Yu-Gi-Oh! Fan Fiction ❯ Faith In You ❯ The Beginning of Paradise ( Chapter 4 )

Chapter 4 up! Hey Rin, I hope you don't mind that I used Setsuko in this chapter; I just thought it would be cool! You haven't come online all day so I couldn't get a hold of you. I hope you don't mind! Enjoy and keep the reviews coming! We love you for it!

Disclaimer: I DO NOT OWN YU-GI-OH!!!!!!!!

WARNING: Mentioning of drug usage in this chapter and possible swearing… no shounen-ai YET… well, maybe.

The Beginning of Paradise
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Meison and I were called down to the main hall area to attend to the first day of our rehab treatment. Everyone from every section of the centre was there, sitting in a big circle on chairs. There weren't many people here, perhaps only about fifty or sixty teenagers. Meison and I took our seats.

A woman walked into the room with long graying hair and a long skirt on. She was wearing a bandana and had huge beaded necklaces and feather earrings on. She looked like a Filipino hippy that just walked out of the 70's. She came and stood in the middle of the circle of teens and smiled at all of us. The room of people hushed as she made herself comfortable.

"My name is Gaia Roxana, but please, just call me Gaia. I am one of the many counselors and your guidance through your stay here at Manila Bay Rehab Centre. Firstly, welcome! To start off with, I want you to all introduce yourselves and tell us what you are here for, where you are from and what you like doing. Let's start off with… you there." Gaia pointed to Meison and smiled motherly to him.

"M-me?" He stammered, pointing to his chest.

"Yes, you, sweetie. What's your name?"

"Uh, well I'm Meison… I come from Osaka in Japan, I'm 16 years old and I like to play Duel Monsters, Dungeon Dice and Dragons and I like surfing." Meison replied nervously.

"And what did you come here for, Meison?"

He fidgeted with his thumbs for a second before answering. "I… I had a cocaine addiction, and my psychiatrist diagnosed me as manically depressed so I'm trying to sort my life out. My father is an abusive alcoholic and I have three sisters. My mother was the one who sent me here."

"Thank you, Meison. Next, please." Gaia said, jotting down some notes.

I gulped back my nervousness as Gaia's solemn green eyes fell upon me. "My name is Mokuba Kaiba… I smoke a lot of pot and… I guess I'm discovering my true sexuality."

"And what do you like to do, Mokuba?"

I forgot that part. "…I like to… play duel monsters… play video games, the usual boring teenage stuff I guess…"

Gaia chuckled a little to herself. "That's great Mokuba."

I let out a breath of relief, only to feel Meison's tense gaze upon me. I flicked my eyes across to him and looked up at him. As I eyed him up, I noticed he was rubbing the insides of his wrists. At first I thought it was a nervous habit, but it seemed that there was more to it. Angry red lines marked those beautiful tanned wrists of his, like a cat had gone rabid scratching him.

"My name is Caprice, I come from Venice in Italy, and my hobbies are swimming and cycling and……" A blonde-haired girl from across the room paused, and then blurted out, "And my father sexually abuses me!" She began to bawl her eyes out.

I widened my eyes and bit the inside of my cheek. Poor thing.

"It's alright Caprice, we're here to help you and make it stop." Gaia reassured. Caprice nodded and pulled out some tissues from her pocket. A girl with pink hair sitting next to her put her arm around her.

"I am from Russia, and my name be Skilah. I was raped and here to get help." She said, trying her best to speak proper English.

The circle of disturbed teenagers went on and stopped at the person sitting on the other side of Meison. I was shocked at what so many people had been through. Most of the girls were here because of sexual abuse or drugs, and the majority of boys were here because of alcoholism and anger problems. It kind of startled me knowing that Meison was Bipolar.

Some more counselors came in and split us up into our separate groups and took us to different rooms. Meison and I were with two other guys, Whitaker from London, England and Felix from Vancouver, Canada, and three girls, Layla from Alexandria, Egypt, Setsuko from Domino, Japan and Jewel from Darwin, Australia. I intended on talking to Setsuko later tonight, since she was also from Domino.

"Alright class, welcome to the first day of your course. Today we will be discussing the different phases that we put you through to cleanse your body and mind and make your addiction to drugs, stop." Gaia said. "This morning I will introduce you to Phase One, part A of our course."

Now I really knew how hard-out this stuff was. They had a whole plan sorted out for us while we were staying here. Each day we would have a new routine. Meison sat next to me with his legs straight out and ankles crossed, his arms folded across his chest. He looked pretty bored. I wish I was stoned right now.

