1. Homecoming

Seto Kaiba replaced his coffee mug onto the dining table and studied the graphs on his laptop before swiping to the next. Every morning, he checked the stocks, shareholder activity, production, and expense reports to ascertain that all was in order and going as it should. He had had countless cases of people trying to buy out his company ever since the debacle with Pegasus. It seemed that, once that silver-haired prima donna made a move for a takeover, others began considering their own prospects at the same scheme.

A small but resonant ding from the doorbell rung through the first floor, its sound faintly permeating the walls of the dining room. In a few seconds his butler, Daimon, would answer it and dismiss the intruder. What moron calls on a Saturday morning, anyway? Don't they know he has more pressing matters to attend to than to purchase girl-scout cookies, or fund a charity, or appear at the next fundraising gala?

He slapped his hands onto the keyboard. There it was, a second ring. Out of all of fifty-four house staff members he employed, could not one of them carry out the simple task of answering the door? Scratching his forehead lightly, he tried to make sense of the missing 10% of shares that had recently been purchased by a company he'd never heard of before: Golem.

Frowning, he bookmarked the page to later dig up some information on it. It wasn't a huge purchase, but he had better keep an eye on them.

Ding-dong!

That's it. He slammed his laptop shut and abruptly left the table, crossing across the room to throw open the doors and kill the persistent pest. Where was everyone? he vehemently thought, not seeing a soul in sight.

Wrenching the doorknob towards him, he glared at the visitor. Brown hair, gold eyes, a dumb smile…she looked familiar. Instantly, he envisioned the faces of Marik, his nagging sister, the dog Jonouchi, and the rest of Yugi's fanclub. "Hi," she said.

"No," he said definitely, slamming the door on her face.

Ding-dong!

He repressed an aggravated growl and walked away.

Ding-dong!

I give her two seconds to get her ass away from here before I murder her, he fumed.

Ding-dong!

"What. Do you want?!" he yelled, casting the door open again. She hopped back and blinked upwards at him. "Ahm," she murmured nervously, "I…" He released a shuddering breath. "Listen. I don't care if your boyfriend's caught up in a knot, or his sister sent you dire news about my so-called past, or Yugi and his friends are stranded on a desert island, or if you just need to borrow a damn cup of sugar—GO. AWAY."

He braced a hand on her shoulder and pushed her back, moving instinctively to close the door behind him.

"O—wait, Nii-san!"

He froze. "What did you call me?" he asked, spinning around to face her.

"Nii-san?"

"I thought so," he said, grabbing the handle again. Demented girl. "You got the wrong person. Good luck finding your real brother. Now leave."

She squeezed herself between the door and its post, snatching a pinch of his shirt sleeve. "But aren't you Gozaburo's son?" she inquired desperately.

"Not that it concerns you—yes."

"It does actually," she said earnestly, "I'm your sister, Mitsuki."

He wrenched his arm from her grasp. "There is no history of me ever having a sister. Unless my parents had one secretly without my brother and me knowing, I don't think so. Goodbye."

"Well, that's what I wanted to talk to you about," she said, quickly pulling out a folded piece of paper from her purse and handing it to him. It was a birth certificate.

Snatching it up, he quickly scanned the name, date of birth, and parents' names. Gozaburo, that damn fool.

"We're half-siblings," she murmured happily.

He tore up the document in her astonished face. It had to be a fake. "You don't think I know what you're about?" he sneered, tossing the pieces in the air. "Do you know how many low-lives approach me, masquerading as someone else? If this is that dog's idea of a joke, you can tell him I'm not amused. Now see yourself out before I call the guards."

He slammed and bolted the door. Hunching and storming across the foyer, he met with the soulless lenses of the butler's spectacles. "Miss Kaiba is here, I presume?" Daimon asked.

"What?!" Seto spat, turning his anger on him. "And where were you the whole time that brat was blasting the bell?" Daimon merely passed him a thick folder. "What's this?" he demanded, unwinding the string on the flap.

"The updated will," Hobson replied grimly, moving past him to undo the locks on the door. "I urge discretion, Seto-sama. She's come to claim her inheritance," he said, his red glasses glinting malevolently.

That couldn't be true, Seto thought. He had no recollection of a third person mentioned in the will that his lawyer read aloud upon his adoptive father's death.

But Daimon's certain behavior toward the girl prompted an unease. He wouldn't put it past Gozaburo to pull another empire scheme, not since the former's last attempt to hijack his body using the virtual pods. He glowered in the direction of the door.

"I'm sorry to keep you waiting, my dear," the short man said, ushering her through. "Your elder brother wasn't informed of your visit—my mistake, I'm afraid."

"I told you," she said, grinning triumphantly at Seto as Daimon led her to the living room.

Seto grimaced. Something in her demeanor had changed when her eyes flicked to him and back ahead. It was taunting. 'Discretion?' he thought. Why would he have to be discrete? What could this girl have that he had to be afraid of?