Disclaimer: I do not own Yu Gi Oh!. Someday I'll take over the world, and then I will own it, but until that time, I'll have to be satisfied with fanfictions.
A/N: (blink) What's this, Tawnykit? A romance? (choke) Am I actually writing a romance? Who am I, and what have the aliens done to my soul to get me to do such a thing? I didn't know I was capable.
Ages: If I recall correctly, Serenity is two years younger than Seto is. If I want them both to be going to the same school, shall we say that she's fifteen and he's seventeen in this story? That would put Mokuba at eleven and the nerd herd, I mean, Yugi and his friends at seventeen-ish, like Seto. (Mokuba would be eleven because Seto was five when he was born, but then Seto turned six a few months later. For most of the year, from his birthday on October twenty-fifth to Mokuba's on July seventh, Seto is six years older than Mokuba, not five.)
And I know the chances of something like this happening are, what, zero? But we all know that deep down, Mr. Coldhearted CEO does have a soft side.
Special thanks to Caorann fridh Brónach, for both beta-ing and for putting up with my constant moaning about stupid Rabid Plot Bunnies!
"Little brother?"
Mokuba Kaiba looked up from where he was sprawled on his bed doing his homework. His older brother stood in his doorway, looking vaguely uncomfortable.
"What's up, Seto?" Mokuba sat up, dragging his thoughts away from the square root ofonehundred and sixty-nineand focusing his attention on his brother.
"…I need to talk to you about something."
Uh-oh… Mokuba cringed inwardly. He didn't find out about that, did he…
"I didn't do it!"
The tall brunette raised his eyebrows. "Oh? Didn't do what, exactly?"
"Uh… Nothing."
Seto came into the room, sitting down on the edge of the bed. He still looked suspicious, and Mokuba gave him an innocent smile. "So… Um… What did you want to talk about?"
"Ah… Well…" Seto rubbed the bridge of his nose absently. Mokuba blinked. He wasn't used to seeing his brother look so flustered.
After taking a moment to collect himself, Seto spoke. "All right… I know that I'm the one who's supposed to help you with your problems and not the other way around, but you're better at emotional matters than I am…" he trailed off, frowning.
"Okay… Yeah, sure thing, bro. What's the matter?"
"To put it bluntly… I'm a hormonal male teenager and Wheeler's sister won't get out of my head."
Mokuba blinked again. Had Seto just said what he thought he had? He felt a grin tugging at the corners of his mouth.
Seto scowled. "It's not funny."
Still grinning, Mokuba shook his head. "No, you're right, it's not. I'm sorry; it's just that you looked so… not like you."
"…"
Mokuba took a deep breath, wondering how much exactly he would have to explain to his antisocial brother. "Okay… Let's start with the basics. How will she not stay out of your head?"
"…"
"Come on, Seto, I can't help if you're not going to talk."
"…What is there to explain, exactly?"
Mokuba sighed. Seto was being difficult. "Won't get out of your head good, or won't get out of your head bad?"
The older boy blinked, as if he hadn't thought about that before. "I can't work when all I can think about is The Mutt's sister."
Mokuba slapped his forehead. "That's not what I meant…"
"Then what, exactly, did you mean?"
"How does it make you feel?"
"…What do you mean?"
The twelve-year-old ran his hand through his raven-colored hair, trying not to be annoyed. He had to remind himself that his brother had absolutely no experience with feeling emotions that he couldn't control. He was bound to be reluctant to discuss it. He was surely beginning to panic about it if he had made himself bring it up at all.
"Do you feel good when you think about her?"
"…"
"Seto…"
"…Yeah."
"Okay, now we're getting somewhere. What about when you're with her?"
His brother visibly paled, though he managed to control his facial expression. "W-what?"
"How do you feel when you're near her?"
"You're implying that I can get within a ten foot radius without-" He stopped before he finished his sentence.
"Without what?"
"…Without being repulsed by the nerd herd. I swear, she's always surrounded by them…"
"Well, they are her friends. And her brother's friends."
"Don't remind me…"
"But that's not what you were going to say."
"Excuse me?"
Mokuba smirked. "'Without being repulsed by the nerd herd' is not what you were going to say."
Seto glared. The color had returned to his face now; in fact, if Mokuba hadn't known any better, he would have thought that the usually stoic CEO was very faintly blushing. He resisted the urge to tease his brother about it. This conversation was difficult enough as it was.
"So what happens when you get within a ten foot radius? And don't say that Yugi and his friends annoy you so much that you can't, because I don't believe that."
"Mokuba…" the older boy growled. He was definitely blushing now.
"Okay, fine, we'll do this the long way." Mokuba paused, thinking of all of the classic symptoms he could. "Does your heart rate increase?"
"You sound like you're diagnosing a disease," Seto grumbled.
"Just answer the question."
"…Yes."
"Do you feel hot?"
"Excuse me?"
"I meant your temperature, geez! Does it feel like your body temperature increases?"
"…Maybe…"
"Seto…"
"…Yes."
"Does it feel hard to breathe?
"…Yeah."
"Do you blush?" He hid a smirk by bending down to fiddle with his shoelace.
