Folgen Sie Ihrem Traum Chapter 14 (Seto Kaiba/Téa Gardner, #07)
Title: Folgen Sie Ihrem Traum (Follow Your Dream); Chapter 14: The Impostor
Author: Crystal Rose of Pollux (rose_of_pollux)
Claim: Seto Kaiba/Téa Gardner (non-Kingdom Hearts claim)
Prompt: 07; Guide [take it step by step, one foot then the other]
Warnings: PG13
Disclaimer: The characters aren't mine (except for the OC dancers) and the story is
This chapter will be cross-posted to 30_nights and http://www.fanfiction.net/s/4336463/14/
“This can’t be possible!” Téa thought. And yet it was. She was, indirectly, aiding the Rare Hunters in their ultimate plans… whatever they were.
She willed herself to somehow focus. She was innocent; all she had wanted was to follow her dream. She could not be held responsible for what she was doing. And she knew that she would have to continue to do so until she found out the one behind this elaborate scheme. That wasn’t to say, though, that she didn’t have a prime suspect in mind already.
“I don’t know how much he knows, but Kayser is definitely a part of it,” she realized. “Either he receives the dance steps from someone higher up, or he’s coming up with these messages himself. And if that’s the case, he never cared about helping me further my career like he seemed to be concerned about at first. He just took me aboard to get me to help out the Rare Hunters.”
She was not amused, but forced herself to remain calm and collected throughout the length of the show. Once again, she was not permitted to mingle with the audience, but that didn’t stop her from sending a message to Valon. Two could play at this game; she quickly sent a message in sign language to the biker, consisting of only three words: “Check your email.”
No one had noticed, except for Valon, who gave her a nod to say that he had understood. She retreated with the other dancers, and proceeded to send him a message detailing her findings. And, naturally, she sent carbon copies to all of her friends; she was so excited about her discovery that she even sent a copy of the message to Seto Kaiba, temporarily forgetting about how he had treated her the last time she had seen him.
After this task had been completed, Téa casually put her handheld computer away, and joined the other fire element dancers aboard the bus that would take them to the airport.
“You alright there, Téa?” asked Aurus, moving over to leave her room on the seat. “You look out of it…”
“I think that last dance took a lot out of me,” she said, nonchalantly. “I mean, really; who comes up with those steps?”
“Your guess is as good as mine,” he replied, with a shrug. “I think my cousin might have some say in it, but I don’t know if he’s the only choreographer or not. Either way, he loves to boss us around, doesn’t he?”
“He certainly does,” Téa agreed, her mind elsewhere.
There had to be some sort of proof that Kayser was the choreographer, or, at least, a contributor. It may not solve the mystery of why he was involved with the Rare Hunters, or what their plan may be, but it would be enough to incriminate him if she found it.
But something else was bothering her; she knew very well that Aurus was the man’s cousin. But Aurus was also her friend, and as much as she didn’t want to think about it, there was the horrible possibility that he was somehow involved in this mess, as well.
“But how could he be involved?” said that ever-trusting voice inside of her. “He never hangs out with Kayser; he usually hangs out with me or the Tessurcas. Maybe Kayser is just using him, like how Siegfried manipulated Leon back in the Grand Prix. It wouldn’t be his fault, then…” She trailed off, noticing the Anubis pendant around his neck. “No; that Anubis carving doesn’t mean anything. After all, he only got that pendant because Kayser didn’t want it; and if someone gave that pendant to Kayser, it means that he knows something about Anubis. The evidence is right there, but I still need more…”
She would have to wait until they reached Chicago before she could do some more investigating.
**************************************
Seto, in the meantime, was attending the business meeting in Detroit that evening. He had half expected that Vulsor would have somehow found her way out of prison (whether through bail or otherwise) to make the speech, but she had not. The keynote speaker from the Dronyche Company was a man whom Seto had never seen before. He was a somewhat tall man, whose face was pale and lacked deep lines, as if he had been wearing stage makeup.
Seto found himself suspicious as the man droned on. Why would a keynote speaker at a business meeting see the need for wearing stage makeup? Was it someone from the dance troupe in disguise? No, it couldn’t be; they were still in Portland. And yet, the man’s voice seemed oddly familiar, but Seto wasn’t able to pinpoint it in his memories, which annoyed him.
“You seem distracted, Kaiba-boy; that isn’t like you,” observed Pegasus. “Could it be that you really did leave your heart behind in San Francisco?”
Seto glared at him.
