Yu-Gi-Oh! Fan Fiction ❯ Arubaito ❯ Busy ( Chapter 6 )

Ch 6 (Busy)

 

A/N: I was going to write more for this chapter, and then I remembered I go to university…

damn.

Also, dragonlady222 & JoeysGal - thank you very much for all your wonderful reviews! -much glomping-

I've been feeling completely uninspired lately and in my very personal opinion, this chapter is not quite up to standard… but… I will let you make your own decisions on the matter. Ja ne~

 

Disclaimer: Characters, worlds, people, games, and everything else is owned by and copyrighted Kazuki Takahashi. This is a non-for-profit fan work with no particular personal gain in mind. I own the writing and nothing else.

 

***

 

Katsuya had decided that, really, it was about time he gave Honda his work clothes back. He had received a few paychecks now, and with the extras he hadn't needed to spend on the cost of living, he figured he had enough to buy himself a whole new outfit or even two that he could wear to work, and finally return all of his friends clothes (he'd ended up borrowing some shirts from Otogi as Honda seemed to only own one that was presentable enough).

Everyone else had decided this needed to be a group project.

So that Wednesday afternoon they'd slipped to the shops to look for Katsuya's new work clothes, and Anzu, who seemed to be thrilled about most aspects of his new lifestyle, had enthusiastically led the way. Unfortunately, in what had now digressed to being a very undesirable situation for all other present members of the troupe, Anzu had decided to be somewhat picky about the articles of clothing Katsuya tried on. In the past hour she hadn't been satisfied with anything, and even now she was still frowning amongst the racks of shirts.

With nothing better to do in the bad situation, the others had decided to start playing a game. The game was to guess how many more stores it would take for Jou to crack and either give up on the whole idea, yell at Anzu, or buy the nearest few items of clothing and storm out.

Someone was about to win.

“Anzu.” Katsuya started, his voice taking on a threatening tone. He was standing in front of a change room, with a whole new set of neat clothes on, and she was frowning again. “What, exactly, is wrong this time?”

She tilted her head to the side. “I just don't think that colour shirt really goes with your hair colour. I mean…”

“You said that last time.” Katsuya interrupted her, and to all the world clearly trying to keep his temper down. He could understand that women thought a lot about this kind of thing. He wasn't mad at Anzu for being picky, because girls were just like that. He was just irritated that, in all their years of friendship, she still hadn't seemed to grasp the concept that he wasn't like a girl. Being that he was a boy. And boys weren't picky about clothing. They didn't really give a rat's ass whether a button matched their eye colour. It fit, and that was about as important as the features of any article got.

Although, he had to admit, her determination in the face of the fact that most of her best friends were the opposite gender was one thing Katsuya admired about her. She never complained about having to be dragged to arcades and watching her friends play games for the most part, and they in turn didn't put up much of a fight when she started ranting about the latest hot boy band or fussing over her makeup. Once, when he was sleeping, she had even plaited Ryou's hair. This was a few years ago now, and although he had been initially quite miffed, he had forgiven her eventually.

The others were keeping the photo hidden away until his twenty-first birthday.

Anzu pouted, “Well, it was true last time, and it's true this time.”

Katsuya gave her one last glare; the others looked on in a mixture of hope and wariness. Suddenly he broke her gaze and turned straight around back behind the doors of the change room. She blinked; she had been expecting him to explode. After a very short amount of time he re-emerged, back once again in his normal attire of jeans and t-shirt. The clothes he had tried on where slung over the crook of his arm, and Anzu eyed them with slight precaution.

“I'm sure the next place we look will have…”

Katsuya raised his hand, palm towards her, and she stopped speaking. “I'm getting these ones.” He stated. Then, when he found he couldn't keep his serious face on for very much longer, he chuckled and turned to her with a grin; “Plus I'm starving Anzu! We've been shopping for ages! Aren't you hungry?”