Seto sighed. When he spoke, his voice was dry. "If I were anyone else, I'm sure that I might be mistaken for a ripe tomato. As it is, it takes every scrap of my training to hide it." He propped his head up with his hands, frowning.
Mokuba's lips twitched up at his brother's analogy. Ripe tomato, huh? I'll have to remember that… "Okay, one last question."
"I'm not going to like this, am I?"
"Nope," was the cheerful reply.
"Great…"
"Okay… Um, how to put this…" Mokuba rubbed his forehead. "Do you, um, start imagining… er…" He waved his hand absently. "I don't know… what it'd be like to kiss her… or stuff like that?
Seto scowled. "What do you take me for, some kind of pervert?"
Both boys were blushing now, and Mokuba covered his face with his hands, mumbling, "Well, do you?"
"…I'm not answering that."
"What, don't want to self-incriminate yourself?" he smirked from behind his hands.
"…" Seto stood, and for a minute Mokuba thought he was going to leave. He sat up, about to shout at his brother to come back (and give chase, if he had to), but was relieved to find that the older boy was merely pacing around the bedroom. Mokuba watched him as he walked to and fro, the twelve-year-old's eyes bouncing back and forth as if he were watching a tennis match.
Finally, the CEO stopped in front of the room's sole window. The sun was setting and was just shining into the bedroom, silhouetting the tall boy. Mokuba had to shade his eyes to protect them from the light.
"You okay?" Mokuba asked.
"I'm fine. Just… thinking."
"About…?" He didn't need to specify.
"Mayb–…Yeah." He turned away from the window, his face calm. He came back over to the bed and sat down once more.
"So," Mokuba began.
"What?"
"Well, I might be stating the obvious here, but it sounds like you have a crush on Joey's sister."
He ran his hand through his hair. "On The Mutt's sister… So what do I do about it?"
Mokuba rolled his eyes. "First off, get over the fact that she's related to Joey. I know you don't like him, but that doesn't have anything to do with her."
"She's a Wheeler."
"You can't help who you fall for, Seto. It just…"
"Just what?"
"It just happens. It's not like you walked down the street and decided to fall in love," he ignored his brother's choking and pressed on, "with your rivals's friend's little sister."
"I didn't want to 'fall in love,' as you so eloquently put it, with anyone at all!" he snarled.
"Well, there's not much you can do about it. Personally, I think a girl would do you good."
"What?"
"You heard me. You're too uptight, Seto, you need to learn to have some fun."
"…Fun?"
"Yeah, you know, fun."
"I don't have time for 'fun.' Or a girlfriend."
"Don't know what to tell you."
"Some help you are," the teenager growled.
"I didn't say I wasn't going to help. Just that I wasn't going to help you ignore her."
"Mokuba, the last thing I need right now is to get involved with The Mutt's sis–"
"Stop right there!" Mokuba interrupted.
"What?"
"You can't keep thinking of her as 'The Mutt's sister,' Seto!" he said, as if speaking the obvious. "She does have a name, you know; you should start using it."
"…Fine, then. The last thing I need right now is to get involved with Serenity. There, happy now?"
"It's a start. Not a very good start, but it's a start nonetheless."
"Mokuba…"
"Tell me truly, big brother, what do you want?"
He blinked, surprised at that question. "What do you mean?"
"You say you don't have time for her, because of the company and whatever, but what do you want? Forgetting obligations and responsibilities, if you were just an ordinary seventeen-year-old with an ordinary crush on an ordinary girl, would you want to do something about it?"
"I…"
Mokuba sighed. "If you want to get closer to her, then you could always, I don't know, get her flowers or something. Or ask her out."
Seto coughed, obviously not liking that idea. He opened his mouth as if to say something, then shut it, scowling.
"What?" Mokuba pressed.
He ran a hand through his hair, not responding at first. Finally, he asked, "What if…?"
"What if what?"
"…Nothing."
"What if she doesn't feel the same?" he prompted.
Seto grimaced.
Correctly interpreting that as a 'yes,' Mokuba said, "Well, there's only one way you're gonna find out, right?"
"Not going to happen, little brother."
"Well, the feeling's not just going to go away, you know. If you don't do something about it, it'll just keep bugging you. At least, that's my advice."
"…I have work I should be doing." Seto stood up, not looking at his brother.
"Okay." Mokuba watched him walk to the door, then called out, "Hey, Seto?"
He stopped and turned back to face the younger boy. "Yes, Mokuba?"
"Thanks for trusting me."
"…If I can't trust you, kid, who can I trust?"
Mokuba smiled. "Seto?"
"Yes?"
"What're you gonna do?"
"…I don't know, Mokuba." Not waiting for another question, the CEO turned and left.
Mokuba sighed, lying back on his bed and tucking his hands behind his head. "Wow… Seto likes Serenity…" He smiled. "I never would've thought…" He picked up the pencil that he had been doing his homework with before his brother had come in and began to fiddle with it. His smile grew. "She'll be good for him. Assuming that he ever makes a move, of course… Well, I suppose I could always… help…" With that thought, the twelve-year-old smirked and returned to his homework.
A/N: (pulls out pistol and shoots Rabid Plot Bunny) Damn thing won't die…
(cringe) Okay, so how bad was it? has never written a romance before
Dare I ask for your reviews?