“Don’t you notice anything familiar about that speaker?” the young CEO asked through gritted teeth, trying his hardest not to think of Téa.
“Nothing at all, Kaiba-boy,” Pegasus replied. “But, then again, you’ve had more encounters with Vulsor and her crew than I have had. Also, if she is affiliated with the Rare Hunters as you say, you will also have had more encounters with them. Perhaps you have seen him somewhere.”
Seto glanced back at the speaker.
“He’s certainly depending on his notecards a lot,” the young man thought, derisively. “If he really was a good representative of a company, he would have had a lot more experience in dealing with talks such as these… And then there’s that painfully obvious stage makeup; why on earth would he wear that on his face to a business meeting?”
And that was when the realization dawned on him; this man did not want his face to be seen. But stage makeup wouldn’t be enough to conceal or change his identity; once again, it didn’t make sense.
Seto was distracted by his handheld computer silently alerting him to a new email. He was astounded that it was from Téa; he hadn’t expected to hear from her again. But then he noticed that he was only one of many recipients, and based on the number of exclamation marks in her subject line, she must have found out something of great interest.
He wasn’t disappointed.
“I know how the Rare Hunters are receiving the messages!” she had written. “Our dance steps are in Morse code; that’s why Mako found them to be so strange! I’m almost certain that the troupe leader has a large role in this; I’m going to stay with the troupe until this case bursts wide open! There’s no need to worry about me; I’m certain that they don’t suspect me of anything yet, especially since they think I’m just shopping and sightseeing.”
“I wouldn’t bet on that, Gardner,” Seto thought, more to himself than to her (though he had to admit that whoever had come up with the Morse code dance scheme had to be credited with some intelligence). “Bandit Keith is a lot shrewder than he’s letting on. I still say that you should leave while you have the chance, but I know that what I say won’t make any difference to you. And then you had the nerve to get upset just because I decided to leave to go to this meeting. You don’t make any sense, Gardner; you were the one who told you that you don’t want to get sawed in half by an insane magician, and yet you insist on staying with the troupe…”
His thoughts trailed off as he remembered Arkana. If he remembered correctly, Arkana usually wore a small mask on his face to cover up the scars he had received in a failed trick.
He glanced back at the nervous keynote speaker, still reading from his notes. The CEO soon had a satisfied smirk on his face; he knew why the man was wearing the stage makeup. Now, he just had to prove that this “Dronyche Company representative” was really a Rare Hunter.
“I may not have the Millennium Eye anymore, Kaiba-boy,” said Pegasus, as he glanced from the young man to the speaker. “But something tells me that you suspect him.”
“Very good,” Seto replied, sardonically, with a roll of his eyes. “What gave it away-his notecards, or his mask of makeup?”
“I don’t suppose there’s anything I can do to help…?” the older businessman asked, deciding to ignore the question.
“Of course there isn’t anything you can…” Seto trailed off, forming a plan as he pondered over the situation at hand. He did not like having to turn to others in any way for help, but perhaps, in this unique case, he might make an exception. “Actually, I can’t believe that I’m saying this, but maybe there is a way you can prove yourself to be useful…”
***********************
“Téa, you don’t look too well,” said Aurus, as he noticed her glancing aimlessly out of the airplane window.
“Well, you know how it is,” she said, trying not to arouse the suspicions of anyone who might be listening in. “I’m starting to get rather homesick after all these weeks away from Domino.”
“Yeah, well, you’re not the only one,” he replied. “I know that the boss is my cousin and all, but he rarely treats me like family. No; I’m just another underling to him…”
“Is he saying this out of pity to make me feel better?” Téa asked herself. “Or does Kayser really leave him out of everything? Because if what he says is true, then it means that he really is innocent… I’m sure if I told him about how his cousin was just using him, he’d help me.” She glanced around the airplane. “Maybe they all would help me if I told them… But I need to make sure that none of the others are in on this plot, too. Someone has been watching me; it’s most likely Kayser, but it could be one of the other elements…”
“Ah, well,” Aurus said, with a sigh. “We’ll get a vacation during the off season; you can go visit home then. In the meantime, we have more performances to deal with in some very big-name places. It’s no good getting nervous, especially when Broadway is looming only a few weeks away.”
“I know; I’m not going to say that I’m not excited… I have to admit that I am a little nervous, though,” she said.
“You shouldn’t be nervous, but I can see why you are,” he said. “After all, Broadway is Broadway. Everyone who’s anyone will be there, watching your every step. The critics will be waiting for you to make one single mistake--”
“And that’s why we have that no mistake policy, right?” she asked, trying to act as casual as possible.
