Pairing: Seto/Jou, OC/Seto
Beta: Jennie B - too good to be true
Chapter oneAs soon as Jou entered the hospital, he was approached by a big number of journalists, all of them pointing their microphones in his direction. He took a step back as the questions were shouted at him from everywhere.
“How do you feel after having gone a whole month without knowing about Mr. Kaiba?”
"Is his condition bad?”
“Where did they found him?”
“What took the police so long?”
The blond was on the verge of screaming some obscenities when a firm hand landed on his shoulder. “He has nothing to say to you; he came here to see how his lover is doing. Now if you’ll excuse us...”
Wait a fucking minute. Lover? Seto was his lover? He turned around and felt a little relieved to see that it was Yami who was guiding him through the crowd of journalists, but that relief soon turned into more confusion. “Yami, what’s going on here? What happened to Seto? And what the fuck is that about him being my lover?!”
The former pharaoh looked at him like he had two heads. He sighed and continued to guide the blond through the corridors. “I know it has been hard for you, Jou, but you can’t feel guilty about what happened. Not now.”
Jou still stared at him, confused beyond imagination. They stopped at one of the doors and Yami smiled a little sadly. “Yugi went to buy some coffee. I will let you two alone be for a while.”
The blond nodded and watched Yami walk away. Apparently, all of the answers he was looking for were behind that door. Slowly he opened it and entered the overly white room, his amber eyes staring directly at the still form lying on the bed. He approached and gasped when he saw the state that the young CEO was in.
His face, which had always been so utterly handsome, was marked with bruises – bad ones. His lower lip was swollen because from a cut and some nasty scars, probably from other injuries, surrounded one of his eyes. Jou felt tears prickle at the corner of his eyes and he grabbed a chair and set it near the bed. He still didn’t understand shit about what was going on, but at that moment he knew, as he had for ages, that he did carry some feelings for the brunette. And, seeing him like that, so utterly helpless, was a shock to him. He rested his hand on top of the brunette’s pale one, and sighed deeply. What the hell had happened to him?
“Puppy?”
He was startled by the tenor, and his first instinct was to let go of the hand and get up. But, as soon as he looked up to the CEO, he found himself frozen to the spot. Those azure eyes, which were usually so cold, were glowing with pain, sadness, and something that was making him feel desperate – as if he knew that something unusual had happened to him. “How are you feeling?” The question was blurted out of his mouth before he could stop himself.
“As fine…” The brunette sighed, “As I can be.”
“Oh.” He seated himself again and looked at the brunette through his golden bangs. Flashes of their bodies entwined together on a large bed suddenly appeared in his mind, but as soon as they had come, they were gone. “Can I get you anything?”
“Jou,” the brunette answered in a tired tone, cutting off the blond’s mumbling. “Sit here…with me?”
The blond didn’t even think twice about it. He seated himself on the side of the bed in the tiny space that was available next to Seto. Immediately, the brunette inclined his head to rest on his shoulder, and he quietly spoke. “All this time…when they were doing what they did, I was thinking about you.”
The blond widened his eyes at hearing those words, but the brunette didn’t see it, because he had fallen asleep thanks to the heavy drugs in his system.
-----
“Hey Jou.”
“Hey Yugi,” said the blond, smiling softly at him. He was seated outside Seto’s hospital room while Mokuba was inside with his brother. He waited for his small friend to sit down beside him, and smiled a little more.
“So…how are you dealing with all of this?”
That was a good question, indeed. He didn’t know why he wasn’t freaking out right then. Most probably it was because he was torn between his memories; he kept getting flashes of images from two different series of events, and he was having a hard time discerning what was real and what was not. He remembered quite vividly how awful the day had been for him at school. He knew that had been real. But, at the same time, he felt that it couldn’t possibly be true because he also realized that he would never fight with Seto like that – not after two years of being his boyfriend. And when he thought about how long they had been dating, his mind became clouded all over again. He still felt that pang in his chest every time the brunette humiliated him. And, even now, it still hurt when he thought about how cruel the young CEO had been that afternoon. “I’m a fucking mess right now,” the blond finally replied to his friend. Yes, that pretty much summed up his mental state.