"Phase One, part A is what we call the "Drug Withdrawal" stage. A specialist will be here soon to interview you one-on-one and help you cope. This will be the hardest stage for you, but it only gets easier from now on." Gaia said with a smile. "Don't be frightened, that's the last thing we want to do to you. You are welcome to share all your secrets here, it's completely confidential. Now, take one of these and I will be back soon." She handed us all a paper booklet and left the room.

I began to read through it. It said a lot about the facilities and the diet they would put us on. I forgot about that---the food here was probably horrid. There were sauna and spa rooms and there was a beached-off area in the bay where we could spend our free time. I turned the page and up the top was headed "ROUTINE".

"This is bullshit." Meison muttered.

"You're telling me." I replied.

"All I'm looking forward to is getting into this spa that they're talking about."

Setsuko was sitting across the room from me looking at me peculiarly. I swore I had seen or heard of her before, but I couldn't quite put my finger on it. I locked eyes with her for a second and she gave me a little smile.

"You're Seto's younger brother, right?" She asked.

"Uh huh. Who are you?"

"I… well I used to go out with Honda Hirito. Do you know him?" She replied timidly.

"Yeah, not too well though. He's gone to live in Tokyo with Otogi Ryuuji now." I replied.

Her gaze fell to the ground. "I know…" She sighed. "I live with him and Otogi in their apartment. Otogi's business has really skyrocketed in Tokyo you know."

I nodded. "I'll bet it has. What are you here for?" I asked, being careful not to pry.

"Well, since I moved to Tokyo I've kind of been mixing with the wrong crowds. I've been doing all sorts of shit and I thought that since I'm pregnant I should at least try and get my life back on track, for the baby's sake." She rubbed her stomach gently. I hadn't noticed the small bump under her black top as she came in.

"I…I…uh, congratulations…" I mumbled, not really knowing what to say.

She smiled and twirled one of her waist-length red curls around her finger. "The baby is Honda's, just to satisfy your curiosity. We just aren't together anymore. He said he would help support me with the baby though."

I nodded, and Gaia came back into the room along with a man dressed casually with friendly, wise blue eyes that seemed to be constantly smiling, even though his mouth wasn't actually smiling at all.

"Alright class, this is Dr. Lee, he is a professional therapist and dietician and specializes in patients that have been abused by drugs or alcohol. He's here to help you all." Gaia said.

"Hello people, today we're going to work out your itineraries and we'll work out what's best for you together while you're here for your treatment." Dr. Lee declared with a coherent smile.

"Now, I have written down all your names on separate pieces of paper and put them into this box." Gaia held up a small box about the size of a shoe box. "Dr. Lee will pick at random who will be first to see him to work out your everyday schedules."

Dr. Lee put a hand inside the box and rummaged around, pulling out the first slip of paper. "Whitaker?"

Whitaker, already known as the boy with wild crimson hair, stood up from his chair. "That's me." He grumbled.

"Alright, follow me Whitaker." Dr. Lee said.

"So what are we supposed to do while we're waiting?" Meison asked.

Gaia smiled. "Never fear, Meison. There is always something for you to do here." She sat down on the floor and pulled out a thick book titled `101 General Knowledge Questions'. I groaned. We played this in school a lot on rainy days when the teacher had run out of things for us to do.

"Come now, sit down with me." Gaia gestured for us to sit down on the floor in front of us. I felt like I was back at kindergarten again.

Time passed relatively quickly, and I had to admit that I was enjoying myself. Gaia was the sort of person who brought a smile to anyone's face whatever the mood. Meison was even giggling like crazy as he sat next to me on the carpeted floor. Dr. Lee had been through four of us so far - Whitaker, Layla, Felix and Setsuko. Meison, Jewel and I would be next.

"Mokuba?" Dr. Lee questioned as he pulled out the next slip of paper.

I stood up and followed him into a small secluded room at the side of the hall. Lee sat down behind a desk with a computer on it. It was kind of like being in Seto's office at KaibaCorp.

"Now Mokuba, firstly, how are you?"

I blinked a few times at the abrupt question. "I…I'm fine I guess." I replied.

"Great! Now, it says here on your profile that you used the drugs cannabis and heroin, correct?"

I nodded. "More so dope than heroin though."

Lee nodded and moved his computer screen around so I could see it. "Now, you see here? These were the 2002 survey results for teenage drug users in the United States. 25 percent of males and females between the ages of 12 and 19 admit to being addicted to cannabis where as 15 percent referred to alcohol." He pointed to bar and pie graphs on the screen.

"Wow…" That was pretty bad, I had to admit.

"Now I need to know which way you used the Heroin, just for safety precautions." Lee said.

"It was injected…"

"And did anybody use the needle before you did? Be honest Mokuba, this is for your health safety." Lee said gravely.

"No, I opened it myself. It was sterile."

