, his first test, steps up to the table; they watch him with unreadable expressions on their faces. They don't look wrong, exactly, but Seto doesn't really think they look right, either. It might be the damnable lighting in this fucking room, but there's something off about them, and Seto doesn't like it.
He doesn't like looking at these three again.
He doesn't want to face them again.
"This is the real you?" Kohaku asks him.
"I haven't the faintest idea what you mean," Seto says, "so . . . I must be. For all the good it does me to say it, yes. This . . . is the real me." He gestures to himself, holding out his arms like he's allowing for an inspection.
"Why did you leave?" Mokuba asks.
"I can't leave a place I was never in to begin with," Seto says. "I didn't belong with you."
What is this suppose to prove? What is he supposed to learn from this? Seto can't guess, and he doesn't think he wants to. All he wants to do, in this moment, is find Shadi and throttle him. He wants to take that damned leather cord holding the Millennium Ankh around his stupid, stupid neck and . . .
"So, what?" Mokuba demands, his voice rising sharply. "We're just supposed to smile and nod, and be happy that you stole him from us?"
Seto blinks. Stares.
"Stole . . . what from you?"
"My brother!" Mokuba fires back. "You took him! You replaced him! And you think you can just leave?!"
"I have too many sins that I am responsible for," Seto says, "to go around taking blame for things I didn't do. I stole no one, and nothing, from any of you. I survived in a game that I was pressed into playing. No more, no less."
"So, that's it? Really?" It's Yuki's turn to speak. "My son was sacrificed for a game, and that's all you have to say?"
Verse Three.
Seto thinks about saying that it was just a vision, that none of it had ever been real, that the whole basis of his understanding of this magic—which was accepted and he'd been told was correct—hinged on everything from that game being built from his own memory. But then he thinks about who told him that, who had him do all that, and then he thinks about what Isis Ishtar said, and her assertion that the Torque allowed someone to see into other worlds, other dimensions, other possibilities, and Seto wonders whether he can afford to believe that.
Seto wonders if it surprises him if Pegasus Crawford lied to him. Again.
It doesn't. It really doesn't.
Seto looks at the family he wishes he could leave behind, the family he turned his back on, and he wonders if he can afford to apologize to them; is that even what he's supposed to do? Is this a test? Is he supposed to see through something? Is he supposed to beg forgiveness or justify himself? Or is he supposed to do something entirely different? He doesn't know.
". . . If you're looking for a target on which to vent your feelings," Seto says, slowly, "then I'm not the person you need. I never sacrificed your son, nor did I ever call for any sacrifice at all."
"You started this!" Mokuba cries, pointing accusingly at him.
"I didn't." Seto shakes his head. "I have never been anything but reluctant on this journey. I take it because I'm left with no other choice."
"There's always a choice," Kohaku says.
"Fine." Seto gestures. "The choices I made have led other people to do harm to your family. Because of choices I made, others took your son from you. Take it up with them. Have Pegasus Crawford answer for this. I'll be happy to facilitate that for you. But your problem isn't with me."
"Do you even care?" Yuki asks, in a betrayed little whisper.
"Honestly?" Seto quirks an eyebrow. "You don't want me to answer that question. But if you're going to press me to answer it, then you answer this one: do you care that my brother, my family, was placed into danger because of these things? That he was my motivation for taking on these trials? If you want me to apologize to you for what happened to your son, fine. But first, walk up to my brother and tell him, to his face, that he should be dead."
Yuki's face twists in something like disgust. "You . . . are not my son."
"No," Seto agrees. "I'm not. I haven't been a Yagami for a long time now. I am a Kaiba. I have kept as much of myself alive as I can afford. Most of the boy I was, I have had to kill. It was the only way to survive. Shall we talk about how you abandoned me? Since we're casting blame at people who don't deserve it. Answer for that. Where were you when I was changing my brother's diapers and teaching him to talk? Where were you when I was the only one in my house who did the laundry? Where were you when Gozaburo Kaiba was beating me into shape? When he nearly killed me for the fifth time?"
Mokuba looks more overtly, and obviously, revolted than his mother. "Maybe it would have been better for the universe if he'd succeeded."
"So, you want me to value your brother's life, but mine deserves to be snuffed out," Seto says. "You could at least pretend to have the high ground."
Verse Four.
"Kisara?" Mokuba looked worried, and that worry was quickly going to spiral into something worse, considering the situation they were all in. "Are you okay? You look like . . . you look . . . upset."
If she'd been fully present, Kisara Mayer might have said something about them all looking upset, which was perfectly expected and acceptable, but she wasn't fully present. She felt herself switching between consciousnesses, like she was splitting in two, and she was quite sure that something new was happening.
