Deliverance

Chapter 8

 

                “Is this some kind of joke?  A hit man?” Seto demanded. 

                He had made it back to Domino and managed to put on a fresh suit before the police showed up at his office.  Not just the Tokyo police, but three Interpol agents as well.  He gave a statement to the Tokyo police and ushered them out, but the Interpol agents had stayed behind.  He wondered why no one bothered to tell them that he was a busy man and that he allowed them to intrude upon his time simply to show the local authorities a bit of undeserved respect.  Why the hell hadn’t they taken a cue from the police and bow and thanked him as they backed out of his office?

                One of the Interpol agents, a British man who had greeted him in Japanese and introduced himself as Agent Martin, had laid out a series of photographs taken from an airport security camera.  “No sir,” the man assured him.  “He was spotted flying from the Caribbean island of St. Thomas, and again going through LAX before boarding a plane to Tokyo about twenty hours ago.  He goes by a dozen different names, though Interpol has nicknamed him Picasso.  We know he is aware of the moniker and he seems to approve, dreadful as it sounds.”

                “Dreadful?”

                “Yes, he likes to think of himself as an artist, however, his medium of choice is blood and destruction.  The apartment you mentioned was rented to a man matching the description of an equally dangerous assassin known in international circles as the Professor.  Agents and witnesses who have dealt  with him report that he is highly educated, extremely intelligent, and always quoting classical literature.  The two of them have been spotted together on numerous occasions, so it’s no big surprise to find them both in Japan at the same time.  If we were to make a list of the most dangerous assassins in the world, it would be a short list and they would be close to the top.”

                “They have also been spotted trying to kill each other when there wasn’t any money involved,” said one of the other agents.  He had not been introduced to Seto when they came in.  “And if someone was serious about taking out the Professor, Picasso would be just as likely to take the job as anyone else.  More so, I would say, because he’s one of the few who could actually manage it and he knows the Professor’s habits and mannerisms.”

                “Hopefully we can get him into custody before anyone finds him,” Agent Martin grinned.  “Now that we know his real name is Jounouchi Katsuya, it should be much easier to apprehend him.  Especially if Picasso is in an artistic mood.”

                Seto forced himself to chuckle.   “Artistic mood?  His medium of choice?  Come on, you sound like you stepped out of a bad James Bond movie.  Who put you guys up to this?”

                “We are completely serious, sir,” said one of the other agents. 

                The agent tossed a full color photograph of what looked like slaughterhouse on to his desk.  “Picasso has earned his nickname just as well as the Professor has earned his.  This was taken from at the apartment  building this morning after we arrived on the scene.  You have to connect the dots, I’m afraid.”  The agent bent over the photograph with a sharpie and began to trace the thicker lines of blood in the photograph.  When he was finished, he turned the picture around for Seto.  “A daisy, I believe.”   He tossed out three more photographs.  “A sunburst, this one Henderson thinks is a rose although I can’t see it, and this one we’re not sure about yet.”

                Seto glanced at the photograph of all that was left of the Japanese gunman he had seen that morning.  Sprays of blood had streak the wall above him and three lines of blood were pulled away from the man’s torso, extending out to etiher side.  The man’s arms had been nailed to the wall below the vertical streaks.  “A cat,” Seto said immediately.  “Those are the ears and whiskers.”

                “Oh, yes, I see it now,” Agent Martin carefully drew in the lines of the image, the corner of his lips turned up as he did so.    “Good eye.”

                “But Jounouchi can’t be this Professor person.  He can’t be associated with someone like that,” Seto insisted.  “He’s a thug, he worked for one of the local gangs, that’s all.  As I told the detective, I went there hoping to find him, hoping he might have just gotten involved in something that was too big for him to handle.  And he is neither smart nor well educated.”

                “Really?  Our investigation showed that he only returned to Japan during the incident in which you were held for ransom.  He reportedly has family ties to the local Yakuza, and he allegedly got his start here, but our records indicate he’s spent most of the last decade hopping between Europe and North America.  Hard to be a local thug when you’re in a different hemisphere.”

                “I’m a busy man, I can’t keep track of every citizen in Domino, I’m afraid.  I knew him as a kid, I saw him again when I got a bit lax with security, I don’t know what he’s been up to between high school and now.”

                “Well, hopefully the next time you’re inclined to rescue a thug off the street, this will encourage you to write a check to a local nonprofit instead.  Incidentally, you were in your office during that explosion last week, right?”

                Seto held the man’s gaze, not quite certain of what he was seeing reflected back at him.  The man was lying to him, Seto knew that much, but he couldn’t quite see the truth through the façade.  “The one down the street?  Wasn’t that a bank robbery or something?”

                “No.  It was a hit on the regional leader of one of the Yakuza families.  It seems an electromagnetic pulse was detonated just after the explosion to wipe any surveillance footage clean.  Forensics is on it, or course, but preliminary reports indicate that the bank next to the parking garage was untouched.  Were you in your office?”

                “Yes.  It took us a bit to recover our internal security footage, since the electromagnetic thingy you mentioned knocked out our servers, but I was in my office meeting with the representatives of a toy retailer in China.  There are witnesses and video records with the date and time embedded in the footage.”

                “Do the police have a copy of the footage?”

                “In point of fact, they do,” Seto said coldly.  “I’m sure they’ll burn you a copy if you ask.  I don’t see what this has to do with that explosion.”

                “You don’t?  You promised a large amount of money to anyone who could bring you the Professor.  One of the few people in Japan with any ties to him gets blown up in a parking garage a few blocks from your property last week.  And this week, his apartment building gets shot up and you just happen to be there.  In our line of work, Kaiba-san, you quickly find that coincidences are never coincidences.”

                “You’re welcome to request the footage from the police.”

