Fixation

Chapter 18


Jou cringed as Mokuba went flying, landing face first on one of the blue practice mats the younger Kaiba had set up in their private dojo. The way his face scraped against the blue plastic looked like it hurt.

It had been five days since Mokuba insisted they all spend their evening at Kaiba Corp, and Jou had spent most of those five days watching Mario and Mokuba train. He had also been speaking with insurance agents constantly, trying to calm down those clients who had discovered that their office was blown up, and trying to heal despite Seto’s tendancy to roughly demand sex whenever they were alone together. Not that Jou was complaining about that. Between handcuffs, silk scarves, and ropes, Jou had been having the most incredible sex of his life. He had even stopped fidgeting, he was so damn relaxed.

Mokuba sat still for a few moments, too exhausted by the day’s practice to move. Then, through what looked like sheer will power, he pushed himself up on to his knees. He was having trouble catching his breath and sweat was pouring off of him. He had shed the top of his uniform nearly an hour before because it was saturated. Quivering with each movement, Mokuba climbed to his feet and turned back towards Mario. “Again,” he rasped.

Mario, also covered in sweat but only slightly winded, smiled and crouched down into a low stance. “Would you prefer karate? Or kung-fu?”

“I’ve come at you… with karate attacks… mu tai… too.”

“Yeah, but this time I’ll just use regular striking art blocks.”

Despite the fact that he could hardly hold his eyes open, Mokuba managed to glare at the larger man. “What good would… you can just throw me… nothing works…”

“Well, yeah, but it’d make for a better match.”

“I don’t want… to feel good about… the damn match… I want to learn…”

Mario nodded. “Let’s try it again, then. You just keep missing the side-step. If you change the direction of your momentum I wont be able to throw you and we’ll both go to the ground, but you’ll be in control of the fall and you’ll be in control once we’re down there.”

“Only martial art in the world where folks are happier playing on the ground than on their feet,” Jou said.

Once again they both assumed fighting stances. Mario lunged, Mokuba back peddled and tried to slip around Mario’s right side to begin a pivot-based throw. Jou saw the mistake in his footing again, and shut his eyes as Mokuba went flying once again.

When Mokuba finally managed to pull himself to his feet again, Mario smiled down at him with genuine respect in his eyes. “Let’s just go through the footwork again. Then you should spend an hour or so running through katas quickly, so you actually get some exercise out of this.”

“You think… this isn’t… a workout?”

“It’s only been three hours. I lead ten hour seminars doing this stuff all the time. And when I’m not on a contract with Joey I teach for at least six hours a day, and then spar with my kid sister or Joey for two hours a day.”

“You do this for eight hours a day?” Roland looked horrified.

“Well, yes. What else is there?”

“He’s being honest. This is his entire life. He even limits himself to two beers a week because of how the extra calories affect his fighting.” Jou laughed and leaned back against the wall, wishing for the hundredth time that his ribs and arm were healed so he could join the other men.

Mario began leading Mokuba through the footwork again, slowly tracing out each step and repeating them over and over again.

“So Mr. Wheeler,” said Roland formally, “Have you given any more thought to my offer?”

Jou sighed. “I’ve thought about it, but I still don’t have an answer for ya. I’ve got a lot back home that I’d be walking away from. And I’d be leaving my entire company in the hands of this big lug and his sister. I’d never even have time to go back and visit, what with all of the work involved.”

“That’s probably true. But you’d also never get bored and never run out of things to do.”

“I know you’re eager for an answer… but I just don’t have one yet. I’ll make up my mind by the end of the week, though.”

“Fair enough. Speaking of duties, I’ve got to go relieve the gentleman in the control center so he can take his dinner break.”

Roland passed Seto on his way out the door. Seto knelt down beside Jou and rubbed his hand up and down his thigh by way of a greeting. “Mokuba,” Seto called out to the younger man.

Mokuba glanced up at them.

“When did you last stop to eat?”

