You're Not Me

Sorry I couldn’t get this up sooner, RL is still playing with me. For the second time this year fire threatened my hometown, where my mother still lives, and there were a few tense days. And added to that my train line was disrupted by a car losing a battle with a train, the driver never had a -- I got home several hours late, totally dehydrated because it was a summer like day on top of it. And I was working on Mastering the Game; hope to have the next chapter up soon!
So I hope you like this, till next time…

You’re Not Me continued…..

Bakura listened to what he could hear through his ring, glad that it still had the power to listen to conversations away from him. He was listening to Kaiba from another room. When the conversation ended, he smiled, it was the same every day, now he waited for the man to leave his office so he could do some more… snooping.

He wheeled the trolley into Kaiba’s office and while he did the job he had taken over for the day, cleaning, he cleaned and snooped. There was nothing of interest in the bookshelves and not much on his desk, only a photo of Mokuba, though there seemed to be a bare space where he would have expected another photo frame to be. He found another wall which did have other pictures on it. Old ones of Mokuba and Kaiba, one or two on his old tournament wins and right in the center was a strange one, “Dragonball?” he muttered. He had seen the anime with Ryou, his Hikari liked to watch late at night in bed, between… “Hmm. But this Vegeta is too tall and skinny, while Goku is too short. And what’s that trophy they’re holding?” He sighed; he wasn’t there to be fascinated by strange photographs.

He finished up finding nothing out of the ordinary. He had a meeting with Yami in an hour so hurried to get set for that.

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He sat in the booth nursing a beer when Yami came in looking slightly different. Just as Bakura had used his shadow magic to change his white hair to look brown, Yami had changed his to look all black and spiked in a different way.

Still Bakura stared at him.

“What?’

“It’s just I saw something similar today… in Kaiba’s office.”

“You were in Kaiba’s office?”

“Yeah, as part of my snooping for you. The only weird thing I saw in there was this picture on his wall of those Dragonball characters Vegeta and Goku, except they were the other way round in their heights, and I swear you look just like the Goku in the picture.”

“Why would he keep that?” said Yami thinking about it.

“Keep what?”

“That picture, it’s of him and Yugi. They went to an Anime Convention and went in the cosplay contest; they won, as Vegeta and Goku.”

“Shit, I didn’t recognize either of them.”

“They didn’t want to be recognized, that was the weekend they officially got together. What I don’t understand is why he has kept that picture on his wall knowing the meaning of it.”

“Well the only other thing I’ve been able to pick up is that he’s checking up on Mokuba every day now. The kid’s overseas with his school, he’s with a lot of other VIP kids and they are wrapped up in security, so I don’t see why he’s checking up all the time. And apart from that the place is wrapped up tight security wise, I disguised myself as a worker who was having rather deep nap to get in, otherwise I would not have been able to. You, Yugi and any of those other friends of his are on this list of not to be admitted… I’m not,” he said smugly.

“Why would you want to see him?”

Bakura ignored him, just then his cell phone rang. “What’s up Hikari?” he answered.

“I know I’m early with this call, but I have a dinner ate with Malik and Odion later and I wanted to see if you understood this message I got on our email.”

“I don’t use the computer except to play games, you know that.”

“I know, but it’s weird and I know it’s not spam.”

“So who’d it come from?”

“That’s another thing, I don’t know. It’s not an address I know. Anyway listen to this, it’s what it says ‘Kakarrot, I’m still listening, Vegeta’, then there is a series of numbers and letters. 34N52S554PGB9/9932061200.”

“What—“

“I think the first lot of numbers is latitude and longitude for Domino City, but what the rest is I don’t know. Are you okay, Bakura?”

“Yeah, this is all too weird.”

“I thought you were used to weird things by now, Yami.”

“Just shut it, Hikari. I’ll talk to you later; I’m with Yami right now.”

“Oh, okay, tell him hi, love you.”

“Ah, love you too,” he tried to hide from Yami.

Yami smiled, “So what’s weird?”

“Okay, Ryou got a strange email,” he repeated the words to Yami, “He thinks the first numbers are for Domino City, the rest he doesn’t know.”

“What are they?”

“554PGB1/9932061200.”

Yami paled.

“Well looks like it means something to you.”