                “We will.  You see, the rumor running around is that the explosion was the work of the Professor.  It’s not like the Professor at all, though.  A man like the Professor would never be so crass as to use an explosive for an old friend.”

                “Excuse me?  An old friend?”

                Agent Martin sat down in the chair in front of Seto’s desk, crossed his legs and leaned back.  “Which brings us to why we’re here.  What I think happened, Mr. Kaiba, is that you wanted revenge for the things done to you when you were kidnapped.  Understandable, certainly.  It’s widely rumored that you offered a lot of money to anyone who could bring you the Professor’s head.  The old Yakuza man, Sasano, wasn’t it?” Agent Martin looked to one of his colleagues for confirmation, “Yes, Sasano decided to sell out his prodigal son and didn’t expect the son to take it personally.”

                “Son?”

                “Not by blood.  The old man was the father-in-law of Jounouchi Katsuya’s sister, I believe.  Nothing short of a personal insult would make him resort to something so tactless as that explosion, and even then…” 

                Seto sat back and gripped the arms of his office chair.  This entire week was seriously messing with his sense of general superiority.  He couldn’t control Jou’s behavior, and it took several days before he stopped being surprised by it, and now for the second time in one day, someone had talked about his approach to dealing with the Yakuza as though it were merely a serious breach of etiquette rather than an excessive show of force. 

                Agent Martin steepled his fingers together.  “As a mob tactic, explosions have their place, but among men of the Professor’s caliber, they are traditionally considered something utilized by beginners and… amateurs,” his tone was dripping with disgust as he said the last word.  “With men who kill people for a living, usually you can judge a man’s skill by the range at which he carries out his attacks and the amount of discretion he uses, although there are a few grandstanding bastards out there like Picasso who just don’t care. He considers discretion to be something that happens to other people.  In general, though, a sniper rifle is considered a beginner’s weapon because it never requires entering the scene at all.  An explosive is slightly less pathetic, but only because it requires infiltration, it requires planting the explosive itself.  Smaller guns require closer range, but they’re still flashy.  Among professional hit men throughout the world, those with enough skill and courage to get close enough to their target to use a knife are considered to be at the pinnacle of the profession.”

                Seto kept his face absolutely still as the man’s British accent faded and slipped.  He deliberately did not look at the other two men in the room.  If they had caught the slip in their partner’s accent, they would be watching him for any sign that he had heard it, too.  “And you’re suggesting that these two…  they’re both that dangerous?”

                “From your statement, it’s clear that Picasso took out at least seven other hit men right in front of your eyes.  Do you really doubt that he’s that dangerous?”

                “No, no I wasn’t questioning that.  It’s just that I grew up with Jounouchi.”

                “And you think he couldn’t possibly be like that?  I’m sorry to be the one to tell you this, Kaiba-san, but if those two ever did decide to try and take each other out, the smart money would be on the Professor.  Picasso, for all of his talent, has the discipline of a ten year old.  The Professor is just as talented, but he is also completely in control of himself.”

                “You’re wrong.  Picasso would win.  He can get his shit together when he needs to,” the other agent insisted.  “He would be dead if he couldn’t.  I think most people can’t even imagine the level of skill, observation, training, preparation, speed, and strength necessary to take the careless approach he does.  When he stops to make a mess, he is totally confident that he is the top dog and that there is no one else around capable of interfering.”

                Agent Martin waved his hand dismissively.  “Arrogance masquerading as confidence, and a hell of a lot of luck, that’s all.  The Professor doesn’t leave much to chance, so there’s no way Picasso could get lucky against him.”

                “Picasso is twelve years older than the Professor.  He’s one of the oldest in the game, so I wouldn’t be so quick to call his confidence an overestimation.  He knows what he’s capable of, that’s all.  He allows himself to have a bit of fun within those parameters, but he doesn’t go beyond them.”

                Agent Martin grimaced and was about to turn to argue with the other man when he caught Seto’s eye.  “Ah, there you go.  My money would be on the Professor, at any rate.  As Henderson has just shown, there are those who think Picasso would turn the Professor into tacky mural of a orchid if the mood struck him right.”

                “I still find that hard to believe.  It sounds like your investigation has been very thorough.  Why haven’t you arrested either of them yet?”

                “They’re rather difficult to find.  We don’t’ have the funds to search ever tropical beach in the world for Picasso, and until recently we were looking for the Professor in Hungary of all places.”

                Kaiba pressed the silent alarm button beneath his desk.  “Well, you gentlemen have the statement I gave to the detective from Tokyo, do you have a business card so I can get in touch with you if I see either of them?”

                Roland, still carrying his rifle from earlier, stepped inside the office door, surveyed the situation, and took up a station behind the men.  Two other security officers followed him. 

                “Absolutely,” Agent Martin smiled.  He practically jumped to his feet and pulled a lose business card from his jacket pocket.  Seto read it quickly and made a note of the Interpol seal.  The damn thing looked real enough, aside from the fact that it was so new that he could still smell the toner in the ink.  It couldn’t have been printed more than a couple of hours ago.

                “I’ll definitely let you know if I see anything.”

                “We appreciate your cooperation, Kaiba-san.  And if anyone else should contact you about the money you’ve placed on Jounouchi’s head…”

                “I have done no such thing.  I would be quite distressed to know that Jounouchi was dead.”

                “Then if anyone suspicious contacts you at all, let us know?”

                “Of course.”

                “Roland, please have one of my security staff show these officers the way out.”

                “Yes, Kaiba-sama.”

                One of the security personnel who entered with Roland held the door open and bowed low.  “Right this way, please.”  Seto stared at the door until it clicked shut, then quickly motioned for Roland to be quiet.  After waiting about twenty seconds, Seto hurried to the door.  Roland fell into step behind him without a word.  Seto forced himself not to run as he hurried towards his brother’s office. 