Mokuba looked confused. He glanced at the clock but his eyes unfocused and he didn’t seem to recognize the digits on the clock face. It was then that Jou noticed the way the younger man’s head swayed.

Seto rocked back on his heels and pushed himself to him feet in a single, elegant motion. He hurried over to a small cabinet and pulled out an energy drink and protein bar. “You need to take a break.”

Mokuba couldn’t seem to find the words or strength to argue. He nodded and slumped over to where Jou was sitting and collapsed in a heap on the floor. Jou noticed that his skin was pale and clammy, and he hadn’t stopped sweating.

“You’re diabetic,” Jou said carefully.

“Hypoglycemic,” Seto corrected him. “He also has some autism spectrum issues, and if he were remotely aware of what’s going on, he’d try to punch me for saying that out loud. Not as reliable as a glucometer, but it means he’s pretty bad.”

“And he kept training anyway?” Mario looked concerned.

Seto opened an energy drink for his brother and held it to his lips. “He tends to get a bit over-focused. I’ve been told we both do. We just have different interests. I focus on work, Mokuba, and Jou. He focuses on fighting and protecting me.”

“Autism spectrum issues…” Mario raised an eyebrow. “He’s incredibly high functioning, if that’s the case. I teach a few students with autism. They don’t act like him.”

“It’s called Asperger Syndrome. Unlike most autism disorders, it does not impair intellectual ability. Many people with it possess above average intelligence. The fact that we have it does not change the fact that we’re both geniuses. It just means that we tend to have narrow interests, and we have difficulty focusing on anything beyond those interests. Unless eating is a part of his routine, I have to remind him to do it.”

Mario looked genuinely shocked. “So much so that you would forget to eat, even if eating regularly were a matter of life or death?”

“Yes,” said Seto coldly. “Our family doctor finds it troubling, but I can’t say that I have ever had an issue with it. That focus has allowed me to achieve things in the business world that most people never even dream about. Mokuba’s focus has been on fighting for some time now.”

“Does it involve the same emotional issues that autism does?” Jou asked, trying to think back to the abnormal psychology class he took six years ago. He almost remembered what the cover of the textbook looked like, but that was it.

Seto scoffed. “I would hardly call them issues. Yes, I suppose neither of us has a great deal of real empathy for others, but I don’t consider that to be a significant impairment. Neither of us have the same social grace as Yugi or Honda, but for the most part I don’t like people enough to want to be social. And there is nothing wrong with having a stable routine.”

Jou laughed out loud.

Mokuba’s eyes swiveled towards him, alert once again. He glanced around at the others then took the energy drink from his brother and drained it, crushing it when he was finished. Seto tossed the protein bar at him. “What’s so funny?” Mokuba asked, clearly unsettled that he had blacked out enough to miss an entire chunk of their conversation.

“You two!” Jou said honestly. “All of the emotional shit that comes with autism and friggin’ genius level IQs to rationalize that you’re better off that way! I’m not sure why I didn’t recognize it before.”

Mokuba’s glare shot towards his brother.
“He would have figured it out sooner or later,” said Seto. “He may not be as smart as me, but he is that smart. This way there is no ambiguity. Eat.”

Mokuba looked like he was about to snarl at his brother, but instead he used his teeth to rip open the protein bar. “Did you bother to tell him that he can expect a full blown temper tantrum from you if your morning coffee isn’t perfect?” He went back to eating without waiting for an answer. When he was finished he jumped to his feet again, hoping towards Mario in a fighting stance.

“No more today. You worked yourself to exhaustion already. Do some slow kata to cool down and we’ll do more tomorrow.”

“You’re giving up? I thought you said you could do this all day?”

“I can. But if you want to make progress, you’ll stop for the day. You’ll just get thrown around again if you’re too sore to move tomorrow. If you keep going now it will only slow your progress down by tearing apart more muscle fibers than you body can rebuild overnight.”

“I’d listen to the man, Mokuba. This is his area, after all.”

