Souvenir

Disclaimer: Just own the words, not the folks.


Your Holiday


Yami’s laughter reminds me where I am and what’s going on around me.

Raphael is driving us back to Yami’s house and they’re laughing about the incident at the café. After the reporters turned on me, Yami and Raphael decided that it was time to leave. Surprisingly, it was Raphael who first came to my aid, screaming at the woman who’d thrust her recorder in my face.

Before the pictures...

Pictures...

They can’t publish those pictures. They can’t. He’ll find us!

No, just me. Mokuba is safe. He’ll never get to Mokuba.

Unbidden memories of constantly being taken by him overwhelm me. It’s been almost four years since the last time, but I remember everything as if we’d only run away yesterday. The pain, the shame, the desire to end it all...

If he finds me, I’m not old enough to keep him away. And I can’t go back to the streets. I’d have to go back with him. And then he’d be able to...to...

I can’t go back! I can’t!

“Seto!” Yami’s voice calls me back to the reality of the car ride.

I look up from where I’ve sequestered myself on the floor behind Yami’s seat, and into the other’s wide, worried eyes.

“Seto..”

“I-I’m fine,” I assert, climbing back into my seat.

I feel Yami’s concerned eyes on me as I stare out the car window, but he doesn’t say anything.

As soon as we get back to the house, I lock myself in my room, my assigned room. I just need some time alone. Some time to plan what to do if…

I’m on the bed wrapped around a pillow when Yami knocks on the bedroom door.

“Seto, are you all right?” he calls.

I really don’t want to talk to him.

“Seto!” he calls again, rattling the locked doorknob. “Open the door so we can talk.”

Reluctantly, I let go of the pillow and open the door, returning to my original position. Yami sits down behind me.

“Are you alright?” he intones, a hand briefly touching my back in a comforting gesture.

“Fine. Just tired,” I mumble into the pillow, hoping he’ll let it go, but knowing he won’t.

“I’m sorry about what happened at the café. They’ve been doing that to us every summer for the last few years so we’re used to it, but I guess it was a bit overwhelming for you,” Yami continues in a soothing tone.

I laugh to myself. He thinks I care about annoying people asking me questions. Their questions aren’t what can hurt me.

“The brown haired woman is Fuyumi Yamata. She works for the society columnist of the local paper. She’s actually quite nice and makes a very good ramen,” Yami explains.

He goes on to tell me that the black-haired woman, Aki Nakamura, works for a local tabloid, and the blonde, Shungiko Soryo, runs her own celebrity web site and is honestly as scary as she seems.

Surprisingly, his random conversation calms me, gives me something else to focus on other than the likelihood of being found.

“Thank you,” I mumble over my shoulder.

“Anytime, Seto! That’s what friends are for!”

Friend; it’s a novel concept, his being my friend and not my captor. My friend, not my Master. My friend...

His hand brushes lightly down my arm before he gets up from the bed.

“I’ll make you some pastries to help you feel better.” He smiles as he leaves my room.
My room. I’ve tried to deny it for months, but as I look around, I realize that it is no longer an assigned room. All of the books, clothes, even the music in the CD player that Yami bought me are all my personal possessions now. Yami even let me pick out the sheets and curtains. The only things in here are things that I want in here. So, this is my room.

And maybe that’s all right.

If my choice is to go back with him or stay here, then this will be my room and my home.

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“No,” I repeat to his entireties to accompany him and Raphael for lunch and shopping.

“Seto, you haven’t left the house in almost a month.” Yami frowns at me. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” I lie easily. “I just want to stay home.”

“Seto...”

I turn away and head up to my room.

I won’t leave the house anymore. I can’t anyway.

The web site published two clear pictures of us from her phone the next day with hints about “the location of our love nest.” The society column posted their story the day after that, including a shot of us after I’d put my hand up and innuendo about me in relation to Yami and Raphael.

Included with the head shots of all three of us published by the tabloid a week later were more hints and innuendos along with a picture of us driving away in the car and a shot of the front of Yami’s house from before he took me in.

Now it’s only a matter of time before he comes for me. I’ll stay here and wait in my home, in my room, with my things. I hope that I’ll at least get to say good-bye.

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I step into the living room, intending to watch TV with Yami after I’ve finished the dishes from dinner and see him.

“Also in today’s news...”

He’s on the TV. Shaking hands. Presenting a check. Surrounded by children.

Smiling.

“The CEO of Kaiba Corp., Gozaboro Kaiba, pictured here at the Domino City Orphanage, held a press conference early this afternoon.”

I can’t breathe.

“Mr. Kaiba’s generous donation of 1,000,000 yen to the Domino City Orphanage will allow them to renovate and expand, giving more children who desperately need one, a home.”

“Seto! Seto, are you alright?” Yami prods, helping me up from the floor. When did I fall down?

And then I hear his voice. I look up to see him talking about the orphanage and the children. He’s talking about helping the children at the Domino City Orphanage.

But the only thing he wants to do with children is...

Mokuba!

He’s found us! He has Mokuba! I just left him there for a few weeks until I got a better job! Just a few weeks! And now he has him!

“Seto? Seto!” Yami’s hands on my arms remind me. If I’m with Yami...

“He’s safe,” I affirm to myself, fighting unsuccessfully to keep the memories at bay.

“Seto, you’re shaking. What’s wrong?”