“Yep,” he said. “But don’t worry about it; you’re doing great so far. There’s absolutely nothing to worry about.”
“If you only knew…” she sighed to herself.
************************************
Seto was only paying attention to the meeting half-heartedly. Part of him was keeping a record of every mood the Dronyche representative was making. Another part of him was regretting that he ever mentioned anything to Pegasus; ten to one, he would completely ruin the plan, but there was no turning back from it now. He had to find out if the mysterious man was Arkana, and as the meeting took a break for lunch, he began to put his plan into action.
To his amazement, Seto found himself hoping that it was Arkana. A very chivalrous (and normally silent) part of his mind was thinking that if Arkana was here in Detroit, Téa would be safe from him and his madness.
He shook his head slightly. Why was it that even in a meeting (an environment where he could completely immerse himself in his work), he was thinking about her? He had already established that he didn’t want to change; that was why he had been so desperate to come here. And there she was, haunting his thoughts; there didn’t seem to be any escape from her.
But he was changing her, too; the fact that she hadn’t complained to her friends about his snub said that much. Why was he finding it almost admirable that she was learning to rely on herself? Was he inadvertently changing her, just as she was inadvertently changing him?
“Something has to be done,” he said to himself. “Otherwise, we’re just going to end up as complete opposites.”
And for the first time, he was regretting his cold actions towards her, and then he was regretting the fact that he was regretting it. He was confused, but then again, so was she.
His thoughts halted as he noticed Pegasus approaching the Dronyche representative with a bottle of seltzer water in hand.
“I’m almost glad I ask him to do this,” Seto thought, as Pegasus “accidentally” aimed the bottle at the man and unleashed a jet of seltzer water at his face. “You wouldn’t have caught me trying something like that…”
The man from Dronyche let out a frustrated cry as his thick stage makeup began to run (Pegasus was “apologizing” profusely, of course). And sure enough, scars and burns began to reveal themselves on the man’s face. The shocked onlookers soon found themselves staring at Arkana.
The Rare Hunter didn’t stay long; his cover blown, he angrily pushed past the crowd of businessmen and women to get to the door.
“You’re not getting away this time,” Seto vowed, under his breath. “I want some answers, and you’re going to give them.”
With that, he took off in pursuit of the magician, heedless of any possible trap that the madman might be leading him into.
Author: Crystal Rose of Pollux (rose_of_pollux)
Claim: Seto Kaiba/Téa Gardner (non-Kingdom Hearts claim)
Prompt: 07; Guide [take it step by step, one foot then the other]
Warnings: PG13
Disclaimer: The characters aren't mine (except for the OC dancers) and the story is
This chapter will be cross-posted to 30_nights and http://www.fanfiction.net/s/4336463/14/
“This can’t be possible!” Téa thought. And yet it was. She was, indirectly, aiding the Rare Hunters in their ultimate plans… whatever they were.
She willed herself to somehow focus. She was innocent; all she had wanted was to follow her dream. She could not be held responsible for what she was doing. And she knew that she would have to continue to do so until she found out the one behind this elaborate scheme. That wasn’t to say, though, that she didn’t have a prime suspect in mind already.
“I don’t know how much he knows, but Kayser is definitely a part of it,” she realized. “Either he receives the dance steps from someone higher up, or he’s coming up with these messages himself. And if that’s the case, he never cared about helping me further my career like he seemed to be concerned about at first. He just took me aboard to get me to help out the Rare Hunters.”
She was not amused, but forced herself to remain calm and collected throughout the length of the show. Once again, she was not permitted to mingle with the audience, but that didn’t stop her from sending a message to Valon. Two could play at this game; she quickly sent a message in sign language to the biker, consisting of only three words: “Check your email.”
No one had noticed, except for Valon, who gave her a nod to say that he had understood. She retreated with the other dancers, and proceeded to send him a message detailing her findings. And, naturally, she sent carbon copies to all of her friends; she was so excited about her discovery that she even sent a copy of the message to Seto Kaiba, temporarily forgetting about how he had treated her the last time she had seen him.
After this task had been completed, Téa casually put her handheld computer away, and joined the other fire element dancers aboard the bus that would take them to the airport.
“You alright there, Téa?” asked Aurus, moving over to leave her room on the seat. “You look out of it…”
“I think that last dance took a lot out of me,” she said, nonchalantly. “I mean, really; who comes up with those steps?”
