Yu-Gi-Oh! – Traitorous Savior
Author's Note: This is my sequel to my first fanfiction, Yu-Gi-Oh Future History. I want to make a couple of points about this story before you begin.
First the dueling. As before, I've written this fiction with the anime rules 'in mind'. Duels are played with 4000 Life Points instead of 8000. Sacrifices must be made for monsters, Fusion Monsters can attack in the turn they're summoned, Normal Spell Cards can be treated as a Spell Speed 2 which means they can be used on the opponents turn like a Trap or Quick-Play card, monsters can be played face up in defense mode if they want. Unless for reasons stated in the story, no card is banned. But there is no mention, nor will there be mention/playing of God Cards.
Now the status of Future History. I know it's unfinished and unfortunately, I may not complete it. Reason being that I had it completely finished and a storm knocked out my apartment's power before I could save it. I may finish it, but I've written the ending of it in within the story for 'completion's sake'. You'll get the basic gist of it.
Now the story. First thing that I'll say is that I will be doing far fewer duels than before. It was in a tournament setting, so it was warranted. I just feel, having read a few more fictions, that the dueling shouldn't drive the story. That's what I've seen with a lot of other fictions, more dueling than character time. Take away the duel and the emotions/statements said within the duels, and the characters don't have much to them. I felt like my characters were about to fall into the same rut.
Future History only got some 7 reviews but they were pretty positive. I'm not writing for the reviews but if you want to offer them, please do. I plan to do this whole story regardless of how many i get. Upset enough that one story of mine is unfinished...
Hope you enjoy the story!
"I swear to God, I'm going to knock your head smooth off your neck if you don't get out here!"
"Screw you…" came a feeble and quiet reply from behind the house's door.
"Alright, Knowledge, you had your chance…" Terry Hairston let out an exasperated sigh, and then gave the signal to his friend Jamie Cantou.
The two of them were trying to coerce their mutual friend Catravious Collins, or "Knowledge" as he liked to be called, into coming out of his house. Where he had locked himself up for the last week after the end of the Battle City tournament in their city of Millstone. Terry was pounding on his friend's front door trying to use normal means to get him out. But upon realizing that that wasn't going to work, underhanded tactics were now necessary.
Terry's signal gave Jamie the go-ahead to sneak into Knowledge's house via an unlocked window that was cracked in the fairly mild heat of spring. Thankful that the window made no noise when lifted, Jamie hopped up into the opening and made his way into the waited outside but didn't have to wait long for the sounds of a struggle to erupt. The voices were thrown over each other, so he couldn't tell who was saying what.
"What the hell?!"
"Get outside!"
"We've been waiting on you!"
"…snuck in my house like a damn rat!"
"Get off me, I'm not your girlfriend!"
"No weapons! No bats, you IDIOT!"
Silence fell. It got quiet in the house.
The sound of someone fiddling with the door lock in front of Terry.
The door swung open to find a not-too-happy Jamie sporting a bag of ice over his forehead standing next to an equally not-too-happy Knowledge.
Terry broke into a wide grin. "Morning guys!"
"Have you found them yet?"
"Not yet."
"What is taking you so long? "
"Don't remind me about how important this is."
"If we all mess this up, you won't need me to do it."
"…"
"You know, you could've just asked me to come out like a normal person instead of trying to go all secret agent breaking into my house, Jamie." Knowledge muttered.
Jamie had left the ice at Knowledge's house as the three of them walked down the street side by side. But he was still rubbing the top of his head where he got whacked. He looked to his right, "Well, normally, you don't greet people with a closed door and a 'Screw you'"
Knowledge snickered, "Yeah, maybe not."
The tone of that set Jamie off. "Forget Terry, I'm gonna be the one to knock you upside your head!"
"Well it was said in the heat of the moment…" Terry meekly tried to explain.
"Heat of the moment? Yeah right, I'm still wondering what kept you from turning that door into a pile of toothpicks." Jamie quipped.
It was Terry's turn to snicker, and he got a head start on this one, jogging ahead of them, "Because I did what any great general does, used scouts!"
Jamie tore off after Terry, screaming where he could stick his next 'mission'.