“Shut up! Shut up! Shut up!” I scream at the TV. I don’t want to hear his voice anymore! Not ever! “You can’t have him! Mokuba is safe! You can’t touch him! Shut up!”

“Seto!” Yami’s firm shake and yell again remind me where I am.

“He can’t touch him,” I whisper clutching Yami’s arms. “Mokuba’s safe. He’s safe.”

I don’t fight Yami helping me to the couch to lie down. I vaguely notice the TV being switched off and the light blanket from the closet that he places over me.

“It’s alright, Seto,” Yami assures, hand stroking my hair.

I like Yami’s hand on my hair. It reminds me of stroking Mokuba’s hair before he left with the Ishtars.

I miss Mokuba so much.

Yami’s hand is soothing. I close my eyes and allow his fingers sliding through my hair to usher me into a comfortable sleep.

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It’s been a while since I’ve been able to sneak into Mokuba’s room and read to him. I pull a book from his shelf and sit down on the bed beside him as he snuggles under his covers.

It’s one I’ve read many times before because it’s one of his favorites. The story centers on the adventures of two brothers: a warrior and a magician.

I start to read the part where the warrior brother defeats the overlord and saves his little brother yet again as I have countless times, but the words are different. As I continue to read, I notice that the story is actually different from before. The warrior is defeated by the Overlord and has to watch helplessly as his little brother is dragged away screaming his name.

Frowning in confusion, I look at Mokuba to explain that I don’t know what happened to the book, when the sound of his bedroom door slamming open startles us both.

A dark cloud hovers over Mokuba, before seemingly reaching to drag him away. I try to fight it off, but find myself powerless against the suddenly solid menace. Reeling from an open-handed blow to the side of my head, I look up from the floor to see Gozaboro sneering at me.

“It’s for the children, Seto,” he laughs darkly.

“Seto! Seto, help me!” Mokuba screams as he’s dragged out the bedroom door.

I awaken to the sound of my own scream echoing in my ears and a frantic Yami holding me down on the couch. I pull away, not needing his sympathy just now, but he doesn’t move from his place kneeling on the floor beside me.

When he doesn’t speak for a long time, I figure that he’s decided to leave me alone.

“Who is Mokuba? And why are you so afraid of Gozaboro Kaiba? ” His clear voice inquires calmly.

I guess he’s not going to leave me alone after all.

“Seto?”

“What business is it of yours?” I mumble, pulling the blanket over my head and further turning away from him.

“I’m your friend, Seto. I’m just trying to help,” he asserts.

I don’t respond. And he doesn’t go away. Instead, he starts lightly running a hand down my covered arm a few minutes later.

“Just go away, Yami,” I snarl.

“I won’t,” he replies as calmly as ever.

What does he expect me to do? Just tell him everything? Why should I? Gozaboro is sure to find me now that those pictures have hit the paper. That’s why he’s here in Domino! To take us back! But he’ll have to settle for just me. No matter what, I won’t tell that bastard about Mokuba’s new family. Even if I have to...

And I know that bastard will want to, if only to punish me for running.

So why should I tell Yami anything? It’s not as though he can do anything about it!

I lie there for a while longer, but try as I might, I can’t ignore Yami’s hand on my arm and the concern flowing from him. Maybe it would be nice to have someone know the truth before I disappear, probably for good. And Yami says he’s my friend. Maybe...

“He’s my brother,” I whisper, still not sure why I’m telling him anything.

“What?” Yami’s hand pauses in mid-stroke up my arm.

“Mokuba,” I clarify. “He’s my little brother. He was adopted by a good family and they moved to Egypt.”

Silence for a moment, then, “And Gozoboro Kaiba?”

“My step-father,” I laugh bitterly. “And Mokuba’s real father. We-we ran away.”

“Why?” he asks quietly, though I suspect by his tone he’s already figured it out. No need to sugarcoat it then.

“He started..touching...me when I was nine,” I confess to the first person since Mr. Motou.

At his sharp intake of breath, I wonder if I should have taken that secret to my grave.

“And Mokuba?” he croaks a few moments later.

“Just a few times. We ran before it got bad,” I disclose.

Ha! “Before it got bad.” As if having the father you adore rape you five times isn’t “bad.”

Yami’s quiet for a long time after that and I figure that it’s too much for him to handle. So much for having a friend...

“Do you know where Mokuba is?” he surprises me by asking.

“Egypt, I think. I haven’t had any contact with him for two years.” All of my secrets are just tumbling out of me now.

“You miss him.” It’s not a question, but I answer just the same.

“Yes, very much.”

I don’t know how it happens, but soon after that final statement, I find myself sitting at the kitchen table with Yami telling him everything. About the abuse, running away, losing Mokuba at the orphanage, living on the streets…

He listens intently, plying me with tea and pastries the entire time. Though I think he only made the pastries to calm himself down rather than “to help me feel better” as he supposes.

“I think you should try to find Mokuba,” he levels at me once we’re heading to bed for some much-needed rest. “I’ll help you.”

The thought of at least talking to Mokuba before Gozaboro takes me away is too appealing to ignore.

“O-okay,” I stutter as he bids me goodnight and heads to his room.


A/N:
I am working on Chapter 8 right now and hope to have it out relatively soon.

*snugs* and kisses to Nenya, Dragonwrangler and Bnomiko for letting me bounce stuff off of them for this chapter and for this overall story.

And an extra *glompatackle* to Bnomiko for beta-ing this chapter.