“Your guess is as good as mine,” he replied, with a shrug. “I think my cousin might have some say in it, but I don’t know if he’s the only choreographer or not. Either way, he loves to boss us around, doesn’t he?”
“He certainly does,” Téa agreed, her mind elsewhere.
There had to be some sort of proof that Kayser was the choreographer, or, at least, a contributor. It may not solve the mystery of why he was involved with the Rare Hunters, or what their plan may be, but it would be enough to incriminate him if she found it.
But something else was bothering her; she knew very well that Aurus was the man’s cousin. But Aurus was also her friend, and as much as she didn’t want to think about it, there was the horrible possibility that he was somehow involved in this mess, as well.
“But how could he be involved?” said that ever-trusting voice inside of her. “He never hangs out with Kayser; he usually hangs out with me or the Tessurcas. Maybe Kayser is just using him, like how Siegfried manipulated Leon back in the Grand Prix. It wouldn’t be his fault, then…” She trailed off, noticing the Anubis pendant around his neck. “No; that Anubis carving doesn’t mean anything. After all, he only got that pendant because Kayser didn’t want it; and if someone gave that pendant to Kayser, it means that he knows something about Anubis. The evidence is right there, but I still need more…”
She would have to wait until they reached Chicago before she could do some more investigating.
**************************************
Seto, in the meantime, was attending the business meeting in Detroit that evening. He had half expected that Vulsor would have somehow found her way out of prison (whether through bail or otherwise) to make the speech, but she had not. The keynote speaker from the Dronyche Company was a man whom Seto had never seen before. He was a somewhat tall man, whose face was pale and lacked deep lines, as if he had been wearing stage makeup.
Seto found himself suspicious as the man droned on. Why would a keynote speaker at a business meeting see the need for wearing stage makeup? Was it someone from the dance troupe in disguise? No, it couldn’t be; they were still in Portland. And yet, the man’s voice seemed oddly familiar, but Seto wasn’t able to pinpoint it in his memories, which annoyed him.
“You seem distracted, Kaiba-boy; that isn’t like you,” observed Pegasus. “Could it be that you really did leave your heart behind in San Francisco?”
Seto glared at him.
“Don’t you notice anything familiar about that speaker?” the young CEO asked through gritted teeth, trying his hardest not to think of Téa.
“Nothing at all, Kaiba-boy,” Pegasus replied. “But, then again, you’ve had more encounters with Vulsor and her crew than I have had. Also, if she is affiliated with the Rare Hunters as you say, you will also have had more encounters with them. Perhaps you have seen him somewhere.”
Seto glanced back at the speaker.
“He’s certainly depending on his notecards a lot,” the young man thought, derisively. “If he really was a good representative of a company, he would have had a lot more experience in dealing with talks such as these… And then there’s that painfully obvious stage makeup; why on earth would he wear that on his face to a business meeting?”
And that was when the realization dawned on him; this man did not want his face to be seen. But stage makeup wouldn’t be enough to conceal or change his identity; once again, it didn’t make sense.
Seto was distracted by his handheld computer silently alerting him to a new email. He was astounded that it was from Téa; he hadn’t expected to hear from her again. But then he noticed that he was only one of many recipients, and based on the number of exclamation marks in her subject line, she must have found out something of great interest.
He wasn’t disappointed.
“I know how the Rare Hunters are receiving the messages!” she had written. “Our dance steps are in Morse code; that’s why Mako found them to be so strange! I’m almost certain that the troupe leader has a large role in this; I’m going to stay with the troupe until this case bursts wide open! There’s no need to worry about me; I’m certain that they don’t suspect me of anything yet, especially since they think I’m just shopping and sightseeing.”
“I wouldn’t bet on that, Gardner,” Seto thought, more to himself than to her (though he had to admit that whoever had come up with the Morse code dance scheme had to be credited with some intelligence). “Bandit Keith is a lot shrewder than he’s letting on. I still say that you should leave while you have the chance, but I know that what I say won’t make any difference to you. And then you had the nerve to get upset just because I decided to leave to go to this meeting. You don’t make any sense, Gardner; you were the one who told you that you don’t want to get sawed in half by an insane magician, and yet you insist on staying with the troupe…”
His thoughts trailed off as he remembered Arkana. If he remembered correctly, Arkana usually wore a small mask on his face to cover up the scars he had received in a failed trick.
He glanced back at the nervous keynote speaker, still reading from his notes. The CEO soon had a satisfied smirk on his face; he knew why the man was wearing the stage makeup. Now, he just had to prove that this “Dronyche Company representative” was really a Rare Hunter.
