Duel 1 - The Next King of Games

Blackness. Dark gray clouds streaked the sky in thin tapers, yawning fingers stretching out to smother all of New York City in its grip, blotting out the sun so completely it was indistinguishable from night. Rain was usually beautiful, mystifying, bringing joy and sadness to whomever it visited, but now it was a thick smattering dirty hailstorm.

Maya scampered as frantically as a frightened hare, bolting past the sluggish people, hopping past sidewalks, and almost killing herself sidestepping speeding cars. She didn't even bother to put her backpack over her head, leaving her completely unshielded to the cold, heavy storm. She was a fast, but it wouldn't save her from being late to the Academy.

The Academy of New York City was one of many Duel Academies around the country and the world, prodigious schools that trained unassuming duelists into renowned champions. But just to enter, applicants had to pass two difficult tests. Maya already passed the written exam mailed to her with an average score. Now she had to arrive in person to pass the practical exam.

What was a duelist? A duelist was a strange human being: a warrior and an artist, a star athlete and a fantasy gaming nerd, a clown and a philosopher. And what tied all those idiosyncrasies together was the nature of their art; a mass-produced trading card game of magic and fantastic creatures known as Duel Monsters. It was a game given such weight by the public an expert reaped as much wealth and fame as a Super Bowl star.

But the best thing of all was to be a true duelist, a champion player who embodied the best qualities of the game. And the greatest True Duelist that ever lived was the King of Games himself, Yugi Motou. No duelist could ever hope to be him. The best a duelist could do was climb near to him as possible.

The academy was right ahead! In her carelessness Maya tripped and fell, plummeting to the mud and grit below. Her backpack ruptured open scattering everything in it. She doubled in agony, bitten by pain in her scraped palms, arms, and chest. After a few red, searing moments she scrambled on the sidewalk for her things. She quickly recovered a dozen cards from her Structure Deck, and a strange contraption for playing the game (or "dueling" as it was called) called a Duel Disk.

But the rest of her deck was completely missing, lost somewhere in the mud, streaming away to a gutter somewhere… Just as she was about to give up, she heard a haggard voice croak, "Aren't these yours?"

She looked up. It was a bum, a small, dirty, dark old man with haggard hair and beard, crumpled in his hideous clothes like a brown paper bag. He huddled against a towering wall where a cornice of the Academy building gave him small protection from the bitter elements. With a wrinkled, sinewy hand, he offered her missing card.

Maya quickly snatched her cards.

The bum held up a small plastic cup and shook it, shackling a small jingle of pennies. "How about some spare change."

She lurched back as if licked by a slimy ghoul, and dashed off.

Maya burst through the front door, wheezing and panting, her face blue and her arms limp from exhaustion. But that dizzying, simple happiness vanished only after a few seconds and was replaced by the usual mists of anxiety. She was very late.

She staggered to the stadium inside. There was a large arena surrounded by an amphitheater. Within the arena were a dozen sprayed tennis courts where applicants dueled proctors for their Practical Exams. The amphitheater was a ghost town. Hardly any spectators remained. Even the last applicants were wrapping up their duels and leaving.

She tugged the coat of someone who looked like an administrator, an aloof and neatly dressed man with suave sunglasses, an elegant, neatly trimmed goatee, and adorned academy uniform. "Can I please take my exam?"

The administrator glanced back at the dirty girl, a small glean of contempt in his eyes. "No! I'm sorry but all the tests are over."

"Please, let me take it! I came all this way in the rain!"

"You'll try again next year. Have faith. Everything happens for a reason."

She showed her scraped arms and palms. "Like me slamming myself on the sidewalk?"

"Well, yes. I'm sure it was either a test of your character or a way of telling you to try again next year." He waved her off dismissively. "You're too late. Come again next year."

"No, let her try out."

Both looked up in surprise. A young man in a top-ranking student's uniform, a long white and blue blazer, stood on the top tier of the amphitheater. He was a short and portly but handsome young man, with a tumble of thick black hair and warm but brilliant and piercing brown eyes. He carried an air of nobility but also what would have been a rustic's charm if it weren't for his uniform and the rank it suggested.

"I don't think you can do that, Matthew." The administrator protested. "All the tests are finished and all the proctors are gone. It's a violation of academy rules and is simply aggravating to make an exception."

"I am one of the top students here." Matthew sharply rebuked. "I choose to duel her because every duelist should have a chance. I choose to challenge her as a proctor."

