Title: Forever and Always

Summary: Seto urges Kaiba toward the place he needs to be.

Pairing: Kaiba x Yami

Rating: T

Disclaimer: Yu-Gi-Oh! does not and never has belonged to me.

A/N: This fic is a bit dark in concept, but not enough to merit an M rating in my opinion. But if you prefer the light and fluffier side of things, this fic probably isn't for you.

It was the absence of everything; a place where silence became sound and shadows grew in darkness. Nowhere became everywhere, but he knew that something was wrong—he felt that something was wrong. There was something important that he was forgetting…

"You're not supposed to be here."

It was only when Kaiba opened his eyes that he realized that they were closed; somewhere in there it felt like there was a lesson to be learned, a truth to be grasped. Instead he tried to focus on the darkness that was taking on a form, his mind slowly processing what had just been said in a voice that might as well have been his own.

"Here?" Kaiba managed to ask, although he wasn't sure if he voiced it out loud or not.

The shadows produced a being that was a darker mirror image of himself and Kaiba could only stare at the man before him. He was confronted by the displeasure and disappointment in those glacial blue eyes and Kaiba felt his ire beginning to stir the presumptuousness of the expression; it was like being watched by himself and he hated it.

This time he saw the lips moving on his doppelganger as the words were spoken, "You don't belong here."

"Then why am I here?"

The disgust was evident in the judgmental gaze that Kaiba found hard to meet. "Because you made the wrong choice," he informed Kaiba, his tone laced with distain.

Kaiba didn't understand, but he was becoming distracted by the sound of heartbeats and mixed emotions that were carried from afar. It sounded like the whisper of an echo and he caught the faintest hint of, "Seto," in the distance.

"That's you," Kaiba realized, addressing the stranger. "You're Seto."

"Obviously, you have learned nothing," Seto said sadly, turning away from Kaiba with a frustrated expression.

Before Kaiba could ask what that meant, everything became nothing once more.

Time passed and light returned once again. Kaiba saw the stranger sitting by the side of a river and he confronted the man with the accusation, "You're Seto."

"If I am, then who are you?" Seto questioned, looking up at Kaiba with expectation in his gaze.

"What?"

"Who does that make you?"

Kaiba didn't even know how to begin answering that question, which was fine since he never got the chance to.

Darkness and flickering candlelight, the sound of ancient insomnia. Kaiba looked at Seto with contempt, resenting the priest for his predicament. "Why am I still here?" Kaiba demanded, his irritation shattering the silence of their shared solitude.

"Why are you here at all?" Seto replied in turn, meeting Kaiba's gaze with icy apathy.

"You tell me."

Eternal eyes assessed the insolent reincarnation, before Seto coldly answered, "Because you are a fool."

Kaiba growled low in his throat, approaching Seto with a menacing glare. "You do not get to tell me that I am the fool," Kaiba hissed, grabbing the priest by his robes and pulling him close.

"Then why do you remain here with me instead of at his side?" Seto countered, making no attempt to free himself.

"His?" Kaiba repeated without comprehension. "Who are you talking about?"

Disappointment and defeat temporarily dulled cerulean depths as Seto sighed heavily. "If you cannot remember, then all is lost."

"What does that mean?" Kaiba yelled, frustration revealing itself in his voice.

"Remember," Seto urged him before the world became shadows of midnight and despair.

Ascending the heavens as the priest never could, Kaiba stared out the windows from his modern skyscraper with an anomaly of time by his side. "Who is he?" Kaiba asked, getting straight to his point, never knowing when the moment would break.

"He is the reason why I can never watch the sun set," Seto cryptically answered, smiling sadly as he watched the dawning of a new day defeating the remnants of the greying night.

"What the fuck does that even mean?" Kaiba shouted, his patience at an end.

"Because when the bleeding crimson blaze fades into darkness, it reminds me of the last time he closed his eyes," Seto murmured, his voice wavering with guilt and grief.

"What does that have to do with me?" Kaiba snapped, ignoring the poetry of Seto's pain. "What does any of this have to do with me?"

"We chose duty over love," Seto answered as he turned away from the wall of windows. "You have repeated the same mistake and that is why you are here."

There were so many things wrong with those sentiments in Kaiba's opinion, but he was unable to refute them as the sun reached the horizon.

A chaotic flash of light and a cacophony of sound disoriented Kaiba as glimpses of destruction echoed through his core. Fractals from glass went unnoticed as the memory was lost to the awareness of now.

"What was that?" Kaiba asked, unable to comprehend why he was panting for breath.

"The reason why you are here," Seto whispered as he looked into the formless darkness. "The reason why he cries now."

Swallowing hard, Kaiba struggled to regain control of himself without understanding how he had lost it in the first place. "I don't understand," Kaiba groaned as he collapsed to his knees, wondering where the blood was coming from and who the source was.

"Regardless, we are almost out of time," Seto said sadly as he helplessly watched the world fade away from them both.