"…I located them."
"Very good. Where are they?"
"…"
"Well?"
"…"
"Answer me!"
"…America."
"…"
"Yes, we seem to be having the same thoughts."
"That makes it more difficult to recover them. Narrow down the search to the precise city."
"…"
"Do you have it?"
"Yes. It is in…Millstone City. They're on their way to a museum according to this. For a special showing there for a week."
"I see…The same city as where that boy is, too. This isn't good."
The three of them calmed down enough to manage to keep walking together without getting into too many more heated arguments. Indeed, the events of the last week was trying on all three young adults. Well, young adults being the dual 16 year olds in Terry Hairston and Catravious 'Knowledge' Collins. Jamie Cantou was still the standout being 21 but that was not an issue between the three. The fact remained that they were all recovering from the events of the last few days in their own ways.
Today being a fairly hot day for spring, all three had chosen to wear shorts outside. Jamie was dressed in a basketball uniform, a primarily white sleeveless top with matching shorts that hung just past his knees. It offered no pockets but was very welcome with the weather.
Terry had opted to wear dark blue jean shorts that also came down to his knees. A primarily yellow shirt with a vertical black stripe that ran down the front of his shirt, and also down the tops of his short sleeves, were tucked into those shorts.
Knowledge was the least dressed in a way. He was wearing a simple light blue tank top over a like, colored pair of jean shorts. The shorts were made so the front and back of the shorts looked white and faded around the sides into a light blue color.
All three of them wore backpacks that carried their own Duel Disks. They never left to go anywhere without them now, but didn't put them on their wrists. It was too hot to have to machine on their arms and likewise too hot to duel. At least that was their line of thought. A duel could be seen in progress far ahead of them with two children at play with some friends or maybe just spectators of similar age watching.
"Wanna go watch?" Jamie said.
Both Terry and Knowledge replied with a shake of their heads and turned at the intersection they had come across. Jamie shrugged it off. The three of them were drained from dueling. Terry had had his fill of dueling in general from the last week of events that had nearly left him for dead. An involuntary shiver ran down his spine. Re'-Sha had been defeated, he had fulfilled his role in the future, and set things right. The aftermath of the tournament had left him as the city's Battle City champion and a transparent, glass-like Duel Disk sat in his backpack as proof of it. He looked back at the duels he faced as a way of growing up a little and abandoning those idiotic thought of being some hero. Hero, he wasn't and wasn't ever going to be. He just did what he could to set things right with the help of his other persona. One that he couldn't remember clearly, but maybe it was better that way.
Jamie had his own share of unwillingness to duel lately. He glanced at the bobbing Millennium Puzzle that was around Terry's neck and scowled at it. He had never liked the Millennium Items after learning they were real. All they brought with them were destruction and despair. Even death. He might've been the only one that looked at the things as weapons of massive negligent energy instead of cool playthings. The awe and wonder of them were lost on him, he saw them for what they really were to him. While dying was something that he rarely thought about, being forced to think about your own mortality at such a young age was not cool. He'd seen only one Game of Darkness. That was enough for him to decide it was nothing that was willing to engage in. Something that had that much power, in his opinion, was only a disaster waiting for a catalyst.
Knowledge, on the other hand, was usually the most talkative but was reserved now. Not that his friends could blame him. Re'-Sha had turned his lady friend Janet Rush into a person he no longer knew. He also lost out in a match in the quarter-finals of Battle City to Lamar Vega, the one duelist that all duelists agreed could be realistically called a King of Games. He also took it upon himself to take one of the Millennium Items Terry had collected and planned to use it as a bargaining chip against Re'-Sha. Which led to him being the first person to use Soul Burning between him and Terry. A method that basically could slowly kill its user, but brought forth a real monster. Since Re'-Sha had been banished, he wouldn't or couldn't stop thinking of how to get Janet back.
Jamie looked over at Knowledge, knowing what was on his mind. He just will not let this thing about Janet go. Can't blame him, I'd probably be the same way. But he shouldn't be letting the whole thing rule his life.
"Just where are we going anyways?" asked Knowledge, talking to Terry's back who was a few steps ahead of him and Jamie. Terry turned to look at the two over his shoulder as he kept walking.