She returned the smile, and finally admitted defeat. Mostly because her stomach decided to growl at that moment, almost as if it had heard Katsuya and wanted to express its agreement.

He smiled broadly, happy that it was finally all over, and headed to the counter to pay for the clothes which, although in Anzu's opinion didn't match his hair, fitted him perfectly. In any case, it wasn't as if he actually had someone to impress.

Behind them, the other boys let out a contented sigh. Finally the madness had come to an end. To them, every piece of clothing Jou had tried on had looked pretty much the same thus far, so although they were a little annoyed it had taken him this long to stand up to Anzu's scrutiny, he had done it eventually, and that was all that mattered.

Yugi, of course, never lost a game. “Alright, pay up!” He said cheerfully, breaking the happy silence and turning to each of his taller friends.

“How did I just know it would end like this?” Honda wailed sarcastically, reaching into his pocket to find his wallet and withdraw the required amount of cash. Otogi just chuckled, whilst Ryou was looking frowningly at his scarcely financed case and thinking that perhaps it hadn't been the best idea to go in on the bet when he wasn't sure he would have anything left over once he paid the winner.

However Yugi, being Yugi, generously decided to spend the money he'd just received to finance their dinner, and none of the boys could really hold it against him for very much longer. He even had some left over afterwards and bought them all a few rounds of games at the arcade.

Katsuya, Honda and Yugi had always been the most interested in these types of games. Otogi naturally preferred dice games and Ryou still loved his tabletop RPG's, even if he didn't really get to play all that much anymore. Everyone was just too busy. And although that was becoming a more commonly used excuse nowadays, he realized it was just too painfully true. They were older now, out of school, and life was suddenly a lot more hectic. That was what happened when you grew up, Ryou supposed. Life was one giant busy. Interrupted by odd moments of calm in which to reflect on the fact that perhaps your life really was going down the toilet, but knowing deep down that you may never have enough energy to do something about it. Because life was busy, it took it away.

“Looks like Kaiba's latest game.” Yugi said, pointing to a gaming console over in the corner. It had been given wide berth, almost as if the other games wanted nothing to do with the newcomer and had surreptitiously shifted away from it, and large posters were displayed all around the machine with the infamous “KC” logo. It looked very fancy and technical. Kaiba had, as they knew very well, been a fore-runner in designing holographic technology, and many of the gaming systems his company produced included some sort of form of it. This latest game appeared to be a shooting game. These were Honda's favourite kind, his skills in the field even helping his friends out once or twice before, so he immediately volunteered to try it.

Katsuya was always hesitant to jump up and down at the chance to play a game produced by his most hated ex-classmate, so he gladly encouraged Honda to have the first go. They all stayed to watch the developments of course, interested to see how Honda would fare versus Kaiba's game, and also how the game itself would work. None of them had ever seen it before, so they assumed it was brand new.

Honda stepped up onto a small platform that was fronted by low wall, blocking him from walking further. Straight across from him was a screen, flashing with scenes from the game and high scores at intervenient moments. Honda put six 100 yen coins into the slot and waited for it to start. Immediately the screen changed and “new game” could be seen flashing at the bottom. What he realized he also hadn't noticed before was that there were two more screens either side of the main one; nothing had been displayed on them previously so in the dark he had completely over looked them. They were lit up now though, the background a landscape he suspected he would come across later on. He picked up the gun in front of him; it was plastic but felt suitably heavy, and since it was only a hand gun he shifted it into his right hand, and then fired at the screen. “New Game” flashed twice in recognition, then proceeded to fulfill his wish.