Mokuba reluctantly agreed. He shuffled off to bed, his shoulders and neck slouched in exhaustion.

“Got to admit, the kids got more heart than most. More discipline, too. I’ve taken on people from other martial arts before,” Mario explained to Seto, “Because the energy expenditure is so much higher in ju-jitsu, most of them can’t even last for a full one hour session until they’ve been at it for a few weeks. He’s good.”

“I expect better than that of him,” said Seto, as cold as ever. “Please excuse me, I need to make sure he doesn’t pass out on his way to bed.”

When the door closed behind them, Mario offered Jou a hand getting up. ‘Did I mention how charming these friends of yours are?”

“It’s enough to make a guy feel all gooey and appreciated, ain’t it?”

“How do you put up with that?”

Jou shrugged. “That’s just Kiaba. Do you how we met?”

“Hm?”

“He was so obsessed with being top in the world in Duel Monsters that he came into Yugi’s shop and strong armed his grandpa into selling him his most valuable card, a Blue Eyes White Dragon. As soon as he had it, he tore it to pieces right there in the store. See, in Duel Monsters no one can have more than three copies of a card in their deck. There were only four copies of that card in the world and he already had the three he could use, so he ripped it up just so no one else would ever be able to have one. Then he threatened to kill Yugi’s grandpa if he complained about it and stormed out.”

“And you fell in love with this guy?”

“Yeah, I’m still trying to figure that one out myself. I kind of blame Yugi. If Yugi hadn’t kept insisting that there had to be some good in him, that he had to really want friends despite all the evidence to the contrary, I don’t think I ever would have looked at him twice.”

“Oh shit,” Mario glanced at the clock nervously. “I’m late. Sorry, Joey, I gotta go.”

“What, you got a hot date or something?”

Mario blushed slightly then shook his head. He splashed some cool water on his face and picked up his uniform top, pulling it back on. “No, nothing like that, I beat Yugi in a strategy game last night and he wants a rematch.”

“You beat Yugi?”

“Yeah, just at War Craft III, and only twice, so it’s not like it counts against all the times he’s beat me so far. He said he would definitely win with Age of Mythology, though, so he was going to load it tonight.”

Jou thought back to the strategy game. He had seen it on store shelves years ago and had stopped to think about just how much Yugi would like a strategy game that let him fight with ancient Egyptians. “You just might get your ass kicked.”

“Not the end of the world,” Mario said with a smile Jou hadn’t seen in a long time.

Jou felt his mouth drop open, ready to start shouting childish taunts and jokes about the larger man liking Yugi.

“Not a word,” Mario said sternly. “He started it, and Mokuba egged him on, so I don’t want to hear it.”

“Mokuba? That’s weird… But Yugi! Yugi!”

“I’m going to go now,” said Mario, hurrying out to avoid letting Jou see the blush on his face.

Jou was left in the middle of the empty dojo, laughing to himself. He had been reluctant to leave his friend alone with Mokuba for fear that something in his training sessions would go wrong and the young man would take it as an insult. Sparing sessions could turn dangerous at the best to times, when adrenaline and testosterone made every tap hit a little harder and both sides began to take it personally. But Jou hadn’t had to worry after all. Despite the fact that both of them had to communicate in English, they seemed to meld together into a student and teacher relationship seamlessly. It seemed like there was nothing to worry about after all.

Now than he had some time, Jou turned out the lights and headed down stairs, grabbing a snack on his way to back to the tiny control center. For the last five days, he had been trying to get into the small door in the back of the control center, to see the safe room that left Seto terrified. However, between Seto taking the week off to focus all of his attention on molesting him, and Roland being in the control center every time Jou was demanding to know if Jou had decided to accept the offer of filling the other man’s job, Jou hadn’t managed it.