“Yes, I can tell,” said the short teen. “After this past month of worrying about Seto, and then, when he was rescued, to be found this way…”
“Wait.” He knew he was going to get a strange look for asking, but he pressed on anyway. “What happened…to Seto?”
Bull’s eye. Yugi looked at him like he had grown a second head. “You’re kidding, right? Seto was kidnapped, and you almost died of worry!”
The blond sucked in his breath. Seto had been kidnapped? For a whole month? And then to have been found in that state – the kidnappers must have done something terrible to him and…As soon as he thought the words, a sick feeling fell on his heart. There was something he was missing; some piece of the weird puzzle his life had turned into. Something was so wrong with the whole situation. He saw Yami approaching with the doctor and he stood up. The doctor, an old man, entered the hospital room, and a few minutes later, he came out, Mokuba next to him. He approached the blond and smiled friendlily, the gesture not quite reaching his eyes.
“So…how is he?” asked Jou, all four of them paying attention to what the doctor had to say.
“He is recovering quickly due to quick action on the part of the staff when he got here. But, I’m more worried about his mental state right now.”
“Why?” asked the raven-haired teen.
“The results of the examination he had done were delivered to me, and I found some nasty bruises on Mr. Kaiba’s body. From the look of it, he was probably tortured and raped by his kidnappers.”
Jou froze on the spot, and suddenly a sentence he had uttered that afternoon came to his mind, making him feeling sick:
I just wish that someday you can suffer the way I have in my life, just so you can learn how to treat people better.No, that couldn’t be! They had just been words, thrown in a fit of rage; he didn’t have that kind of power! Things like that were only supposed to happen with Yami! But, the more he thought about it, the more he started to feel guilty. He slid down along the wall, putting his head on his hands, his body starting to shake uncontrollably.
Mokuba crouched down on his knees, putting a hand on his shoulder. “I know it’s difficult to hear it Jou, but…please don’t think like that; we have to be strong for nii-sama right now.”
And that made his body shake even more and before he could stop himself, he had started sobbing. How he could have ever wished something like that upon someone? Even more, how he could have wished that upon the guy he liked? And now…he didn’t even know if he could ever face the brunette; he just felt so incredibly guilty.
-----
He blinked open his tired eyes and looked around. A deep sighed escaped his lips when he saw that he was in a hospital. Not in that warehouse. Not anymore. A shiver traversed his body as Seto thought about the last month. He wished that his memories would become nothing more than a blur, but they were so achingly vivid. Their filthy hands, their voices laughing at him, their punches and kicks when he refused to give in every time they raped him – but what was worst was their words speaking of Jou.
“He will never touch you again, rich boy. Not when he sees his lover as dirtied as you are now,” growled the man from behind Seto as he had thrust into the pale body, not caring that he was tearing him open. The brunette had squeezed his eyes shut, trying to block his mind from both the physical and mental assault. He had done that before with Gozaburo; it wouldn’t be any problem right now."Jounouchi is his name, isn’t it? He’s such a delicious blondie! I bet you are the one who fucks him,” exclaimed the guy next to him, jerking off at the sight of his friend raping the brunette. “How is he in bed? Maybe we should find out; what do you think? Should we bring him here as well?”
The brunette had ground his teeth together, growling low in his throat. “Touch him and you die.”
“Shut the fuck up!” The other man had punched him in the face, the sound echoing loudly in the bare room. “Better yet, I think I will put your mouth to better use.”
The brunette had suddenly felt the rough fingers opening his mouth, and the thick cock being shoved inside of it. Seto gagged, and the man had pulled his auburn hair, starting to shove more and more of his dick on the teen’s throat. “Oh, you should feel his mouth later; he is so good at this…” the man had moaned, and his friend had laughingly agreed, thrusting even faster into his passage.
At that moment, he had known that he was bleeding. But, nothing had felt worse than his pride, which had been crushed.
He heard the door open and saw the blond enter the room. He looked so shy and unsure of how to act. He tried to dry the tears that had been sliding down his face, but the effort was in vain. They kept falling. He heard the footsteps echoing on the floor, and then he felt a weight beside him on the bed.
