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A loud crash came from inside Kaiba’s office. Ebi-san, the secretary, flinched and looked over to Mokuba who braced himself outside the office door. He was still in his uniform, having just gotten out of school and been rushed to the office. His little fists were tightening, and his chest was puffing out.
Anger. Pure, unequivocal anger. Mokuba didn’t have to see it. But something thumped against the wall. While the secretary flinched and jittered in her chair, she tried to keep her self pressed amongst the other associates present, her vice president included.
“Mokuba-chan, I don’t...”Ebi-san began. A quiet blanketed the floor, and the secretary looked back at her boss’ office with a curious glance. The intercom buzzed, and Mokuba shook his head to her, telling her ‘no’. With his game face put on, the boy pushed the door open and slammed it behind him.
Kaiba was behind the desk, cleaned of most possessions, while the rest of the room was littered with the contents normally on it. Files, folders, equipment, binders...he suspected they’d been used mostly for pitching practice, judging by the majority of it focused on one wall. And the wall knew how to take a beating; there were old dents there, still.
“What’s wrong, nii-sama?”
“Nothing.”
His voice was terse, hands twitching, searching for something to hold onto. He paced in a space created between the chair and the desk.
The peace lily that normally sat by the desk, meant to make the room a little more organic, was knocked over as well.
“You don’t like plants now?”
“Mokuba, I am not in the mood.”
Mokuba’s curled his nose. “For what? Not using contractions?” he asked.
A glance, a scowl. Not at him, just the facade that had been etched on Kaiba’s face that afternoon. Mokuba let one of his shoes step on the files before him, inching them further out to cover more of the floor. When he glanced back up, Kaiba had begun pacing in a small space he’d made between his desk and office chair.
“Who’d you talk to?” Mokuba asked.
“No one.”
“So why’s the phone in the trash?” That had to be the start of it. “Was it Schroeder?”
“Mokuba...”
“I’m just asking,” Mokuba said. He was spreading the papers into stepping stones towards the desk, pausing whenever Kaiba looked his way. “So it wasn’t?”
“Was not what?”
“Schroeder,” Mokuba repeated. One of the files was just kicked, flat, opened up to reveal more of itself. Back to the pacing. “It was, wasn’t it?”
“No, it was not.”
Mokuba sighed, and once he ran through the line of paperwork and placed it on Kaiba’s desk, he began looking around the room. At least the bookshelf hadn’t been reached yet. That was a good place to start.
“Then who? Pegasus?”
Silence. A good enough response.
There was a vein in Kaiba’s neck that could be seen when this rage sprouted. Connected to a taut jaw, and it seemed to define itself the further this went along. Mokuba could see that, using it like a meter, before he walked up to the bookshelf and grabbed one of the higher books off it. It fell to the ground with a satisfying ‘thud’.
Kaiba flinched.
“What are....”
Another book dropped. “Mokuba, you had better...”
Two this time, along with an odd little metal bauble. He stepped up onto the first shelf. “Mokuba, do not make me...”
A cacophony of books splattered like rain drops, with Mokuba tucking himself into the bookshelf to avoid being hit. He could hear his brother’s heavy footsteps coming, as if the anger had hit its peak. Mokuba’s hands grabbed onto everything he could, tossing as quickly as he could, up until he felt his wrist caught. The grasp wasn’t tight, but it was firm.
“What do you think you’re doing?” Kaiba asked, tempering his voice.
Mokuba looked over his shoulder, doe-eyed and smiling, before saying: “Helping,” the response sent something off-kilter, though Mokuba couldn’t say what. His feet slipped off the shelf and he landed on the floor, using his free hand to take a book and hand it to Kaiba. “This one probably has a bit of aerodynamics. Could prolly hit the wall pretty good.”
It was taken but the elder brother, inspected, and thrown towards the wall, though it didn’t make any noise when it struck. Mokuba scoffed: “You can do better than that.”
“Oh?”
Kaiba’s hand had released from Mokuba’s wrist, and the boy took a book, winding up and throwing it, though it fell halfway towards the wall. “Like that. Work on the wind up.”
A snort, and Kaiba put a hand on his hip. Mokuba was transparent in his efforts, but it beat a lecture on how the stress was going to kill him. And while he still felt the twinges of anger sparking at his fingertips, he knew the energy wasn’t about to be wasted.
Walking the distance between the bookshelf and the wall, Kaiba picked the stapler off the ground, surprised that it had managed to not fully open up. He returned to the spot where Mokuba stood, books collected in his arms, and found himself reminded of PE as he went through a pitching wind-up. It made an echoed ‘thud’ against the wall, springing open.
Mokuba fed his brother a book, and then another, and another. Spectating the vigor that Kaiba displayed as the frustration bled out of every pore. He wondered what sort of target that his brother saw on the wall. It didn’t matter, and only stopped when the books were no longer in Mokuba’s arms.
“You want coffee?” Mokuba asked. “I was gonna go get a soda or something.”
A brief nod. Kaiba walked away from the mess of the bookshelf, picking up files and binders on his way back to his desk. “Yes, please. Did you bring your homework with you?”
“Yeah. It’s in my bag downstairs. I’ll be back in a few?”
Another nod. More paperwork was grabbed and sorted. The phone was dug out of the trash and set back in its proper place.
Mokuba walked out the door, Ebi-san’s eyes following him as he gave a thumbs up.