"Good, so that way we can rule out any infections diseases such as Hepatitis B or HIV/AIDS. Now, how frequently did you do heroin?" Lee asked.

I picked my brain. It was hard to remember… "I think only about three or four times."

"Okay, there won't be any initial damage Mokuba, but the sooner you withdrawal from it, the better."

"So… what happens now?" I asked, curious.

"I was just about to get to that. I need to know your eating, sleeping and exercise patterns."

I shrugged. "I don't exercise… unless you call walking around the school grounds exercise. I usually go to sleep around midnight and get up at six, and I eat whenever I'm hungry."

Dr. Lee laughed. "Okay, I'll work out a suitable daily routine for you okay? You have to stick to it though, or the treatment will not be effective."

I nodded. Lee began typing up something on the computer. He finished shortly after and printed out a few sheets of paper. The first one was headed up, "DAILY DIET". What's the bet they would feed me cabbage soup and spirulina every day?

"This here is your daily diet schedule, Mokuba. The center's kitchen has vitamin supplements that match those on your schedule here. They will serve you up specialized meals, drinks and vitamins as according to this schedule that I have made up for you. You have three meals a day; breakfast is at seven in the morning, lunch at noon and dinner at six in the evening."

"What about dessert?" I asked, in high hopes to get my sugary necessities each day.

Lee grinned. "You will get different desserts each day at seven o'clock, an hour after your dinner is served up."

A second page printed off from his printer. This page was headed up "EXERCISE SCHEDULE". I was dreading this part. I had to be the most unfit teenager that ever lived.

"This here is your daily exercise routine. Your exercise will be after lunch at one o'clock until three. From thereafter until dinner you get free time."

"Doesn't sound so bad." I confessed.

"Your treatment class will be from seven thirty until noon each morning. Just come to the main hall and assemble into your groups. Gaia will take care of everything else."

"Alright… so is that it?" I asked.

"Pretty much, but here, take these and read them tonight." He printed off a third and fourth page from his printer. The first one was titled, "THE EFFECTS OF MARIJUANA" and the second was "TRUE FACTS ABOUT HEROIN".

"There you go son, you're free to go now." Lee said.

"Thanks." I got up and left the office. Lee followed me and called Meison into his office.

We played General Knowledge until Meison and Jewel had been interviewed. Since it was the first day, Gaia said that we could go and play out on the beach at Manila Bay until lunchtime came around. None of us had objected to that, so Meison and I raced up to our hostel and grabbed our swimming gear.

"What type of vitamin supplements did Lee give you, Mokuba?" Meison asked as he took his t-shirt off. I just about fainted when he turned around and showed off his tanned, muscled body. He made me look like pasty white-trash.

"Uh…uh…" I looked down at my Daily Diet routine sheet. Under the sub-title Daily Vitamins it said, Vitamins C, B, Omega-3, Iron and, you guessed it, spirulina.

"I got a whole lot of shit to take…" I mumbled.

Meison cracked up laughing. "I only have to take calcium and vitamin C. The doc says my health should be quite alright."

"Lucky. Well, should we go for a swim? I'm just about ready to cark it… it's so damn hot in here." Luckily Meison didn't pick up the double meaning in my sentence.

Meison gave me a little smile and ran a hand through his blue and white hair. "Alright, let's go!" We grabbed our things and rushed back downstairs and down the boardwalk to the beach.

"Wow…" I breathed. I had never seen anything so beautiful in my life. The water was beautiful and clear and the beach was golden and shimmering against the mid-morning sun. The air was muggy, causing me to sweat slightly. Meison and I just stood there in silence, mildly taking in the surroundings.

"Race you." Meison said, a devious glint twinkling in his mauve eyes.

Without another word he took off down the sand and left me standing on the beach. I laughed and ran after him. Meison ran into the water and dove under the waves, quickly surfacing and flicking his tresses out of his eyes. Water ran down his toned chest, making him look delectable in every which way.

"Come on in Mokuba! The water's great!" he cried smiling radiantly.

I grinned and stepped into the water. It was luke warm. "Alright but I'm not staying in for long." I said. He nodded and gestured for me to come in deeper. I began running and dove under, eventually surfacing up in front of Meison who was standing waist-deep in the water.

"You like swimming?" He asked. I hesitated when he moved his hand out of the water and went to move some of my bangs out of my eyes.

I restrained myself from moaning when his fingers came in touch with my face. "Yeah… we've got a pool at home…"

For the rest of the morning we bobbed about in the water and lay sprawled out on the beach, just talking and laughing. Meison was great. I couldn't have asked for a better roommate. He was starting to make me forget about my feelings toward Seto… Perhaps my stay here wouldn't be so bad after all.

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