                Seto passed the business card to Roland as he walked.  “Check their credentials thoroughly.  Then sweep my office and every other inch of the building those men had access to for anything suspicious, including any potential explosives.  Until that sweep is complete, Mokuba and I will be working from home.  I want the security on the manor doubled.  Those three are not to be allowed back into the building, even if escorted by the police.”

                “I understand, Kaiba-sama.  May I suggest you take the service elevator down to the car while I retrieve Master Mokbuba?”

                “No,” Seto insisted.  “I’m not going anywhere without my brother.  Jou’s cats are somewhere safe?”

                “I saw to it personally.”

                “Alright then.  Let’s get Mokuba and get out of here.  Maybe declare a half-holiday until the explosives sweep is complete…  Try to clear the building without causing a panic.”

                “As you wish, Kaiba-sama.”

                Seto barged into Mokuba’s office without knocking, but he never knocked.  Mokuba never did anything terribly indecent in his office, or anywhere else where Seto might barge in—not since a terribly embarrassing incident when Mokuba was thirteen and discovered pay-per-view, anyway.  As expected, Mokuba was talking on the phone and typing quickly at the same time. 

                “Hang up,” Seto ordered. 

                He hoped that his brother would understand how serious the situation might be from his tone of voice, but Mokuba just flipped him off.     

                “Fine, bring the phone.  We’re leaving.”

                Roland grabbed Mokuba by the arm and hoisted him out of the chair.  He grabbed Seto’s other arm and ushered both of them out of the office quickly.  They took the service elevator down and followed more security officers to the limo.  Roland lagged behind long enough to pull down the nearest fire alarm, then climbed into the car after them.

                Mokuba hung up his phone and slipped it back into a pocket.  He glanced between Seto and Roland, trying to work out what was happening.  “Did I miss something?  When did the building catch fire?”

                “It’s been a busy day,” Seto said levelly.  “We’re just being proactive in case it catches on fire.  Or blows up.”

                Mokuba’s eyes bulged as his face grew pale.  “You didn’t…”

                “No!” Seto rolled his eyes.  “I…  I’m probably just being paranoid.  Some guys, who might or might not work for Interpol, showed up to talk about what happened in Tokyo this morning, and some of the things they said didn’t sit right with me.”

                “What happened in Tokyo this morning?”

                Seto pressed his lips together.  He didn’t want to alarm Mokuba more than he already had.  There was no telling who his brother might call, what he might tell them, or how much time Seto would have to spend talking about his feelings afterwards, if he told Mokuba the truth.  “I had trouble returning Jou’s cats,” he said carefully.  “So I had to have them boarded at a vet’s office.”

                Mokuba stared at him for a moment, pointedly glanced down to Seto’s knee and stared until Seto forced it to stop bouncing, then looked into his eyes again.  When Seto didn’t rise to the bait and rush to fill the silence, Mokuba pulled out his phone again and pulled up the daily news from the Tokyo area.  “Four Dead in Gruesome Downtown Shootout,” Mokuba read aloud.  “Authorities Devastated by Carnage.”  Mokuba glared at Seto. 

                “Don’t look at me like that, I didn’t kill them!” 

                “Seto…”

                “I did not kill them.  They were all killed with a knife.  I couldn’t do that.  I blow people up like an amateur, apparently…  Those dicks have no understanding of what a show of force is supposed to be…  Hang on, this can wait until we’ve gotten away from the building.”  Seto stared out the window as they pulled out of the parking garage.  He half-expected to hear an explosion from the moment the three men who came to question him left the building.  As the car pulled away, he mentally braced himself for the sound and the shockwave. 

                And nothing happened.  After three blocks, Seto’s chest felt tight and he had to force himself to take a deep breath.  Somewhere in the back of his mind, he knew he needed to get away from this situation.  This morning had brought back all of the paranoia he’d felt immediately after waking up in the hospital, brought it all back and doubled it, just for good measure. 

                “Roland,” Mokuba turned to the security officer, “What happened this morning.”

                “We were caught in the cross fire of what appears to have been a circle of professional assassins who were all attempting to kill one another.”

                “Why were you there?”

                “As your brother said, he was attempting to return Jounouchi-san’s cats,” Roland confirmed.  “Jounouchi-san was not present, but an acquaintance of his was in his apartment.  He…”  Roland glanced at Seto.  Seto rolled his eyes, folded his arms, and resolutely refused to offer any help whatsoever.  Roland hesitated for a fraction of a second.  “He joined us on the elevator and then proceeded to engage the gunmen in close combat.”

                “Are you serious?  He rode down in the elevator with you and just jumped right out into a gun fight and started shooting?” 

                Seto thought about the bloody sprays and splatters that the men who claimed to be Interpol agents insisted were the art of a professional killer.  Lynn Grayson hadn’t seemed like a bad guy in Jounouchi’s apartment, but as he rolled and danced through the hail of bullets, debris, and blood, Seto had to admit that his breathtaking smile looked more demonic than beautiful.  He didn’t want to give Mokuba a reason to have him committed, and confessing to living through another ‘trauma’ would certainly add to the list of reasons his little brother already had, but he also knew that if he kept expecting the world to explode around him, Mokuba was going to start questioning his mental stability. 

                Roland’s mouth was frozen open as the older man tried to frame an answer that wouldn’t sound horrible.  “Actually, he leapt out and dove for cover…”

                “Then nailed them to the walls and sliced open their major arteries so that their blood would spray out in pretty artistic patterns,” Seto whispered with a sadistic smirk. 

                “Oh, ha ha,” Mokuba glared at him. “Can’t you grow up and stop making tasteless jokes for once?  Four people are dead, Seto!”