The administrator tried to object, but gave up midway. "Whatever." He sighed. He shook his head. "Duelists are crazy."

He turned to dirty and obnoxious girl before him. If it weren't for her he would have been at home by now to watch a James Bondmarathon on TNT. "What's your name?"

"Marina Božović, but you can call me Maya."

"Uh huh." He scribbled her name nonchalantly on a pad he was carrying. "Interesting." He pointed to one of the exit doors. "The duel will being in ten minutes. You may want to clean yourself up beforehand. The bathroom is over there."

Maya winced as she scrubbed off her wounds and tried her best to get the grime off her clothes without soaking herself. She checked herself with the small, cracked bathroom mirror. A small, dark, insignificant girl of seventeen years old stared back contemptuously. Her face, smattered by a handful of red blemishes she was dumb enough to keep touching was made worse by her swarthy skin and her mess of unruly short hair she herself had cut and dyed with disastrous results.

Pathetic.

She saw Matthew in his majestic, platinum regalia, his tussle of "rebellious but charming" hair and healthy tan standing somewhere high above wherever she stood. A hard but not stern stare, merciless but always forgiving, the embodiment of power but also of kindness… He was Yugi himself, a mighty yet humble king.

And Maya…

The grime was hardly off. Her purple jacket was tarred from her fall. Her tight wrist chains – she noticed they looked sinisterly like handcuffs – chain necklaces and black skirt were all smeared with grime. It was bad as her technicolor mess of toothpaste purple and puke green highlights. Her gashes were now a sickly dark red. She looked like as if Yugi was beaten up at school and left crouching and moaning on the floor.

A small but powerfully hot flame burned in her skull and traveled down her spine, spreading throughout her body in waves of simmering boiling water. With a heavy sigh she stumbled away.

The futuristic elevator below effortlessly pushed Maya upward through the floor to make her debut. Matthew stood opposite her, already ready for combat. Maya strapped the Duel Disk around her wrist. It spun into place; its two "wings" snapping together to form a portable gaming platform. She quickly slipped her deck into a large slot above her wrist.

Maya: 4000 || Matthew: 4000

"You get to go first." Matthew said. "Good luck."

"Thanks…" Maya drew her first card. She didn't have a bad opening hand. She had a powerful combo she could use… "Alright. Here goes. I summon Mermaid Knight Attack Mode." She slapped her card on one of five slots on the arm blade. And behold! A dazzling holographic display of lights and energetic, technological sounds! A shape suddenly appeared on the stage! A monster was summoned! Maya's monster was an amazonian mermaid with 1500 ATK, with sea green skin and wearing purple armor, brandishing a short and shield.

"I set two cards face down." She slid her two spell or traps cards into two narrow slits beneath her monster slots. Two huge holographic face down cards materialized behind her warrior mermaid. "Turn end."

"My turn!" Matthew announced. "I draw!" He barely glanced at his hand. "I summon Horus the Black Flame Dragon LV4!" The holographic lights formed into a small, sleek, silver hawk with 1600 ATK on Matthew's side of the field. It looked more mechanical than organic with its jointed limbs and armored metal body. "I set two of my own face-down cards." Two oversized cards appeared behind his "dragon". "You're move."

Now was the time! "I activate A Legendary Ocean!" Maya slid her card in a special sixth compartment on the side of her arm blade. . The space around them began to twirl into a glowing, holographic rainbow. The whole arena itself changed into the bottom of a sunken city. The bright yellow of the sun high above danced with the aquamarine, mossy buildings and the ocean blue fishes in an evocative ballet.

"My Ocean increases my monsters' ATK points by 200. Mermaid Knight's effect allows it to attack twice when Legendary Ocean is up. My Ocean also downgrades the Level of all of my monsters by 1. Now I can summon a Level 5 monster. I summon Giga Gagagigo." A bulky reptilian monster, sporting a whooping 2450 ATK with blue-green armor and scales, now 2560 ATK, marshaled next to Maya's amazon mermaid.

"Go my monsters! Destroy Matthew's Horus and then his Life Points." Both monsters instantly threw themselves at Matthew's dragon with the speed and directness of a javelin.

"Not so fast!" Matthew countered. "I reveal my trap, Negate Attack!"

One of Matthew's face down cards lifted up. A barrier, transparent but with impossible hardness, effortlessly shoved Maya's monsters away, forcing them to retreat. "Negate Attack negates all attacks." Matthew elaborated. "Furthermore, it ends the battle Phase all together."