“Seto? Are you in pain somewhere? Do you want me to call the nurses?” whispered Jou in a worried tone.
“No, please, I just…” He didn’t want anyone else to see him in that state. His hand shyly touched the blonde’s. “Don’t tell anyone you saw me like this, not even Mokuba.”
“But…” Jou looked at him, and the brunette saw sorrow and guilt reflected in the amber eyes.
Seto leaned his head on his shoulder and buried his face in the other teen’s blue shirt. “Please. I don’t want anyone to see me like this. Just…don’t tell anybody.”
“Seto…” Jou felt his heart clench painfully at seeing the fragile state of his lover – or not; he was still so confused – and he couldn’t handle the guilt. He made up his mind right then as he held the young CEO, feeling the hot tears staining his shirt. Even if his own mind was messed up right now, he would help the brunette to recover, to forget all the painful memories. It was his fault, and he would fix it.
And he would make sure to never wish for anything ever again.
-----
The week that Seto stayed in the hospital passed very slowly. And it had been a very confusing time for Jounouchi. When he left the next morning to go get some clothes from his home, he had another surprise. Apparently, he no longer lived on the bad side of the city. Mokuba, looking at him with a funny look, said that it had been a year since he had moved in to Kaiba’s mansion when, after another fight with his dad, the older male had been arrested for abuse.
Upon hearing that, Jou had gone to the jail to visit his father, if only to set thing right in his mind. He hadn’t expected that his old man would fly off in a fit of rage when he saw him, and it took two guards to contain him. As he left the prison, flashes of his last fight with his dad came to his mind, one in which he had been beaten severely. He sighed, no longer all that surprised with the weird things his mind was concocting. It was at that moment that he had decided that he would no longer care about what had or had not happened; instead, he would look to the future. He had to do that because at that moment, the brunette needed his support.
When he arrived back at the hospital, he was surprised to find Honda leaving Seto’s room. As soon as the teen saw him, smiled sadly before he approached the blond and hugged him. “How are you holding up buddy?”
“I really don’t know,” Jou answered truthfully. He sighed deeply. “Can we talk somewhere else?”. He hoped that he could count on his friend to help relieve his inner turmoil.
“Sure thing. Let’s go to the winter garden,” suggested the brunette.
The blond nodded and followed his friend to the secluded place, which at that hour was thankfully empty. Jou sat down on a bench with Honda beside him, and then leaned forward, resting his head on his hands with a sigh. He felt his friend’s hand on his shoulder.
“So talk. I will listen.”
The blond sighed one more time before he started trying to explain things, starting with the awful day he had had yesterday…or, the one he thought he had had. He talked about everything that had happened, from his awful fight with Seto and the cruel words he said, and then…the news that the young CEO had finally been rescued. After that, he felt silent, just waiting to hear what Honda would have to say about all of it.
“So…what are you saying is that ever since you said those words, you’ve felt like you’ve fallen into a dream where you and Seto have been lovers for two years now; that he was kidnapped and everything, just because you wished that?”
“Kind of.” He glanced over at the other teen. “Look Honda, I feel like I’m going crazy. I don’t know what’s real and what’s not anymore!”
“Jou,” the brunette sighed before pressing on. “It’s hard to believe that things happened like that because all the gang and I have seen how happy he’s made you over these past two years, since you started dating. I know that when it comes to us, nothing is ever right – at least not since we met Yami.” He smiled lightly. “But think about it. This is your reality, and you have to live with it, face it. Don’t run away.”
“I’m not running away! I just…don’t want to feel this guilt eating me inside of like it is right now.”
“Well…” Honda thought for a few seconds. “The only way I can see for you to put your mind at rest is to think about Seto right now. You and Mokuba will have to help him recover…both physically and mentally. So…concentrate on him, and only him.”
Those words only reforced his decision. Smiling sadly, he hugged his best friend, a silent ‘thank you’ escaping his lips. He just hoped that he really could put these thoughts out of his mind and help Seto to overcome the ordeals of the last month.
TBC
