There was a thrill of excitement in the air as the crowds surged towards the huge Dome shape that sat roughly in the middle of the city, the city had no name, it never had. It had started as a huddle of shacks, and was now roughly twice as big as New-Domino City with a huge scrap dome in the middle, every 5 years, the Fortune Cup would come into town. Goodwin had never officially extended the tournament, but it had happened, and it was the only way to legitimately get out of the Belts.

There were people of every walk of life, old and young, professional and amateur. These people had all turned up to watch, every year, the Fortunes Twelve went up against 12 duelists from the Belts, of whom the survivors then went up against each other, until only one was left. Then they got to leave the Belts, for good, there they were flown to New Domino to meet Goodwin himself before being set free, a new life.

---

Clair looked across the small room at Axel, the guy looked really uncomfortable, he didn't duel very often, but now he would have to duel in-front of a crowd, a big one. Sash didn't look to bothered, she liked crowds, it gave her a chance to cut loose and show off, both things that she was very good at. And as for Chris … he had pretty much vanished off the face of the Earth, although they had been worried for the past couple of days, that had been forgotten in the stage fright and exultation.

There was a faint twinkling as the red light came on, it was time, Clair had let her red hair flow down until it almost reached her waist. She was wearing close-fitting clothes, the same she wore when she was turbo-dueling and they were very comfortable. Sash was wearing a black jumpsuit, which showed off her more … feminine features, and Axel was wearing what he always wore, minus the greasy apron and oil-stained gloves. Duel-Disk corresponding to their runners, Green for Sash, Red for Clair and Yellow for Axel, were on their arms as they strode out into the light.

---

The atmosphere prickled with about as much intensity as a brick. Several tons of bricks. The crowd looked on as the three of them took their places with the other 9 challengers. The Huge lights above were horribly bright and drenched the twelve of them in a sickly heat.

Then the MC's voice garbled itself out of the speakers, he was wearing a black trench coat and had grey hair that was rather long for a man. On his feet were a pair of scuffed, brown shoes and he voice was hoarse,

"Ladies, Gentleman, and those Children who have managed to skip school, and to all of those of you who are illegally watching us on cable, welcome to 43rd annual Belts Fortune Cup, now then, Let's meet this Years challengers, Introducing" A huge spotlight suddenly flashed onto the person down the furthest to the right, it was a guy dressed in a pair of ragged jeans, he wore a pair of broken glasses and wore a black T-Shirt with long sleeves, he had green eyes and blue/black hair and his expression was one of Icy calm

"The clam and calculative, Elax Fortitude"

The light moved to the next person, this one was a girl, she wore a grey vest and a pair of black track-suit bottoms, she had blonde hair and blue eyes, and a fire-up expression.

"The sporty Miss. Eliza Ventruff"

And so the cycle repeated itself,

"The Dangerous Johnston Millwall"

"The ethno-botanist, Daniel Verdure White"

"The Villanous Zackory Koshi"

"The Noble Micheal Rosenman"

"The Average Joe Peterson"

"The Silent Miss. Courtnie Lighter"

"The Slightly Sadistic Alexander Kenny"

"The Lovely Miss. Sasha Nelargent"

"The Mechanic, Axel Piledriver"

"and last but not least The Mystic, Miss. Clair Susterra"

After each name there came a smattering over applause and cheers from the crowd.

When the MC had finally finished a huge TV-Screen appeared behind them as it was lit up with dozens of lights,

"Now then Ladies and Gentleman, lets see whose going up against who in the First Rounds"

12 Images began flickering back and forth along next the pictures 12 of one the Fortune Twelve, then they began to slow, slow, slow and then stop.

"Ladies and Gentleman, the brackets have been set and the Gauntlets have been thrown, and our First Duel is Elax Fortitude for the Belts up against Genger Verana for the Fortunes Twelve, could all of the other Duelists please take their seats and wait to be called."

The eleven remaining Duelists went over to the far right side of the arena where a dozen chairs were arranged for the chosen,

"Look at it this way" one of the other joked, "Even if we lose, best seats in the house right?" there was a murmur of agreement from everyone else as they took their seats, Clair found herself sat in the back row, roughly towards the middle, with Sash on her Left and Zackory Koshi on her Right, he was a tall man, with black hair, blue eyes and a strange expression, his Duel-Disk was slightly old-fashioned, or so it appeared, and he had an odd presence about him, it was almost as if her was shrouded in a cloud, he glanced at her, weighing her up and down, before retuning his attention to the duel about to start.

"Now then Ladies and Gentleman, we have the calculative Elax Fortitude going up against the chain caster, Genger Verana, now then … LET'S DUEL", the whole crowd joined in the last words and the First duel of the 43rd annual Fortune Cup, went underway.

-----

Elax – 4000

Genger – 4000

Elax went first, "My Draw, and I summon my Spell Reactor – RE (1200/900), in attack mode, then I set 2 cards, your move chain caster" his voice was oddly familiar, and yet alien, his expression hadn't changed once in the whole 30 seconds of his first move, which was defiantly strange.

Genger clenched a fist, he was a bulky man, in both muscles and fat, he wore a pair of leathery trousers and a leather jacket, he was basically a biker, down to the boots, which had a pair of fake spurs in the back of them in an attempt to look cool and he had the vague beggings of a beard on his cheeks.