                Roland pressed his lips together in a tight line. 

                “It wasn’t a joke,” Seto insisted.  He found himself laughing despite his claim.  “The Interpol guys and the Tokyo police showed me the pictures. He made three flowers shapes and a cat.  And I wasn’t being metaphorical when I said he nailed them to the wall.  He used a fucking nail gun!”

                “Two flowers,” Roland whispered.  “They said the third was a sunburst.”

                “It was a flower,” Seto insisted.  “There were leaf shapes at the bottom.  Apparently he did a scar tissue smiley face on Jou’s chest, too.  It’s kind of morbid, but very precise.  No!” Seto held up both of his hands and leaned across the seats towards his brother.  “No, don’t throw up!  I’ve heard them both talk about it and I am absolutely sure that it some kinky and totally consensual game!” 

                “Do you really think that’s going to make it better?”  Roland glared at him.  The old body guard dug behind the drinks in the mini fridge and pulled out a folded paper bag.  “Just in case,” he explained and he passed the bag to Mokuba.

                “It’s alright, Mokie, it really is.  I may have lost control of the situation over the last week, but I am totally on top of things from here on out,” Seto promised.  “I will deal with it.  I just wanted to get you and everybody else out of the office because I was freaking out.  Probably just PTSD, you know sometimes even a car backfiring can trigger bad phases for me.”

                “You can deal with it!” Mokuba screamed.  “How the hell do you think anything you’ve done recently counts as dealing with it!  Do you think blowing up half of downtown to kill a Yakuza Lord is dealing with it!  Do you think kidnapping a member of the local Yakuza and tying them up in your guest room is something a rational, sane person would do!  You were nearly killed this morning and you can sit there and joke about a man cutting other people to pieces!  You need help, Seto!”

                “Actually, Jou’s not a member of the local Yakuza anymore.  Apparently he’s a—“

                Roland’s arm wrapped around Seto’s neck and his hand covered Seto’s mouth.  “Not making it better,” Roland growled. 

                Seto glanced at him and tried, with a look, to apologize.  Unfortunately, the glance didn’t quite work.  The serious look in Roland’s eyes made Seto begin to chuckle, despite everything they’d been through during the day—or maybe because of it.  Roland bit his lip to try and stop himself from laughing.  That just made Seto shake with the effort of not laughing.  Somehow, he couldn’t help it.  His stress level had gotten to the point where he felt like he was going to scream, and laughter was what came out instead. 

                Mokuba slowly tightened both of his hands into fists.  “I hate you both,” he hissed.  “This kind of crap is not funny!  I cannot believe I used to defend your fucked up sense of humor!”  Mokuba pressed the intercom button.  “Stop the car up here, I will walk back to work.”

                “No!” Roland shouted through the intercom.  “Don’t stop the car!  No, Master Mokuba, forgive me for laughing.  We are not joking with you!  And your brother’s paranoia aside, there was something very off about those three men.  I have a member of the staff trying to verify their credentials with Interpol, but I haven’t heard back from them yet, and until I do, I am inclined to trust my instincts.  My instincts tell me not to let you or your brother near the building again until it has been searched thoroughly.”

                Mokuba sat back, seething but quiet. 

                “I’m sorry, too,” Seto finally managed to get control of himself.  “I didn’t mean to make a joke out of any of it.  Even if I am just being paranoid, I would like you to work from home until I…”  Seto didn’t want to continue, but humility was sometimes the easiest way to manipulate Mokuba.  “Until I’m less frightened, alright?  Just…  Humor me?”

                “Fine.  But you need to start talking to Temari again.”

                “As soon as I sort this out, I will give her a call,” Seto promised. 

                “Tonight,” Mokuba insisted. 

                “I wont have time tonight,” Seto insisted.  “I need to find Jou before anyone else does, stop the Yakuza kid who has put out a contract on his life, run a check on those three fake Interpol agents, sweep Kaiba Corp. for explosives, and then go pick up Jou’s cats.  I’m swamped.”

                “I don’t want to know,” sighed Mokuba.  Mokuba leaned back in his seat and stared out the window.  Then he leaned forward, trying to get a better look at something.  “Well, that figures.”

                “What?” Seto asked, feeling the panic set in again. 

                Mokuba hit the intercom button again.  “Go around the block and find a parking space.”

                “Kaiba-sama?”

                “It’s alright, go ahead,” said Seto, trying to see what his brother had noticed out the window.  The limo pulled around the municipal library and stopped along a side street. 

                “It’s getting dark out,” said Mokuba softly.  “The lights in the library make it easy to see through the windows.  I saw Jou inside, standing in one of the aisles with his nose in a book.”

                Seto really did feel like screaming then.  He didn’t.  But it was a difficult urge to quell.  “Jou left me to go to the library!  I nearly got killed in Jou’s apartment building and he is in the library!  Mokuba, wait in the car.  Roland, come in but keep your distance.”

                Kaiba jumped out of the limo and hurried towards the mail doors of the library.  He kept his distance from people on the street, and he found that the adrenaline began to gush through his system every time he thought he saw someone with an American skin tone in the crowd.  By the time he made it to the steps of the library, he was practically jogging.  He quietly strolled through the library and back into the stacks, searching for any sign of his blonde. 

                Seto saw him sitting at a table in the far corner, his back to two windowless walls.  He had a hardcover book propped up on the table in front of him, leaning against a stack of well-worn paperbacks.  Seto watched laughter dance through Jou’s eyes as he turned the page. 

                Seto walked towards him, wondering if he should give the man some kind of warning.  Jou seemed to be engrossed enough in his book that Seto was worried he might startle him.  However, as he got closer, Jou kicked the chair across from him out, then turned another page without even glancing up. 

                “Any good?”