"Don't know, just felt like going out and chilling with my friends." He remarked.
"What? We don't have any idea where we're going?" Knowledge nearly face fell.
Jamie tried to salvage the situation. "Let's go bug RJ for a while."
It was a suggestion that everyone liked since none of them couldn't get enough fun out of teasing the store owner of Rolling Stock. It was incidentally the store where all of them had gotten their Duel Disks and began Battle City. None of them had been in the store since a few days before the start of Battle City. Which was actually the same amount of time when Re'-Sha came into the picture. She came after Terry for the Millennium Puzzle, wishing to use it and the other items to rejoin with Exodia. She claimed Exodia was originally a monster born from her own pure, raw emotions because of, in her mind, unfair punishment by Anubis and Egyptians of ancient times. Her body, which they came to call Exodia, was fragmented and became a tool of the Egyptians whilst her heart was sealed into the Millennium Puzzle. In a kind of sad way, her shattered ethereal form was used as a weapon. A weapon they assisted in creating.
Terry's friends, after learning about that fact, always glanced at the Millennium Puzzle with less awe and more caution. But none more than Terry; he carried a part of the woman that wanted to kill him around his neck. He told them it never sat well with him, having your enemy that close to you.
Knowledge and Jamie hadn't been to see RJ since they started in Battle City. The walk to the store didn't take very long and they slipped into the store to find it pretty empty. Outside of a couple of people browsing, there was a small group of kids that were gathered around a table off to the side of the store.
"Well, well…my two favorite leeches!" came a voice from within the circle. A head poked up and RJ stood up. He was a guy roughly in his mid to late thirties, in the prime of his life. He had sandy blonde hair that was swept back and to side, some spilling to just over his eyebrows. Brown eyes and a sharp jaw, he was dressed in a gray t-shirt over some pretty dusty looking blue jeans. His usual kind of card shop attire. He always carried himself with an attitude that seemed so easygoing and even-tempered. He stepped away from the kids to approach Terry's group.
"Leeches?" Terry laughed. "Hey, bite me, geezer."
RJ smiled walking toward Terry and gave him a light, quick knock on his head. Looking at Terry as he rubbed his forehead he said, "Watch it, kid." He nodded to the kids behind him with a small smile. "There are Playskool kids present."
Jamie and Knowledge stifled a laugh and followed RJ as he walked behind his L shaped glass counter of displayed cards. "So what's happenin, RJ?" Jamie asked, looking at the cards for potential new collectables.
"Not too much. Enjoying the downtime." RJ spilled himself lazily into a beat up executive chair in front of his register and idly began counting the money in it.
"Downtime?" asked Knowledge.
"Hell, yeah. With you guys and your Duel Disks, I don't have to have 60 screaming kids and 60 cursing young adults to manage in my store." he remarked, pausing in counting the register and chuckling.
"Man, you couldn't even fit that many people in this place." Terry remarked, giving the store a once over.
"Like you told me…" RJ made his hand into a claw shape and had it 'bite' into his hip. "Anyway…I don't have nearly as many people crowding in here to duel. They still like to come here as a meeting spot I guess but I'm starting to grow color into my hair again with all that stress gone."
Jamie snickered. "Don't worry, it'll turn grey soon enough."
Under the level of the table, RJ gave Jamie the old one-fingered salute.
Knowledge folded his arms, "Or it'll just fall out altogether."
With his other arm, Knowledge, too, received the bird.
"You could use a wig right now anyways." Terry muttered, intentionally loud.
Seeing as how both of his fingers were in use, RJ motioned Terry toward his crotch.
Terry, Knowledge and Jamie all turned away, laughing.
"So how is it being a champ these days?" RJ asked Terry.
Terry, with his back still turned, took off the backpack he was carrying and opened up the main pouch so RJ could look at the glass Duel Disk. RJ leaned in, his eyes wide as he stared at the transparent Duel Disk. He carefully slid it out of the bag, marveling at its design. It was in the design of the Mark I Duel Disks, the type that the anime showed as first being developed by Seto Kaiba and his company, Kaiba Corporation for the Battle City Tournament. The duel field was completely transparent except for the arrows on the disk which where shaded blue. The outer edges, or any area on the disk that would've been colored grey was instead shaved crystal so it looked like a snow white color. The outlining part where the deck rested had been shaded blue and the outlining around the graveyard was shaded black. Right below the panel that displayed Life Points, the machinery that operated the Duel Disk could be seen.