"Fine then Belty, My turn, I draw and summon out my Iron Chain Repairman (1600/1200) in attack mode, but that isn't my only trick because next up I have the Spell Card known as Double Summon, now I can make an additional summon this turn, so now I'll bring out this monster my Iron Chain Snake (800/1200)"

"And now Genger, my Spell Reactor's effect activates, dealing you 800 points of damage whenever you activate a spell card, so Open Fire"

Genger – 4000 - 800 = 3200

"Lucky shot, but now I can play a special effect of my own, specifically my Iron Chain Snake's, so now he can equip onto your Spell Reactor, reducing it's ATK and DEF by 800 points, let him have it"

Spell Reactor – (1200/900) - (800/800) = (400/100)

"So now I attack with Iron Chain Repairman, go CHAIN HAMMER, flatten his Reactor"

"Not so fast Genger, I reveal my face-down card, Fake Explosion, now none of my monsters can be destroyed in battle"

"but you still take damage, 1200 points worth"

Elax – 4000 - 1200 = 2800

"but taking Damage is a good thing Gengar, for me at any rate, you see now I can play the trap card known as Damage Summon, now I can Special Summon 1 monster from my Hand or Deck with ATK equal or less than the damage I took, since I took 1200 damage, its no sweat for me to summon my Trap Reactor – Y FI (800/1800) in attack mode, and the fun doesn't stop their, Fake Explosion's other effect activates now, so now I can summon my final Reactor from my hand, met Summon Reactor – SK (2000/1400), in attack mode, and with three reactors on the field, you have yourself a serious problem, and it's not even my turn yet"

Genger gulped and sweat-dropped, 3 monsters and Elax's turn coming up he certainly wasn't messing around yet,

"I'll … I'll place 1 card face-down and end my Turn"

"Good, then I'll now activate the Special Ability of my Summon Reactor, now I can send SK, Y FI and RE to the Graveyard, and bring out my Big Guns, meet Flying Fortress SKY FIRE (3000/2500), the Instrument of your destruction, now I'll set 1 card and activate his special effect, now I send 1 card from my hand to the Graveyard and destroy 1 card you control and deal you 800 points of damage, so I'll toss out my Scrap Reactor, and destroy your face-down card and deal you 800 points of damage, activate Bombing Barrage"

Genger – 3200 - 800 = 2400

"Now SKY FIRE attack his Repairman, with Flying Fortress Firepower"

Genger – 2400 - 1400 = 1000

"And now I'll send my Iron Chain Shield from my hand to the Graveyard to negate the destruction of my Repairman"

"Your move then Biker boy"

Genger sweat-dropped again, wiping his forehead, this was his second round and he was getting flattened, down to a quarter of his lifepoints, and facing down a giant plane.

"my … my draw, and I activate the Spell Card Painful Choice, and the name speaks for itself, now I pick 5 cards in my deck and you need to select one of them, then the rest go to the Graveyard and the select one goes to my hand, now then … I select Iron Chain Snake, Iron Chain Blaster, Iron Chain Coil, Iron Chain Defender and Iron Chain Repairman"

Elax stared at the card arrayed in front of him, before pointing at one of them with a pale, slender finger, "You can take your Iron Chain Coil"

"Ok then, now I'll summon my Iron Chain Coil (1100/1600) in attack mode and …"

"and now I play SKY FIRE's effect, now I can destroy 1 card you set or summon during your turn and deal you 800 points, I select your Coil, what a waste of a card"

Genger – 1000 - 800 = 200

"Then I'll just activate my face-down, Effect Shield, this card special summons my Iron Chain Coil back in defence position and now I tune my Coil with my Repairman to Synchro Summon my Iron Chain Dragon (2500/1300), now I can remove all of the Iron Chain monster in my Graveyard from play and my Dragon gains 200 ATK for each one, with 6 members of my Chain Gang, that's a bonus of 1200 points"

Iron Chain Dragon (2500/1300) - 1200 = 3700

"Now attack his SKY FIRE, with Chain Blast"

Elax – 2800 - 700 = 2100

"Your move Fortitude"

"Why thank you Genger, now if you don't mind I'd like to go activate this spell card Reactor Draw, so now I send 1 machine-type monster from my Deck to the Graveyard, then I shuffle up and draw another card, so then I'll activate Pot of Avarice, so I shuffle my 4 Reactors and SKY FIRE back into my deck and draw 2 card, so then I'll play the spell card Trap Booster, so now I toss out another card and I can activate a trap from my hand, like my Ultimate Mine, so now I get an Ultimate Mine Token (800/800) in defence position, so then I'll summon this monster, Black Salvo (100/1000), so now his effect lets me resurrect my Trap Reactor Y FI (800/1800) in defence position and negating his effect, but I don't need it as I'll tune my Black Salvo with my Reactor to do a Synchro Summon of my own, so come forth, Dark Strike Fighter (2600/1800), so now I'll play his effect, and tribute 1 monster on my field to deal you 200 points of damage times it's level, and I just happen to have 1 spare, like my Ultimate Mine Token, so now you lose 2000 points since it's a level 10, plus another 800 due to it's effect, Sayonara … Biker"

"Nooooo!"

Genger – 200 - 2800 = 0

"Ladies and Gents, after 5 rounds of fury, we have our first Victor. Ladies and Gentleman it's Elax Fortitude"

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Yes ….. we all know who Elax really is … and if you haven't figured it out already, well then you really need to catch up with the story line.

Also, I REALLY didn;t used to like Flying Fortress SKYFIRE, I prefered Giant Bommer AIRRAID, but the former has grown on me a little bit so i'll be using it