                “Yeah,” said Jou, his smile gigantic.  “It’s the new Terry Pratchett novel.  It just came out today.  I’m almost done, I swear.  Sit down, grab a paper or something.”

                “I’ve got my phone, I’m good,” said Seto casually sliding into the chair.  “How long have you been here?”

                “Since nine thirty,” said Jou.  He stifled a chuckle at something he read. 

                Seto glanced at the spines of the books in Jou’s stack and saw five different Mark Twain novels.

                “The bookstore opened at nine,” Jou explained.  “And I don’t have my Kindle.  This works out good, though, because here I can look up all of the literary references in the book.”

                Seto sat back and took in the whole picture.  “Lots of Mark Twain references?”

                Jou nodded happily.  “River boats, slavery, hotheaded country folk, it’s great.  Have you ever read Pratchett?”

                Seto shook his head.  “Never heard of him.”

                Jou looked up at that.  “Oh, Kaiba, you’re missing out.”

                Seto pulled out his phone and began to type out of a text message, but stopped when he noticed that Jou’s chuckles and page turning had stopped.  Seto felt awkward, but when he turned around he saw that there was no one around.  He was about to turn back to  his phone when a familiar  American in a new tweed suit walked around the corner, smiling and bouncing as he walked.  As the man’s blue eyes landed on Seto, his smile grew.  

                Seto glanced at Jou and noticed that the blonde wasn’t smiling.  Both of Jou’s hands were beneath the table, out of sight. 

                “What terms are we on at the moment, Col?” Jou asked, his eyes calm and sharp as steel. 

                “I’m not that broke, Joey.  Although, I could buy a chunk of Seychelles for what that kid is offering for you.  I could have my very own tropical island resort.  How cool would that be?” 

                “I don’t think you have it in you to paint palm trees for the rest of your life.”

                “Too true.  No, I’m here because word got out last week that you were dead.  I came to keep my promise, silly boy.  Still, I prefer you alive.  May I join you?  And Mr. Kaiba, always a pleasure,” the man bowed slightly.

                Jou’s glance shot towards Seto. 

                “Hello, Mr. Grayson.”

                “Oh, call my Lynn, we’re all friends here, after all.”   

                “Are we?”  Jou slowly pulled his left hand up from beneath the table.  In his hand was a stack of white drawing paper, wrapped in shrink wrap.  On top of it was a small box of oil pastels.  “I caught a bit of the news when I went for coffee.  Figured I’d be seeing you,” he explained. 

                “Joey, you shouldn’t have!”  Lynn sat down in the chair next to Jou and ripped the shrink wrap off of the paper and the pastels.  “Flesh tones!  Oh, Joey, you’re the best!”  He pulled away the paper from one of the pastels and began to sketch a round shape on the top sheet of paper, just as focused on the page as Jou was on his book. 

                “I try,” said Jou.  He dog-earned the page of his book and shut it carefully, using only his left hand.  Seto leaned back in his chair and tried to see Jou’s right hand under the table.  Against Jou’s thigh, held in a ready grip, was a small pistol that Seto had never seen before.  It was aimed just to the side of Seto, towards the hall.  “So,” Jou stared between the two of them.  “Talk about a small world.  How do you two know each other?”

                “Oh, we met at your old place this morning.  Had a bit of a disagreement about the whole Budapest issue,” Lynn said quietly.  “Do you know he comes with his own riot cops?  That was funny, and I admit, more than a bit helpful.”

                “Disagreement?  Where are they?” Jou growled quietly.

                “Well, discussion, really,” Lynn clarified.  “I intended to bring them with me, but at the last minute I got caught up in a project.  He was kind enough to grab them for me.”

 

                “Where are they?” Jou growled louder.

                “They got knocked around a bit,” Seto admitted.  “I had them boarded at a vet’s office over night, to make sure they were alright.”

                Both men on the other side of the table nodded, but otherwise kept their eyes on the paper in front of them.  “I guess that’s alright,” said Jou.  He opened his book again. 

                “How did you know he’d be here?” Seto asked.

                Lynn looked up at him, his smile still firmly in place.  “A new Terry Pratchett novel came out today.  Nothing short of a platoon would keep him away from a bookstore this morning.  And even then, it would have to be a heavily armed platoon.  His Kindle and personal phone were still at his place.  Without his Kindle, he would head for a library to read it for the first time.  There are only so many libraries between here and Tokyo big enough to suit his tastes.  Since he started here in Domino this morning, it wasn’t that much of a leap to assume he’d still be here.  You found him, so you must have come to the same conclusions.”

                “Something like that,” Seto lied.

                “You were looking for me?”

                “Yeah.  I figured you’d head back to your apartment.  I was actually trying to bring your cats home, since Buddha wouldn’t sit still for me.  And I was kind of worried.”

                “I don’t need a babysitter.”

                “Well, your cat needs a twenty-four hour sedative.”

                Jou winced.  “Sorry.  She wasn’t too much trouble was she?  I know she’s a handful, even with her partner in crime around…”

                “She hasn’t made any friends among my household staff, but she wasn’t too much trouble.”

                “I really am sorry.  I’ll pay for anything she shredded, I promise.”

                Seto thought about the shattered Queen Anne chandelier, the china, and the reported damage to his ballroom.  “I’m insured,” he said, as much for his own reassurance as for Jou’s. 

                Lynn stopped drawing and looked up at Seto, chuckling with surprise. 

                “That bad?” Jou swallowed. 

                Seto remembered what his butler said about the windows.  “Worse.”

                Beside Jou, Lynn chuckled and went back to his oil pastels.  “I really love her…”

                “Enough to adopt her?” Jou looked at him hopefully.  

                “You mean you’d let me?”