RJ took it all in and if his eyes had the ability, they'd turn into dollar signs.
"Just how long you plan to hold onto this?" RJ asked, his voice pleading for Terry to give him that disk. He tried to cradle it into his chest, keeping it away from the young adult.
Terry took on the tone of a scolding mother, "Now, now, RJ. Didn't mommy teach you that stealing is wrong?"
Standing straight and proud with a big smile on his face, RJ said, "Keh, my mom taught me three things. One, never stand behind a cow. Two, work smarter, not harder. Three, "Maximum profit for minimal work." RJ counted off on his fingers after he had replaced the Duel Disk into Terry's backpack.
"Huh…sounds like your mom is as lazy as you are." Knowledge muttered.
"That's right, that's ri- Hey!"
Knowledge and Terry lost it, falling to the floor in a twisted heap of laughter that masked RJ's yell of 'That's a damn lie!'
Knowledge, after regaining himself, pulled himself away from the group for a minute when a call from his cell phone chirped. He flipped open his phone and raised the antenna.
"Hello?" he spoke into the receiver.
"…"
"Hell-o?" he repeated.
"Hi…Catravious."
Knowledge turned away from the group his eyes narrowed and now completely focused on the caller. He knew this voice, even though he had never talked to her on the phone.
"No warm welcome for me, Catravious?"
"'Welcome' isn't exactly the word that came to mind, Janet." Knowledge admitted.
"Aw, are you still hurting from that beating you took from me? Poor boy. Your pride hasn't healed as fast as your scrapes."
"Where are you?"
"Why do you want to know? Why should I tell you?"
"Because I want whoever I'm talking to gone and the real Janet Rush back!"
"You ever think that Janet might be happier, that I might be happier, as I am now?"
That gave Knowledge pause.
"That weak girl is gone. All those insecurities, all the self-doubt, fear and hesitation that made her up…they're gone now. I've been reborn as someone stronger."
"Stronger? How? Tell me how you've become stronger."
"You don't know the old saying 'What doesn't kill you only makes you stronger?'"
"A saying made you stronger? Is that it?"
"No, but maybe it's better if I actually show you how much stronger I am. You remember the square where we met? Two hours."
"So nothing to do huh?" RJ said, now working on a laptop on top of his counter.
Terry nodded. Jamie had decided to look at the kids' duels but Knowledge was still on his cell phone. "Pretty much, now that Battle City is done with. Plus I just haven't felt in the mood to duel lately."
"Yeah, I guess a match like that could kill your spirits for awhile. Nothing will top that match. That was intense!" RJ exclaimed from his seat.
Terry nodded, realizing the cover-up was still in place. Everyone in attendance had chalked up the effects and drama and…injuries…to being well-placed and more of a drama effect than anything. The whole match had unfolded out as something that belonged in the movies and that's what people believed. Which suited Terry fine, he didn't want to be hounded about Games of Darkness or how the monsters looked so much more real than the holograms of the Solid Vision System in the Duel Disks.
"Hey, check this out for a sec, Terry." RJ turned his laptop so Terry could look at the monitor. RJ was currently looking at a message board that was frequented by a lot of duelists. The forum topic…"The F/X Champ!" There was one topic that was centered in the page that RJ seemed to be looking at.
"I could beat Terry on my worst day!!! I hate noobs like him, and what's his deal with the cards he uses? Reverse Trap? Sasuke Samurai? My monarchs would pwn his ass! Then I'd take that Scorpio Dragon off of him!"
Terry let out a sigh. Like he had said, he was grateful that there was a cover-up…but not thrilled about it. Comments like this were rampant through the internet. Even some prominent sites listed it as "obviously an un-rigged match, but F/X that put The Matrix to shame, a plot dying dogs could write better, but worse, put duelists to shame in this city."