“I may not have the Millennium Eye anymore, Kaiba-boy,” said Pegasus, as he glanced from the young man to the speaker. “But something tells me that you suspect him.”
“Very good,” Seto replied, sardonically, with a roll of his eyes. “What gave it away-his notecards, or his mask of makeup?”
“I don’t suppose there’s anything I can do to help…?” the older businessman asked, deciding to ignore the question.
“Of course there isn’t anything you can…” Seto trailed off, forming a plan as he pondered over the situation at hand. He did not like having to turn to others in any way for help, but perhaps, in this unique case, he might make an exception. “Actually, I can’t believe that I’m saying this, but maybe there is a way you can prove yourself to be useful…”
***********************
“Téa, you don’t look too well,” said Aurus, as he noticed her glancing aimlessly out of the airplane window.
“Well, you know how it is,” she said, trying not to arouse the suspicions of anyone who might be listening in. “I’m starting to get rather homesick after all these weeks away from Domino.”
“Yeah, well, you’re not the only one,” he replied. “I know that the boss is my cousin and all, but he rarely treats me like family. No; I’m just another underling to him…”
“Is he saying this out of pity to make me feel better?” Téa asked herself. “Or does Kayser really leave him out of everything? Because if what he says is true, then it means that he really is innocent… I’m sure if I told him about how his cousin was just using him, he’d help me.” She glanced around the airplane. “Maybe they all would help me if I told them… But I need to make sure that none of the others are in on this plot, too. Someone has been watching me; it’s most likely Kayser, but it could be one of the other elements…”
“Ah, well,” Aurus said, with a sigh. “We’ll get a vacation during the off season; you can go visit home then. In the meantime, we have more performances to deal with in some very big-name places. It’s no good getting nervous, especially when Broadway is looming only a few weeks away.”
“I know; I’m not going to say that I’m not excited… I have to admit that I am a little nervous, though,” she said.
“You shouldn’t be nervous, but I can see why you are,” he said. “After all, Broadway is Broadway. Everyone who’s anyone will be there, watching your every step. The critics will be waiting for you to make one single mistake--”
“And that’s why we have that no mistake policy, right?” she asked, trying to act as casual as possible.
“Yep,” he said. “But don’t worry about it; you’re doing great so far. There’s absolutely nothing to worry about.”
“If you only knew…” she sighed to herself.
************************************
Seto was only paying attention to the meeting half-heartedly. Part of him was keeping a record of every mood the Dronyche representative was making. Another part of him was regretting that he ever mentioned anything to Pegasus; ten to one, he would completely ruin the plan, but there was no turning back from it now. He had to find out if the mysterious man was Arkana, and as the meeting took a break for lunch, he began to put his plan into action.
To his amazement, Seto found himself hoping that it was Arkana. A very chivalrous (and normally silent) part of his mind was thinking that if Arkana was here in Detroit, Téa would be safe from him and his madness.
He shook his head slightly. Why was it that even in a meeting (an environment where he could completely immerse himself in his work), he was thinking about her? He had already established that he didn’t want to change; that was why he had been so desperate to come here. And there she was, haunting his thoughts; there didn’t seem to be any escape from her.
But he was changing her, too; the fact that she hadn’t complained to her friends about his snub said that much. Why was he finding it almost admirable that she was learning to rely on herself? Was he inadvertently changing her, just as she was inadvertently changing him?
“Something has to be done,” he said to himself. “Otherwise, we’re just going to end up as complete opposites.”
And for the first time, he was regretting his cold actions towards her, and then he was regretting the fact that he was regretting it. He was confused, but then again, so was she.
His thoughts halted as he noticed Pegasus approaching the Dronyche representative with a bottle of seltzer water in hand.
“I’m almost glad I ask him to do this,” Seto thought, as Pegasus “accidentally” aimed the bottle at the man and unleashed a jet of seltzer water at his face. “You wouldn’t have caught me trying something like that…”
The man from Dronyche let out a frustrated cry as his thick stage makeup began to run (Pegasus was “apologizing” profusely, of course). And sure enough, scars and burns began to reveal themselves on the man’s face. The shocked onlookers soon found themselves staring at Arkana.
The Rare Hunter didn’t stay long; his cover blown, he angrily pushed past the crowd of businessmen and women to get to the door.
“You’re not getting away this time,” Seto vowed, under his breath. “I want some answers, and you’re going to give them.”
With that, he took off in pursuit of the magician, heedless of any possible trap that the madman might be leading him into.