                “No.  I am really, very sorry,” Jou said to Seto again.  “It’ll take me a bit to get some cash, but I’ll pay you back.  Incidentally,” he turned towards Lynn, “What happened at my place?  I couldn’t see a thing on the news.  The police seem to have roped off the entire block.”

                “I spent the morning dealing with labor issues.  Enforcing standards, encouraging civil professional relationships, that kind of thing.”

                “I figured it was something that like.  What happened?”

                “Some idiots had the audacity to play sniper from across the street while I was in your living room,” Lynn whispered. 

                “Hm.  I have that reflective film on the windows.  They shouldn’t have had a clear shot.”

                “Oh…  Well, that might explain why they fired at me, and why they missed.  I thought they were too damn lazy to ID who they were shooting at…  And too poorly trained to shoot straight.  Oh well.”

                Jou nodded and turned another page. 

                “Then there were seven others camped out downstairs.  They weren’t really acting like men committed to cooperative enterprise, you know how it goes.  Old rivalries pop up, suddenly someone gets impulsive and no one remembers that they’ve got a job to do, everyone just tries to nail everyone else.  There was another American, a Hispanic guy, and a couple of Japanese guys.  And three Europeans, too.  But no one was even bothering with the contract.  I doubt any of them even said a single word to each other.  It was depressing.”

                “Hm,” Jou nodded again.  “So, that scene on the news was to encourage them to consider team work?”

                “To be more professional,” Lynn insisted.  “How can we be expected to maintain a professional image if we constantly try to kill each other instead of the subject we’re supposed to be dealing with?”

                “So you killed them all?” Seto asked.  “Did you give them time to say something?”

                “No, of course not.  They might have had time for a clear shot if I’d done that,” Lynn shook his hand in the air dismissively.  “Besides, four of them were incompetent anyway.  They completely failed to accurately assess the situation because they were distracted by your rent-a-cops.”

                “Obviously incompetent,” Jou agreed. 

                “How would you know?” Seto demanded. 

                “They’re dead.  From the news, I’d guess that this morning’s mess ended in knife work.  If you let someone like Collin here get close enough for knife work in a situation like that, it just screams of incompetence.  If they noticed Collin and your guards both coming out of the elevator and decided that your guards were the bigger threat, then they failed to accurately assess the situation.”

                “Most people would make that assumption,” Seto insisted. 

                “Kaiba, there aren’t that many of us.  We all know each other, at least professionally.  If I seen Collin and a bunch of riot cops come into a scene at the same time, I’d be using the riot cops as human shields.”

                “What?  You’d let someone else get killed just so you could have better cover…”

                “No,” Jou stared at him, his eyes still as dead as ever, but his expression curious.  “That would make it difficult to focus on Collin.  I would probably slit their throat or snap their neck, then use their corpse as a shield.  Heavy, but no jerking movements or predictability issues.”

                “Ohh,” Lynn nodded approvingly, “The perfect solution to the ‘what to do when the thing you’re trying to take cover behind keeps trying to gouge your eyes out’ problem.”

                “Regardless, those guys either didn’t see him, or they screwed up.  And, technically, if they didn’t see him, they screwed up.  Incompetent.  Same thing with the snipers.  First they fired at someone they couldn’t see clearly, and second, they either missed or didn’t shoot to kill.  Then they assumed that their range would keep them safe and they didn’t find adequate cover.  Those are some pretty serious mistakes.  Totally incompetent.  At least this way, they got to be an example for anyone else up on those buildings, maybe keep them from making the same mistakes.  They might learn a little, survive, and then go find a job that is not quite so far out of their league.”

                “Someone else up on those buildings,” the expression on Lynn’s face was almost hurt.  “Joey, I’m not that sloppy…”

                “Never mind that, of course they wont.  If he had left anyone alive, they might have.  But this way they wont be around to teach the next batch of ex-Marines the same bad habits,” Jou amended quickly.  “Incompetence is contagious.”

                “Exactly.  If they survive, others with even less experience will watch them and try to learn, and suddenly you have hundreds of incompetent morons all competing with one another every time anybody tries to get any work done.   They can fire a lot of bullets quickly, but they never bothered with the basics such as aiming.  Really, it’s less trouble to just take them out and be done with it, because if you wait, you’ll just have to do it down the road.”

                “But they were just inexperienced.  How do you expect someone to survive long enough to become competent?” 

                “I don’t,” Jou insisted.

                Lynn nodded.  “I totally concur.  It’s thinning the ranks, that’s all.  Like how intro classes in every subject always have a higher failure rate than the upper division classes.”

                Jou froze, looking at his book but not really reading it.  “When did you last sleep, Col?”

                Seto watched the man next to Jou become rigid with tension.  Lynn Grayson rubbed his left hand over his eyes, letting his bright smile slip as a bit of weariness peeked through.  “You know me, Joey, unless there are pina coladas involved, I never sleep.”

                “There ya go!” Jou slapped Lynn gently on the shoulder.  “And hey, speaking of work, did you at least apologize to my doorman for the mess?”

                “I apologized and tipped him.”

                “Yeah, that’s something at least.  Is this something I should worry about?”

                “I thought you’d have heard by now.  They were after you.  The youngest of old Sasano’s kids found out that your body wasn’t recovered from that fiasco last week and has decided that you had to be the one responsible.”

                “What?” Jou suddenly looked furious.  He shot a quick glare at Seto.  “You’ve got to be kidding me!  He’s just a kid!”

                Lynn shrugged and changed to a different color.  “Who knows….  Who cares…  The price is ten.”

                That made the look of fury vanish.  Jou’s eyebrows knitted together in confusion.  “I am only worth ten?  No way would seven guys come after me ten thousand.”

                “Million.  That, along with a rumor that someone else still has twelve million out on you,” Lynn paused, stopped drawing, and glared up at Seto.

