Rock Bottom: Season One

Friends

"I'll be taking a couple days off for personal leave next week," Duke said suddenly as he and Seto put the finishing touches on what they'd been working on. For Seto, that meant proofing just a few more lines of code, just a few more, and then he'd be done. Or not. He liked his work, and tended to have a hard time stopping. Besides, a little overtime never killed anybody, right? Meanwhile, Duke was putting away the extra pieces lying on his worktable and hanging up his tools. They were working on what had been named "Duel Disks" by someone higher up in the corporate bureaucracy from the department of product development. They were just prototypes, but they were functional so far.

"If all goes well," Duke continued, "I'll be putting in my two weeks' notice when I get back."

"Really?" Seto asked, looking up at his partner in surprise. He'd thought that their partnership was going well, really well. He couldn't think of there being someone more agreeable or better suited to work with, which made him feel a bit disappointed. He looked back at the computer screen, trying to sort through the strange tangle of feelings in the pit of his stomach.

It's okay to just say that you'll miss him because he's your friend, Seth advised, speaking directly into Seto's mind and disrupting his train of thought.

"Yeah. It has nothing to do with you," Duke assured, not wanting Seto to think that he was the cause for Duke's departure. "I just don't want to keep working at a place this corrupt, where people's rights to their own inventions are extorted from them and there's almost nobody you can trust. It's stifling, and I can't really stomach it anymore. I didn't want to quit before I knew I had something else to go to, but now it looks like that'll be taken care of."

"Hm, that's too bad."

Come on, Seto, you can do better than that, Seth goaded. Tell him you'll miss him.

I will do no such thing.

Why not? Seth asked, wondering if Seto himself could even articulate the answer.

"I can't imagine that you like having your software stolen from you either," Duke pointed out, fidgeting with his dice earring as he prolonged the process of leaving.

"Not at all, but there's no other place for me but here, despite the corruption," Seto answered, eyes glued to the computer monitor.

"KaibaCorp isn't the only gaming corporation in need of innovative programmers, you know."

"Yes, but it's the only one with a branch in Domino City. I'd work for ShroederCorp if I could, since I doubt they could be as bad as all this, but I can't afford to move away for my work, not yet at least. I can put up with it for a little while longer, especially since Kaiba's out of commission and people are still scrambling to figure out what they're going to do while he's gone. For now, they're being a little lax with us, and I figure it would be in my best interest to take advantage of that in order to work on my own projects."

"It's after quitting time, you know," Duke said as he lingered by his worktable, completely ready to leave—except that he was still talking to Seto.

"I know, and they haven't been monitoring our overtime very carefully the past couple weeks." Not since he'd defeated Noah Kaiba in Death T-5. That was all he needed to say for Duke to understand: he was working overtime voluntarily and without permission, trying to rack up as much extra pay as he could get away with before they noticed what he was doing. There wasn't any definitive limit on the amount of weekly overtime you could work that was eligible for pay and a half, so Seto was just getting as much as he could, which included getting to work early and short-changing his lunch breaks. He was doing honest work for the company, so he wasn't being deceptive or wasteful in the use of his time. Given his current financial situation and the fact that they were unlikely to fire him over something so trivial as unapproved overtime, he thought it a wise decision.

Suddenly, Seto felt his desk chair being whirled around, his fingers forcibly removed from the keyboard. There was Duke, his hands on the back of Seto's chair as he leaned over Seto with an amused smile.

"It's five-thirty on a Friday, Seto. I'm not going to be here Monday and Tuesday, and I might not be around for much longer once I do get back. Taking all of that into account, and the fact that you and I never got a chance to properly celebrate the success of the Duel Arena, why don't you and I go out tonight and have a little fun. It'll be nice. I promise you'll enjoy it." Duke's tone was casual, as easygoing as ever.

See? He's going to miss you too, Seth teased.

"We're too young for clubs." It was the first thing that popped into Seto's head, and since he had prepared nothing else to say, it was also the first thing that popped out of his mouth. He probably could have said something more tactful if Seth weren't distracting him. It surprised a laugh out of Duke.

"I was just referring to dinner, but I know some places we could go afterward that can legally let us in—since that matters to you," Duke added with a wink, releasing Seto's chair and allowing him to save his work and log off the PC.

"I hope you know a good place, because I haven't been out to eat for the longest time," Seto said, pulling on his favorite dark purple trenchcoat as he followed Duke out of their workroom, flicking the lights off and closing the door behind him. Then he quickly texted Ryou that he'd be a couple hours late picking up Mokuba. He was glad to have gotten a new cellphone; his old one had been a line dedicated for scheduling clients, and he couldn't risk anyone he was associated with knowing that number. It would have been a recipe for disaster. So, he'd finally ditched the piece of junk for something a little more decent. This way, if anything ever happened to Mokuba, he could be reached at a moment's notice.

Duke smiled and said, "I know a few places."

It turned out that what he meant by "a few places" was that he knew every place worthy of your patronage in downtown Domino. Seto enjoyed the evening, even though it seemed to pass in a blur of neon lights, loud music, and strange faces. He would say that yes, he had fun, even if he felt oddly confused and conflicted throughout the whole thing. Seth kept saying that it was a date, and Seto kept denying it, feeling too embarrassed to admit that the spirit was probably right.

Duke was equally confused throughout the evening. He liked Seto, he really did, but he struggled to interpret his mixed signals. One moment he'd be laughing and enjoying himself, and the next he'd be withdrawing into himself, getting stiff and unresponsive. Was Seto trying to play hard to get? He doubted it. Seto was too transparent for such a shallow ploy. His next thought was that Seto himself was unsure of what he wanted, and he figured that was the most probable scenario. Good thing he figured it out before he had Seto on his doorstep.

"This was fun," Seto said, looking almost... relieved, or surprised, or both.

"Yes, it was," Duke agreed with a smile. "I'll see you next week."