Fainter now, in a place full of darkening grey, Kaiba gasped for air as he struggled against forces unseen. Fragments of memories flashed before his eyes: the light of his eyes, the taste of his skin, the beautiful way he moaned and writhed, the warmth of his smile, the comfort of his embrace. Still, the fog of distance separated them and this place was so very cold without his presence. "Who…?" Kaiba tried to question, but found himself unable as he remembered a scarlet seduction, skilled fingers trailing lightly along his skin, a warm tongue lathing lines of lust along his body, the heat of whispered affections that had finally been accepted.

"Say his name," Seto pleaded, watching as his reincarnation drew shuddery breaths in a puddle of ill boding crimson.

A name that he had shouted in anger, had cursed in defeat, had moaned in pleasure was just on the tip of his tongue, but the world was becoming hazier as Kaiba's eyes started to close. "Seto," Kaiba groaned as he curled up into himself in a futile effort for protection against that which was trying to hurt him.

"His name!"

"Our name," Kaiba sighed, remembering the way that he had shouted it in rapture long into the night and at the dawning day.

Content with another victory, he lost the rematch as Seto's words were claimed by the suffocating silence.

Somewhere in the distance there were shaking hands and frantic pleas, but everything was purified into silence by the surrounding bright whiteness of light. Exhausted eyes squinted against it, all strength left behind in a previous place.

Only in the calm quiet did Kaiba recall, "It was early."

"Yes," Seto encouraged, knowing that soon it would be too late.

Recollections like liquid dreams filtered through Kaiba's mind, a dinner meeting finishing early, a momentary debate whether to go to his side or return to the office for a few more uninterrupted hours of work, and the decision made so he could fully enjoy their time alone later. "Shit," Kaiba softly swore, closing his eyes to the mangled metal aftermath of a wrong turn, of a wrong decision.

Disintegrating light, a final warning as Kaiba continued to linger in remembrance of faded yesterdays, unaware of the danger.

Tender kisses, gentle caresses, a comforting moment of peace in the sanctuary of his embrace; it was so easy to submerge himself in him.

"Never again if you do not return to him now," Seto warned, urgency replacing his normal calm.

Kaiba could feel the pull on his soul, the weightlessness of an impending departure, but he held on long enough to ask, "What happens to you?"

"That is unimportant," Seto stoically answered, knowing that he was secondary to the happiness of his pharaoh.

Shutting his eyes for a final time, Kaiba sighed, "Yami," as he gave himself over to the sensations.

He never heard Seto's corresponding, "Atem," that was the last spoken word before darkness descended a final time.

Blue eyes fluttered opened to a new reality, blurry in the dimness. Medical machinery monitored in the background and Kaiba narrowed his eyes in displeasure, his hands tightening into fists as he realized his location.

A sharp gasp to his left alerted Kaiba to the presence of another and he tensed until he saw the watery crimson that had beckoned to him elsewhere. "Yami," he remembered in a broken whisper, his fingers straining for contact.

Taking Kaiba's hand into his own, Yami placed a reverent kiss on it before nuzzling it with affectionate relief. "You're okay," Yami murmured, desperately trying not to shed the tears that were so close to falling.

"Yami," was all Kaiba could say, his throat too dry and his mind too disjointed to focus on anything other than the comforting touch of his lover. Kaiba softly called out, "Yami," as if it was all that mattered, as if his everything could be summed up in that single name.

"Shh, I'm here," Yami reassured Kaiba, reiterating through constant touch. "I'm here, I'm right here and you're fine, Seto."

Egyptian mists over mirages of time drifted through Kaiba's consciousness and he said, "Maybe he is..."

Yami was momentarily confused by the statement and he prompted, "He?"

The smallest quirk of a smirk ghosted across Kaiba's lips before he answered, "Seto."

"The priest?" Yami clarified, although it didn't make any sense to him.

"Mm," Kaiba agreed, his eye shutting out the light despite his need to see Yami.

"Stay with me," Yami pleaded, not ready for Kaiba to slip away from him again.

Sighing softly, Kaiba promised, "Always," before drifting to sleep with forward facing dreams of the future with Yami, not a priest in sight.

"Always," Yami repeated as he continued his vigil, kissing Kaiba's hand once more and finally at ease that everything would truly be fine.

A/N: So…this probably wasn't what anyone was expecting, including myself. o.O;; Consider this an experiment, I suppose. Although I feel compelled to add that this is actually a happy ending and Kaiba is/will be fine.

A little history is probably required for this oneshot. It was originally going to be part of the Entangled Series, but I thought that the language didn't really fit that ficverse and it was much darker than I wanted to go. The concept of Kaiba choosing to go to work instead of inflicting the Yuugi-tachi on himself in order to meet up early with Yami also didn't work for Endless Loop. Thus, this has been languishing as an incomplete fragment for well over a year until I randomly decided to finish it this week.

Next update should be Sunday, August 2nd, but once again, I'm not really sure what will be posted. I seem to be working more on the whim of whatever catches my ear week to week, so I appreciate your patience and encouragement! I know this one was a little strange, so thank you for indulging this diversion!