                “I’m going to take care of that,” Seto said quickly. He tried to send a text message as discretely as possible.

                “Asshole,” Jou whispered. 

                Lynn tilted his head to the side and stared at Seto.  Then he went back to drawing.  “You two are a strange mix.  Anyway, it’s a lot of money.  It has stirred up a lot of interest.  Hell, I think there was someone else on the plane with me when I flew over.  It’s shaping up to be one hell of a party.”

                “Twenty-two million,” Jou whispered.  “Fuck, that’s a lot of money.  I guess I’ll have to deal with it.”  He turned another page and focused on his book again.  Lynn continued to draw. 

                “Ten million,” Seto insisted.  Seto watched the two, wondering what his next move would have to be.  Jou grumbled and kept reading.  Lynn went back to drawing. 

                “Ha!” Jou said out loud, after a couple minutes and a couple more page turns.  “What year was Pride and Prejudice published?”  He reached for one of the Mark Twain novels and turned to the title page.  “Oh, never mind, that’s not even close.  Well, it would have been cool.”

                “What are you talking about?” Seto asked pulling the novel Jou just finished towards him. 

                “I thought that maybe there was a reference in there that wasn’t there…  A joke about Pride and Prejudice that seemed out of place with the Mark Twain theme.  It would have been really cool if they were contemporaries.”

                “He gets excited about things like that.  About two years ago he was reading one of the older books and jumped up shouting ‘Chekov’s three sisters!’ and laughing like a madman.”

                Jou scrunched up his eyes and forced himself not to laugh.  “That book was funny,” he finally managed.  “And the three sisters thing was awesome.”

                Seto noticed that Jou’s friend was looking at Jou like he was insane, too, so he didn’t feel so awkward about it.  Lynn shook his head.  “You need to take up surfing or something, Joey.”

                “It was funny,” Jou insisted. 

                “So,” Lynn set the paper and the pastels down.  Seto was a bit surprised to see a remarkably life-like sketch of himself and Jou on the paper.  “When did this thing with you two start?”

                “There is no thing,” Jou said quickly.

                At the same moment, though, Seto blurted out, “In high school.”

                Lynn leaned back and laughed at them.  “There’s got to be a one hell of a story behind that…  Come on, dinner, you can tell me all about it.”

                “There’s nothing to tell,” Jou insisted.  “He was an asshole.  He is still an asshole.  There is no thing.  There were a couple of kidnappings, some interesting use of sedatives all around, , and maybe a bit of sex, but no thing.”

                “Yeah, he mentioned that you let him tie you up.  He mentioned a lot of interesting things.  I never knew you were into anything that kinky.”

                Jou shut his eyes and dropped his head onto the table. 

                “Oh, an outburst and a full blush.  There’s a thing.  That or you’re slipping, Joey,” Lynn said as he patted Jou’s shoulder.  “Is it finally time to have another conversation about attachments?”

                Jou picked up his head and hit it against the table softly.  “Kaiba, I really might end up killing you.”

                “Incidentally,” Lynn’s smile didn’t fade.  “Is the gentleman with the gray hair yours?” he asked. 

                Seto spun in his seat, expecting to see Roland.  There was no one nearby, and no sign of Roland at all. 

                “He really has no clue…” Jou said sadly. 

                “Not his fault, not his fault,” Lynn soothed.  “The reflection, kid. There are a lot windows in this place, and in this light, they you can get a bit of a reflection of who is standing behind the ends of those shelves over there,” Lynn nodded towards the shelves to the right of their table, “and who is standing between those shelves and the tables along with windows over there,” he nodded towards the left.  “It’s a decent vantage point.  There are only a few blind angles.  The man with the gray hair is using the reflections to watch you as we speak.  Does he know just how visible he is?”

                “Why do you ask?”

                “Joey?”

                Jou rolled his eyes.  “When dealing with a flat surface, the angle light is reflected at is the same in both directions.  If light hits it at a thirty degree angle, it’ll be reflected back at a thirty degree angle.  He means,” Jou began to explain, but Seto cut him off. 

                “He can see us, but everyone on either side of the window in the rest of the room can see him, if they look in the glass.  He’s visible to the entire room, from the main entrance to this corner,” Seto nodded.  “I have studied physics extensively.  I would think you would at least remember all the fun we used to have with holograms.”

                “Those were unforgettable,” Jou conceded, though it was obvious from his expression that he didn’t find them nearly as impressive now as he had at sixteen. 

                “But you’ve forgotten that Roland is a body guard.  Whether or not he is visible isn’t really a concern for him.  In fact, high visibility acts as a deterrent, more often than not. He needs a clear view of me and everyone who might approach, so I’d say he’s positioned rather well.”

                “Got a better view of the entrance than we do, anyway,” Jou agred, leaning back in a relaxed posture and dropping his other hand beneath the table.  “He’s moving to intercept someone.”

                “I can’t see who,” Lynn complained.  His paper and pastels had disappeared.  His hands had also disappeared beneath the table.

                “Martin,” Jou said in a whisper. 

                “I thought I saw one of the Austrians this morning.  If Martin’s here, his little friend will be with him.”

                Seto shifted until he had a better view of the window.  He briefly caught sight of one of the Interpol agents he’d spoken to just an hour ago.  They worked fast.  Out the window, though, in the glow of the street lights, he saw the third man pretending to read the paper while he watched the doors of the library. 

                When Seto turned back, Jou and his friend appeared to be arguing.  “Absolutely not,” Jou growled.  “We are in a library.  How would you feel if I walked into the New York Museum of Fine Art and began to slice all of the paintings to pieces and cover them with blood?”