It was the dragon. It had to be the dragon.
Kisara eyed Shadi, standing there in silence in front of Seto, and she wasn't sure what she expected to see. She said: "Are you running this show?" she asked. "Or is this game dependent on his reaction to the magic? Is he building his own resistance right now?"
Shadi turned his head, just so, and sent his unwavering blue gaze directly into Kisara's soul.
"I do not dictate what is in Seto Kaiba's heart," Shadi said. "What struggles he faces are his own."
Kisara's face soured. "I don't think I like that," she said.
"Such is the nature of this test."
"What's . . . what's going on?" Mokuba asked; he looked close to panic. "What are you thinking about? Kisara, do you think something's going to happen?"
"There's only one thing that can sabotage him now," Kisara said. "Himself."
Understanding shot through Mokuba like adrenaline. "You don't think Niisama can make it out of this game. If he's making his own trouble, if the test is being built out of his own insecurities, then you think . . ."
Kisara nodded. "I do," she said. "I think he will bury himself."
It was Noa's turn to scowl thunderously. "You are . . . not wrong," he admitted.
"But what . . . does any of that mean for us?" Mokuba asked. "We can't do anything about it."
Kisara grinned, showing her teeth. She could feel that old aura, that energy, rising in her. She knew what it was this time. It felt familiar this time. "It may be true that you can't do anything," she said, "but someone can." She clenched her fists tightly enough that her knuckles cracked. "I think it's high time for me to try a little something. I'm getting a bit tired of standing on the sidelines, letting other things take control. I think I'd like to be active for a change."
Light flashed; it honestly looked like Kisara had fangs for a moment.
It was Ryo who seemed to fully understand what was going on, the first among the throng.
He smiled. "Good luck," he said. "You're going to need a strong grip on your self-image. It's easy to lose track of yourself when you're . . . inside."
Kisara nodded. "Thank you," she said.
She stepped forward, toward Seto's prone form, and a sheen of gold like a force-field sprang up around him. It was a warning from the gods not to interfere with the game. Kisara reached through, breaching the barrier as easily as if it weren't there, and she gripped the eldest Kaiba's left shoulder.
"Let us see what you have truly learned, my prince."
Verse Five.
Seto closes his eyes, preparing himself for something, when a door opens behind him. He whirls, utterly incapable of working out whether there'd been a door behind him a moment ago, and he watches as a figure steps into the hall. It's a familiar figure, one that he's grown to associate with trouble, but he supposes that isn't fair. It would be just as accurate to associate Mokuba with trouble, something he's never honestly done.
Until now, anyway.
Yuki, Kohaku, and the other Mokuba all turn their attention to the new arrival.
Kisara is a light source all her own, and she sheds a bright silver sheen across the huge oak table. She steps up near Seto, stops at his shoulder, and bows her head.
She speaks: "I believed it best to intercede. There will be no solutions brought to this table as things are unfolding now." She glances over at Seto, offering the faintest of little smiles; he can't tell if it's patronizing or not, and he's quite sure that has something—everything—with how high his hackles are raised right now. "You are thinking like a boy, my prince, and not like the force of magic you aim to become." She gestures grandly. "Perhaps that is to be forgiven. After all, who else will you ever be, when faced with these people, but a boy? A brilliant boy, a precocious boy, but a boy all the same."
Seto stiffens, but he doesn't speak.
Kisara turns her attention to the family before them. "Permit me, I pray, to assuage you: the boy you know, who makes whole your family, has not been sacrificed. He has been . . . misplaced. Lost. The magic utilized by Pegasus Crawford to facilitate my prince's ascension, so to speak, has resulted in . . . some crossed wires. You need not grieve, nor extract vengeance, but merely wait. Your son will be found and returned to you." She gestures now to Seto. "As for my prince's conduct, I pray thee remember that he understands little about the nature of magic, and so he relies on his training. That training is . . . less than amicable, and it makes things difficult for him when trying to reach out to other people."
Kohaku's eyebrows raise. "What . . . training?" he asks, suspiciously.
"My prince," says Kisara, "I am going to ask you to do something in this moment that you will be loathe to do. I ask you to do it. Trust in me, as you always have. I know the nature of this game, and I know what Shadi is expecting from you in order to win it."
Seto grunts. ". . . Fine."
"Remove your shirt, so that your family can look upon the results of your training."
Seto stiffens again; when Kisara turns to face him again, he can tell that she is dead serious.
Seto remembers that she pulled him from the murk of Obelisk's chaos, and that he owes her his trust at least. So, Seto does what he never would have done for anyone else: he nods, quickly, curtly, and then divests himself of his coat, shirt, and undershirt.
He turns his back, slowly, to his family.
END.