Tonight, though, he might get lucky. Seto was distracted by his brother and wouldn’t bother trying to track him down for an hour or so. Roland might still be in the control center, Jou would wait until the regular guard returned from dinner before barging in. If he had the shift rotation figured out, tonight Tanaka-san would be working in the control center. He was the same young guard who had been working on Jou’s first day of exploring the automated security system. Since Tanaka would be working for him within a matter of weeks, Jou was certain he could persuade the young man not to summon Roland the moment he walked through the door. Almost certain, anyway.

He didn’t see Tanaka in the kitchen, and he caught sight of Roland manually checking a motion sensor as he passed through the main hall, so he hurried to the control center, trying to act nonchalant.

“Hey,” he whispered, slipping inside.

“Mr. Wheeler, sir, good evening,” the young man stood up and bowed low.

“What’s going on, Tanaka-san?”

“Everything’s quiet tonight, sir. We heard that you’ve been offered Roland’s position. Have you decided to take the job?”

Jou shrugged. “I don’t know. It seems like I’d never have to worry about being bored again. But it’d mean I’d have to trust Mr. Delgado and his sister to run Ally for me… It’s a difficult decision. They could certainly manage it. And actually, since you’ve been here for nearly five years, I was hoping I might be able to pick your brain a bit about what things are like where when there isn’t a death threat to deal with.”

Tanaka glanced at the monitor for a moment. Jou saw his eyes flick down to the location of Roland’s transmitter. The chief of security had retired to his quarters on the far side of the house.

“Yeah, sure. It looks like it’s going to be dull around here anyway.”

Jou pulled up a spare chair and propped his feet up on the console. “So, five years? Have you worked here in the house that whole time? Was this your first job?”

“No,” Tanaka smiled, “I started out in law enforcement, went to the academy right out of high school. I tore my Achilles tendon before my first year was up. They were going to promote me, give me a job as an administrative assistant, and I couldn’t stand that. The city’s insurance wasn’t going to pay for the surgery I’d need to work again. So, I started working nights at Kaiba Corp, because the benefits were so good. I was just going to work until I qualified for insurance, then get my leg fixed, but then I started to like the job. There was no one to chase and it gave me a chance to learn more about automated security. Plus, it means a lot, you know, when your boss gives a damn about you. The city never cared about my quality of life, they just wanted to do what was cost effective for them. Kaiba-sama not only offers insurance that covered the surgery, but he let me take time off during work to go to physical therapy sessions. Kaiba paid for me to go to any training seminar I wanted, and to go back to school, too. By then I was sold on the idea of being a company man. I transferred over here two years ago.”

“How have things been sense then?”

Tanaka sighed. “You shouldn’t listen to what the old staff says, Mr. Wheeler. The Kaiba’s have skeletons in their closet just like everyone else, but the job is not cursed, no matter what that old cook says.”

“Cursed?”

“She’s just a superstitious old lady, Mr. Wheeler. She has no right to talk about things she knows nothing about.”

“So the job’s not cursed?” Jou parroted back the younger man’s words.

“No!” He shook his head vehemently. “It might get a bit creepy sometimes, but it is not cursed. As long as you’re loyal to the Kaibas, they will stand by you to the end.”

“A bit creepy?”

Tanaka glanced at the monitor again, his face worried. “Look,” he leaned forward, “You didn’t hear this from me, but some of the old staff, they say this place was worse than hell before old Gozoboro died. Apparently he had a thing for little boys, and for pain.”

“He hurt kids in the house?”

Tanaka glanced at the monitor, then at the entrance. “Come on,” he said quickly jumping out of his chair. He locked the entrance with a deadbolt and half-sprinted over to the small green door. Perfect, Jou thought, following him with his best sincerely confused expression plastered to his face. “I can’t be away from the desk for long, and this will show up on the alarm logs, but odds are no one will notice.”

He followed Tanaka into a dark stairwell. Yellow flood lights flickered to life as motion sensors within the stair well activated. Jou followed the quick man down two flights of concrete stairs to a gray steel door that was set into a wall made of painted cinder blocks.

“This is Kaiba’s safe room?” Jou asked.