There was a plot involved, probably, but Honda fired straight past it to get on with the actual shooting part of the FPS. He was happy when the game finally started and found himself suddenly standing in the middle of a deserted street. There was gun fire, and then there was gun fire at him. Men rushed out from behind cars and poles and Honda didn't need telling twice what to do in this situation. He fired with practiced precision and seemingly controlled abandon. He was taken by surprise however, when he turned a little to his left and was met face to face with the enemy. The guy wasn't just on the screen; he was right in front of him! Honda reacted immediately and shot the man down. The words “Stage 1 Completed” flashed across the main, centre screen, although he didn't really notice them. He was still trying to calm his breathing right down. The enemies were not only on the screens a few metres in front of him; they were being projected three-dimensionally out towards him as well. And they looked so lifelike.

This game was so awesome!

Katsuya was impressed, but did his best not to show it. How could he ever be impressed with something Kaiba had made anyway? The rest of them were making “ooo's” and “ahh's” at appropriate intervals, and he had to admit that holographic enemy coming out of nowhere had caught him by surprise as well. At any rate, he flatly refused to recognise out loud to how good the CEO's latest product was, or agree when his friends kept saying it.

“So how is your work with Kaiba going?” Anzu asked him, her voice slightly lower so that Honda could concentrate on killing. Although she perhaps needn't have bothered, with the amount of noise that was coming from the machine.

“Mmm?” Katsuya stirred from his vengeful thoughts to turn to her, “I can tolerate it I suppose.”

She looked slightly surprised, “Wow. So he really must not be that bad then? I mean, if you're saying he's tolerable than that means a whole lot more than if someone else had said that he…”

“I meant the job is tolerable, not him.” Katsuya hastened to correct himself. Just thinking about his `boss' left him glowering. “He is still a pushy, pompous, ego-inflated jerk.”

Anzu chuckled; maybe it was impossible to change Jonouchi's opinion after all. Although, she herself had not met or spoken to the boy-billionaire since graduating high school, she always liked to think the best of people and in this case would have liked to hope that Kaiba had lost some of that smart-allec edge by now. Perhaps she was wrong, perhaps she was right, but she didn't foresee working this out personally any time in the near future.

“Ah well, at least you say it's tolerable. And you're not pulling each others hair out constantly or punching each other in the face, right?”

Katsuya muttered something that sounded like: “barely” before frowning and glaring at nothing in particular.

Honda made it past stage after stage and eventually he was facing what could only be the hardest stages in the game and by this point all of his friends - Katsuya included - were openly cheering him on. He reached the final boss and his cronies and fired away, now completely confidant with the new system of enemies at all levels of vision. He knocked them away until finally there was only the boss left. The computer character spieled some plot point before pulling out two machine guns and firing recklessly at Honda. He motioned the gun to move his character behind a pillar and out of immediate harms way. The brunet waited until the boss had finished firing both his clips and went to reload. Then Honda sprang back out again and started his round of firing. He lost four bullets, the third one hitting home.

After a final film clip the ending credits rolled, and his friends gave up numerous rounds of cheers while they waited to the very end. Honda input his name, then finally the game flashed back to the “new game” screen.

“Anyone else want to give it a try?” Honda grinned, clearly pleased with himself.

Katsuya was also grinning back, “Na man, I don't think anyone else would be able to do such a good job. Plus we've just watched the whole thing…”

His other friends nodded in agreement.

They decided to leave it at that grand finale, and seeing that it was quite late by now, and as most of them had to attend morning lectures, they soon found themselves parting ways. Standing alone on the train on his way back to his apartment Katsuya pondered when it was he was going to be able to see each of his friends again. Yugi and Ryou he would see tomorrow as they had a class together, but Anzu was taking a completely different degree to the rest of them so they didn't see her very often at all, and Otogi didn't even attend the same university. Honda shared some of his other classes but only one of his tutorials. He wouldn't see him until Monday.

And then another thought occurred to him; that in all actuality, these days he saw Kaiba more than he saw his friends. It had only been a week since the CEO had taken over Nobita's old job temporarily, but in that time he had seen Kaiba at least three times, and this Wednesday was the first time he had seen his friends. Katsuya gazed mournfully up at the roof; was this what his life was going to be like from now on?