                The man with the beautiful smile turned his grin into an equally striking pout.  “With their most recent couple of exhibits, it’d only be an improvement…”

                “Permenant collection.”

                Lynn’s head rocked from side to side, like he was seriously considered the impact. 

                “Never mind.  I said no.”

                “There are three,” Seto said quickly.  “Two inside, one outside watching the door.”

                Roland’s voice, in a loud, boisterous British accent, echoed through the library.  “Agent Martin!  Oh, excuse me, I didn’t mean to run into you.  How are you enjoying the city?  I meant to say hello before, you know, one Englishman to another, but, well, you know how work is, always keeps us busy.”

                “This way,” said Seto, calmly getting up and strolling towards the side of the counter.  The librarian was trying to hush Roland, who had somehow managed to knock over a jar of pencils and a cup of coffee.  Lynn and Jou, no sign of weapons, books, pastels, or paper, leapt over the counter with smooth, silent movements.  Seto smirked and walked through the gate in the counter, confident that Roland could keep the librarian distracted.  At this time of night, the offices behind the circulation desk of the library were empty.  “The loading dock,” he pointed to a corner of the open offices that had boxes and pallets of paper stacked against the wall.  “We should be able to get out without setting off the fire alarm.”

                Lynn and Jou didn’t follow him though.  Lynn took off in one direction, running so fast through the desks and filing cabinets that he was bent into a crouch.  Jou took off in the other direction, stopped to duck behind a gigantic metal cabinet.  Seto ran for the door.  He heard something behind him before he made it out the exit, so he dove in-between two pallets stacked full of boxes of copy paper. 

                He hoped to find out if it was Roland by listening, but whoever had come into the office area after them was being very quiet.  For a minute, he wished he had dove into the desks like Jou and Lynn, since there were still windows along the walls by the desks.  He tried to think of something he could use for a mirror, so he could see what was going on, but he also didn’t want to pull out a piece of gleaming metal that would shine in the shadows of the door.  He felt around in his pockets and eventually pulled out his phone.  With the screen’s back light off, the screen itself was a crystal clear black.  It wasn’t a mirror, but it would have to do. 

                He held the phone up and adjusted the angle.  Agent Martin, with a machine gun that no law enforcement officer would ever carry, was walking down the main aisle between the desks in a crouch.  He had to turn his phone to find the other man, who had only come a few feet into the room and was keeping his back to the door. 

                “Joey…” Martin sang out.  Seto noticed that as soon as he spoke, he side stepped several feet and got lower.  In a moment, Seto lost sight of the man as he ducked behind something.  He heard a single, muffled gunshot, the sound of a gurgle, and then he moved the phone, trying to see what was happening without exposing himself.  He turned so he could see the reflection of the other man, the one Martin had called Henderson, but instead of just seeing Henderson, he saw Jou behind him, his slender fingers wrapped around the man’s throat.  Henderson seemed to be struggling, but Jou was holding him tight enough that he couldn’t make any noise. 

                His first thought should have been moral outrage or shock.  There had to be something wrong with him, he knew, if the first thing that came to mind as he watched this new lover strangle someone was idle curiosity about how he’d gotten behind the man without being spotted.  But Henderson was a big man, easily four inches taller than Jou and a good fifty pounds heavier.  The flailing man was fighting against Jou’s hold so hard that Seto saw Jou’s feet leave the ground.  Seto leapt to his feet, not sure if he was going to run to Jou’s rescue, or to stop him.  He didn’t have time, though.  On the floor in the very center of the room was the body of the man who had introduced himself as Agent Martin.  About ten feet away, Lynn was calmly placing a pistol back into his clothes.  He glanced briefly at Jou, watched until the bigger man dropped forward on to his knees and then on to the ground, then turned to the body. 

                Both men, Seto noticed, had blue rubber gloves on.  Lynn turned the body over, unfolded a black garbage bag, folded the man in half and efficiently slipped the bag around him.  As Lynn turned the body, Seto saw a small bullet hole in the center of the man’s forehead.  Despite the small wound, there was a lot of blood on the tile.  Lynn didn’t seem ready to start finger painting in it, at least. 

                Seto came closer and watched as the man opened a travel sized container of what looked like baby powder.  The powder seemed to soak up the blood, clumping and growing in volume.  Lynn scooped up the powder and tossed it into the bag on top of the dead man.  When most of it was in the bag, he used his rubber-gloved hand to sweep the rest of it up.  In less than sixty seconds, the entire mess was contained.  He worked fast, but Jou worked faster.  Jou walked past him with a black plastic bag slung over his shoulder.  Lynn tied up the bag, slung it over his shoulder, and followed Jou out the back door of the library. 

                An alarm sounded as the back door of the library swung open, but both men ignored it.  Seto hurried through and pulled the door shut behind them.  The blaring alarm shut off.  Seto watched as both Jou and his friend tossed the bodies in a large dumpster and swing the lid shut.  Jou laughed at something that Lynn said and the two of them strolled back towards Seto. 

                Behind him, the back door swung open and then closed again so quickly that there was hardly a beep from the alarm system.  Roland strolled down the stairs, glanced quickly between Seto and the other two, paused when he noticed that Jou and Lynn each had pistols pointed at his head, then continued down the stairs.  “Security reports that the third man left the building.  They followed him Noth for two blocks, then lost his as he entered a train station.”

                “Train station...”  To Seto’s surprise, Lynn nodded to himself in approval.  “Very smart.”

                “But he ran away…” Seto pointed out.

                Jou snorted.  “He headed for a crowd.  Probably expected this to blow up like your little adventure in labor relations this morning.  He wanted to be someplace where he could blend in when the police show up.” 

                “Oh.”

                “So,” Lynn wrapped an arm around Jou’s shoulders, his smile just as fixed in place as before.  “Dinner?”