Maya cursed. All the air was punched out of her lungs as if she slammed against a wall. She couldn't even graze him!

"Strange. You're pretty reckless for a WATER duelist. That doesn't really fit in." Maya noticed a narrow squint in Matthew's eyes, a small pique in his stare. "You walked right into my trap. Didn't you ever stop to think why I didn't attack you?"

Maya bit her lip in frustration. A flame of embarrassment fanned with a flame of resentment.

Matthew drew his next card with an incomparable grace, as if he was practicing the motions for years. "Now I'll show you how to make a proper attack. First, I activate Mystical Space Typhoon to destroy your Ocean field spell." A cyclone of whirling lightning and fury whiplashed the whole field into frenzy. The buildings of the ancient city crubled instantly and the entire ocean scene was vaporized. Matthew summoned yet another monster. A boiling, oozing elemental ball of molten earth took to the field, Gaia Soul the Combustible Collective, a monster with a whooping 2000 ATK!

"And that's not all! I activate Level Up!! In case you haven't noticed, my Horus monsters come in Levels; LV4, LV6, and LV8. With Level Up! I evolve my Horus to the next level!" Matthew's silver hawk glowed in a soft, green light. Thunder burst from its form as its body grew in size and complexity, morphing it into a greater creature. This was Horus the Black Flame Dragon LV6, a larger silver hawk shaped more like a dragon. "Battle! Gaia, destroy Mermaid Kn-"

Maya reacted, flipping one of her cards in defense. "I activate Gravity Bind! Monsters above Level 4 can't attack!"

"I activate my trap, Royal Decree!" Matthew retorted. "All of your traps are negated!"

Maya's card cloaked in a red hue and later faded to black.

"Now where was I? Oh yes. Gaia, destroy Mermaid Knight!" the boiling elemental shot a blazing torch of flame from its eye, incinerating the warrior mermaid before it even got a chance to scream. Maya's Duel Disk made small beeping sounds as it trickled Maya's Life points down by 500.

"I'm not done yet! Horus, attack her reptilian beast with Blackheart Fire Blast!"

"But Horus is weaker!" Maya protested.

"I activate Shrink from my hand!" The spell card reduced Giga Gagagigo's ATK from a mighty 2450 to a mediocre 1225. With a loud screech, Matthew's dragon launched a volcano of flames, bursting Maya's monster into ashes. Maya winced as she was mercilessly singed from the backburner of the inferno.

And Matthew still wasn't done yet. His Horus dragon once more began to glow. "If Horus LV6 destroys a monster it evolves at the End Phase into Horus the Black Flame Dragon LV8!" Horus expanded, doubling in size, developing every angle of its body until it reached its highest state, one of the mightiest of dragons. There was a fiery aura around Horus, or was it intimidation from its sheer size. Matthew set one final card face down.

Defeat began to set in. – But there was still one more measure.

"I set one monster face-down." A huge card appeared horizontally, right in front of Horus's aim, waiting to be obliterated.

Matthew gave Maya a pitying glance. "I activate Nobleman of Crossout. Your monster is banished instead of being sent to the Graveyard." A blinding flash of light shaped as a sharp blade stabbed through the card, vaporizing it instantaneously. Maya was wide open.

"Horus the Black Flame Dragon, finish her off with Blackheart Fire Blast!" His dragon screeched for one final time before firing a cannon of darkened flamed at its victim. Maya blew up and was consumed by the remorseless fire. The flames sizzled out and died. Smoke rose up, clearing the arena. Maya was conquered, beaten.

Maya: 0 || Matthew: 4000

"Well, that's it." Matthew concluded in a matter-of-fact tone. He almost wiped his hands of the matter. "Good game."

Maya remained silent. Black tar and ash settled in her chest and smothered what little remained of Maya's fighting flame while only fueling the heat of her flame of resentment. She tore her duel disk and threw it on the floor in disgust.

Matthew sighed. "You really need to work on your game if you want to come here. You didn't even scratch one Life Point from me. Come back next year."

Silently nodding, Maya scooped herself up and left the arena to the dark world outside. Home and school were the last places she wanted to go to. They were like tight prison cells or small black houses in a dark, deathly quiet forest… coffins.

But then she saw a few faint rays of sunlight managed to pierce through the black, raining clouds outside. And some of the heavy ashes blew away.