He was suddenly a lot less enthusiastic to go to work tomorrow.

 

***

 

If Seto had liked reflecting on his past childhood, which he didn't, he may have noticed something interesting. Compared to most of his other school associates and people of his age, he had seemed to completely skiped the whole “rebellious teenager” phase of development. If it could have been visually displayed on a graph, one would have observed a giant leap from 'boy with need to cling to parent figure' to `man with enough intelligence and independence to run a multi-billion dollar corporation on his own'. Seto might have further reflected, which he wasn't, that he was extremely lucky in this case that Mokuba wasn't going through any annoying teenage phases either. Or, if he was, Seto didn't know about them. He still clung to his older brother like glue, something which was probably owed to their not having any biological parents anymore. They had both been very young when they had suddenly become orphans, and both had many years of grief and growth now behind them. When running a company one always had to look towards the future. Seto's days of dwelling on dueling and festering over all the possible ways to beat Yugi Moutou were behind him.

Well, more or less anyway. Dueling was still one of his greatest passions. Even if it had digressed to somewhat more of a hobby these days. He was just too damn busy. Mokuba had a lot more time to still enjoy being a kid, and Seto discreetly encouraged this in his own kind of way, feeling that the boy had gone through way too many hardships in his life already to be throwing away his childhood as well. Kaiba Mokuba was technically second in charge of Kaiba Corp. and while he still sometimes helped out with odd things (for example when someone was required to road test a new game he might make a sudden reappearance), Seto was the one who was really running it all. If it hadn't been like that in the past, life had changed to make it so. Life was like that. Life was busy.

Life really did get in the way a lot of the time.

Three days ago he had received a call from Yahada's Chinese hospital, and Yahada himself had spent ten minutes profusely apologizing for the accident. Which hadn't been his fault in the first place, but when it came to dealing with Kaiba it was best to offer an apology than an excuse and blame someone else. Seto had expressed his irritation towards the issue but had conceded long ago that no matter what was said now, there could be nothing done to change the fact. He had also begun to grow accustomed to his temporary office. Doing his work on his lap top and via emails to his main office was something had he done almost everyday when he had needed to attend school, so he fell back into the old routine almost effortlessly. In a random act of kindness he had even finished his conversation with Yahada by telling him to take all the time he needed to get better, not to rush, and to rest well.

Later he would wonder what the hell had gotten into him.

The phone rang, interrupting his thoughts. He automatically reached out a hand to the receiver but stopped, suddenly realizing that it wasn't that phone that was making noise. He pulled out his mobile from his pocket and flipped it open, answering aloud at the same time.

“Hello!”
Seto paused, then glared determinedly at the desk in front of him, wishing it was her face instead. “Niita, why in God's name are you calling my mobile? I have an office phone.”

If she was fazed by this her voice didn't show it, “I had to make sure you picked up this time.”

He frowned at that; so she had realized he'd been avoiding answering her phone calls? Great. It wasn't his fault if he had told her eight times not to call him so often but she kept doing it despite what he had said. It gave him every right to ignore her if she was going to ignore him first when he said not to do something.

Sensing that Kaiba was likely to hang up on her now that he knew who she was, she hastily explained the reason for her call; “I just wanted to let you know that you left your presentation at the office. You know, the one you need for your second meeting this afternoon? I would have told you sooner but I only just discovered it on your desk.”

He would swear she had some sort of unconscious selective capability that turned her brain on at the oddest of moments. Usually they were times like this, when she was giving him bad news.

“What.” It was a statement in the way that he said it; his tone implied that he wanted to doubt that very much but also that part of him was already dawning to the fact that she might actually be right for once.

If he'd left his presentation at the office, that was not a good thing. Like she had said he had two meetings this afternoon, and one he noted, looking at his watch, was in ten minutes in Shichi Corporation's conference room with their board of directors. He was going to formally announce his plans to instigate a new CEO, and would explain the other minor details that would be associated with this. Including just how many people were going to be fired.