"Yeah, Knowledge isn't the only one with his share of problems I see." RJ noted.
"Well, nothing I can do about it." Terry said, scrolling down to look at other posts. "I don't duel to change peoples opinions of me, I do it for the fun and for the competition." Or on occasion to save the future and potential lives...
"Cheer up, Terry. Let 'em say what they want, but most of those guys were probably out there competing with you and didn't make it very far at all. I'm still surprised that the three of you made it into the final six duelists. Makes for good business to say that half of the finalists came from my store."
Terry raised up from the counter, a thought occurring to him. "You didn't happen to say that 'I' come here a lot, did you?"
RJ shook his head, "Nah, I didn't want to make you into a walking bullseye. Plus, Upperdeck won't let me anyway. Privacy issues and junk with lawyers that I don't wanna deal with."
Terry was relieved.
"By the way, where is Knowledge?" RJ asked.
"So what are we going to do?"
"We will go to Millstone City, retrieve them, and return."
"Savior, I don't think its going to be that simple."
"I have a plan. We'll need help to execute it, but it should keep us hidden."
"And keep us secret as well?"
"Of course. These are the ones we'll use."
"I know of this one."
"Him?"
"Yes. They call him the 'King of Games' in America."
"It shouldn't make much difference, it will keep the authorities busy while we slip away. That's all we should need to recover the Dragon Bones. Send only one and use some of your sleepers to assist your candidate."
Terry and Jamie had left Rolling Stock looking to get some food in their stomachs. Fortunately, there was a really nice pizza shop not even two blocks away from RJ's store so they all set out. They entered, ordered, and sipped on their sodas while their pizza was cooking.
"Hey Jamie, whatever happened to that Natasha chick?" Terry idly knocked some ice in his glass around, opting to wait for his pizza before drinking soda.
"What about her?" he asked while chugging down his root beer.
"Well, I heard off Knowledge that you two were close or something? You hitting that?" Terry asked, a lecherous grin on his face.
Jamie looked at his friend with a shocked expression, choking and coughing up his root beer. "What? Not a chance!"
"Sure…" Terry took a long drag on his soda before flipping up his own cell phone that had started ringing. He opened it up to see the number was an unknown number.
"Hello?"
"Can I talk to Terry Hairston?"
Terry got a chill in his spine. The last time someone called him and asked him the exact same thing, it let to his first meeting with Re'-Sha.
"…This is him." He said, hesitantly.
"Ah, I hope you're having a good afternoon."
"…I am…"
"Terry, I'm calling on behalf of Upperdeck, my name is Bruce Warren, the Director of Marketing of our company."
An Upperdeck telemarketer? Terry thought to himself. "What does Upperdeck want from me now?"
"Well, basically, to give you money."
That got Terry's complete attention in an instant. His silence was Bruce's signal to continue.
"As the Champion of the recent Battle City tournament, you received our crystal Duel Disk as you prize. But a decision has been made to market the duels on a DVD. Without getting too legal and confusing, we basically need your permission to use your face and likeness and your own duels on our DVD."
Terry smirked and said, "Milk it for all it's worth, huh?"
"Heh, very sharp, Terry. But basically yes, it's an opportunity we wouldn't pass up on. So we are prepared to offer you an initial, shall we say, "signing bonus" for 4,500.00 and a 6% share of all the profits of the DVD's we sell. Sounds tempting?"
Terry didn't believe his ears and Jamie didn't believe the look on his friends face. Whatever he was talking about on the phone must've been pretty important.
"D-Did you say-"
"Yep, I did. And just so you're aware, we expect to pull in about a couple million from releasing this DVD, so this could mean a check in the 10-40,000.00 range down the line."
"Excuse me one second…"
At that moment, the waitress had brought Terry and Jamie's pizza to their table. And as Jamie was about to reach for his wallet to pay for it, Terry reached across the table and patted him on the shoulder, still with the phone to his ear. Jamie looked at Terry with a confused expression on his face as Terry reached for his own wallet and pulled a 20.00 and 10.00 bill out and handed it to the waitress.
"But the check was only 17.00." she protested.
Terry smiled. "I can afford it now."
Hope you enjoyed the story!