“That’s what it’s used for now, yeah,” Tanaka said nervously.

“It looks like a cell door,” said Jou. And it really did. The door was solid steel with a four inch glass window set at eye level and a small locking hatch set on hinges near the center of the door. Jails used similar doors to pass food to prisoners who were locked down.

“It gets worse,” Tanaka whispered, opening the door with large metal key. He pulled the door open an inch, let it shut again and made sure that it opened again without the key. “Go on in,” he said, holding the door open.

As Jou moved into the room a single bank of fluorescent lights turned on. The feeling that he was walking into a jail cell skyrocketed. The room was made of white washed cinder blocks with a single concrete bench along the length of one wall. The bench was about the size of a single bed. In the corner, a hole in the concrete with a drain set three inches down seemed to be the only accommodations made of hygiene. “There’s no sink, no water…”

“You noticed that too… Even the toughest max cell has a water fountain,” Tanaka agreed. “We don’t have a lot of time, but take a good at the bunk.”

Jou stared at the white concrete bunk for a moment before he began to notice what Tanaka had wanted to show him. He knelt down beside the bunk and stared at two spots where something had worn down the paint along the edge of the bunk. Two indentations were roughly round on top, with slight line-shaped grooves running down the front of the bunk beside them. Small crescent shapes were imbedded into the paint about two inches from the round indentations. “Gods…” Jou breathed, recognizing the slight curve of thumb nails. “How long does it take to wear down paint by hand?”

“This is enamel, not paint—it’d take a long time. Don’t forget the stains,” Tanaka pointed to a series of dark patches along the center of the bunk.

Jou felt his stomach rebel as he ran his finger over the darker areas of white. A few inches away from the patches, he could feel a rim of paint. Whatever the stains were, someone had gone to a great deal of trouble to clean them up and paint over them. What had happened to Seto in this tiny cell?

“I scraped some off, when I finally realized what it was… A buddy of mine in the crime lab took a look at it, just a quick analysis so it wouldn’t use up too much lab time. All he could tell me was that it contained no less than twelve distinct DNA traces, mostly blood, but a trace of fecal matter, too.”

“Twelve people…” Was Mokuba’s blood mixed in with those stains? Was Seto’s?

“It gets worse,” Tanaka wore a resigned smile, as though determined to continue without betraying how much the entire room made him want to scream. “I looked up the designs for the old security system, when Gozoboro was alive. He had eight monitors set up in that room up there. Seven of them cycled through cameras in different areas of the house. One of them, the only one with a VCR hooked up to it, showed a split display of this bunk. Not the room, just the bunk. He had cameras set up in every corner.”

Jou glanced towards the ceiling and saw two small wires and metal brackets poking out of the concrete in each corner.

Tanaka took a deep breath and went on. “Kaiba Mokuba comes down here sometimes, late at night, and sits on that bunk for an hour or so. Kaiba Seto avoids it. The only time I’ve seen Kaiba Seto use this as a safe room, their family doctor had to come in and tranquilize him to get him out of here because he kept attacking everyone who went near him.” Tanaka glanced at his watch. “Shit, I’ve been away too long, we’ve got to go.”

“Right,” Jou nodded.

He followed Tanaka out the door and up the stairs quickly, feeling as desperate to get away from the cramped cell as the younger guard was. When they reached the control center, Tanaka checked the monitor again, unlocked the door, and then settled back into his chair.

“That’s the worst of it,” Tanaka said glumly. “If you listen to that old cook, she’ll have you convinced that you’re going to get blown up or die in a car accident within six months of working here, but it’s not true. Those men spent four years here as boys, living with a monster. I don’t consider the fact that they’re all dead to be a curse, I figure it’s justice.”

“They’re all dead?”

Tanaka chewed on his lower lip and nodded. “Every one of them. Every security guard who ever manned this room for Kaiba Gozoboro. And if they weren’t already dead, I know I’m not the only one here who would do their best to correct that.”