He was rather looking forward to it, actually.

After that finished however, he was due at an informal meeting over dinner with a few of his shareholders. He needed the presentation for that to show them various reports and charts and graphs that all basically illustrated how well his company was doing and implied upon them how lucky and smart they were for keeping money in it. People were worried about his most recent business takeover, and if he showed up without the documents to back up his claim, he would lose credibility. He needed that report, but he didn't have any time to go and get it.

Niita repeated herself, assuming this is what Seto had meant. He sighed in annoyance and leaned his head on his palm, supported by his elbow on the desk in front of him. What a day to forget a simple report.
She heard him sigh and said, “I guess you'll just have to go without it.” She was his personal assistant, she knew his schedule.

He was still frowning, entirely annoyed with himself now for being so absent minded, when a thought suddenly struck him.

“No,” he said, pulling himself back together, “I'll send someone over to get it.”

 

“You know it'll take me a good hour to get across town right now. Actually maybe longer, it's almost peak time.” Katsuya said matter-of-factly. “And that means the same amount of time back.”

Kaiba had explained the situation to him, almost immediately after he had hung up with whomever he had been speaking to.

“I know. That's why you're taking the car.” Katsuya observed that Kaiba looked like it pained him to say this. Probably thinks the poverty will rub off onto the seats or something, he thought.

“The Car?” Katsuya asked automatically, emphasizing the capitol letters.

Kaiba glared at him. “Yes the car. My car to be precise. So don't go messing it up.” He made a noise that sounded like `hunh', “Not that the Driver would let you anyway.”

Katsuya blinked while he tried to figure this out. Then it hit him; “You're letting me take your limousine!?” He half-yelled it.

“Yes. I can't afford you to waste hours on the trains over this. I need that presentation immediately.” Kaiba looked like he was thoroughly sick of answering Katsuya's stupid questions.

Which, in fact, he was.

“So go already.” Kaiba's glare seemed to increase again, as he stared his latest assistant down.

Katsuya stood still for a moment. He was torn between wanting Kaiba to be disadvantaged without his report to being extremely excited about hopping a ride in a limousine.

Well, there was no way he was going to able to say no anyway. He would have had to take the subway if Kaiba hadn't been willing to offer his help. He felt he should be extremely grateful that he was being this generous at all. Katsuya felt that it was a very un-Kaiba-like thing to do.

“Okay, I'm off.” He stated, then turned and left the office, since the CEO had already said the driver was waiting in the lobby.

On his way out past reception, he suddenly had the biggest urge to turn to Sasaki, poke his tongue out and say: “Nyh… I get to ride in a limousine and you don't!” But that would have been entirely childish of him.
Maybe he'd flaunt it a bit more professionally later, once he'd gotten the job done.

 

Kaiba Corp.'s main office and place of operations was the tallest building in all of Domino City. Riding up in an elevator passing the seemingly endless floors, Katsuya was suddenly glad he didn't have an issue with heights. He had other issues, mainly concerning ghosts and other relatively spooky things (which, quite frankly, scared the shit out of him), but heights had never been much of a problem.

The car ride over had been extremely fun. He'd sat in Kaiba's limousine before, but this time he was alone, and certainly was not about to waste the opportunity to test every button, open every case, and look inside every crevice the car had whilst on his way. If the driver had noticed, which he could only assume he had since Katsuya had lowered and raised the window between them countless times, constantly having to go over the buttons again because they all looked the same it was easy to forget what they all did, he didn't mention anything. In fact, when Katsuya had finally arrived and thanked the driver profusely for taking him all the way over here, he had responded with: “My pleasure sir,” and gave him a rather large genuine smile. Jou had probably provided ample amusement for the trip. The driver then said he would still be waiting down here for Katsuya once he returned with Kaiba-sama's report. He had needed to resist the urge to salute, before going to enter the building.