“It does. It’s a meeting place, the place where all this started.”

“Meeting, you think Kaiba wants to meet you?”

“Not me, Yugi, but I will be going instead. I’m not telling Yugi about this. The meet’s for tomorrow at noon.”

“Do you want me to come?”

“I wouldn’t mind you being in the background somewhere.”

“Fine tell me where.”

“Parking garage 554 Main Street bay 1/99.”

“See ya tomorrow then.”

With that Bakura left. Yami sat for a while wondering what Kaiba was up to now. Why did he want to see him after what he had done?

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The parking garage was full of cars. It was a work day. The place was gloomy considering the dull cloudy day, which suited all the participants of the meeting. Yami’s hair had been coaxed into a Fedora, so no one would recognize him, and he had a plain brown coat on that covered him from head to foot. In the weather of the day he would look like just one of the crowd. He got there right on time and made his way to the meeting place.

He couldn’t see anyone, but he knew someone was watching him. Then a tall dark figure slipped from the darkness of the bay wall. “Yugi?”

Yami pushed the hat up a little revealing his face.

“Dammit Yami, I wanted to see Yugi,” said Kaiba getting angry. He moved to the small car in the bay, “Get in.”

Yami did as Kaiba ordered and got into the passenger side of the car.

“Why are you here?” said Kaiba from the driver’s seat.

“I got the message and I was damn sure I wasn’t going to let Yugi see you. Haven’t you done enough to him?”

“So he doesn’t know about this at all?”

“No.”

Kaiba looked down at his hands before him and very softly said, “I wanted to see him… to explain…”

“Explain! You broke his heart, Kaiba. It’s been all I can do to keep him sane. He stopped eating again and you know that’s bad for him. He‘s gotten it into his head that he is the one at fault, that he did something wrong. But he didn’t, did he? There’s something going on and you had better explain what.”

“Someone threatened to do to my loved ones, what was done to me two years ago,” Kaiba said plainly without looking up.

Yami shivered at the thought. Kaiba had been pack raped. If anyone understood the horror of that, it was him. Threatening Yugi and Mokuba with that… Now he knew why Kaiba was checking up on Mokuba.

“Why couldn’t you just have told him that, instead of breaking up with him and shattering him?”

“How could I have kept him safe without smothering him? This maniac hasn’t even told me why he threatened my family, but he knows things that he shouldn’t…”

“Family?”

Kaiba raised his head to look Yami in the eyes, “I still love Yugi.”

“You have a funny way of showing it.”

“I did what I did to keep him safe. I sent him back to you because I knew you would keep him safe, that you could hold him to this world. That your love for him could hold him where mine could not.”

Yami’s eyes were locked with the blue eyes. Kaiba was telling the truth. “If you think I’ll just let him go back to you later, you’ll have a fight on your hands.”

“That’s not something we haven’t done before… Anyway I wanted to give Yugi some hope. I have to find out what this bastard knows, what he wants. I know I’m being watched, he keeps reminding me… I have to go, I’ll be sure to be questioned about this missing time… Just keep Yugi safe, if anything did happen to him…”

“Oh I’ll keep him safe, Kaiba. You can be assured of that.”

Kaiba nodded and got out of the car and was soon gone from the parking garage.

Yami stayed where he was until he was joined by Bakura.

“Did you hear all that?” asked Yami, knowing Bakura’s trick with the Ring.

“I believe him.”

“What?“

“I said I believe him. You got me here to check him out and everything I’ve seen and heard tells me that he is telling the truth. Wouldn’t you want to put Yugi out of harm’s way if you were being threatened? Sure it has hurt the kid, but it’s better than the alternative. He witnessed Kaiba’s rape, and it sent him over the edge. What would happen if it happened to him? Don’t look at me like that. Can’t you believe me or Ryou that I’ve changed for the better?”

“Ryou I’d believe, but it’s still a little weird for me… Anyway I guess you’re right. Do you think you could dig anything up on this bastard that’s threatening Kaiba?”

“I can have a look around again,” he lifted the Ring, “This thing is great for surveillance.”

“Okay, I’m going home, I’ll see you later.”

Yami and Bakura left the parking garage separately. Yami did not feel anyone watching him, but he did wonder about all that Kaiba had said.

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tbc