The elevator stopped on the third to top floor. Katsuya was, by this point, the only one still in there, so stepped out alone and gazed around the immediate vicinity. It's so posh, he thought. The space he'd stepped into put his own office to shame. It was clearly better designed, equipped, formatted… Dark colours were all around him, but it only helped to make the atmosphere appear clean and professional. Even the pot plants seemed to scream: “Money! We have lots of it!” He half-expected some doves to come flying past out of nowhere, and to turn around a corner and see a fountain.

Luckily Kaiba wasn't that insane.

He was snapped out of his reverie as someone spoke to him. “Hello?” The voice inquired politely.

He turned to where the young women stood, coming out of another doorway which led to goodness knows where, and who appeared to be on her way back to her office. She was carrying a coffee mug which had bright purple flowers on it, so perhaps she had just been on a break?

“Uh.. Hi.” Visions of his first time walking into Shichi Corporation flooded back to him, he had felt completely out of place there too. As if on cue, another staff member exited from a nearby office and walked past him on their way to the elevator. Katsuya caught the disapproving wrinkle of the man's brow as he spied the young adult. He didn't waste any time in closing the doors of the lift and descending to a different floor.

Apparently the other woman, however, wasn't in a rush. She was still standing watching him with an almost dopey look on her face, as if she had never seen anything like him before.

Katsuya suddenly realized how quiet this office was compared to his own. Whereas back at Shichi there were at least some cubicles alongside each other and people could chat intermittently whilst they worked, here there were glass walls and doors that blocked one person from the next. There were some visible desks and complementing chairs, but at present no one seemed to be occupying them.

“So, can I help you with something?” She asked pleasantly, deciding to break the somewhat awkward silence that had erupted once the other man had exited his office. He looked at her with unexpected relief, realizing that if she hadn't been around he might have spent forever trying to find Kaiba's office. Which was where he assumed the report would be.

“Yes actually, I'm looking for Kaiba Seto's office?”

The young woman, who had taken a sip of her coffee whilst he spoke, blinked back at him. “I'm sorry, but he's actually not here right now.”

“Ah, I know. I'm meant to pick something up for him.”

She frowned, looking like she was considering whether to trust him or not. Did Kaiba normally have random people try to come into his office and steal reports? Katsuya wondered. Don't know why anyone would bother, the only thing worth stealing would be his bank card, and I'm sure he keeps his money on him at all times, he thought.

“Uh… I'm his assistant?” Katsuya tried.

Her frown faded immediately and was replaced with a gigantic smile, “Really? Me too!” She practically bounced. Her voice had become so shrill on the last statement that Katsuya found himself almost wincing. She all but skipped over to him, “You must be Jonouchi-kun then!”

A few thousand questions popped into his head. They all tumbled over each other in an effort to gain a place in his mouth. The main contestants included: “You're Kaiba's assistant?”, “Are you this bubbly around him too?” and “Jonouchi-kun!?”

However what made it out was, “You know who I am?” He looked suitably perplexed.

“Yes.” She nodded, still smiling.

“Uh.. how?”

“Kaiba mentioned you,”

He what?

“Something about having to put up with two annoying assistants nowadays...”

Katsuya raised his eyebrow, that statement clearly insulted them both, but she didn't seem fazed by it at all. He decided then and there: she was definitely a weird kind of insane.

Seto, on the other hand, would have been impressed at her ability to remember this fact, considering her track record in the field.

Katsuya decided to break where that train of thought was leading. Her weird personality was starting to get to him and he absently wondered why Kaiba would have hired someone so… clearly contrarily different to himself (Katsuya himself didn't count, Kaiba had been given no choice on that one). “So, I'm here to pick up a report.” He prodded, remembering that The Car was still waiting for him downstairs. Down many stairs.

Thank God for elevators.

“Oh right. Come this way, I'll show you where it is.”

She turned and bounced away quickly down a corridor and he hastened to follow behind her. Kaiba's office was not very far at all, and from the outside looked just as up-market and posh and the rest of the floor and building. The assistant even had her own large desk with computer and phone outside it. He felt an odd pang of jealousy - he wanted a computer too, damnit! Although, he would have no practical use for one since all he did was store files and answer the odd phone and re-stock fax machines all day. Still, it was human nature to want after something you didn't really need.

He dismissed the thoughts, “Thanks, uh…?” He smiled at her, pleased she had been so inviting. She had already walked over to her desk and was in the process of seating herself behind it. The desk itself had a large back to it, and it almost hid her entirely from view.

“Niita.” She supplied helpfully, “But you can call me Niita-chan if you want to?”

“Uh, I'd rather not.” She was older than he was!

This didn't seem to faze her either, “Ah, I understand. Well, Jonouchi-kun, the report should be on Kaiba's desk inside there.” She pointed to the double doors that lead to his office, just in case Katsuya was blind.

She does realize it's rude to call me that, right? Katsuya thought, a little irritated at the implication that he was a little kid again. On the other hand, she did ask me to call her `chan', so maybe she is just immature?

At any rate, she was confusing the heck out of him. No one could be that happy and ignorant and slightly annoying all at the same time. It was like the perfect combination of personality to be used as a minor character in a horror film, the kind that gets killed off first after they decide to wander off alone in the old abandoned mental asylum…

He turned to the doors and pushed one open, letting himself in. His eyes widened as he gazed around the office, if he'd thought Nobita's had been large, Kaiba's could have eaten it for breakfast. It was easily twice the size, probably a lot larger than that but Katsuya had never exactly been enthralled by knowledge about room spans. Everything inside was so modern - the chairs and desk and bookcases were all so sleek and designer. They were made with a kind of `classic' feel about them, however, and it helped to take a sort of sharp edge off the rooms' appearance. There was something inviting about the sophistication of it all, and despite himself Katsuya let out a whistle of approval. He was not exactly sure what he had expected Kaiba's office to look like, but he had not thought he would be impressed at any rate.

Before he even realized it he had already walked into the middle of the room. Taking one last three hundred and sixty degree gaze around he finally settled on Kaiba's desk. It was helpfully clean. Only a few pieces of paper on it, and most of them were single sheets so it was easy to tell which one was the multi-paged presentation. Aside from the minor clutter of this, there was also a phone and an extremely modern computer system. The desk itself was huge, so there was also ample room to spread out other items across the desk and if cleared would have a vast space to work on. There were pens, note paper, a stapler, and a lot of other normal office things. He had a sudden urge to rummage through Kaiba's drawers, and was seriously considering whether to do so or not when the phone rang. He reflexively moved to pick it up then remembered where he was, so he waited for the other assistant, Niita, to answer it.

And waited.

Then waited some more.

He knew she was sitting right outside, damnit! And she had a phone! He could hear it ringing from in here. What was wrong with her? He waited for two more rings then finally couldn't handle it anymore. His arm dashed out and picked up the receiver from Kaiba's desk, not caring if he would be annoyed with him for this action or not.

“Uh.. Kaiba's office?” Upon reflection he realized that sounded completely pathetic, especially since it had come out more as a question that implied he wasn't even sure of the fact himself, than a statement as to confirm the place the person had been calling.

The caller paused, then,

“…Mutt?”

Katsuya blinked. “What the hell are you calling for? Shouldn't you be in a meeting?”

“I am in a meeting.”

“So why are you calling me?”

“I wasn't calling you!” Kaiba sounded extremely frustrated. Katsuya was confused but happy that he was annoying the other boy.

“Sounds like ya're to me.”

“Why the hell would I be calling you?!”

“I'm not sure. You want to chat?”

He heard something that sounded like a growl. “Hardly. I wanted to speak to someone else. Who should have been the one to answer the phone.” The last statement sounded as if it was meant more to himself than Katsuya.

“Niita?”

“Yes. I wanted to check you'd picked up the report, and that it was on its way.”

“Can't trust me to get the job done right for a minute, can you?”

“Not as far as I could throw you.”

“I don't know why she didn't answer. I could swear she was still out there…”

“Typical.” It was more of a mutter.

“You know Kaiba, your assistant is really…”

“Annoying?”

Katsuya couldn't help himself, let out a laugh at the blatancy and sarcasm in the other's voice. A moment later he clasped a hand over his mouth in shock. Had he just laughed at a joke from the CEO? Okay, that had certainly never happened before. Freaky.

There was a silence, and both boys reflected how weird that had felt.

“I have to get back to my meeting. Just make sure you get me that report.” Kaiba broke in, then abruptly hung up, not giving Katsuya a chance to reply.

Rude. He thought automatically before remembering just who it was he had been speaking to. He slammed his own receiver back down, snatched up the report and quickly left the office. He didn't have time to snoop around now, since Kaiba knew he was there already and would now be expecting him back quickly.

Niita was sitting outside at her desk, just as she had been before, but this time she had the head phones of a music player in her ears. Although he found it a little difficult to believe that she was so deaf she couldn't hear the phone that was sitting right next to her elbow when it was ringing, it was the only solution that presented itself.

We waved a hand to get her attention. At the sight of him she brightened immediately and took her head phones out, giving him her full consideration.

“I'll be off then.” He raised the report to indicate that the main stage of his mission was complete.

“Cheerio!” She smiled broadly and gave him a little wave as he walked away.

Maybe she's not all that bad, he thought, but doesn't Kaiba get annoyed that she doesn't answer his phones? He shrugged it off, not his problem in any case. Now he just had the limo ride back to look forward to.

 

It was an hour later, or maybe a bit longer, that Seto finally left his meeting and in the short break between the first and the second hurried back to his office to see whether the mutt had pulled through for him. Lucky for Jonouchi, really, that he had, otherwise Seto was sure he would have fired him.

The boy had left it neatly on his desk, and although he himself wasn't around anymore Seto hadn't exactly expected him to be - it was after 5 o'clock now and that meant Jonouchi had finished for the day. He picked up the precious document and slipped it into his briefcase, now feeling a lot better about the upcoming dinner. It hadn't occurred to him to cancel it, as that would have been extremely impolite because of the late notice, so he would have had to have done his best without it. But actually having the presentation in his hands let him develop his confidence once again, and he made his way out of the building striding as purposefully as he normally did.

The association the report now had with his new assistant brought his mind back to Jonouchi all over again. Seto reflected on the past week and had to admit, despite himself, that it hadn't been as exasperating as he had anticipated it would be. He had expected the mutt to be a complete pain up the ass, and even for them to be as argumentative as they always had been. But the fact was that Jonouchi was actually agreeing to do things instead of disputing exactly why it was Kaiba needed something done, and this was actually very helpful. Although only what one should come to expect of an assistant.

And that made Seto… well, not happy exactly, but it made him feel better about the whole situation.

Huh… as if he needed to feel better.

He had realized that afternoon, after it was Jonouchi who had answered the phone not Niita, that he was actually slightly more dependable than she was. Lord only knows why the situation had developed that way, knowing Niita she had probably been too engrossed in a game of computer solitaire to bother with answering the phone.

It was an interesting development in any case, Seto thought as he ducked to get inside his car. But for the moment he needed to concentrate on his dinner, his corporate appearance, and Jonouchi's report.

His report. Not Jonouchi's.

Then he could think about all the other minor details that seemed to endlessly plague him whilst he continued to run his company.

 

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Thanks for reading! I know this chapter was completely lame. I apologize. Please Review Anyway! I appreciate it yes I do. See you next time~